Redstate

She and the President have at least presented a proposal that is workable.  I see nothing like that whatsoever from Tancredo, Malkin or other critics of their plan.

All I hear is nonsense about amnesty (which the President's plan is not).

I think that you are absolutely correct here.  The dominant elites of both political parties support an unspoken "Open Border" policy.  As far as assimilation goes, we really cannot expect this process to happen as quickly for 21st century immigrants -- legal or illegal -- as it did for our forefathers.  Technology and cheap airfare mean that new arrivals to this country can keep much stronger ties to their countries of birth.

There have been many proposals. We might start with the very strange and unthinkable one of enforcing duly-enacted law, against both illegals and companies that employ. That alone would make an enormous difference.

What is this "workable" to which you constantly refer?  

I heard what happened when it was tried after Prop 187.  The result was a lot of acquittals - in one case, the phony documents were on fax paper, and the acquittal came in fifteen minutes.

"Gatekeeper" and "Hold the Line" were grossly manpower intensive and not sustainable over the long run.

1. Does not break the bank.
   
2. Does not tick off the average American when they see it on the morning news.
   
3. Significantly reduces the level of illegal entry.

further information on this?

I briefly dated a young lady working for the US Attorney in San Diego.

Right after 187 won, the US Atty's office brought some cases against employers of illegal aliens, looking to make some quick political points on illegal immigration for the Clinton administration. The results were 100% failure. Not one conviction.

And one of those cases involved documents printed on fax paper. If anything should've been a slam-dunk, it was that case.

Most folks do not strongly object to illegal aliens being hired for private work. But a vast majority detests the idea of giving public money to those who are here illegally. The Clinton administration ignored that distinction--because, frankly, they had to. If they had gone after illegal aliens receiving public assistance, the usual suspects (the La Raza bunch and public employee unions) would've made sure the Clintons were off the ticket in 1996.

Is a friend who knew someone in the U.S. Attorney's office.

Then there's nothing to be done.  Damn shame, too.

Pass the President's guest worker program.

and we will normalize the illegals who are already here and make it easier still for them to import their families, thereby rewarding their lawbreaking and encouraging more of the same; the supply of would-be illegals will remain essentially limitless and illegal labor will therefore still be cheaper than legal labor; and nothing will happen to those who hire the illegals, because juries still won't convict them.  Meanwhile, it will still be ruled unconstitutional to deny public benefits to illegals.  So, the rot will continue, and we'll just be encouraging it.  Thanks, but no.  I despair for the future of the republic.

...is that we outlawed the legal means of hiring seasonal labor in 1965, solely as a political favor to the AFL-CIO. We had an illegal immigration problem--but it was a tolerable one, not the God-forsaken mess we have now.

A lot of people in the SW US thought that the ban was unreasonable, and decided to ignore the new law. And their peers decided that it wasn't a "real" criminal matter, in the same way that they didn't view violating the Volstead Act as a criminal matter.

And thus, we have the present situation.  We can try to toughen it up, but it will not solve the problem.

The current law is not enforceable - not when the people on the juries acquitted.

We had something workable prior to 1965.  It worked fine, but LBJ killed it as a favor to the AFL-CIO.

As a conclusion, I note you repeat the canard that the President's proposal is amnesty.  It is not.

"The dominant elites of both political parties support an unspoken "Open Border" policy. "

...is this because they are afraid of alienating - no pun intended - primarily the Latino constituency, or is it something less superficial?

Here is a post from a while ago that argues for more open borders from a conservative standpoint.

FWIW, those of us who support "open borders" immigration policy do NOT generally support the high levels of illegal immigration.  We believe that the solution to the 2 million illegal immigrants a year is to allow more people to come into the country legally as long as they are not meaning the country harm.  The 1.99 million of the 2 million who are not part of criminal gangs, drug mafias, and terrorist organizations ought to be able to come and improve their lives and those of their families without having to jump through so many hurdles.  That's the general argument.  The details are here.

Many of us have simply called for the laws to be enforced.

1. Go after businesses that hire illegals.
   
2. DEPORT ILLEGALS, especially the criminals
   
3. Deny services to illegals

If we make people think twice about hiring illegals, don't help make life easier before we catch them, and actually deport them when we do, we could make a big, big dent in the problem.

Instead, we look the other way when illegals pick fruit in  California, let DHS play catch-and-release games, and give illegals full governmen tservices.

No wonder they keep coming.

Leaving aside issues of assimilating new immigrants, I think the practical issue of illegal immigrants goes like this:

1.  The country needs a certain number of immigrant workers. However, we have more of these workers (in the form of illegal immigrants) than we need.
   
