In addition to trying to stake out space as the sure social conservative, Mitt Romney is apparently trying to move far to the right on the issue of immigration. Check out this story in today’s Miami Herald. And this op-ed, also in today’s Miami Herald. (Romney is traveling to Miami this weekend and is getting a lot of attention because of that).
For many reasons, I am distressed that Romney is becoming the anti-immigrant candidate. But I also think we need to be clear why.
Romney is apparently in favor of some kind of employer ID card to weed out illegal immigrants. He wants to “secure the borders” and make sure kids learn in English. He opposes amnesty. Romney is clearly more anti-immigrant on these issues than McCain and Giuliani, who are much less willing to bash illegals.
Let me make this very clear: it is not a “conservative” position to oppose immigration. Conservatives (of which I am one) are: 1)pro-business, free-trade, economic liberty, low taxes 2)support a strong national defense program and 3)support traditional values on social issues. Think Ronald Reagan. If the illegal immigrant debate were to concentrate on number 2, which has to do with keeping out terrorists, it would be a conservative position and would approach it with conservative solutions. But of course the debate is not about that, it’s about preventing mostly Mexican immigrants from “Hispanizing” the United States. And there is nothing at all conservative about that.
In fact, President Bush and his brother Jeb Bush (the current leaders of the conservative movement in the U.S.) are famously pro-immigrant. And so is the Wall Street Journal editorial page, another long-term source of conservative thought. Ronald Reagan was pro-immigrant and signed one of the biggest “amnesty” bills in history in the 1980s. The reason is that it is good for business, economic growth and the country in general to welcome immigrants.
Personally, if I were running for president, I would solve the immigration problem by setting up border processing stations along the Mexican border and in major entry stations (Miami, NY, LA) and announcing to the world that any immigrant who wants to come to the United States can come. Of course this program would involve background checks, fingerprinting and other means to prevent terrorists. And it would pay for itself because we would charge, say, $2,000 per immigrant. (Keep in mind immigrants pay that and more to Coyotes today to find their way across the border).
Given Mitt’s famous problem-solving abilities, I’m somewhat surprised he is not looking for more innovative solutions than basically adopting the nativist Tom Tancredo position.
But, then again, I’m not all that surprised.
The reason Mitt is doing this is pure politics. The Republican party desperately needs to avoid a third party candidate from the Right. Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter, the two anti-immigrant candidates, are itching to be the right-wing third party candidates to help their national profiles. So, it appears to me that Mitt is triangulating. I don’t buy that he will be the anti-immigrant president if he is elected. I don’t think his heart would be in it, and it would be bad for business and the economy. But he needs to appear anti-immigrant to stave off Tancredo and Hunter but capture some of their votes in the primaries.
Do I like this? No way. I would prefer Mitt to take the high road and the Bush brother approach, which is to state openly that immigrants are good for the United States. But I also understand why he’s doing it, and so I’ll hold my nose and continue to support him — for now.
I just got sent this story:
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/print?id=2871498
In it, Mitt ventures even farther into the anti-immigrant camp saying the country should consider ending the policy of giving citizenship to (illegal immigrant) children born in the United States. I find this outrageous. I hope Mitt steps away from supporting such an obviously nativist position.
I think it’s pretty despicable. I have been very disappointed in what appears to be political cowardice on Romney’s part. Ever since he started getting serious about running, he has been changing his position all over the place. People can see right through that, and they don’t like it. For a long while I have wanted to vote for Mitt but have become more and more reluctant to do so.
I’m with Carl.
I just wrote the following letter to the Mitt Romney campaign:
To whom it may concern,
I have been dreaming about a Mitt Romney campaign for several years, and I think this is Mitt’s time. I have a Mitt Romney for President sticker on my car in Miami, FL, and I have already gotten several positive comments from other drivers.
I am writing to ask you to please reconsider recent stances against immigration. It is not conservative to oppose immigration. Ronald Reagan was pro-immigration.
Please see my post at a Mormon themed blog here:
https://www.millennialstar.org/index.php/2007/03/09/mitt_the_anti_immigrant_candidate_anti_i
I am begging you to please reconsider this approach. It is turning off Republican Hispanic voters and many other voters like myself who may support somebody like Mitt.
If Mitt continues to become known as the “anti-immigrant candidate” I will have to take the Mitt Romney for President sticker off my car and vote for somebody else, probably Giuliani, in the Florida primary.
With great sadness,
Geoff B
Miami, FL
I like your solution, Geoff, but I don’t think Congress will ever implement meaningful immigration reform legislation.
It’s one more thing that bugs me about Mitt, too. I’m (mostly) with Geoff, excpet that I haven’t decided who to support yet.
