THE issue in '08: Immigration

And if a Democrat has the balls to adopt a "tough on illegals" stance, he/she will win the election going away, as the Repubs have zero credibility on the issue.

The problem with "Immigration" as an issue is that:

* Immigration itself is a neutral term

* The GOP is working even now to legalize the status of more and more immigrants who have traditionally been considered to be here illegally.

are you sure the repubs have no credibility on this issue? Why are they still seen as the party of immigration control? I think both parties are guilty of catering to illegal immigrants. It was disturbing to see the intelligence bill pass without any mention of immigration. I do agree that alot of votes could be had if a candidate has the balls to stand up to illegal immigration lobbies. I don't think most latinos and asian-americans are for illegal immigration, but I could be wrong.

is that legal Latino immigrants will have no problem with a candidate who gets tough on illegals. I don't think it will have much of an effect on the Hispanic vote either way. Matter of fact, Hispanics who are here legally will probably respect a politician who defends THEIR rights and commends them for having done it the right way.

While I never like to generalize about a group, the Hipanic "leaders" in this country are pretty vocal about there not being anything which would hinder the civil and economic rights of illegal immigrants. While we might get some blue collar and union types on our side with a "get tough" on illegals platform, we would allow the GOP to make further inroads into the Hispanic vote.

Getting tough:

1. Denying access to schools and health services for children of illegals.

2. Instant deportation when apprehended, even for a traffic stop.

3. No drivers licensnces and "on-the-spot" confiscation of cars driven by illegals.

4. Massive fines for employment of illegals.

5. A national ID card to ferret out illegals.

Is this where we would want to go????

on the immigration issues. I wouldn't say it takes balls to adopt a tough on illegals stance. It takes prejudice, stupidity and the willingness to exploit the worst instincts in America.

This nation was built on immigration and it will take balls to take a pro-immigration stance.

Or are you confusing illegal immigration with legal immigration?

such a thing as "illegal" immigrants then you are anti-immigration.
Saying you are only against "illegal" immigrants is a nice cover to avoid sounding xenophobic but if a person is really fine with immigration they will propose allowing more people into the country as the way to solve the "illegal" immigrant problem. I don't think being "tough on illegal immigration" means allowing more people into the country, so yes it is anti-immigrant.

if that's what you mean. And if one doesn't believe in open borders, then it follows that there has to be both legal and illegal immigration, because there will be rules to follow to apply to get into this country legally.

Open borders are a nice concept, but they aren't practical security-wise; it's fairly important, in this day and age, that we have somewhat of a grip on knowing who is entering the country.

but few of our immigration laws are about security. If that's all the laws were about I wouldn't mind. But you and I both know that the restrictions on the number of people allowed in the US each year has more to do with keeping out people with the wrong skin color than it has to do with national security.

I don't have a problem with people wanting to come here, as immigration is what made the U.S. More than anything, we need to keep track of people coming in. Like you said, I think they should be about secrurity and not about the 'wrong skin color.' If we made it legal, I think it would make it much easier to keep track of them, and thus more secure.

States are staggering under the burden of illegals; they can't build schools quickly enough, & hospitals have closed in all the border states.

Businesses & corporations want illegals for cheap wages, but the communities are stuck with the costs.

Then they will pay taxes that will help build the community infrastructure like schools and hospitals. They will also start to make enough money to contribute to the economic well being of the community. Classifying human beings as "illegal" only makes things worth.

The businesses deduct their FICA and withholding.

...what they don't receive is a refund, since many use fradulent numbers just to gain employment.

Where I live, a majority of the migrant workers pay taxes. These taxes go to fund schools and other services. The main difference is that they don't receive as much from the money that they pay in, especially in Social Security, a different topic all together.

The people who are saying that so called illegal immigration is hurting our schools and other social services are simply scapegoating. Government mishandling (a non-partisan issue) is to blame.

What needs to be fixed is our foreign policy and they way our social services (schools, libraries, health care) are run.

...it's there.

Many illegals who come to this country have sizable families back in their homeland, and that's why they're coming. Many don't intend to stay; they intend to make enough money to return to their homelands and care for their families. The reasons they come here have a lot more to do with their own country being f*cked up than with us.

As an anecdote, I tutored a young Mexican student in the English Center at a local community college. He was the oldest of TWENTY children, and was working to support his mother and siblings. He started working here as an illegal in the fruit orchards of eastern WA, and had somehow obtained a visa when he asked for permission to enroll in the local high school. As for me, I gotta tell ya, the first thing I think about is "how the F*** can a nation tell a woman she can't control her own fertility, but then turn its back on the 20 kids she winds up with?!?"