2.  A percentage of these illegals take jobs that American might take if so offerred at a slightly higher wage level.  The Federal Government, under both Democrats and Republicans, has no interest in ascertaining  how many American Citizens might take jobs offerred to illegal immigrants.
   
3.  The American Labor Movement doesn't care that some illegals are taking jobs from Americans or that wages are being pushed down.
   
4.  Given the above, let's say that there are 10,000,000 million illegal immigrants in the country and that there are 5,000,000 jobs for them.  That would mean that 5,000,000 would have to leave, because we have no work for them.
   
5.  Tamar Jacoby asserts that we allow the flow to be self-regulating.  That we don't, given the above example, send back 5,000,000 illegals.  My own view is that we do send back those illegals for whom there is no emplyement (as defined as either no job or a job that a legal American citizen might take if offerred).  However, for the rest of the current illegals, who are actually needed, I would give legal work permit.    

"The country needs a certain number of immigrant workers."

Says who?  Says businesses who like getting third-world labor?  That's really short-sighted, to depend on that instead of innovating to stay competitive.

If we shut off the tap of illegal alien labor, and we see inflation, then we can increase the number of legal aliens admitted.  Enforcing our  laws is not incompatible with allowing illegals, but I'm not inclined to believe without verification the claims of the open-borders crowd about our labor market.

Make that "Enforcing our laws is not incompatible with allowing legal immigrants in."

And I'm clearly tired now, so this is my last post for the day, heh.

I'm not saying this to be critical of anyone who believes this way (as I'm something of a softie myself), but too many Americans would never go along with #2 or #3.

It would only take a couple of front page stories of a child in the country illegally who was sick or had died from poor nutrition or lack of health care and #3 is out the door.

Many illegals have been here long enough to start families, producing citizen children.  There is no way Americans as a group will allow families to be disrupted by deportation in the name of enforcing immigration laws that are poorly constructed and have not been enforced in my lifetime.

It is against this backdrop that the President proposed his two pronged strategy of enlarging the future pool of legal immigrants and guest workers, to stave of any more compounding of the problem, and penalizing and legalizing the current pool of illegals (many of whom would go home regularly, if they had a guest worker visa and could come back to work without swimming the muddy river).

We really are a compassionate nation, and the policies have to reflect that if they are to have any success.  On a related note, the politicoes (sp?) will address the immigration issue soon, as the American people are beginning to grow irritated at the current lack of border control and our guys are good at reading polls, if nothing else.

Ten year old second-hand reports of failed prosecutions is no reason to give up. I feel certain that a little tweaking of the laws could help as well.

Both California and Arizona voters have passed initiatives implementing #3.

If it didn't happen, it's because of  runaway courts, not a lack of popular support.

"Ten year old second-hand reports of failed prosecutions is no reason to give up."

You know what really annoys me?

So-called "conservatives" who are too flippin' STUPID to understand what people actually wrote. If you find that statement offensive, Tango Sierra.

Changing the law to reflect reality is not "giving up." It's recognizing that the Democrats FUMTU'd the situation 40 years ago.

Prosecuting employers is a waste of time and resources, because one most prove that the employer KNOWINGLY hired an illegal alien. That is damn near impossible when the juries don't view it as a crime in and of itself.

Before 1965, employers got convicted. After 1965, they didn't. The difference was that there was a reasonable process to get legal labor. After 1965, there wasn't. Restore the original process, and you're going to get employers convicted.

In one sentence you deny with great indignation that you are giving up; in the very next sentence you explain why we should give up.

The giving up I refered to, of course, was the prosecution of employers who hire illegals. As things stand now, said prosecution is, in your own words, "a waste of time and resources."

I understand that you want the laws changed. Fine. But your counsel for us, under the laws we have now, is indeed to give up on prosecution of employers. And your evidence to buttress this counsel is that some attempts at prosecution failed ten years ago in California.

Now: We agree that the 1965 immigration law was stark lunacy. Good. There's a start. I'm all ears on ways to correct its errors, including "restoring the original process" for getting legal labor.

In America, people get murdered.  Children get kidnapped and raped.  Retirees are swindled out of their savings.

All of these things are "reality."  Shall we repeal the bans on these activities, too?

We can't prevent these from happening, and not everyone who commits these acts gets convicted and punished, but we don't give up because we know we're doing the right thing.

If you're ready to give up on enforcing our immigration laws, all it shows is that you don't think they're worth enforcing to begin with.

So please, let's keep the debate on why the laws are good or bad, instead of going down dead-ends about whether "reality" matches the legal ideal, becuase that dead-end  just forces us to come back to whether the laws are right or wrong to begin with.

