Amnesty for illegals.

[Friendindeed]

Are you saying illegal immigrants aren't people? Or that they just aren't as good people as citizens and legal immigrants?

Are you delusional ?
Where did I say anything about them not being people or not being good people.

What I did was clarify the issue you are trying to muddy up, that ILLEGAL immigrants are different than just plain immigrants.

When he said he's sick of the cries that 'they're just trying to feed the kids' is the reason i called him a dumb a-hole. They are not part of some conspiracy to take over the country, and they are just trying to feed the kids and find a better life for them. Even though they made a mistake coming here illegally, they are still people. I know an illegal family with a terminally ill daughter, and they are some of the nicest people I've ever met. All they're trying to do is get some good health care for the daughter. So until he either takes back or clarifies his remarks, I will stand by my original statement. I deleted it to comply with forum rules.

Your fight with krazykat is your own affair, my objection was to the name calling.
You can stop trying to pretend that anyone here has said illegal immigrants aren't people because that is a complete lie.
And finally, your rebuttal of Lily's points is ridiculous. You must not know the first thing about economics, not one of your statements holds water.

 

[saggyjones]

Are you delusional ?
When did I ever say anything about them not being people or not being good people.

What I did was clarify the issue you are trying to muddy up, that ILLEGAL immigrants are different than just plain immigrants.

"And that song and dance that there only trying to feed the kids is getting old."
That is the quote. It angers me because they are just trying to feed the kids. To think that they are coming here just to take over the country or something is ridiculous. Then when you say there is a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants, I interpreted it as you saying that one group is just trying to feed the kids and one is part of some malicious act other than that. Obviously they're different from a legal standpoint, and I find it hard to believe that you would just say that for no reason.

Your fight with krazykat is your own affair, my objection was to the moronic name calling.

And I apologized and deleted the name.

You can stop trying to pretend that anyone here has said illegal immigrants aren't people because that is a complete lie.

That's your interpretation.

And finally, your rebuttal of Lily's points is completely ridiculous. You must not know the first thing about economics.

Apparently not, because I fail to see how forcing illegal immigrants who are working at less than minimum wage to work at or above minimum wage will take more jobs away from Americans. In fact, it will give them jobs because immigrants and citizens will be working for the same wages, so Americans have a chance to compete.

 

[Friendindeed]

I'm having trouble with this site now, I'll be back in a little while.

 

[Friendindeed]

"And that song and dance that there only trying to feed the kids is getting old."
That is the quote. It angers me because they are just trying to feed the kids. To think that they are coming here just to take over the country or something is ridiculous. Then when you say there is a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants, I interpreted it as you saying that one group is just trying to feed the kids and one is part of some malicious act other than that. Obviously they're different from a legal standpoint, and I find it hard to believe that you would just say that for no reason.

That quote is from krazykat, I told you before that's between him and you. Don't try to get answers from me about it, I just objected to you calling him names.

When I remind you that there's a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants, I am not saying they are not people and I am not saying they are trying to take over the country. In fact no one has mentioned those two things except you as far as I can see, so that is why I asked about delusions.

And I apologized and deleted the name.

Cool but you're still discussing him to me, please don't.

That's your interpretation.

There is no other interpretation possible, if I am wrong tell me what the other interpretation is.
Let me refresh your memory. I said there was a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants and you asked me,

"Are you saying illegal immigrants aren't people? Or that they just aren't as good people as citizens and legal immigrants?"

Apparently not, because I fail to see how forcing illegal immigrants who are working at less than minimum wage to work at or above minimum wage will take more jobs away from Americans. In fact, it will give them jobs because immigrants and citizens will be working for the same wages, so Americans have a chance to compete.

Do you understand the most basic principles of supply and demand at all ?
The more workers available to do the job, the lower the wage can and will be kept. Saturation keeps the wage artificially lowered.
I can't believe I even have to tell that to anyone.

