Lou Dobbs and Leprosy

Last week, New York Times columnist David Leonhardt wrote of Lou Dobbs' tenuous relationship with the truth – "a somewhat flexible relationship with reality"– and his refusal to own up to an erroneous, fear-inducing report in violation of a basic journalistic creed.

It seems Dobbs wants to stick to a completely false assertion – first aired on his CNN program in 2005 and repeated again this May – that "there had been 7,000 cases of leprosy in this country over the previous three years, far more than in the past." Dobbs attributed this increase to "unscreened illegal immigrants."

Leonhardt reported that there have indeed been approximately 7,000 diagnosed cases – but not over the past three years as Dobbs would have viewers believe. Rather, these incidents occurred over a thirty-year period and have "dropped steadily" since a peak of 456 cases in 1983. "Mr. Dobbs was flat-out wrong," Leonhardt writes. But facts be damned, Dobbs is sticking by his numbers ("If we reported it, it's a fact," Dobbs said.)

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) – a civil rights organization that fights discrimination and monitors hate groups – ran an ad in the New York Times and USA Today calling for CNN to issue a correction on Dobbs' show. In its Open Letter to CNN the SPLC wrote: "The source for Dobbs' leprosy claim is the late Madeleine Cosman – an anti-immigration zealot who once publicly stated that 'most' Latino immigrant men ‘molest girls under 12, although some specialize in boys, and some in nuns'….Given that Mr. Dobbs refuses to retract his leprosy claim, we believe it is CNN's responsibility to do so. We suggest that the appropriate place for the correction is the same place where the falsehood was told: on Mr. Dobbs' show."

In response to Leonhardt's article – which Dobbs called a "personal scurrilous attack" – Dobbs said he wouldn't have used Cosman if he had known of her background. But last year, Daphne Eviatar reported in The Nation, "Dobbs often features and quotes activists with links to extremist and even openly racist groups…. Yet Dobbs consistently fails to mention those connections." Also, in "vilifying immigrants," Dobbs "searches high and low for statistics showing the negative impact of immigration on the US economy, and he conveniently leaves out contradictory information."

This pattern of ignoring the facts and engaging in inflammatory rhetoric not only poisons an important national debate on immigration – as SPLC President Richard Cohen said in a recent web chat– it also places Dobbs in what Eviatar described as "a long line of illustrious, and notorious, Americans who have played pivotal roles in the nation's periodic outbreaks of nativism…."

Leonhardt wrote, "The most common complaint about [Dobbs], at least from other journalists, is that his program combines factual reporting with editorializing." But that's not the real problem, in my view. I have no problem with the mix of factual reporting and editorializing, interpretive journalism married to factual accuracy. (In fact, I think Dobbs has done a good job in this regard when it comes to issues like outsourcing, the minimum wage, and corporate welfare.) We do that every week in The Nation – along with investigative reporting, editorials, review essays, etc. And unlike CNN, which claims to be politically "neutral," we are politically engaged and open about our politics and values. We are also assiduous in our fact-checking – always believing that accuracy is a duty, not a luxury or simply a virtue. And we publish clarifications and corrections as needed.

But there are no signs that CNN is doing anything to set the record straight or address Dobbs' relationship to factual accuracy. Even CBS – which initially caught what Frank Rich described as "Lou Dobbs's hoax blaming immigrants for a nonexistent rise in leprosy"– has now hired him as a commentator for The Early Show. How far will Dobbs go in pushing his fact-challenged immigration agenda on this new outlet? And if he truly wants to serve his viewers by reporting on what he calls a "nonpartisan independent reality" then isn't it time he stop pulling the wool over folks' eyes?

Comments (143)

1. Lou Dobbs, great intellectual, so we were asked to believe in these pages recently.

   Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 5:35pm

2. You don't think Lou Dobbs is right that a massive influx of cheap, third world labor hurts our workers at home? Not to mention how much they cost with all the welfare benefits they soak up from the government teet.