Countries like Mexico manufacture poverty through a series of draconian policies. The union of church and state. Limited or no access to family planning resources of any kind. No environmental or labor protections. Astounding divide between rich and poor.

Yet Vicente Fox gets on the TV, in his custom suits, and tries to grin and glad-hand President Chimpy into swinging wide the gates for illegals. And I wonder why somebody doesn't stand up to Fox, and other Banana Republicans, and tell him that when his government starts taking care of its own people and stops passing that buck to Canada and us, we'll be more inclined to raise the numbers of LEGAL immigrants we'll accept per year.

Certainly, I believe in providing illegals with healthcare and education -- it's not just good for them, it's good for everyone else. But our foreign policy needs to demand more from rich corporocrats like Fox who allow their own people to starve, and nod and wave while they flee their ancestral homes out of desperation for support. Immigration isn't just a U.S. problem.

The US is an empire. We live in the belly of the beast. We can and must change the way that our country acts.

<i>Many illegals who come to this country have sizable families back in their homeland, and that's why they're coming. Many don't intend to stay; they intend to make enough money to return to their homelands and care for their families. The reasons they come here have a lot more to do with their own country being f*cked up than with us.</i>
You are most certainly right about the size of families. But why is that? Is it because their governments force them to? Or is it because large families serve as a form of social security? Your experience illustrates the form of SS that I refer to. I also believe, and am sure there are statistics to back me up, that twenty is not the norm.

Sure their countries are messed up, but why is it? Let's look at Haiti. They have had turmoil since the Revolution in 1804. Why is that? A look at the countries history shows that while there were some monstrous dictators, they were often supported by the US and other Western powers. When a democracy blossomed, it was overturned - violently. Additionally, the country has been invaded, blockaded, and threatened by the "civilized" Western Powers since the slave revolts.

Mexico too was invaded by the US. Sure jokers like Fox don't help, but he surely isn't the cause. He is backed by the US. If he wasn't he surely wouldn't be in power. Look at the rest of South America and tell me that US involvement hasn't played a role in their current status.

<i>As an anecdote, I tutored a young Mexican student in the English Center at a local community college. He was the oldest of TWENTY children, and was working to support his mother and siblings. He started working here as an illegal in the fruit orchards of eastern WA, and had somehow obtained a visa when he asked for permission to enroll in the local high school. As for me, I gotta tell ya, the first thing I think about is "how the F*** can a nation tell a woman she can't control her own fertility, but then turn its back on the 20 kids she winds up with?!?"</i>
Great point! Maybe removing the global gag rule institued by the US would help. As for Mexican policy, I'm not sure that they regulate women's use of birth control.

<i>Countries like Mexico manufacture poverty through a series of draconian policies. The union of church and state. Limited or no access to family planning resources of any kind. No environmental or labor protections. Astounding divide between rich and poor.</i>
Are you trying to tell me that the US has had nothing to do with this? Does NAFTA ring a bell?

<i>Yet Vicente Fox gets on the TV, in his custom suits, and tries to grin and glad-hand President Chimpy into swinging wide the gates for illegals. And I wonder why somebody doesn't stand up to Fox, and other Banana Republicans, and tell him that when his government starts taking care of its own people and stops passing that buck to Canada and us, we'll be more inclined to raise the numbers of LEGAL immigrants we'll accept per year.</i>
Yes, Vincente Fox is a puppet, what's your point? Clinton helped the degradation with NAFTA. To stop the flow of immigration we should stop propping up puppets and work to improve global living standards. This isn't about Fox or Bush (or Clinton for that matter). This is about making the world a more livable place.

<i>Certainly, I believe in providing illegals with healthcare and education -- it's not just good for them, it's good for everyone else. But our foreign policy needs to demand more from rich corporocrats like Fox who allow their own people to starve, and nod and wave while they flee their ancestral homes out of desperation for support. Immigration isn't just a U.S. problem.</i>
Immigration isn't really a problem at all. Unjust economic, environmental, and social conditions are.

Back to Haiti. The US refused entry to asylum seekers during the Duvalier years. Asylum seekers that returned to Haiti were killed. When Aristide came to power, the US began accepting asylum seekers. The problem was very few people were seeking asylum! Then the CIA overthrew Aristide, put Constant, guy phillipe, and Chamblain in power. Haitian refugees multiplied drastically but the US refused them. . .again! The pattern repeats itself.