 

[Friendindeed]

I keep editing because I don't want you to criticize my spelling like you did the other guy's lol.
Now I will tell you why I ridiculed your rebuttal to Lily's points.

Immigrants go to school and use our tax money for education regardless of status, so that one's out.

Nope, not out.
That is why we have a limit on the number of LEGAL immigrants and why the schools are so burdened because of ILLEGAL immigrants which exceed the numbers we can absorb. Legalizing all of them will not change that at all.

About food stamps, this quote explains it:

Just like with the schools, we allow only a limited number of immigrants for a reason. All of those extra unplanned ones are a heavy burden on these social services and they will need them after they are "legalized" too because there is always a percentage of people who don't keep a job or who go to prison or who get a catastrophic illness.

Hospitals have to accept someone regardless of status. But you're right, Medicaid is something they would be eligible for. I really don't find it possible that they will start taking out more than they will put in with taxes, because they were already using too many government funded programs before they were made legal.

Are you aware that that doesn't even make sense ?
Read what you wrote again and you will see that. You are saying that because they have been using too many government funded programs before being legal, that means it is not possible that they will use more than their tax contributions after they are legalized.
WTF, give me one reason why that would be true.

I really don't know how to make it more clear, but I'll try. If we make illegal immigrants here now legal, we won't have to spend money deporting them since they'll be legal.

You didn't answer the point. At all. Her point was not even about saving money on deportation, it was about how you said deporting doesn't work and then you said we should start deporting anyone who comes after the amnesty.

These 12-20 million low-skilled workers are already here! Making them legal will force companies to pay them minimum wage, which they aren't paying now. That means it would give Americans a chance to compete with them and wages would go up. Just think about it.

Again you failed to deal with the point. She said that the motivation to hire them has been the slave level compensation so there would be a large number that would lose their jobs.

And saturation of the labor market as both Lily and I and someone else has pointed out to you.
Another point you have not answered.

No, you can't easily afford health insurance on a low-skilled job. But it gives them the ability because they're legal.

Wrong. It doesn't give them the ability. It gives them legal status to buy it if they have the ability but most won't have the ability.

Do you not understand that the illegal immigrants are taking American jobs because they don't get paid minimum wage, because they're illegal? If we make them legal Americans can get the jobs because they will be competing for the same wage.

Do YOU not understand that there are only so many jobs available ?
You also didn't answer her point about the Swift raids or the stress on low skill class from importing direct competition even at equal wages.

I never mentioned George Bush. Do you think he would actually support legalizing all immigrants here now?

Of course he would.
What in the bloody hell do you think he has been promoting for the past two or three years ?

Actually they are rooted into the economy because they sneak across the border and work for less than minimum wage.

Because they have been deliberately allowed to do that. So you failed again to answer the point because the point being made was about the open border as a favor to corporations from people like George Bush.


[coming back later to add one more thing]
Do you understand what the big picture is and what the plans are for the United States and Mexico ? Until you do it will not be possible to get a grip on why any of this is happening and you will only be looking at the symptoms and not the disease.

And please don't ask me if I am saying illegal immigrants are a disease, I am using an analogy.

 

[saggyjones]

That quote is from krazykat, I told you before that's between him and you. Don't try to get answers from me about it, I just objected to you calling him names.

When I remind you that there's a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants, I am not saying they are not people and I am not saying they are trying to take over the country. In fact no one has mentioned those two things except you as far as I can see, so that is why I asked about delusions.

Cool but you're still discussing him to me, please [don't.

But you're the one who brought it up. Are you allowed to discuss him and I'm not? Or do you just decide when the discussion ends? I can discuss whatever I want; you have the freedom not to respond to it, which I assume you will choose to take.

There is no other interpretation possible, if I am wrong tell me what the other interpretation is.

Let me refresh your memory. I said there was a big difference between legal and illegal immigrants and you asked me,

"Are you saying illegal immigrants aren't people? Or that they just aren't as good people as citizens and legal immigrants?"

I already explained my interpretation in the last post.