   Posted by USAResistance at 06/05/2007 @ 5:43pm

3. From Dobbs' response to the NYT column cited by Katrina:

   Today's New York Times column is primarily a personal attack on me, focusing on an ad-lib on the set of this broadcast uttered more than two years ago by Christine Romans on the number of cases of leprosy in this country -- an unscripted ad-lib, not a report by the way.

   ...

   That columnist also said I gave air time to white supremacists, and mentions one by name: Madeleine Cosman, who wrote the article that Christine Romans used as a source for her later leprosy statement.

   The fact is, I made a mistake, and I've said we would never have used her as a source if we had known of her controversial background two years ago, at the time of the offending ad-lib. But the columnist fails to note that his own paper wrote a glowing obituary of Madeleine Cosman when she died last year.

   I believe I saw the word mistake in there somewhere. In any case, there may be less to Katrina's rebuke than meets the eye.

   Lou Dobbs is a television personality. This kind of crap comes with the territory. If the Nation had a nightly show, to say nothing of a whole network, I'm sure we'd all find a bone to pick.

   Posted by MyParadigm at 06/05/2007 @ 5:59pm

4. Not to mention how much they cost with all the welfare benefits they soak up from the government teet.

   Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/05/2007 @ 5:43pm | ignore this person

   you are misinformed. illegals get no welfare benefits.

   Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 6:32pm

5. ....."The most common complaint about [Dobbs], at least from other journalists, is that his not the real problem,....CNN, which claims to be politically "neutral,"....

   Just so I get this straight: KVH have NO problem with a 24-hour/day mainstay of the MSM that claims to be politically "neutral", editorializing while reporting the news! OK, so, Fox TV is cool, right? And, if and when Murdoch takes down the WSJ/Dow Jones and it begins to do the same, that will naturally be fine w/KVH!

   MASK, you've got to archive this one!

   Posted by Happy at 06/05/2007 @ 6:36pm

6. Lou Dobbs' numbers may be off but according to this article from columbia niversity news service it is on the rise, it is more common in immigrants, and some immigrants are coming here specifically to seek treatment.

   http://jscms.jrn.columbia.edu/cns/2005-03-15/whitford-americanleprosy/

   A new case of leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, is diagnosed somewhere in the world every 60 seconds, but in the United States outbreaks remain rare. Only about 130 new cases are discovered each year, mostly among immigrants from areas such as Mexico, India or the Caribbean, where the disease is more widespread.

   Posted by pbot at 06/05/2007 @ 7:50pm

7. @JOHANNESROLF regarding "immigrants don't get welfare"

   check this quote from that same article in my previous post:

   And at least some of those patients, he confirmed, were coming to the U.S. specifically to seek treatment. "Certainly we do see some of that," he said. "We've had even a couple of patients from Cuba who were put on a boat by Castro just to get them out of the country--they made their way here through Mexico and Central America basically just to get treated."

   "We treat them; our job isn't to be immigration police," he added.

   Posted by pbot at 06/05/2007 @ 8:00pm

8. HAPP, better selection...

   "But that's not the real problem, in my view. I have no problem with the mix of factual reporting and editorializing, interpretive journalism married to factual accuracy"

   The "escape clause" on Fox is...Ms vanden Heuvel (and others) wouldn't consider them "factually accurate" and therefore they don't get the same treatment.

   But what IS bad about that "standard" is "editorializng" and "interpretive journalism" do NOT rely on facts, but opinions. So...where is the line drawn? No doubt, Ms vanden Heuvel's view of which facts can be "interpreted" and "editorialized" and which can't...are based purely on her subjectivity and politics.

   So...IS Fox News outside the realm of what she would consider "no problem"?...of course not. But aside from politics, and giving her generous application of "interpretation" and "editorializing"...why not?

   Posted by Mask at 06/05/2007 @ 8:13pm

9. "you are misinformed. illegals get no welfare benefits."

   But their anchor babies get food stamps and attend our public schools. They also overburdened the medical system.

   And of course illegals get welfare benefits, even if they aren't supposed to. Bleeding hear welfare beaurocrats are always looking to expand their base, they will lie to "help" them.