So continue to ignore the crucial role the US plays in the problem and it will never be solved.

The U.S. f*cks up other countries. So the logical solution to this is that we swing wide the gates and let everyone in? As punishment for being imperialist pigs? The solution to screwing up the world (assuming your view is accurate, and the U.S. is the origin of every evil in the world, and Third World leaders have entirely clean hands and good intentions, it's all our fault...) is to screw up our own country. Oh, OK.

If you want to punish the imperialists, you go right ahead and punish them. But you conveniently forget that large populations of undocumented immigrants skulking about doesn't hurt the gated-community set who advance policies like NAFTA. Au contraire; it never touches them. It hurts the American lower class.

They're the ones who have to ride public transport or send their kids to school with illegals who might be carrying TB or God knows what else. They're the ones competing for jobs with people who will work for pennies. They're the ones who suffer when hospitals and schools collapse from underfunding in border states.

No, the US isn't the origin of every evil in the world, nor are teh hands of Third World dictators clean. Those are silly claims and I never made it, but you know that.

While I don't believe in borders, I didn't suggest "we swing wide the gates and let everyone in." I merely suggested that we go to the root of the problem instead of hacking at the branches.

Instead of instituting a closed border policy I suggest that we encourage policies that would limit the desire to immigrate.

And as far as your comment about the lower class. . .my impression is that you believe I am in the middle to upper class. I'm not. I'm definitely working class, living paycheck to paycheck. I grew up in a working class town with a lot of first and second generation immigrants. I rode public transportation with them. I never caught "TB or God knows what else" nor did anyone that I know. I'm not saying that it doesn't happen, but I never knew of any cases.

It's also an economic fallacy to assert that immigration (legal or illegal) is leading to the lowering of wages. It's the current form of globalization and automation that is eliminating good paying jobs. The immigration issue is, in my opinion, a smokescreen to turn our attention from the real issue.

No message about legality.

This nation was built on immigration.

However, this nation does not have unlimited natural resources, and you are wrong to label those who oppose increasing immigration racists.

VERY WRONG.

At the present rate of immigration, California's population will double in 38 years. We barely have enough fresh water in this state for drinking, farming, and our remaining natural areas, such as the delta, as it is. It has got to stop.

We need real leadership on this issue. Immigration is a different challenge in this century, and overpopulation is the gravest threat facing humankind and this planet

There's plenty of room. I know America has more money and resources than whatever nation immigrants are coming from. Chances are they have less natural resources to expend than we have. We're the richest nation on earth, by far.
The question is, do we care about all people regardless of where they were born, or not? Overpopulation is a global problem that must be solved. Stopping immigration doesn't solve the worlds' overpopulation problem. It just leaves the problem in somebody else's back yard.

in the U.S. is not a serious problem. It's a threat to the future of our children and grandchildern even more.

Morally, this issue needs to be addressed. It won't go away, and ignoring it will only make it worse. The planet is at stake.

You can't shut the door and ignore the problem. Overpopulation in other nations will effect the US in one way or another. To deny that is short-sighted and maybe idealistic. It seems you are the one who wants to ignore the problem by closing our borders and pretending it is something only other nations will have to address on their own.

If we're going to deal with overpopulation we have to address it as a global problem, not a California problem.

...I know many thought the Sierra club members who opposed illegal immigration were racists...but that's too simplistic. Many of us are looking at land resources, and are pro- low birthrates. It is a fact, that many immigrant communities culturally support larger families than are sustainable.

I'm not cruel, and I actually don't believe we should refer to any human being as "illegal". However, I do think we have to balance human needs with those of the environment.

should assist them in doing so.

If, however, as in Mexico the population continues to increase at an unsustainable rate, we have no obligation to overpopulate our country as well.

The number of children per family in Mexico is very high, and the culture must change.

Generally speaking, immigrants come to the U.S., either legally or illegally, to look for work, not wilderness.

There may be plenty of wide-open spaces in Kansas and Montana, but the deer and the antelope aren't hiring. Indeed, these places would be a lot less sparsely populated if there were jobs aplenty there.

Have you ever thought that our lifestyles have anything to do with so-called resource depletion?

Our farming practices are unsustainable. Our lawns are unsustainable. Urban sprawl is unsustainable. Swimming pools in the desert are unsustainable.