...then kindly don't waste my time by replying to them.

"But your counsel for us, under the laws we have now, is indeed to give up on prosecution of employers."

Yeah, I generally do not approve of the idea of paying government employees to do nothing useful.

That must be too conservative a notion for some folks.

We should continue to throw good money after bad in an effort to enforce laws that juries nullify on a regular basis?

That is a bigger waste of money than the transportation bill that Congress just passed.

Furthermore, do we really want ICE chasing after maids, nannies, landscapers, and other day labor, or should we instead go after the al-Qaeda and MS-13 thugs that are in this country?

either/or? Why can't it be both/and? Seems to me that ICE shouldn't be dealing with MS-13 at all until they are ordered deported.

the term "finite resources" is not understood?

And in case you did not read earlier, juries acquitted folks accused of hiring illegal immigrants.

As far as I can tell, "regular basis" means only "a few times ten years ago in California." And in any case, acquittals are part of the business of prosecution. But no business in its right mind will count on the scofflaw good will of juries to maintain its profitability. The just fact of increased indictments would have an effect.

And what about civil action? American juries don't seem very timid about sticking it to corporations in civil court.

No law is enforceable.

And yes, it is amnesty, with a $2000 processing fee.  

It's not amnesty.  When you call it amnesty, you're pretty much lying about the President's proposal.

How do you define amnesty then?

You are setting up a construct that is fallacious on its face and bootstrapping the rest of your argument into it. Fact: ICE doesn't have jurisdiction over the ongoing suppression of MS-13. That is local, state, and federal law enforcement.

And in case you didn't read earlier, the plural of anecdote is not data and one or two cases from a decade ago, as Paul noted, are dispositive of zilch.

Even were that the case in most trials it makes as much sense saying we shouldn't prosecute these cases as saying no one should have been tried in the various lynching trials in the Deep South in the 50s and 60s because the juries wouldn't convict. That is to say, none.

So Eliot Spitzer's shakedowns are okay if done for the right cause?

How many indictments leading to acquittals dfo you want?  No US Attorney wants to see a bunch of acquittals on his record.

How much money do you want to waste in something that is known to be unlikely to succeed?

of those acquittals cost the defendants far more money than the government and that message would not have been lost on others... if the government had persisted.

Have more to do with the rapid population growth in Latin America in the last forty years?  You can talk all you want about jury nullification in the Southwest, but what does that have to do with the unwillingness of people to do anything about illegals in places like Virginia, where the history of illegal immigration stretches back less than twenty years?  Not much, I propose.  Furthermore, your claim doesn't make much sense.  If people are just ignoring the law, then how did the law change anything?  The law should, under your model, have no effect.  It shouldn't cause more illegal immigration in the absence of other factors.  Finally, we're not talking about seasonal labor.  We're talking about people moving here to stay, and McCain-Kennedy permits more of that than the present regime.  Again, no thanks.  

It would be in the form of no penalty for illegal entry.

The President's plan, in case you had not read it, involved a penalty for those who did not leave the country to apply for the guest worker program.

It just isn't the penalty you would want.  But there is a penalty.

with MS-13 if we hadn't let in all the illegals in the first place.

Which is that if juries won't convict people for hiring illegal aliens, no criminal law against doing so is enforceable.

Didn't the Senate recently vote to throw out lawsuits against gun manufacturers because the big-city mayors were filing tons of these suits (with help from the Brady Campaign) based on the same idea?

I never thought I'd see someone - much less a person who professed to be a conservative - advocate using the criminal justice system in that manner.

Do you really want to keep unenforcable laws (like the Volstead Act) on the books?  Or isn't it a better idea to cut the losses?

Aren't you?  How will McCain-Kennedy change the willingness of juries to convict employers for hiring illegals?  

Yes, imagine the gall of this guy -- he wants the criminal justice system to be used to prosecute criminals

There is a reasonable (and legal) means to acquire day labor.  It restores the pre-1965 condition (which LBJ got rid of as a favor to the AFL-CIO).

There would be much better odds of getting the conviction at that point.

much attention to the debate.

The gun liability bills would have made gun manufacturers liable for deaths and injuries from the use of their guns even when those guns were acquired illegally.

The employers in question are knowingly hiring illegal aliens.

The gun liability didn't relieve murderers of liability for killing people.

So there is more than a nuanced difference between the two situations.

And, as a conservative, I am in favor of enforcing our laws. I never thought I'd see someone who professed to be a conservative advocate otherwise.

