One of the more interesting aspects of the immigration debate is the difference
between New York and Los Angeles. Los Angeles, full of immigrants, is split
between the Latinos and their supporters, on the one hand, and those who would
kick them all out if they could, on the other.
In New York, by contrast, virtually everybody is pro-immigrant. And it’s not
because there are fewer immigrants here: Michael Bloomberg notes
today that New York City has 3 million immigrants, of whom 500,000
are illegal. He adds:
Although they broke the law by illegally crossing our borders or overstaying
their visas, our economy would be a shell of itself had they not, and it would
collapse if they were deported. The same holds true for the nation.
Bloomberg makes some sensible points, which probably means he will be ignored
in this overheated debate. Just don’t ask me what I was doing reading the WSJ
editorial page.
It seems that people do not see the underlying problems with ilegals. Fact 1. They Broke the law, Fact 2. Most of them do not pay taxes, why? because they are payed in cash by the perpertrator of … fact 3. unscropulous companies that hire theses imigrants. and fact 4 thousands of LEGAL IMIGRANTS waiting on citizenship have to wait many years to become a citizen. So why the double standard? I’d like to belive that we have the best legal system in the world, it has its mistakes and it can be improved but it is still the best…so for GOD’s sakes let it work and make everyone have a unfalsefiable id card of some sort and lets make everyone accountable.
It seems that people do not see the underlying problems with ilegals. Fact 1. They Broke the law, Fact 2. Most of them do not pay taxes, why? because they are payed in cash by the perpertrator of … fact 3. unscropulous companies that hire theses imigrants. and fact 4 thousands of LEGAL IMIGRANTS waiting on citizenship have to wait many years to become a citizen. So why the double standard? I’d like to belive that we have the best legal system in the world, it has its mistakes and it can be improved but it is still the best…so for GOD’s sakes let it work and make everyone have a unfalsefiable id card of some sort and lets make everyone accountable.
Um. Yes. Well. Fact 1 is hardly disputable: if they didn’t break the law, they wouldn’t be illegal. But then you stop making sense. Fact 2 is false: the vast majority of illegal immigrants do, in fact, pay taxes — usually payroll taxes. They get their jobs by presenting fake green cards and pretending to be legal. Which means that Fact 3 is also false: businesses simply hire the cheapest labour they can find, and often that turns out to be illegals pretending to be legal. And Fact 4: er, yes, it can take a long time to become a citizen once you become a legal immigrant. Are you implying that illegal immigrants can become citizens more quickly?
point 4 above… it would seem felix, that the language of the text that passed congress would make it faster for illegal immigrants to become permanent residents. if this means ‘green card’ as permanent residents typically does in ins/dhs speak- then congress passed something that says that an illegal immigrant can become a perm res so long as they have been in the country for 5 years, worked for three of those years, paid their back income tax and some sort of penalty. it doesn’t even matter if they worked for the same person for those 3 years.
that sounds a lot easier than coming here on a work visa, paying visa fees lawyer fees, finding a job that will sponsor you for a green card, dropping $10k+ on legal and ins/dhs fees and waiting 6 years for the whole thing to process- all the while not changing jobs, otherwise you have to start the whole process over again. oh yeah- and your’re paying income tax at the same time.
i really hope that i am misreading the congress bit (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c109:1:./temp/~c109NbqlYj:e414560:)… otherwise i really screwed myself by coming here on work visas. by my reading of it, an illegal immigrant who has been in the country less time than me could be eligible for permanent residence now. this would put them a good six years ahead of this legal immigrant.
i’m all in favor of immigration and think the system clearly needs reform- but i am certainly livid that the reform appears to give the leg up to illegal immigrants vs. those who have been pursuing the legal method.
feel free to correct me if my indignation is misplaced.
testing 1.2.3.
Just what we need, another pro-illegal immigrant sympathizer, running for office. I can’t see how anyone living in this country who is either a born and raised American or a legal immigrant could possibly think of voting for these that are for this farce of a bill they are working on in the big house. Illegal immigration is already bankrupting this country. We stand to lose our Social Security that we have been paying for years (what are our children and grandchildren going to do) our healthcare system is already crumbling with hospitals going under from illegals not paying their bills and the crime rate is getting worse by the day. Institutions are allowing these people to borrow money without even having a SS card, what happens when this goes belly up? They go bankrupt and we the people bail them out. This is a travesty, when are the American public going to stop putting people in office (like Clinton, Obama, McCain, etc) that condone this???? Wasn’t Bush bad enough for getting us in trouble? If we are so ademently against him over this war, why would we vote for someone who agrees with him or Kennedy on immigration reform??? Please get educated and stand up for AMERICA, don’t vote for someone just because it is a woman, or a black, vote for somone who will fight protect us and not cower to these big business and lobbist groups.
Perhaps everybody in New York is smart, and everybody in Los Angeles is stupid? New York City is a city of immigrants. My grandparents lived in New York City when they came to this country. Immigrants are the lifeblood of this country. Cut it off, and you cut off our vitality.
And regardless what you or anybody else thinks about immigration, the Constitution doesn’t give the federal government the power to restrict entry into the United States. Power over *citizenship*, yes, but not power over *entry*.