   Posted by USAResistance at 06/05/2007 @ 8:17pm

10. unless you want to change the constitution, anchor babies are here to stay. they are american citizens, they are not illegal aliens. no medical care for them? no schooling? so they'll grow up to be sick uneducated adults. you are a nasty nativist, the kind we have seen in this country many times before. back then it was the irish and the italians who bore the brunt, now it is mexicans and Hondurans. may I suggest you take your hatefilled posts elsewhere?

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 8:26pm

11. And at least some of those patients, he confirmed, were coming to the U.S. specifically to seek treatment. "Certainly we do see some of that," he said. "We've had even a couple of patients from Cuba who were put on a boat by Castro just to get them out of the country--they made their way here through Mexico and Central America basically just to get treated."

    "We treat them; our job isn't to be immigration police," he added.

    Posted by PBOT 06/05/2007 @ 8:00pm | ignore this person

    this is obviously phony. Castro put them on a boat to drive through Mexico and central america. musta been an amphibious boat. whataloadofcrap.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 8:29pm

12. KAT,

    what ever happened to those, "Venezuela, this is what democracy looks like" pop up ads we used to see on the Nation's website?

    Keeping 'em off until the protests die down?

    Posted by davebarlett at 06/05/2007 @ 8:46pm

13. I don't blame the hispanics, I blame the corporate elite class that imports them.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/05/2007 @ 8:51pm

14. And Italians and Irish didn't have out of wedlock births and high school drop out rates approaching 50%.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/05/2007 @ 9:01pm

15. Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/05/2007 @ 9:01pm | ignore this person

    bullshit. you are just posting nonsense. nasty nonsense.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:09pm

16. Posted by DAVEBARLETT 06/05/2007 @ 8:46pm | ignore this person

    if you got nothing to say don't post. you are just wasting time.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:10pm

17. "And Italians and Irish didn't have out of wedlock births and high school drop out rates approaching 50%.

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/05/2007 @ 9:01pm

    Nor were they completely illiterate in their own country and they came here to BECOME American, not demand schools here teach them in Italian, German or whatever..they came to part of the American fabric...not to retain their entire fabric of back home and install it here..

    JR,

    Some of the things you believe are nasty are just observations of what was true. How many Itailians came pouring in through Canada? How many Irish came here and had advocacy groups suing the US for trying to fix our own borders? How many Germans lived here for generations and never learned English...and had the rest of the towns and state they lived in have everything for them in German so they wouldn't have to learn English?, and therfore, not become part of the melting pot. The current immigration wave and how it is handled is a recipe for the Balkanization of the US...IE, a death sentence for the very idea of an American.

    Posted by john maasch at 06/05/2007 @ 9:19pm

18. I blame the corporate elite class that imports them.

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/05/2007 @ 8:51pm | ignore this person

    who hires the illegals? Fortune 500 companies? not likely. your brother in law with the construction business. that nice man next door that has the landscaping business. the deli on the corner. your aunt who pays the babysitter off the books.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:20pm

19. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 06/05/2007 @ 9:19pm | ignore this person

    what nonsense. you are just reciting slogans.this is all so easy.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:30pm

20. a death sentence for the very idea of an American.

    Posted by JOHN MAASCH 06/05/2007 @ 9:19pm | ignore this person

    a death sentence for your narrow and bigoted idea of america can't come soon enough.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:32pm

21. a death sentence for your narrow and bigoted idea of america can't come soon enough.

    Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/05/2007 @ 9:32pm

    Nonsense..I welcome all to the US to be Americans, who want to become part of what it means to be American...I don't know where you came up with the post above...Balkanization, JR, to be against that is not racist, it common sense...

    Posted by john maasch at 06/05/2007 @ 9:44pm

22. Gotta go eat some racist food...sushi.

    Posted by john maasch at 06/05/2007 @ 9:45pm

23. Maasch, you patronize and look down upon others. that is not my idea of america.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:47pm

24. I have yet to see any posters here commenting on the common humanity we share with those immigrants. their life is the hardest, they are despised wherever they go. they are separated from their families. they work very hard for very little, sometimes they are cheated out of even that. all you hate mongers out there, you are benefitting from the back breaking labor of those whom you denigrate. Maasch you yourself have related as much. that roofing job would cost more than you would pay, were it done by an american union guy. on one hand you put down the unions, on the other hand you put down the cheap labor that has replaced the union job.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:54pm

25. Balkanization? what the hell does that mean? do you even know?

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/05/2007 @ 9:55pm

26. Posted by DAVEBARLETT 06/05/2007 @ 8:46pm | ignore this person

    if you got nothing to say don't post. you are just wasting time.

