[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Kobi

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"][SIZE="3"][COLOR="Navy"]dread,

Thank you. Your argument is one I can listen to. I can see the potential pitfalls in such legislation and why people would be upset about it.

Nonetheless, immigration reform needs to start somewhere and if the feds wont tackle the issue, the affected states have to develop their own plans. Maybe Arizona isnt the best standard but it is a starting place to develop something workable.

Okay then, it would appear you are far more sanguine about American citizens being treated as criminals when they are not for no other reason than that their genetics make them stand out from the majority population than I am. The Arizona law is no more a good starting place as Plessey v. Ferguson was a good start in making America a place of more equal opportunity and for much the same reasons.

I have not said anything about immigrants and social services. Without proper documentation people are not able to get benefits of any kind at least in this state. So nothing was said about anyone sucking up welfare services. Health services are used by those without insurance which then ends up costing taxpayers more to cover the expenses. Educational services averaging over 12,000 per year per student adds up countrywide and again falls on taxpayers.

So you didn't say the following?

Illegal immigrations costs us taxpayers billions and billions a year in services i.e. education and health care plus immigration costs of housing illegals awaiting deportation hearings and providing them with legal representation to name just a few.

Both education and health care count as social services.

Perhaps people used to come here "to take our jobs". Now we export them....its cheaper to do so. From my labor union days, I can tell you that companies tried to placate workers by suggesting a two tier system of payments and benefits.....one for veterans and one for newbies. It was a ploy to cut expenses and wages with the workers backing. It was a terrible labor problem and we are seeing the fallout of such thinking these days. Auto workers making less than half what they are used to just to have jobs or these jobs will go overseas as well. This is not an immigration problem per se, it is an economic strategy problem fueled by workers willing to take less which lowers the standard of living for most people in the long run especially in an economic downturn.

Okay then if it is a labor problem deal with it as a *labor* problem and not as an immigration problem. The issue of outsourcing and a race to the bottom as far as wages and benefits is an issue, deserving of concern, in its own right and has the benefit of being race-neutral as well.

And it is not just laborers. Financial institutions are looking to hire folks from Japan and China who are willing to work for less in corporate offices. The science industries are looking for foreign workers who are better suited to their businesses due to foreign emphasis on math and science skills as well as economics.

Well, that is OUR fault. WE have created a society where the next worse thing you can be is an 'egghead' (Poindexter, nerd, geek). It is not because of foreigners that native-born Americans aren't majoring in the hard sciences, mathematics or engineering--it's because Americans think that the those subjects are *hard* and why spend the best part of a decade getting an advanced degree in, say, nuclear physics when you could get a degree that is far less work? The work still needs to be done and if we aren't pushing our kids to go into those fields then employers will look far afield for them.

I had to chuckle at your political history of the our effects on other countries. It's kind of ironic how we can do so many bad things to peoples respective homelands but people still want to flock to this country. Strange thing irony.

No, not strange at all--unless, of course, you cannot make a useful separation between a national government, the nation and the people of that nation. It appears that Americans, on the whole, have a singular inability to do so. So, for Americans, the Iranian government, the Iranian people and Persian civilization are all the same thing functionally indistinguishable from one another. So if the Iranian government takes some action that is harmful to America or Americans, then from our point of view the Iranian PEOPLE did this and therefore Persian culture is irredeemably corrupt, violent, etc. So from that point of view it IS ironic that people would want to come to America because, from the point of view implied in your statement, what the American government does is what the American people has done which is what America is all about and therefore it WOULD look ironic for people to immigrate here. However, if you have a more subtle--let's call it--view of things then you can realize that there is what the American government does, there is what the American people do and there is what America stands for. America's government is not particularly popular around the globe and certainly not popular in South or Central America. The American people, on the other hand, are not particularly hated around the globe and the idea of America is positively loved! So it isn't ironic although, from a certain point of view, I can understand why it might appear so.