Do you understand the most basic principles of supply and demand at all ?

I thought so...

The more workers available to do the job, the lower the wage can and will be kept. Saturation keeps the wage artificially lowered.
I can't believe I even have to tell that to anyone.

They are already at minimum wage! It can't get any lower! Making them legal will raise the wage to minimum; after that of course it's going to stay there.

 

[Friendindeed]

But you're the one who brought it up. Are you allowed to discuss him and I'm not? Or do you just decide when the discussion ends? I can discuss whatever I want; you have the freedom not to respond to it, which I assume you will choose to take.

No, I did not bring up the topic of krazykat and his attitudes, I just objected to the name calling. I do not know krazykat from the man in the moon and so there is no use in you repeating what he said and expecting me to answer for it.
Do you understand the words coming out of my mouth?

I had two things only to say about krazykat. Number one stop calling him names, and number two, he didn't say immigrants he said ILLEGAL immigrants.

I thought so...

Well I don't think you do if you cannot see the harm involved when we import direct foreign competition to a whole class of workers who are already at the bottom of the heap.

They are already at minimum wage! It can't get any lower! Making them legal will raise the wage to minimum; after that of course it's going to stay there.

Wrong on two counts. One of the reasons that the Swift plant incurred legal trouble after the raids is that the wages had been held down by hiring illegals.
And where you were also wrong is that it was not minimum wage, it was $11 an hour.
Everything wrong with your arguments bascily comes down to a lack of correct information.

What about all my other points and what about my remark on the big picture ?

 

[Lilly Marlene]

saggyjones, having read the rest of the thread I can see that most of my remarks were vindicated amply well by Friendindeed.

You did ask me for a link to the article; here is one to which you might give better consideration than the FAIR article, because it is authored by those who presumably share more of your views:

http://www.progressiveu.org/093920-...-is-a-bad-thing-very-bad-with-capital-letters

 

[saggyjones]

saggyjones, having read the rest of the thread I can see that most of my remarks were vindicated amply well by Friendindeed.

You did ask me for a link to the article; here is one to which you might give better consideration than the FAIR article, because it is authored by those who presumably share more of your views:

http://www.progressiveu.org/093920-...-is-a-bad-thing-very-bad-with-capital-letters

I still don't think you understand me, I support tightening border security, even a wall. I don't want more immigrants coming here. I hope you get it with this post because I don't know how to put in any clearer.

By the way I read the article, and they share my views on tightening security, but not on sending them back now.

 

[saggyjones]

No, I did not bring up the topic of krazykat and his attitudes, I just objected to the name calling. I do not know krazykat from the man in the moon and so there is no use in you repeating what he said and expecting me to answer for it.
Do you understand the words coming out of my mouth?

I had two things only to say about krazykat. Number one stop calling him names, and number two, he didn't say immigrants he said ILLEGAL immigrants.

OK, I think the issue is settled then.

Well I don't think you do if you cannot see the harm involved when we import direct foreign competition to a whole class of workers who are already at the bottom of the heap.

We aren't importing it, the illegals are already here. Are you reading my posts at all?

Wrong on two counts. One of the reasons that the Swift plant incurred legal trouble after the raids is that the wages had been held down by hiring illegals.
And where you were also wrong is that it was not minimum wage, it was $11 an hour.
Everything wrong with your arguments bascily comes down to a lack of correct information.

The Swift plant is not the majority of illegal workers. It is in agriculture picking plants, and they get paid less than minimum wage. Once they become legal they will demand higher wages.

 

[Lilly Marlene]

I still don't think you understand me, I support tightening border security, even a wall. I don't want more immigrants coming here. I hope you get it with this post because I don't know how to put in any clearer.

Of course I understand you; we are speaking the same language and I'm not an idiot.

I know that you support tightening the border ...as I recall our disagreement was over whether to grant citizenship or not.

I pointed out to you what the devastating consequences were when Reagan did that in 1986, and you have not given any response.