    Posted by JOHANNESROLF

    JR, Of course, as we all know, your time is so valuable, being self-appointed master of the Nations Blogosphere and all.......

    Posted by davebarlett at 06/05/2007 @ 10:01pm

27. I am Hispanic and this is my personal view. I think there is bad and good nationalism. I used to think that Lou Dobbs was a very honest man that speaked out of his guts. In fact, he is partially, the other half is demagogue. If someone compares his "nationalism" with the Nazi ideology...well, he is just a little short of it. He abhors immigrants, does not want NAFTA or any other economic treaty (in fact he seems to be enemy of globalization), always plays to the poor "middle class American that has just lost his job". Can you hear those german "leaders" from yesterday?. Some reason he has, corporations should be more patriotic, not necessarily that nationalistic and international treaties should work for the American people. But there is a thing America and the whole world just can't do (and Lou wants): return to the past. Another thing, we can not simply criticize, we must propose solutions to problems. I agree with Lou in this: to put a heavy blame of the immigration thing basically on corporations like Mac Donald or Marriott. I bet that they have made so much surplus wealth in all these last 40 years with so much cynicism. America is probably the best free market in the world, but sometimes planning should have a role too. I am thinking of social contracts, not only around immigrants but also maybe 20% of the American working population. Companies can not just hire a man 5 years and not give him medical insurance benefits. They should think what they are doing to him and his family, and how are they transfering the problem to the society as a whole. Immigration wil not stop because we want it to stop. It is like when water is at two different levels, it will never stop flowing, and this is exactly what it is with the tremendous difference in salaries in the two sides of the border. Hispanic people are in general hard workers; of course, the tendency is that people that come have lower education. But then again, people with higher education - unless they are something less than geniuses - don't come because here they become underemployed. So, the two economies match each other in the job market like two pieces of a puzzle. We must solve the problem of lack of workers with temporary workers, we must reinforce the border, we must create much more tech jobs for the American people,but first of all and paramount we must people that live and work decently here humanly.

    Posted by Jorge T at 06/06/2007 @ 12:07am

28. The fact is we need cheap and unskilled immigrant labor because we've given up on the Black underclass. It's easier to let millions walk into the country illegally than fix big-city schools or do anything else to let the poorest Americans enter mainstream economic life. And then there's white society's aversion to the Black man (unless he walks and talks like Obama). Mexicans get jobs because they're desperate to work and can easily be intimidated. Black men get prison or, if they're exceptionally well behaved, maybe a welfare check or two. For very different reasons, Democrats and Republicans alike are complicit in supporting this de facto solution to the problem of the Black underclass.

    Posted by feinfein at 06/06/2007 @ 01:28am

29. "The fact is we need cheap and unskilled immigrant labor because we've given up on the Black underclass. I'

    The fact is the Black underclass and many Blacks in general have given up on themselves. Many ridicule fellow blacks who succeed in education...not black enough, not "down with the struglle"...the simple fact is..today, the important color in America is GREEN..be it good or bad, that is the playing field....waiting for someone else to get you where you feel you should be will always leave you watching someone else where you want to be..

    In NO, where the blacks lost the most homes and neighborhoods...there are very few blacks working the jobs to rebuild in many of those areas...one will find mostly Mexicans and Yankees.....and the jobs are paying $ 20+ an hour..and the blacks are not filling them in enough numbers to really change the landscape...why? ... is it because the guy who lost his house can't come back and get a job to rebuild, but the Mexican guy from 500-1000 miles away from NO can?

    SELF examination is needed...