As a quick aside, this complicated view of America--as opposed to the simplistic view of either you think America is good or you think America is bad--is something I think that most people of color in this country have to develop to greater or lesser degrees. You see, it's impossible for someone like me to ignore what happened to my parents or grandparents no matter HOW convenient that might be for the majority if I were to develop historical amnesia. However, since I can't do that AND since America is my home I have to come to some form of peace with American history and the American present. It requires being very cold-eyed realistic about where we've come from and where we are. So I can be VERY critical of America while still being patriotic.

As for people staying in their own countries and fighting for change.....we have done it here. The civil rights/gay rights movements meant conflict and hardship and death but it lead to changes. It is amazing what people can accomplish when they band together. And we were fighting an economic machine and the cia as well.

I'm not sure that the CIA's involvement in opposition to the civil rights movement was particularly significant. I certainly can think of no instances where the CIA was implicated in the assassination of civil rights workers--unless, of course, you are going to argue that MLK, Medgar Evers or those freedom riders were killed by the CIA. It's one thing to have dirty tricks and black bag jobs carried out against your movement--it's another thing entirely to have people assassinated. For one thing, if your leadership is being assassinated they wind up being inconveniently dead which, to put it mildly, seriously reduces their leadership effectiveness.

It is not geopolitical niavete. It is a belief in how people who band together can force change to occur in spite of the economic machine and the cia. Otherwise we are all just pawns in a game, tossed about as others see fit. I refuse to believe any humans are that powerless as a whole.

I'm not arguing that people are helpless. I'm arguing that it is incomplete to put the blame for the state of Latin America solely or even primarily on people who are immigrating OUT of that region by saying that their nations would be far better off if they stayed at home. To say that, for instance, them staying in Nicaragua circa 1981 would have made Nicaragua a better place *despite* American-financed guerillas (the contras) and death squads making life in that nation a living hell is to actually ascribe to these immigrants superhuman powers. My reading of history--which may be wrong--is that the assassination of national leaders who are popularly elected has a dampening effect on the prospects of a nation. This is particularly true if it happens repeatedly whenever that popularly elected leader proposes some kind of reforms to make the nation in question better and more amenable to the locals instead of some US corporation or another. Your reading of history may, of course, vary.

I know immigration policy is a complex issue with strong emotional overtones. I just dont adhere to rhethoric on either side of the coin. Because for every argument, there is always another explanation, interpretation, point of view and study to support views one way or another. What made and makes this country great is the diverse points of view.

It seems, actually, that you do adhere to the rhetoric on one side. You're correct, there is always another explanation or interpretation but that doesn't mean that this other explanation and/or interpretation is correct. There was another explanation and interpretation for segregation in America---that interpretation was that blacks were *inherently* inferior and Jim Crow was no worse treatment than what we deserved. I see no reason why I should give any credence to that interpretation but it IS another interpretation and explanation for why segregation lasted until the last third of the 20th century. There were studies done to support segregation that showed that blacks were inferior. One needn't do any studies, in fact, one could point to, for instance, elite schools and say "well, no black has ever gone to this or that university and therefore blacks are not capable of getting into that university". As a statement of evidence that would hold up well-enough. Let's say the university is a tier-1 school and getting into a tier-1 school as a non-legacy admit is a pretty good sign that someone has enough brain cells to rub together and generate high-quality heat. No blacks were enrolled at said school in some year. Therefore, blacks were not mentally capable of handling the work at that university. QED. Now, is that a legitimate viewpoint? No. Is it a reasonable interpretation of the data? No. But it WAS an alternative explanation to the idea that certain universities would not admit blacks.

We've gotten to a place in this country that just because someone CAN argue a contrary point we think both contrary points are legitimate and valid. I refuse to buy into this idea any longer and I also refuse to pretend to buy into it. If you argue that the dogs are fish and I argue that dogs are mammals one of us is wrong--is your argument a different point of view? Yes, but that doesn't mean it is a correct point of view.

Just having diverse ideas does not make a country great or strong. The ability to sift through diverse ideas and separate the good ideas from the bad ideas does but not merely the presence of different ideas.