Bush’s rather pro-immigrant stance is rather unpopular, which helps explain why Mitt feels he has to take a hardline stance. Some conservatives don’t like Bush’s ideas because they want to close the borders off completely, and liberals don’t like it merely because Bush proposed it (whereas if a Democrat had proposed the exact same idea, you know they would be all over it).
I hope Mitt reades Geoff’s post, but I doubt it would happen.
(on a side note: Apparently Mitt Romney was in my sacrament meeting this last Sunday, but I somehow missed seeing him – still it was all the buzz for the rest of the day. There are a few relavtively loaded members in my ward, so I assume he was there for some fundraising).
Hey, speaking of Mitt. A book has just been released this month about him entitled “A Mormon in the White House.” I would be interested to hear some reviews of the book. It is listed on amazon.com under the ISBN # 159698502X. Currently, I expect it to be petty mudslinging political journalism, but hopefully I’m wrong.
Regards,
Zach
I don’t think Congress will ever implement meaningful immigration reform legislation.
Actually, if this Congress accomplishes anything, meaningful immigration reform along the lines of Bush’s plan is likely to be it.
Zach –
that book is written by Hugh Hewitt, a lawyer, former PBS journalist and right-wing radio talk show host. He’s a Presbyterian, but a big fan of Mormons (he and Neal A. Maxwell were good friends). From the comments on his blog it will be a fair but overtly positive look. Hugh hasn’t picked a candidate to support yet – it seems he’s more interested in basically creating positive PR for Mormons. He occasionally gives quite a bit of air time on his radio show to Mormon apoligists – such as back when the “Book of Mormon DNA” thingy hit the newswires.
Hugh Hewitt is a Republican first and a conservative second (he basically supports Bush no matter what – he even wrote lengthy articles on why Harriet Miers was a great pick for the Supreme Court). I don’t like that aspect – but overall, he’s a brillant guy and will be fair to Mitt in the book.
Not having read it, though, I don’t know for sure.
Politics is politics. I am always so amazed that people are surprised when candidates ‘change’ ‘evolve’ ‘grow’ ‘flip-flop’ or whatever you want to call it. What everyone knows is that Mitt is really a moderate…he was raised by moderates and was elected as a moderate in Mass. But we all know that in order to secure the GOP nomination Mitt will have to allign himself further right and attempt to appeal to the base (ie evangelicals). It’s no big deal! He’s still a moderate, but a conservative moderate. Right now Giuliani is riding hi, but he will be drug through the mud. At the end of the day, the candidate with the least amount of baggage, has the certain look, and represents the majority of the party will win the nomination. If ’00 and ’04 repeat itself then Romney is the man. If the party has evolved and is moving away from the evangelical base, then Rudy is the more likely candidate. Poor McCain is simply finished.
Romney is not anti-immigration, I don’t believe that many conservatives are despite how others attempt to distort their views. He is however definitely anti-illegal-immigration, which I think is great.
A few quotes:
* “The current system puts up a concrete wall to the best and brightest, yet those without skill or education are able to walk across the border. We must reform the current immigration laws so we can secure our borders…and increase legal immigration into America.” – Governor Mitt Romney
* “There’s only one condition on getting your Ph.D. here in the U.S. and that is: You leave as soon as you get it,” he told New Hampshire Republicans gathered for their annual convention. “Let me tell you, you get a Ph.D. here in one of our great institutions, I want you to stay. . . . It makes no sense that we put up a big concrete wall against those who have education and skills but our doors have been wide open to people that have neither.” – Governor Mitt Romney
This makes sense to me. I’m very supportive of immigration and would like to see the amount increased but we need to do it wisely. I believe you will see a lot of support for these types of proposals among conservatives: Discourage illegal immigration while at the same time increasing legal immigration.
Mitt just keeps on digging himself in deeper, doesn’t he?
But who knows? I’m hardly a majority viewpoint in the US. Maybe it’ll be a popular stance…
Aluwid, #11, I respect your views and like all of your comments, but I must, perhaps for the first time, disagree with you.
Immigration is basically a supply and demand problem. There is not enough supply (legal immigration processing through the INS) to fill the demand. If you know immigrants, you know that almost all of them, more than 99 percent, would prefer to be legal. But the INS is impossible to deal with, and slow, and bureaucratic, so they cannot become legal. It is literally impossible given the current structure.
So, there are three different general approaches to the immigration situation: 1)ignore it and keep it basically the same 2)increase legal immigration and 3)focus primarily on stopping illegal immigration.