    ....and excuses from the FEIFEINs of the world shine a light on the unstated facts...I am in NO 4-6 times a year..I have a some experience with some of the locals and their comments and feelings.....and experience with someone who received from the govt $ 150,000 for his loss(complete loss) and $ 350,000 from insurance...and has some problems finding some of the contractors needed in short supply...hence the high wages FOR STARTING...

    Posted by john maasch at 06/06/2007 @ 04:51am

30. "I have yet to see any posters here commenting on the common humanity we share with those immigrants."

    Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/05/2007 @ 9:54pm

    That's a sad notion. All through time, the ones who rig the shell game have deflected our attention with the "other", any group we can blame for our declining fortunes, for taking what should be ours, when the truth is it's the ones shuffling the shells who are fleecing us. It makes any kind of collective empathy difficult when the loudest conversations on the subject sell immigrants to us as the reason for our ills.

    I will take issue, at least to a degree, with your assertion that it's just your local roofer, or neighbor who needs her house cleaned cheaply who are responsible for hiring illegals. Hundreds of thousands find employment with agricultural, construction, and industrial enterprises owned by much larger corporate entities who benefit from their exploitation, but are almost never held to account. If I remember correctly, the feds only levied four large immigration fines last year, down from something like 250 the year before. (I'll check it out again.)

    Posted by drhammer at 06/06/2007 @ 08:39am

31. DR, we're both right on that one. I wanted to bring it a little closer to home.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 09:03am

32. "...is it because the guy who lost his house can't come back and get a job to rebuild, but the Mexican guy from 500-1000 miles away from NO can?"

    Posted by JOHN MAASCH 06/06/2007 @ 04:51am

    I think that's a little clumsy, Captain Bootstrap.

    The "Mexican guy from 500-1000 miles away" would be coming to NO (probably temporarily) to rebuild for people who have found the resources to do so.

    The guy who lost his house and "can't come back and get a job to rebuild" is likely facing a much more complex dynamic. I thinks it's fair to assume that if this guy owned a house, he had a job to pay for it. That means he not only had to secure the resources to rebuild, but had to be able to find a job as well, in a city where the job market has contracted, but the cost of living is on the rise. Everyone is not a carpenter, and while $20 hourly might be high cotton for a transient immigrant, it's not exactly DP and caviar money for a homeowner in the new New Orleans.

    Posted by drhammer at 06/06/2007 @ 09:03am

33. Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/06/2007 @ 09:03am

    Fair enough.

    Posted by drhammer at 06/06/2007 @ 09:09am

34. I don't blame the hispanics, I blame the corporate elite class that imports them.

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/05/2007 @ 8:51pm | ignore this person

    I believe your sincerity in this ONLY if you've stopped voting and otherwise supporting any of the corporate elite political apparatus (Republicans and Democrats). If you still vote mainstream then you do in fact blame the "hispanics".

    Maasch,

    Next time you go to New Orleans go to the Section 8 housing section. This area (very close the French Quarter) was not damaged during Katrina. Yet this low income neighborhood was largely padlocked and condemned. Why were good folks not allowed to go home? I hear you ask.....the developers want that area for much more expensive property.

    Now let's say you were a black man living in section 8. After being evacuated you went back home to find it undamaged but yourself evicted. Is that still a city you want to hang around in to rebuild?

    Posted by freedomplease at 06/06/2007 @ 09:12am

35. Posted by FREEDOMPLEASE 06/06/2007 @ 09:12am

    So, why is Ray Nagin allowing that, FREE?

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 09:20am

36. About a decade ago my shop was in an industrial complex, just down the street from a large fence contractor. They had federal contracts, and did work across the country.

    One day two INS tourbuses and a shitload of 'burbans rolled up and collected as many illegals as they could run down, practically filling the buses. It was quite a scene.

    It cracked me up, because the fence company in question had a fed contract to build a large stretch of border fence in the southwest.

    Posted by drhammer at 06/06/2007 @ 09:56am

37. Until recently, I had a lot of respect for Lou Dobbs. He seemed like a pretty thoughtful commentator.

    His obsession with the immigration "scare", though, has thoroughly put me off.