But who wants to deal with all that pesky red tape.  McCain-Kennedy won't reduce the number of people willing to jump the border, and it won't change the fact that it's cheaper to pay for illegals than legals.  No withholding, no paperwork, and no worker's rights.  

What we need is a national ID card and a legal requirement that employers verify the legality of their employees.

Either you need new prosecutors, or you need to take a closer look at why they are acquitting.

I'll give you a hint: It's like the Volstead Act.

The law's not working.  We've tried enforcement of employer sanctions, and it failed.  Juries would not convict.  All the sanctions in the world don't matter if the conviction you need for them to be applied is not there.

I expect the laws of this country to make sense, and be reasonable.  When there is widespread nullification - there is arguably something wrong with the law.  Good grief, if you had actually bothered to read Poohbah's initial post on the efforts after Prop 187, you'd have found out that these aquittals came in on "open and shut" cases.

you need to hang an argument on something more substantial than ten-year-old anecdotes.

Trade off some liberty (accept a National ID card) for the promise it will help address illegal immigration...

And in addition, let's add the biggest gold mine in the world for an identity thief.

my answer is that I don't care.

The employers should be prosecuted at least they will be out of the money it takes them to defend themselves. Consider it a fine running to the tens of thousands of dollars. At least they will probably be reticent about doing it again. That is deterrence.

What is not deterrence is the criminal justice system deciding that it simply will not enforce a class of laws.

and fail again, will you be willing to admit that we need to change the law?  Or will you just say we did not do things right, and come up with some other excuse to avoid biting the bullet?

What will you do when it starts getting noticed in the editorial boards?

Given your attitude, I think it might be a good idea to expand "loser pays" to include criminal prosecutions.  If the jury acquits, then the government will make good the legal fees the accused incurred.

Because quite frankly, you're not promoting rule of law - I think you're pushing for malicious and abusive prosecution.

would not need to be a goldmine for an identity thief. Such a card should have on it nothing more than bearer's legal name and a photo, and perhaps an issuance date and a card number (which would be the number of the card itself, not an ID # for the bearer--if the card were replaced, it would have a different number). The ID should not have any other identifying features: no Social Security number for sure. No birth date. No address. It would be fairly useless to an ID thief.

To verify the card's accuracy, employers could look up the card # on a web site (and stolen of lost cards would be invalidated) and the site would report back Yes, this card is valid for <Name of Bearer> and perhaps display the  picture that should be on the card.

When there is widespread nullification - there is arguably something wrong with the law.

Streiff demolished this argument by a shrewd reference to the juries in the South that acquitted on lynching cases. I see that you have not answered it.

Another example: Rape is often a difficult crime to prosecute, and results in many acquittals. Clancyphile solution: Throw out the laws against rape!

Comparing it to the laws that Poohbah talked about is comapring apples and oranges.  So is lynching.

We're not comparing the content of the laws; we're comparing the difficulty of achieving a conviction.

Do you guarantee the database doesn;'t get hacked.  Ask the credit card companies.  I hear they lost a bunch of credit card numbers when hackers got in.

More red tape, more regulations, more laws... and when they fail.. what will the proposed remedy for that be?  Another round of red tape, regulations, and laws?

It is popular on a ballot because it is the obvious punishment for illegally entering the country, but on a ballot it is all hypothetical.  

When we are confronted with tragic stories, like some poor child crying and suffering because his dad has been deported, even though he has lived and worked here for 7 years and has been nothing but an exemplary person, we will weaken(hypothetical example). I don't know any illegal immigrants personally, but I know that some have assimilated in all ways other than legallity.  

And don't get me wrong, I STRONGLY disapprove of allowing illegal immigration, but I also recognize that we are soft hearted, as a nation, and neither political party is going to want to be perceived as a racist homewrecker.

You do not seem to be reading the posts.  Your mind seems to be made up, and you don't give a damn about facts.

you're doing quite a bit of the same. The jury-nullification thing started out as interesting but it has really worn thin.

Look, I enjoy your opinions... mostly... and I think we can all say with sublime confidence that the immigration system is broken. And that there are a lot of different views on how to un-screw this mess should be expected.

But when the real world intrudes... often the reaction is, "I didn't mean for that to happen!"

Followed shortly thereafter by a refusal to trust the politicians who sold them a bill of goods.  We're going to hear about the high school honor students whose parents brought them over at age three - who had no idea they were illegal until the INS knocked on their door and couldn't even have formed the intent to break the law when they were brought here.

We're talking folks who maybe came here and overstayed visas because back home it was hellish.  Or because it was their one chance to escape the PRC's one-child policy.  Would anyone here send a pregnant woman back to the PRC, knowing they would force her to have a late-term abortion or worse?