Mitt’s approach, according to his recent public speeches on the issue and his consideration of support for even the ridiculous stance of not allowing citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants, is primarily 3). He is clearly trying to become the anti-immigration candidate. President Bush and Jeb Bush and the WSJ editorial page are primarily focused on 2).
This is a marked difference in emphasis and tone. Mitt’s tone is to attract the nativist vote to his side. I just can’t support that.
Geoff, I am keeping an eye on what Romney is up to but I am definitely not catching every speech by him or article about him so I might have missed the instances that you are so upset about. Are there any quotes in particular that you could point out to illustrate this?
I expect that we’re seeing what is expected, in primary season the candidates will focus their message more on their own base, in the general they will focus attention on the middle as well. I wouldn’t be surprised if Romney was emphasizing the means of cutting down on illegal immigration since ideas on solving that problem are what are most important to his current audience. But I would expect that, if he gets the Republican nomination, you’d start hearing more about the other side of the coin – improving legal immigration.
In other words, I see Romney as a Center-Right candidate. Right now he’s emphasizing the “Right” part of the equation, I don’t see that as a problem, it doesn’t mean that the “Center” part isn’t there too.
Aluwid,
Unfortunately, he can’t be Center and Right, as the Right has gotten so extreme.
Dan –
and the left hasn’t? The problem is that both sides are too extreme.
I’d actually be in favor of a right-wing candidate if that candidate were in the mold of Ronald Reagan and not Pat Buchanan and Tom Tancredo.
You cannot simply open the floodgates of immigration under the current system, in which illegal immigrants put further strain on our already-stressed emergency rooms and public schools. The anchor-baby law only entitles them to even more government programs. As I see it, you can scale back either immigration or the government services to which they have access. Since I can’t see an ER doc turning away a pregnant Mexican woman or a teacher refusing to educate their kids because they don’t speak English, it comes as no surprise that Romney supports the former solution.
Dan,
Anyone that is unable to see degrees of moderation on the other side of the political fence is too far out in their own field in my opinion.
Aluwid,
Actually I’m pretty moderate in my views.
Closing the borders is definitely a conservative position; as one who has worked in the belly of the beast at Homeland Security, I can tell you our borders constitute a huge national security vulnerability. That is not a “nativist” position; it’s common sense. You might agree with me if you saw how many people from some of our more difficult parts of the world are trying to come over our Southern border in particular, often with Venezuelan-printed documents.
This is an area where I think your libertarianism is naive and definitely subordinate to security concerns. You might disagree with me on that, but don’t paint me as a “nativist.”
Honestly, I’m a little tired of this whole “security” thing. I’m willing to take a few trade-offs and live in a little more dangerous world.
I actually thought libertarians were more for free moving around, small government and all. It seems like an oxymoron for libertarians to espouse a large government program…
I think at this stage the Republican party has looked at the three main candidates and been underwhelmed. At this stage it is between Fred Thompson or Newt Gingrich depending upon whether they announce. I’m hoping Thomspon will and he’d be my man. I think Gingrch, for all his strengths, has weaknesses at least on par with Guiliani.
Clark,
Conservatives’ love of Gingrich is befuddling me. I mean here he was leading the charge against Clinton’s less than savory actions in the White House, while he himself (along with the dude from Arkansas who resigned—I forget his name now), also had less than savory actions with their House aides! Conservatives may claim their uproar was over Clinton’s perjury (which of course brings up another issue of hypocrisy regarding Scooter Libby’s perjury conviction), but really their uproar was over Clinton’s relations with “that woman.” Why are conservatives today giving Gringich a pass?
Dan,
I agree with you about Gingrich. I’m tired of politicians that claim to represent conservative values yet their personal life makes them into hypocrites. The only way I could see myself voting for him would be if I was really just voting against the Democratic candidate.
FWIW, not all conservatives are giving Gingrich a pass, here are a couple examples:
http://powerlineblog.com/archives/016989.php
http://lashawnbarber.com/archives/2007/03/09/newt-gingrich-affair/
Geoff,
I agree with your position on immigration. It is also one of the few issues on which my position is close to President Bush’s.
But I think the GOP base is not only anti-illegal immigration, but anti-immigration, period. I do not hear Tom Tancredo or Pat Buchanan advocating any increase in legal immigration. And, apart from a few voices in the GOP wilderness like Geoff’s, I do not hear much support in the GOP for welcoming newcomers (documented or undocumented) to this country.
And I think it is short sighted, and not just politically for the GOP, but for the country’s long term health. My understanding is that, but for immigration (including those who are undocumented), our country would not have a self-sustaining birthrate and the population would start to shrink and would age at a greater rate. http://www.careersinaging.com/careersinaging/immigration.pdf
“Immigration is basically a supply and demand problem.”