    Posted by drhammer at 06/06/2007 @ 10:03am

38. DRHAMMER 06/06/2007 @ 10:03am

    Dobbs' schtick borrows a lot from the rhetorical techniques of Limbaugh and Hannity. That's what works on television. It can get a little ugly.

    It seems that all his persistent themes - immigration, the middle class squeeze, outsourcing - have the common thread of the disappearing border. He's basically giving a voice to anxiety over globalization. Somebody's gotta do it.

    When I have a problem with him, I watch a little Glenn Beck, and then I feel a lot better.

    Posted by MyParadigm at 06/06/2007 @ 10:20am

39. So, why is Ray Nagin allowing that, FREE?

    Posted by MASK 06/06/2007 @ 09:20am | ignore this person

    Perhaps Maasch who knows everything about New Orleans can tell us.

    My guess would be that Ray likes the bribes (ahem campaign "contributions") that he gets from corporate developers / construction companies. Money counts a lot more in elections than votes.

    Posted by freedomplease at 06/06/2007 @ 10:52am

40. John and USA,

    You are woefully ignorant of the history of European immigrants in America. The Germans had a very extensive network of German language schools and institutions that stood for generations until the anti-German hysteria of World War I. The Catholic Church and the political machines served as the "advocacy groups" for the Irish, and trust me, that's exactly how the nativists, high-born and low, saw both institutions. Italian youth were among the least likely to complete formal schooling, as their families expected them to go to work and start contributing financially to the family as soon as possible. Jews and Greeks were the two groups from Eastern and Southern Europe that learned English and attained higher education the fastest.

    All of the complaints about Latino, Asian and other immigrant groups at the beginning of the 21st Century were heard about the Irish and in the middle of the 19th and the Poles, Jews and Italians, among others, in the first three decades of the 20th. Germans didn't want to assimilate, Catholics couldn't be good Americans because they answered to the Pope, Italians had a funny diet and weren't learning the language (especially the women!), and they're taking our jobs!

    The solution, then as now, was not racism (the Chinese Exclusion Act, for instance) or nativism, but working class solidarity. Stop supporting union busting at home and abroad, including regimes that routinely imprison and kill unionists (Columbia and China). Rather than trying to round up 12-20 million illegal immigrants - yeah, that won't break the army or the national guard - extend the labor laws to all workers, legally here or not, so that employers can't use illegals to undercut the wages and benefits of legals. No more free trade agreements based on (1) opening up third world countries to subsidized U.S. agribusiness, which just drives their farmers off the land and either into an outsorced factory or on the road to try to cross the border, or (2) opening up U.S. manufacturing to competition based solely on the cost (wages and benefits) of labor. For once, let's try to work together with our fellow workers instead of seeing them as our enemies.

    Mask, Ray Nagin is a former Republican turned New Democrat. Even if he were a more progressive Democrat, as opposed to the corporate one that he is, he would probably be a creature of the real estate interests, especially as most of the electorate has been scattered to the wind.

    Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 11:15am

41. CK, wery lofly, Hoboken deutsch was the predecessor to spanglish. nicely summarized.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 11:19am

42. "Perhaps Maasch who knows everything about New Orleans can tell us.

    My guess would be that Ray likes the bribes (ahem campaign "contributions") that he gets from corporate developers / construction companies. Money counts a lot more in elections than votes.

    Posted by FREEDOMPLEASE 06/06/2007 @ 10:52am "

    Eminent domain? I think if thats true it would be illegal and have a ton of MSM coverage, especially if they blamed Bush and FEMA...

    Posted by john maasch at 06/06/2007 @ 11:53am

43. sorry i'm liberal, but i side with lou dobbs on this one

    Check out these figures, has the U.S. gone mad or is it just the people who are running it....