This is not a blakc-and-white issue any more... and trying to enforce our way out of the problem with brtue force will not work.

I just do not see how we have any hope of enforcing our way out of the problem.  In this case, it's time to pass the President's guest worker program and the DREAM Act (I don't think it's fair to punish honor students brought over here at a young age for their parents' actions) with the Kyl-Cornin enforcement mechanism.

The current system is beyond repair.  It's not weakness to admit the mistake, and redo everything.

if I fail to genuflect before the profound fact of some decade-old failed prosecutions under the Clinton administration.

Here are some other facts I discovered in a brief internet search. They show successful prosecutions of employers of illegals.

nothing will be done, so let's give up, and just sit back and watch while we, in our ignorant soft-heartedness, import the social problems of Latin America.  You're probably right, of that I have little doubt.  But I don't like it.

That McCain-Kennedy would reduce the scope of the invasion?  It doesn't seem likely.  An ID card seems a lot more likely to succeed at reducing illegal immigration than McCain-Kennedy.  As for privacy (it doesn't exist) and identity theft, we're subject to that now.  Talk about refighting old defeats.  Any corrupt DMV or bank employee has more than enough opportunities.  If anything, a national ID card would make identity theft more difficult.  

More red tape, more regulations, more laws... and when they fail.. what will the proposed remedy for that be?  Another round of red tape, regulations, and laws?

This wouldn't be so amusing if your answer weren't... another law.

Or administrative action?

If it's administrative action (which has been done by other agencies - like the IRS or ATF), you don't have to deal with a jury.

It would contain nothing but names, card #'s, dates of issuance and digital photos. Not much of use for an ID thief.

By the way I would prefer not to have a national ID, and I have written posts here against the Real ID act which seeks to make teh states responsible for what should be a federal project, if at all. I was however pointing out that a national ID could be implemented in a way that would not expose anyone to any particular danger from ID theft.

You have names... you have card numbers... you now have a good start.  An identity thief can then work from there.

All they got from the credit card companies were names and card numbers... enough to do damage.

"This is not a blakc-and-white issue any more... and trying to enforce our way out of the problem with brtue force will not work. "

Sounds like what John Kerry says about the War on Terror.

because it depresses wages and otherwise increases their power with respect to their workers.  If "the reserve army of the unemployed" consists of everyone between Laredo and La Paz, management's position is a great deal stronger.  Many "conservative" ideologues are terrified of being called racist, and/or like access to cheap domestic labor, and/or don't believe in borders anyway (libertarians), and/or believe solely in an ideological (and liberal) definition of America.  

On the Democratic side, Latinos vote for Democrats.  'Nuff said.  Why would Democrats be opposed to the introduction of new Democratic voters?  Since the voters stopped electing Democrats, the Democrats may as well elect new voters.  It's worked in previously reliably Republican California.

...innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, and all those other concepts invented by the patriarchy of dead white men. "Conservatives" must destroy those ancient, outmoded concepts in order to destroy their class enemies--

Whoopsie.

"Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?"

would be a dead end. It would not be an ID number (the way our SS number have become). It would be...the number of the card. And if the card was lost, stolen  or for any reason had to be reissued the card number would be invalidated and a new one issued.

As for names, you can get those (along with addresses) out of the phone book.

They way I understood it, workers here illegally would be fined, some would be deported, but many of them would be allowed to obtain a guest worker visa - which does NOT give any type of citizenship.  Therefore, it is not really amnesty, IMHO.

Future immigration quotas would allow in a larger pool, and the laws would be enforced better.

I know it's not perfect, but I can see a lot of potential there for at least getting control of the problem.

Don't forget, many of these people are desperate for a job, but if they were certain they could come back and work tomorrow, they would come, pick their cabbages today, and go home to Mexico tonight.  I like the idea.

...that you venture off to Crawford and camp out next to Cindy Sheehan? You sound like you're (a) just as stupid and (b) just as mentally disturbed as she is...

I got a laugh out of that.

to the (not at all anti-immigration) AILA's 16 page synopsis of the 100+ page bill.

http://immigration.about.com/b/a/178464.htm

authorities is due process.  If someone isn't being charged with a crime, he has no right to a trial.  I'm not saying throw out the laws.  That's clancyphile's position.

And your comments about class enemies and DWMs is just offensive twaddle.  Could you just try civility?

...prosecuting for the purpose of financially undermining an "innocent" person or company seems unethical.

If they aren't "innocent", then why have a trial at all?

Jury nullification is not a good thing, but the answer isn't malicious prosecution.