A problem? Heaven forbid the labor supply shrinks and drives up the wages of resident workers. Or worse yet, businesses are impelled to invest in productivity-generating technologies when they can’t buy and extra pair of hands.
I agree with #27. Romney’s views aren’t strange for a candidate hoping for the far-right vote. The only reason it might seem strange is it’s so different from the last candidate that received most of that same vote. More and more some of his stances seem like posturing for votes instead of what he actually believes (unless his past stances were the posturing). Either way, it’s troubling. It probably wouldn’t bother me, and I’d chalk it up to ‘just another politician’, if he wasn’t LDS. In his case it just makes me sad.
“(along with the dude from Arkansas who resigned—I forget his name now)”
perhaps you’re thinking of Bob Livingston of Louisiana, speaker of the house for a few short weeks in 1998.
I should have said Speaker-elect
DavidH and JJohnsen, the GOP is deeply divided on the immigration issue, which a surprisingly large or mostly pro-immigration people (the Bush brothers, McCain, Giuliani, Swarzzenegger, Martinez (GOP leader), WSJ edit page) agreeing with me on the issue.
Pro-immigration Republicans (Gov. Crist in Florida) dominate in Florida, where I am living. As a pro-immigration Republican, I think it is vitally important for this country’s future that we continue to attract immigrants, and, as I said, I basically favor an ordered and secure “open border” policy.
Also keep in mind that many Republican business leaders are de facto pro-immigration because they are pro-growth, and immigration means growth.
As far as I understood, most Americans aren’t really that extreme on this issue either.
I understood the general American position to be: “I don’t mind immigration per se, but I DO want the law obeyed and I don’t want to reward people who break it.”
Which doesn’t seem completely unreasonable to me.
As far as bor der-enforcement preventing foreign terrorist attacks… that seems like completely wishful thinking.
Test:
Border
I agree with Geoff. Mitt’s pandering to the Tancredo wing of the party is appalling.
I don’t think that either Tancredo or Hunter could scare enough votes up to make a serious difference. (I hope so, anyway. But then I hoped that my state of NY wouldn’t elect Hillary in 1980. So much for how well I read the electorate.)
I’m going to have to track down an old girlfriend of mine, whose daughter married Mitt’s youngest, and see if I can’t get the word to Mitt.
I read Hewitt’s book. (I was surprised to see it at Barnes & Noble in late February when there were still notes on his blog that the pub. date was late March.) It’s pretty light stuff–and nothing that you wouldn’t have read already if you look at Hewitt’s blog, or evangelicalsformitt.com or article6blog. But it’s got a lot of promitt stuff in it.
Actually, I’m hoping Mitt is just trying to protect his right flank, and that he’ll move in a sensible direction–it’s easy to agree that we should control the border, but then the questions that you have to answer are (1) how many, and on what basis, do you allow immigrants to enter, (2) how many, and on what basis, do you allow non-immigrant workers to enter and (3) what do you do about 12,000,000 people here w/o current legal status.
And, by the way, Mitt’s wrong, or at least partly wrong, about the students completing their degree and being told to leave. First, there is the one-year practical training option for all who complete degrees under student visas here. Second, the H-1B visa allows 65,000/year with bachelor’s degrees or higher(with another 10K or 20K, I don’t remember, reserved for those with advanced degrees from U.S. universities) to work here for up to six years (with extensions in certain cases). And, university jobs are exempt from the numerical quota. Third, those people can be sponsored for permanent residence in the U.S. If the job requires an advanced degree, there is no quota, and the period from commencement of case to receipt of green card could be as short as one year. Fourth, while it’s true that immigration is currently skewed heavily in favor of unskilled labor (particularly if you include undocumented entrants), there is a need for both skilled and professional workers and for unskilled workers.
And, spending less time tracking the busboys and gardeners and chambermaids in the Arizona desert will give CBP more time to chase down bad guys.
Finally, the INS is dead. It ceased to exist when the Dept. of Homeland Security was organized in 2003. It was replaced by USCIS–Citizenship and Immigration Services–to parcel out benefits, ICE–Immigration and Customs Enforcement–for interior enforcement and CBP–Customs and Border Protection–figure it out.
Oops. One slip. There is a quota on the advanced degrees green card, but it hasn’t been filled in recent years except for immigrants from India and China, and there the delays have become significant–4 years for Indians and about 2 years for Chinese.