    So often, we get caught up in a debate over political semantics and end up ignoring the hard-shell realities of what we're talking about. According to immigrationCounters.com , here are some of the realities that the Flake-Gutierrez Bill would airbrush out of the picture:

    Number of Illegal Aliens in the Country 20,807,645

    Money Wired to Mexico City since January, 2006 $ 22,213,001,672.00

    Cost of Social Security Services for Illegal Aliens since 1996 $397,450,739,563.00

    Number of Children of Illegal Aliens in Public Schools 3,958,789

    Cost of Illegal Aliens in K-12 Since 1996: $ 13, 965,063,431.00

    Number of Illegal Aliens Incarcerated 332,594

    Cost of Incarcerations Since 2001 $ 1,398,127,429.00

    Number of Illegal Aliens Fugitives 642,799

    Skilled Jobs Taken by Illegal Aliens 9,872,838

    Posted by studlyguy at 06/06/2007 @ 11:55am

44. guy, one sided at best. how about taxes paid. nasty jobs done. educating children, that's bad. gimme a break

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 12:01pm

45. guy, care to put this in perspective with the funds spent on the Iraq war? or the funds expended on out military? funny we have separate budgets for the military and the war.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 12:04pm

46. with all the immigrant bashing, not one idea of what to do, not one realistic notion. not one.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 12:04pm

47. BTW, the reason Lou Dobbs "previously" had such a fan base on the Left was his attacks on the Bush Administration. They loved the guy, had 1-2 regular left-wing posters on Slate's Fray who wanted him to run for President in 2008 (mostly on NAFTA, trade, etc.)....

    but (as per SOP) the moment he became a hard-liner on immigration, they dumped him and now think he's a Nazi.

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 12:59pm

48. 'We do that every week in The Nation – along with investigative reporting, editorials, review essays, etc. And unlike CNN, which claims to be politically "neutral," we are politically engaged and open about our politics and values. We are also assiduous in our fact-checking – always believing that accuracy is a duty, not a luxury or simply a virtue. And we publish clarifications and corrections as needed.'

    I wonder if you consider deliberate lack of reporting or omission of articles on certain topics relevant to progressive interest and issues as being politically open and honest? Say for instance that I just happen to be "friends" with a politician that deserves to be taken to task, but I avoid writing any articles at all about my friend positive or negative, and thereby avoid conflict with my readers and my friend. Is this really being journalistically honest? Do journalists have any affirmative duty to report stories that they personally may be opposed to publishing? I submit that they do.

    Omission often is as incriminating as commission. At least with Dobbs, you know where he stands.

    Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 1:09pm

49. In the 19th century, we didn't have a massive welfare state and an ideology of multi-culturalism that discourged assimilation, first of all. Now people call the melting pot "Racist".

    Secondly, Irish Americans surpassed their forebearers in economic achievement by the third generation. Hispanics don't. Education plateus, rates of illegitamite births increase, their health declines,and consumption of welafare increases. 10% of third generation hispanics go to college, compared with 12% of blacks and 30% of whites. Hispanic SAT scores speak for themselves.

    We are importing a massive underclass in this country. Why are you all for more poor, uneducated, unskilled people who will saturate the public welfare system and drain our treasury?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 1:15pm

50. I can give you examples.

    Hispanics first of all are nutoriosusly reactionary on social policy (http://www.vdare.com/sailer/060917_silicon_valley.htm), They have an extremely disfunctional and disgusting, corrupt political culture that will infect the USA as well if we don't stop it NOW (http://www.laweekly.com/general/features/the-town-the-law-forgot/15731/ ), they are ethnically cleansing native born blacks from their traditional neighborhoods in LA (http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2036580,00.html), and immigrants descendants have even higher rates of welfare depndency, illegitamicy, and crime (http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/002461.html).

    The facts are what they are, don't call me a bigot or racist because I give you statistical FACTS about Hispanics.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 1:19pm

51. We are importing a massive underclass in this country. Why are you all for more poor, uneducated, unskilled people who will saturate the public welfare system and drain our treasury?

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/06/2007 @ 1:15pm | ignore this person

    Because the business class wants cheap labor with no benefits, and wants to break the back of organized labor. Because politicians want to please the business class, and don't want to piss off the Hispanic vote. Illegal immigrants are taking more than unskilled jobs, though their advocates love to claim that illegals only take the jobs Americans don't want. Baloney. Spent any time on residential construction sites lately? If you don't speak Spanish, you aren't going to understand whats going on, and you aren't going to be hired by the Hispanic foreman who knows how to put together a crew of illegals with no problems for the general contractor.