I also cited the harm of importing direct competition into the US - legal or not - for the most vulnerable classes of US laborer ...to which you have also given no response.

In fact, I wish you would reread my entire post and respond to those and all the rest of the points.

 

[Lilly Marlene]

The Swift plant is not the majority of illegal workers. It is in agriculture picking plants, and they get paid less than minimum wage. Once they become legal they will demand higher wages.

Do you still not understand that there are completely different stipulations covering agricultural work ?

 

[saggyjones]

Nope, not out.
That is why we have a limit on the number of LEGAL immigrants and why the schools are so burdened because of ILLEGAL immigrants which exceed the numbers we can absorb. Legalizing all of them will not change that at all.

They will pay taxes.

Just like with the schools, we allow only a limited number of immigrants for a reason. All of those extra unplanned ones are a heavy burden on these social services and they will need them after they are "legalized" too because there is always a percentage of people who don't keep a job or who go to prison or who get a catastrophic illness.

But they already use food stamps, and they will pay taxes.

Are you aware that that doesn't even make sense ?
Read what you wrote again and you will see that. You are saying that because they have been using too many government funded programs before being legal, that means it is not possible that they will use more than their tax contributions after they are legalized.
WTF, give me one reason why that would be true.

They will pay taxes, and since they are already using many government funded programs, the difference between them being illegal and legal will be more than made up once they pay taxes. It's kind of hard to phrase and I hope you understand now.

You didn't answer the point. At all. Her point was not even about saving money on deportation, it was about how you said deporting doesn't work and then you said we should start deporting anyone who comes after the amnesty.

Deportation is difficult with so many immigrants, but if we tighten border security fewer will get in. I really don't know how to answer this; of course it doesn't work all that well but how does that affect giving amnesty to people? In fact it strengthens my argument. I understand your logic but it really isn't an answerable question, because there are no alternatives to deportation of future illegals after amnesty to the ones here.

Again you failed to deal with the point. She said that the motivation to hire them has been the slave level compensation so there would be a large number that would lose their jobs.

And saturation of the labor market as both Lily and I and someone else has pointed out to you.
Another point you have not answered.

The unemployment rate will still be the same though.

How can you saturate a market when there are illegals already here? I don't want to add new ones. Think of a sponge that is filled with water; if you add water, it will get bigger. But if you take water already in the sponge and move it somewhere else in the sponge it won't get any bigger.

Wrong. It doesn't give them the ability. It gives them legal status to buy it if they have the ability but most won't have the ability.

So you agree that they have the ability to buy insurance.

Do YOU not understand that there are only so many jobs available ?
You also didn't answer her point about the Swift raids or the stress on low skill class from importing direct competition even at equal wages.

Once again I don't support new illegals immigrating.

Also I believe I answered her question sufficiently. You are simply attacking my response rather than trying to respond yourself.

Of course he would.
What in the bloody hell do you think he has been promoting for the past two or three years ?

You got me on this one; I forgot about his immigration bill. It's just so unlike him.

Because they have been deliberately allowed to do that.

Does that change the fact that they are rooted into the economy?

So you failed again to answer the point because the point being made was about the open border as a favor to corporations from people like George Bush.

What does this have to do with George Bush? We're not debating reasons behind his policy in this thread.

It seems that you believe answering the point means agreeing with you. I have sufficiently addressed the point and I really don't care if you don't think so.

[coming back later to add one more thing]
Do you understand what the big picture is and what the plans are for the United States and Mexico ? Until you do it will not be possible to get a grip on why any of this is happening and you will only be looking at the symptoms and not the disease.

And please don't ask me if I am saying illegal immigrants are a disease, I am using an analogy.

I don't support more illegal immigrants coming, as I've said.

 

[Lilly Marlene]

They will pay taxes.

You told me you had read the Progressive article I linked for you. Please reread the sixth paragraph, which indicates why the income taxes they would pay CAN NOT cover the expenditures they would require in education, health care, prison and other social programs. As a matter of fact, our expenditures on these benefits for them will increase because they will be entitled to apply for a little more than they now can. Again, you can read that in the sixth paragraph or else go to the two other websites I mentioned prior to that (CIS or FAIR).