It’s fascinating how people believe what they want to believe. Conservatives in the bloggernaccle who are moderate on immigration are begrudgingly supporting Mitt because they believe he’s just playing the political game, pandering, triangulating, strategizing, whatever. I’ve yet to run across a hard core social conservative here in the ‘naccle who expresses similar misgivings that he might be doing the same thing with issues like abortion, gay rights, sc research, hating the French, etc. I’m not sure why this is so, but I suspect that social conservatives want so desperately to have an electable socially conservative candidate–and that Mormon social conservatives want even more desperately for the first Mormon with a real shot at the white house to share their views–that they’re willing to swallow the tripe he’s selling them (he saw the light on abortion because of sc research?!!! What’s next–will Christopher Hitchens convert to Christianity because of the persuasiveness of Intelligent Design?). But the moment his prevarications tread onto uncomfortable territory like hard-core anti immigration, people are willing to call a spade a spade.
I’m sorry, but it just seems to me that Mitt’s newfound conservatism on immigration is far more believable than his newfound conservatism on so many other issues and I find it fairly amusing that one of the ‘naccle’s most outspoken (and well spoken) conservatives wrote his first post questioning the sincerity of Mitt’s positions on this of all issues.
End rant.
Brad, I think you raise some fair issues that are worth addressing. I guess I would say that I find Mitt’s positions on other social conservative issues actually more convincing than his new anti-immigrant position.
1)On abortion, I think Mitt is, in his heart, anti-abortion. He has, at times, seemed to be pro-choice. I believe he has a true conversion on this issue, similar to the one I had several years back. So, this rings true to me. He would most likely appoint conservative, Constructionist judges similar to Roberts and Alito, and that is good enough for me.
2)I think his positions on stem cell research and gay marriage have been consistently and acceptably conservative. As for being “pro gay rights” in the 1990s, well, I am pro gay rights in the sense that I don’t think gays should be discriminated against or denied jobs based on their sexual orientation. But I’m not in favor of changing the definition of marriage, which I think is also Mitt’s bottom line.
3)Mitt recently joined the NRA, which appears to be pandering to the pro-gun vote. I’m not sure of the spin on this, but this is certainly an area where you could legitimately stick him with the title, “flip-flopper.” I am an NRA member who also recently joined. I’m glad to welcome him to the pro-Second Amendment team.
4)On other conservative issues, being pro-business, anti-tax, pro national security, anti-crime, Mitt has not really changed his views recently. And these are huge issues for conservatives, much bigger, for example, than stem cell research.
So, Mitt gets an A-minus as a conservative, in my opinion.
If he becomes a Tom Tancredo clone and starts pursuing the nativist vote, he goes down to a C, however. And the reason is that Tom Tancredo, Duncan Hunter and their ilk fundamentally do not understand the important role of immigration in making this country great. For me, that is a huge, fundamental difference, along the lines of Mitt suddenly announcing he wants a huge tax increase.
Sorry for the multiple posts. Our stupid software had a problem with something I wrote (still can’t figure out what it was). Please read 38-40 as one comment.
Bill,
#30,
That’s the guy, thanks.
Maybe it was the word e m p i r e or K o r e a
So it looks like Fred Thompson may be running. If he runs I have fair confidence he’ll win and he’ll deserve to.
Geoff- I gotta ask you to take a second and address something. I am perhaps your biggest political ally here at M*. Your thoughts are my thoughts 99% of the time. But I cannot tolerate the way you frame the immigration debate EVERY. STINKING. TIME.
Taking a stand against illegal immigration DOES NOT automatically make one anti-immigration. You either do not understand the clear differences between the two, or you are deliberately trying to frame the argument to your advantage by equating illegal immigration with immigration.
I’m not going to waste my time arguing this subject. We’ve hashed it out way too many times. But I would like you to please tell me why you frame this argument the way you do. Come on, man. You’re not talking to somebody clear on the other side of the political spectrum here. You don’t need to jack with me. You cannot sit there and tell me I’m an anti-immigration nativist just because I’m not thrilled about our open southern border. You do that, my friend, and you lose all credibility with me.
I don’t often agree with Tossman, but I think he hits a key distinction in American attitudes about immigration.
Like I said above, most Americans aren’t necessarily against immigration per se. They just don’t want to see people breaking the law and getting away with it.
I agree. The problem is that most politicians are trying to have it both ways.
What we need is a real worker’s permit, better and easier immigration and then a tightening on illegal immigration. But I can’t see politicians of any stripe being willing to do this.
I’ll address Tossman’s comment here.