But instead of looking at ourselves we blame the global poor. This is irresponsible, irrational and cold-hearted.

for Americans. I'm for protecting the rights of Americans. The time for mass immigration of either form is over. If the repukes had their way, they would import immigrants to fill all jobs (technical and menial) and pay them peanuts.

And if the Democrats had their way we would have CAFTA and an expansion of the WTO's powers. At least that would be the case if it were up to Bill Clinton.

These institutions ruin wages, the environment, morale, and overall living conditions.

I believe I requested the info in a previous thread.

cheap labor is still very much the economic model in parts of this country. Cheap labor drives wages down for everyone. Why do you think Shrub is so hot to trot for Mexican immigration? Because he loves all mankind?

Immigration is also a security issue. New laws aren't needed - just enforce the ones we have.

illegals are not welcome in America, imvho!

because we don't like legal immigration. Otherwise, they would all be legal immigrants and the illegals wouldn't have to sneak in.

...is a status created by other countries who neglect, abuse and exploit their own people.

People don't generally like to leave their ancestral homes, cultures and families. It's traumatic. They leave when they're forced to, by a lack of jobs and resources, and an indifferent or hostile government.

Immigration isn't an all-or-nothing issue. It's part of a global human rights discussion. We can't just open our borders and look the other way while greedy despots gut their treasuries for palaces and private jets, and shoo their hungry undesirables onto our shores.

So people don't like to leave their ancestral homes? That's interesting, because where I'm from, people are always moving. There is also an unsustainable amount of urban sprawl and subdivision. All of these people had no problem leaving their "ancestral homes, cultures and families." It wasn't "traumatic" to them.

Good! I'm glad it wasn't traumatic for them, as you testify. Hopefully the journey back won't be traumatic, either. Because if they're not invited, and they're not willing to apply for legal entry the way my non-English-speaking grandparents and their family did, they can just take their happy and un-traumatized asses back home.

It's a matter of human rights. I don't like that "tough on (insert a group of people, excepting terrorists)" attitude. btw i'm a legal immigrant.

illegal immigration creates a cheap labor force that the gop and their paymaters love to exploit. why do you think bush is always trying to make it easier for illegals? because he loves mankind? because he respects the mexican people and their culture and wants us all to come together and sing kum-baya? no because the people who pay for his campaigns love to exploit cheap labor and drive wages down for EVERYONE.

The people that I know have had a harder time under the Bush Administration. Most were hoping for a Kerry Administration.

I think we need *tough* immigration laws.

and whether or not you are a moral person, willing to take a stand. Issues don't seem to matter...

Bob Schieffer said he got more emails on illegal immigration than any other subject for the 3rd debate.

This issue has been brewing, but neither party has wanted to address it for fear of alienating Hispanic voters.

The House didn't get the legislation they wanted, but were told it would come up in the new Congress.

The people of Arizona passed a referendum cutting some bennies for illegals. The Governor & both Senators were against it, but it passed.

Hispanics I know, want the borders enforced. Arnie was elected Governor in Cal, with a majority of the Hispanic vote, promising to take away licenses from illegals. Davis & Bustamante both lost on this issue.

They are obviously related in this country, however.

The idea that California's population is projected to double in 37 years due to immigration is a sobering thought considering our natural resources are already stretched very thin.

I do hope the democratic party looks at this difficult issue responsibly. Right now anyone who brings up limiting immigration is often labeled as a racist.

Neither party is addressing the issue because they are afraid of losing a large portion of the Latino vote, but it is not polictically correct to say that. We need real leadership on this issue.

I don't see any pretense of a stance one way or another mattering.

Immigration policy is basically a matter of quotas driven by a demand for workers of various kinds. Political immigration is trivial in numbers and family co-immigration can't really be changed. There is no "principled" politics of it, there has never been, there will never be. Sure, a society can decide who joins it and who doesn't...but the standards are all situational unless you're talking about a community absolutely defined by who you were born to.

As the old joke goes, the American Indians were the first people to consider illegal immigration a problem in North America. Everybody else has a lesser case.

Then again, I think '06 will change the partisan national power balance and all this "oh my god, this is the killer issue" thinking/hoping will go away.

and if kerry had been one he'd be in the wh today.

they have been giving us wedge issues, but immigration can be their krytonite. why? because although a majority of republicans have been drinking the neocon cool aid, many GOP'ers are paleocon on immigration. they are more traditionalists and nationalists in the buchanan mold rather than corporate anarchists like this administration. to this administration, economics matters more and therefore illegal immigration is good. what the corporate elite want is a country without borders and instant access to cheap labor with little regard for soveirgnty. this division can and must be exploited, we must embrace a populist agenda which includes border security and tough stance on illegals.

least a 3% swing in Kerry's favor had he taken a hard stance on illegal immigration.

gop loves cheap labor and that's why awol is so in love with illegal mexican immigration. this is a great opportunity for dems.