But they already use food stamps, and they will pay taxes.

As above (read the article, which gives numbers instead of just opinions).

They will pay taxes, and since they are already using many government funded programs, the difference between them being illegal and legal will be more than made up once they pay taxes. It's kind of hard to phrase and I hope you understand now.

By now (having hopefully read the article more attentively) you will probably no longer be asserting that their income taxes will cover it.

I think part of the problem is also that you don't seem to understand this: infrastructure is dependent on planning for a projected estimate of the number of persons. You make your case as though an infinite number of people can be served by an infrastructure stipulated for a finite number of US citizens, LEGAL immigrants within calculated parameters, and their offspring.

Please keep in mind also that the people to whom you want to extend another amnesty are mostly very traditionally Catholic in their reproductive ethos.
Thus,
You have not only the 12-20 million (or more) people who were not considered in the planning, but you also have their children.

Why should we misrepresent reality in looking at this ... just to assist the likes of G.W. Bush in helping his buddies keep wages artificially lowered as well as do away with our national sovereignty ?

Deportation is difficult with so many immigrants, but if we tighten border security fewer will get in. I really don't know how to answer this; of course it doesn't work all that well but how does that affect giving amnesty to people? In fact it strengthens my argument. I understand your logic but it really isn't an answerable question, because there are no alternatives to deportation of future illegals after amnesty to the ones here.

There really will be no need to roundup and deport anyone. They will deport themselves back home soon after the jobs and welfare dry up for them.
But yes -
your logic is noticeably flawed as I highlighted earlier, because you said deportation is an unsuccessful tactic ...and yet you suggest an amnesty followed by a deportation strategy.


And by the way - contrary to what you wrote - Friendindeed did NOT agree with you that illegal immigrants will have the ability to buy health insurance just because they are granted citizenship.

He merely said they would have the legal status to buy it. As I pointed out to you long ago, most will be poorer even than the many US citizens who cannot afford health insurance, so it is absurd to suppose that they would be able to afford it. They mostly will not be.

The unemployment rate will still be the same though.

Please explain how that could be possible.

How can you saturate a market when there are illegals already here? I don't want to add new ones. Think of a sponge that is filled with water; if you add water, it will get bigger. But if you take water already in the sponge and move it somewhere else in the sponge it won't get any bigger.

Giving amnesty does not "move it somewhere else". It keeps all the extra water in a sponge which badly needs wringing out.
The market is already saturated as shown by the example I gave you of the Swift plant.

And as I mentioned before,
The amnesty would also be a slap in the face to every person who comes here legally, fills out the paperwork, undergoes screening for infectious disease and violent criminal history, and so forth.

Also I believe I answered her question sufficiently.

No, you actually did not answer my question sufficiently.

If - as you claim - the foreign nationals are not competing for the same jobs as many American citizens, then why were US citizens lined up fanning out into the streets at the Swift plant the next day, hoping to get those jobs after the illegal immigrant workers were arrested ?

Please do not tell me that the Swift plant was a unique situation because the same thing happened at the Smithfield plant in North Carolina.

As anyone can plainly see, that competition will still be in place even if the competitors are legal. And obviously, the more people who want the job, the less the employer can get away with offering to pay.

 

[Koios]

This seems to be a hot topic... so I just wanted to give a friendly reminder to try to keep things as "civilized" as possible.

Now that that's out of the way. I would like to point out that many strong economies have historically needed a form of "migrant" labor (i.e Japan has Korea and South Africa had bantustan/homelands).

Here is something to ponder about. A good friend used to work for the border patrol but after years of noticing the same trend he decided to quit. What he noticed is that during certain times of the year they would be told not to patrol certain areas of the border and instead to patrol less active areas. Again, I emphasis, our current economic model relies heavily on migrant labor.