The issue is one of emphasis and focus. The immigration system is clearly broken, as anybody who has spent time with immigrants knows. It takes years for immigration claims to even be addressed in a serious manner. The result is 12 million undocumented workers, the vast majority of whom would prefer to be legal. if we had an immigration system that worked, a potential immigrant would go to a consulate in Monterrey, Mexico, apply for a visa, be given one in 24 hours, head to the border, show his visa and then get into the country. Once he were here, he would, after a year, apply for residency and get it in one week. After five years, he could apply for citizenship and get it in five or seven years after filling out the paperwork and taking language, history exams, etc.
The reality is visas are impossible to get, residency takes forever, citizenship takes forever, the whole system is broken.
In my mind, our immigration problem is akin to politicians deciding to retroactively charge all jay-walkers with committing heinous crimes and deporting them. That’s not the way you deal with jay-walking: if you want to crack down on jay-walking, you fix the problem of not having enough cross walks, you educate people on the dangers of jay-walking, etc.
So, when I discuss emphasis, I am saying that politicians who “get” the problem understand that you have to fix the immigration system first before you beat up on the people who wanted to follow the law but were unable because the system was broken.
If Mitt were truly interested in innovative solutions, he would be primarily discussing ways to help the guy in Monterrey legally get a visa. He would be discussing ways to streamline residency and citizenship requirements. Does that involve money? Yes it does, but guess what, immigrants are willing to pay more, a lot more, to get visas and residency and become citizens. The system could pay for itself.
Instead, Mitt is on one hand saying legal immigration is good but that we have to crack down on the illegals. His emphasis is primarily on seeing illegal immigration as a crime problem (which it is not) instead of a broken government bureaucracy problem (which it is).
So, if you are not willing to deal with the realities of the situation, which is that the immigration system is broken, you must in my mind either be: 1)ignorant of the situation, in which case if you want to be president you had better get up to speed 2)posturing to the nativists for political reasons 3)anti-immigration. My argument is that Mitt is primarily number 2, but that he is coming across as number 3, and that’s wrong-headed for many, many reasons.
I agree with Tossman. I think the suggestion that Mitt Romney is ‘anti-immigrant’ is misleading and inflammatory.
An opponent of immigration is not ‘anti-immigrant’ he is ‘anti-immigration’. Big difference. And it has yet to be demonstrated that Romney is anti-immigration. He is only anti-illegal immigration, which is an unremarkable thing.
Not related to immigration, but related to Romney so it’s all good right? I saw this article today, those that are concerned about Romney’s courting of the right should take heart in it:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/state/orl-romneyfla1107mar11,0,6007723.story?coll=orl-news-headlines-state
I consider myself to fit the social conservative label pretty well but I really didn’t get the whole Terri Schiavo controversy and I think it’s strange that there are still people that talk about it, act like an injustice was done etc. Nice to see that he disagreed with the whole political circus that went on.
Geoff- I’ll make an analogy. I’m assuming that, as an American, you are concerned with radical Islam- a term meant here as a subset of persons identifying themselves as Muslims. This isn’t to argue who is a ‘real’ Muslim and who is not. The fact is, a certain percentage of persons who worship Allah are radical. The rest are peace-loving faithful who do not share those radical views, and who take great offense to being lumped in with the radical element.
Now how honest would it be for me to go around saying you are anti-Muslim? Absolutely not.
The crux of your argument seems to be that politicians who who’ve taken anti-illegal immigration stances and aren’t gung ho about letting the ship flood while we completely revamp our system, are completely against immigration in general. Further, anybody who doesn’t agree with your theory that curbing illegal immigration means certain economic disaster is naturally against immigration at all. It doesn’t make sense, Geoff.
Tossman,
What would you do with the 12 million undocumented individuals who are here?
Would you support any increase in the current limits on legal immigration?
Well, DavidH, we’re now getting back to the very thing we’ve fought about time and time again. I couldn’t tell you exactly what my opinion as far as increasing legal immigration rates. I simply haven’t studied current policy enough to make an informed decision.
What I would like to see is a fair policy. One that cuts down on the red tape and outdated restrictions, and that makes it equally easy for a Morroccan family and a Canadian family to immigrate. Where I part comp’ny with most of you is my belief in pluggin the leak before decorating the hull. The U.S. economy simply cannot absorb those illegal immigrants at the rate we are recieving them. I invite Geoff, and anybody else, to go check out a Salt Lake area ER or visit a school. We are drowning in illegals here, and it is killing our economy and stagnating our education system.
I think obviously we can’t send them all back, nor does anybody reasonable want to. Really it is our fault they’re here, though that does not exempt them or businesses who exploit them from the law. We have to somehow absorb them- economically, politically, socially. But we cannot begin that process while water is rushing uncontrolled into the boat (please excuse the analogy overkill).