If Democrats decide to crack down on illegal immigration, they'll win the presidency. There are many people who are downright scared about what states are going to do about the problem. My state, Oregon, has been having massive budget shortfalls, and the schools are suffering. Without illegal immigrants demanding ESL classes, I'm almost sure the state could be in the black (I have no facts to back this up, though :p). Nonetheless, I know many, many conservatives who would come to the other side if the Democrats showed that they can be fiscally responsible and tough in illegal immigration.

I'm still figuring out my own views on this issue, but at a recent powwow with Dems and Repubs at my school, a couple folks who'd been working on immigration policy in D.C. mentioned that the even more fundamental issue (than illegal migrants) is the extremely high numbers of people who are allowed in legally every year based on Reagan and Bush admin policies-- approx. 1 million, with lots of "chain immigration" from distant (and dubious) relatives pushing the numbers up ridiculously high. They opined that this was the real immigration issue, that these numbers were unsustainable for the human and natural resources of high immigration states. They were arguing that the US will suffer overpopulation and natural resources collapse in about 3 decades due to our high consumption levels, unless the Bush Administration immigration law from 1990 (which allows the 1 million-ish numbers of new entrants) is changed to lower the number of people allowed in. The policymakers here were of course being entirely fair and non-racist about this, indicating that quotas for Europeans would have to be reduced just as much as quotas for Africans or Asians-- their point was that it's the ridiculously high absolute numbers of legal immigrants that are straining our ecosystem so much.

I'm still not sure what to make of their arguments, but I'm at least mulling them over, and I do honestly get very irritated at the media platitudes about how the USA's doors should remain permanently open since we're "a nation of immigrants." Well, many countries can claim to be nations of immigrants over the past few centuries, not just the US, and I hardly think that e.g. the native Americans (or the Mexicans in the US Southwest, prior to the US-Mexican War in 1846-48) are all that happy about the throngs of Anglos who immigrated themselves in. I have an overall very favorable impression of immigrants to the US, but it's an obvious fact that we have finite natural and human resources here; we can't sustain our level of fossil-fuel consumption for our population as it is, let alone what it would be in 20 years. We have no choice but to set some arbitrary limit on the numbers of people who should come in. And why should the US be so special as *the* immigrant destination anyway? Wouldn't it make more sense to provide foreign aid, AIDS and education for women and the impoverished, better public health and investment to developing countries, to make them more attractive, rather than siphoning off their citizens to do demeaning jobs for slave wages here?

Because of historical circumstances and the enormous land transfer that occurred after the Mexican War (with many Mexicans being evicted from their property and kicked out of the country entirely), I can sympathize to some extent with the arguments of Mexicans in Southwestern states (which are basically becoming Anglo-Hispanic bilingual/bicultural zones anyway, de facto at least). But overall, I'm starting to believe that we need to rething the overall numbers, or at least produce a more directed immigration policy. The willy-nilly system we have now just isn't working very well. I've noticed libs, conservatives (paleocons at least), and moderates all reaching some form of consensus on this.

wage depression Americans are faced with due to offshoring American jobs. Are Democrats going to protect Americans or protect foreigners?

And it's our best wedge issue. We can split the republican party in half with this.

do.

The first issue is illegal immigration. The second is affirmative action. Most Republicans have done nothing to stop either. Remember, Bush is not on the far-right, he's a neo-con. He only seems far-right because a lot of you guys are far off the deep end on the left. An incompetant moron who mis-handled a war, yes. A far right-winger, not even close. Jesse Helms and Bob Barr are far right-wingers, not the Republican Party core and key Senators and Congressmen.

but I agree with the rest of your post. Bush is socially conservative, but other than that...

AA should be based on your economic status, not your racial/ethnic/sexual status. I do reasonably well and my wife should not receive special status based on the fact she is female or asian. A child of a white, dirt poor, trailer-trash should have precednece over her on government handouts. Let's keep AA, but make it available to all the poor; black, white,, or brown.