-I would like to see a fence built. Damn political correctness. Build an actual physical fence and I just bet we see a dramatic decrease. If fences do no good, as many of you have argued, why not tear down the fences surrounding prisons? The fact is that a physical, monitored barrier will work.
-Overturn the anchor baby policy. It is as damaging to illegal immigrants as it is to local American economies. You have mothers risking their lives and those of their unborn children to cross the border. You have mothers getting pregnant specifically for the purpose of anchoring in the U.S.
Plug the hole. Enforce existing laws. Then- THEN I’m willing to talk about revamping immigration policy.
Now DavidH, I realize I didn’t really answer your question, and I realize that you are asking those questions to guage my argument with Geoff. If I support anything other than amnesty, it’s a sure sign to you that I’m a nativist pig. If I don’t support a drastic increase in current immigration levels, to you I truly am anti-immigration. You are rationalizing the equation of ‘anti-illegal immigration’ to ‘anti-immigrant’ with the notion that most people who oppose illegal immigration also don’t advocate an increase in current levels. So to the likes of Geoff, one essentially equals the other. The linguistic acrobatics play on emotions, shoring up (if falsely) your argument.
While I’m not entirely convinced that America has punched its ticket to hell by not dramatically dropping limits, I would like to see a general increase in immigration. I simplly would like it to be fair, equal, and encouraging of a true diversity. Granting amnesty and opening borders certainly does not accomplish that.
Correction: ‘by not dramatically increasing limits.’
Another thing to consider with the whole guest worker thing…
A guest worker program could quite conceivably end up benefiting unintended people if we aren’t careful about it.
First off, a guest worker program is going to be of great interest to labor intensive companies within the US. They will be eager to get their hands on cheap, hard-working labor.
What people don’t realize is, that labor is not really Mexican. If you want to talk pure comparative advantage, Pakistani labor is far, far cheaper than Mexican labor. In fact, relatively speaking, Mexican labor is actually expensive when pitted against other international labor sources.
It’s entirely possible that a guest worker program is not going to benefit Mexican, but Pakistani and African laborers.
If this does indeed happen, we may end up looking at concentrated enclaves of, to continue the example, Pakistani, Afghan, Uzbek, and Iranian laborers. These nationalities are particularly noteworthy because of the possibility of such enclaves becoming breeding grounds for extremist ideologies.
Thus far, the US has been blessed with a relatively educated, and relatively un-concentrated population of Muslim immigrants. It’s hard to predict the social problems that will accompany “company towns” of poor, uneducated Muslim immigrants.
So I don’t think a blanket guest worker program is really a great idea. I would be interested in seeing the immigration problem localized, isolated, and limited to Mexico and Central America via a NAFTA type arrangement. NAFTA has a lot of problems, but it needs to be advanced. We simply cannot continue without some sort of accommodation with Mexico.
I don’t really object particularly to the idea of a fence. But it’s obviously a stop-gap measure. And it’s doubtful if anyone is willing to shell out the kind of cash to make it truly effective. If I were a politician, I would support funding for border enforcement. Done responsibly, it can’t hurt matters, and it will make a large segment of America happier. Heck, if we could get the National Guard out of Iraq, I’d be just fine with the state Governors using them to help police the border.
But a fence absolutely must be combined with a greater increase in funding for the IMF. The barriers Geoff talks about to immigration are very much a concern. The approval process needs to be streamlined desperately. Fees for entry into the US should be boosted (which will help offset costs). We should be doing everything possible to make sure that the stream of Latin American migrants is going through official checkpoints in Texas and California and not dashing madly across the Sonoran Desert in pickup trucks. A fence will not solve that problem, you’ve got to divert the flow with incentives as well as barriers.
Seth, some have suggested that that’s the point of the guest worker program: open up our labor market to a couple billion people who can’t just walk here, and the Mexicans and Central Americans can keep doing as they have been.
The legal/illegal immigration distinction is a meaningless distraction. If legality were the sole issue, then that would be readily solvable by eliminating all border restrictions.
What irritates me a bit is that for over twenty years every person in this country supposedly has had to present proof of identity and eligibility to work when he takes a job. I’ve had to “show my papers” every time I started a new job. A couple hundred million people have to prove they’re not illegal aliens, but the illegal aliens don’t seem slowed down by this. (Similar is the federal requirement that everyone applying for a fishing or hunting license must prove first that he isn’t behind on child support payments.)
Tossman,
I cannot remember if you and I have had a discussion about immigration before. If we have (and it is possible that we have), I apologize for reopening our debate.
But I think Geoff’s position on immigration and his status as a card-carrying conservative republican Mormon is evidence that those of us who support opening our doors are not all bleeding heart liberal secularist democrats. (Of course, it is possible that Geoff is a bleeding heart card-carrying conservative republican Mormon.)
John that’s one major problem with the way the immigration situation works. By making it so lucrative to forge documents it makes it much easier for others (i.e. terrorists) to get in.
DavidH- I appreciate your polite response to my knee-jerk response to your questions. Thank you. I never accused you of being liberal, secularist, or a democrat though.
Or it’s possible that Geoff is just nuts.
OK, Tossman, I will try once more to explain my logic on this issue. If I’m still nuts, then I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree.
Let me start by a logical progression. A pro-immigration person might think this way:
A)Immigration is a good thing and contributes to prosperity.
B)Immigrants are, for the most part, good, hard-working people just looking for a better future, just like most Americans.
C)Most recent immigrants are illegal.
D)The immigration system is a mess and makes it impossible to become legal.
E)We cannot treat the immigration situation as a crime problem because the people involved do not want to commit crimes but instead just want to immigrate (or become guest workers), just like almost all Americans have done.
F)Any solution to this problem has to start with fixing the mess involved with the immigration system.
G)This means recognizing that the people involved are, for the most part, not criminals and that we need to give them some kind of legal status and path to citizenship.
H)Deportations, walls, etc. are not part of the solution until we deal with the 12 million or so already here.
I)Once we fix the system, we can start cracking down on illegal immigrants. If any legal immigrant can have a reasonable path to residency/citizenship and can easily get a visa to enter the country, then there is no reason for them to break the law anymore. Once we do that, we can begin to discuss deportation, walls, etc.
J)The concerns regarding border security having to do with national security issues (such as terrorists sneaking across the border) are legitimate issues that need to be dealt with separately from the immigration issue.
OK, now let’s look at what I consider an anti-immigrant position:
1)Immigrants may or may not be good for the country — the record is mixed.
2)A lot of immigrants don’t know how to drive, don’t speak English, don’t really fit in and are “Hispanicizing” America creating separate barrios where you don’t even hear English — they aren’t like us.
3)In addition to that, these people are illegal, they got here illegally and have committed a crime by doing so.
4)We need to deport them or build walls or set up a national employer ID system and THEN we’ll start dealing with fixing the immigration system.
Now, obviously these are two extremes. A lot of people, including Tossman, are somewhere in the middle. But the A-I position is basically the position of what I will call “pro-immigration Republicans” (and obviously many others, including most Democrats). Positions 1-4 are the types of things you hear from “populist” or “anti-immigrant” Republicans.
My point is that Mitt, in his heart, probably is more pro-immigration than not. But lately he appears to be leaning more toward the “anti-immigrant” side. This does not make Mitt “anti-immigrant,” which is why there is a question mark in the title of this post. But it is worrisome to me, and I think it’s a step in the wrong direction.
The solution is to fix the immigration system FIRST. And once the system works smoothly, meaning there is a reasonable path to getting a visa, becoming a resident and then hopefully a citizen, then we can start thinking about national employment ID cards and the like.
Geoff, thanks for the explanation. You’re still nuts though;)
I think it boils down to is that there are two problems- current immigration policy and illegal immigration. Both problems have their consequences, and you may argue that one resulted from the other.
So the question is how do you solve those problems, and in what order? Can we kill two birds with one stone? Can we really just let the floodwaters flow while we hash out the politics of reforming the system? Say Congress decides tomorrow that they’re going to solve the immigration issue. Even with all the bipartisan cooperation that can realistically be expected given the makeup of this Congress, how long do you think it would take? Meanwhile, the flood continues.
My question is this- what is wrong with stopping illegal immigration first? Your position seems to be that the economic, social, and criminal problems that come as a result of illegal immigration- if they even exist- are small enough to tolerate in the name of compassion.
I ask you, or anybody, to give me a credible argument as what’s wrong with closing the border and stemming the tide first. I really don’t have a problem with the solutions you propose for improving the system. But this cannot and will not be done with the current rate of illegal influx.
One more question for you, Geoff. Would you be in favor of repealing the anchor baby policy? Why?
The longer Romney stays in the race, the more despicable a candidate he becomes.
Pretty sad that Mitt Romney Its leaving he’s own persona behinds and becoming something that he isn’t because of an ambition that he wants to persuit. Too scared to be bashed instead of been he’s own self. Look at Gulliani, he’s social issues are way out of the republican spectrum, yet he stands by them and doesn’t flip flop like Romney has been doing lately.. and he’s on the lead. Either-way, pretty big turn-off.