BTW, are there any anti-AA Republicans, like Jesse Helms was? How about anti-immigrant Repubs? I know Congressman Tom Tancredo sure is.

Trailer Trash? This is the big tent party?

I have spent about four years of my adult life living in "mobile homes". Just adopting the standard DU perjorative.

How about ongoing death and destruction in the Middle East and Afghanistan. How about a failed economy?

The best way to be "tough on illegals" is to fix our foreign policy. I work with migrant workers on a very regular basis. Do you think they enjoy leaving their families to embark on a dangerous, grueling, and expensive trip to the United States? Then once they get here they are harassed and live lives of solitude? Not to mention harassment from their neighbors (both liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican)?

So sure, take a "tough on illegals" stance. That does nothing more than to hurt our brothers and sisters. It also helps alienate the United States from the rest of the world.

If we are truly concerned about overpopulation due to migration, we should look at our foreign policy and the aorrupt form of capitalism that is running our world.

I don't think Dems have the balls, and repukes want the cheap labor for their businesses. Chimp even wants to import more cheap labor. That's what his last proposed immigration bill would do. Kerry wasn't any better.

Only grassroots efforts to protect American jobs and secure our borders will have any effect.

www.numbersusa.com

Let's make the USA a gated community! Surely, this is the biggest issue of all! (After abandoning any hint of gun control, kicking women & gays down a few notches, ending separation of church & state, etc.)

They've really been coming out of the woodwork lately.

like I said earlier the traditional Buchanan view on illegals in the GOP party has been muted by corporate interests where they rather have open borders for cheap illegal labor.

The racism, xenophobia & shortsightedness confused me.

& their jobs & wages.

When we yell about jobs being outsourced, is that racist & xenophobic?

We now have an unlimited supply of workers willing to accept slave wages. This in turn, is holding down the wages of American workers.

And many illegals are paid under the table; this means they don't pay taxes. It also means they don't get benefits like healthcare. So American employers figure, why hire Americans?

You see this constantly in terms of day laborers...ask ANYONE in construction & landscaping if they are losing jobs to illegals.

I recently heard on some news show that about 50% of the construction work in Nevada is done by illegals.

And calling everybody racists is very tired, very old, & very silly.
I chose to live in the most racially diverse state in the U.S.

Is it their fault that American middle class jobs are being outsourced, or that they are paid under the table because thrifty contractors don't want to pay taxes?

Blaming the unbalanced distribution of wealth in this greedy country on poor defenseless destitute people in nearby lands who pay thousands of dollars for the hope of getting over the Mexican border to the promised land is very tired, very old, & very silly, in my opinion.

What about all the wealthy whiter people who immigrate here? Should those rules not apply to them?

The truth is, the US lets into this country whoever they want. If you are a rich European or Hispanic, no problem. If you are not, watch out. You might be rounded up and sent off to the deportation center if you don't have papers, as happened in recent mass arrest of day laborers in Woodbridge, VA, close to Washington, DC.

Is Hawaii really that diverse of a state racially? Recent census figures I looked at do not seem to bear this out, seemed mostly Asian and white to me.

"What about all the wealthy whiter people who immigrate here? Should those rules not apply to them?"

Illegal immigration should be eliminated and legal immigration should be greatly reduced. We owe no duty to foreigners to allow them into this country. If special job skills are needed by employers that are not available in the domestic workforce, then we should allow those foreign workers to emigrate.

Why should we continue to cut the throats of American workers for the benefit of business owners? We only owe a duty to Americans seeking to improve themselves and the lives of their families.

that is hurting American workers, whether they are black, white, brown, yellow or red.

American wages are stagnant for the bottom part of the ladder. Why is that? Simple...supply & demand.

Between outsourcing & immigration & other factors, we are losing our middle class & putting more people into poverty.

Actually, most do pay taxes. They just don't see the return on their tax dollars that we do.

is "mimicking" Republicans. I think it's good policy and good politics.

Let's do something common sensical for once. And cracking down on illegal immigration dovetails quite nicely with populist, fiscally sound, economic policy.

far to the right attempting an end run, will she score? Or will she outrun her own blockers?

We should stand up for those who seek freedom and opportunity in America.

There should be no such thing as illegal immigration. Borders should be secure so that there is no border hoppoing. All immigrants will be accounted for and when they go to work, they will recieve the same wages and rights as American citizens and will pay taxes like American citizens. No more of this allowing in illegal immigrants for cheap labor bullshit. The flip-side to this, is that we should let MORE people into this country legally.