    I am for workers of this country. That is why I am opposed to our open border open door policy with our neighbor to the south. This isn't being racist, this is being patriotic and concerned about my fellow citizen.

    Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 1:29pm

52. Why don't we get an objective opinion on all of this and ask Ann Coulter. She is one person we can go to for honest objective journalism. For some reason I cannot get her picture out of my mind? This could beccome a nightmare.

    Posted by Leefeller at 06/06/2007 @ 1:36pm

53. I make up the facts because I am a bigot and racist Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/06/2007 @ 1:19pm | ignore this person

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 2:22pm

54. "JOHANNESROLF"

    You could call me a Sith aligned with the Dark Side of the Force. I don't really care. The facts are the facts, you didn't refute them.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 2:32pm

55. facts? facts? don't make me laugh.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 2:47pm

56. It has become tiresome hearing all the complaints about immigrants coming here and straining our welfare system. We should be mindful that many or our own are now into the third generation of families living at the government's teat. Maybe we sould reevaluate the choices we foment among our native borns.

    Having lived in a border state, I admit that the sheer numbers are out of control and we are getting more bad apples. However, for the most part, I think the immigration problem can be condensed into two issues: 1. They come from THERE and are willing to work hard for low wages. 2. Many people HERE don't want to learn how to use a pick or shovel at any price.

    The Solution: If a person from THERE has been HERE six months and proved to be law abiding, responsible and hard working, we should award them permenent status with a guaranteed livable wage and benefits package. For each of those, we should take one lazy, welfare sucking, 'maintain my self-esteem' whiner from HERE and boost them over the border into Sonora.

    RAGGEDSTEP

    Posted by RAGGEDSTEP at 06/06/2007 @ 3:03pm

57. Did you visit the links or not? Care to refute them?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 3:04pm

58. Nativists, you are repeating verbatim the talking points and rhetoric that the racist anti-immigrants groups are espousing through the web, Lou Dobbs, and anti-immigrant conservatives. KVH is factually acurate in her editorial, whereas you folk are dead wrong on all counts. You're either conservatives trying to muddy our clean progressive waters, or you're racist progressives, an oxymoron, I know. I must have accidentally gone to The Drudge Report, because there can't be this high a level of ignorance amongst progressives. Thank you KVH for defending the truth! I'm getting a subscription when I'm done posting!

    Posted by dantheman at 06/06/2007 @ 3:35pm

59. Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/06/2007 @ 2:47pm

    Uh, JR...wouldn't it be MORE damning of USARESIST's case if...

    you actually refuted his statements with facts of your own...instead of just refuting them with none?

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 3:40pm

60. I'm still stuck on the whole concept of encouraging a "black underclass."

    Someone really needs to explain that to me because this little black woman from Philly is more than a little confused.

    Posted by edwriter at 06/06/2007 @ 3:45pm

61. Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/06/2007 @ 3:04pm | ignore this person

    if the Protocol of the Zion elders had footnotes, I would not need to consult them. same with your citations.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 3:45pm

62. BTW, how's this for a solution....make it illegal to hire somebody not a citizen or with proper immigration status?

    Oops wait...it is. Okay, how abou enforcing that?

    Satisfies the Right...no work, means no new illegal immigration. They can't go on welfare without revealing their illegal status and be deported and if they know there's no jobs here, there's no point in trudging across the Rio Grande or Sonora Desert, is there?

    Satisfies the Left...hurts those evil corporations/businesses that exploit the poor immigrants. Plus it means no cheap labor to compete with the unions, rising wages with a tight labor market, and nobody that can be intimidated into accepting less-than-minimum wage.

    Plus the Mexican/Central Americans with no "escape hatch" to the US, will stay, organize, and overthrow their corrupt governments and create reform and a "just economy" in their own countries.

    Anybody got a problem with that?

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 3:46pm

63. As for the whole concept of Lou Dobbs as a truthteller, I never bought into that. That he keeps repeating a lie in hopes that it will be seen as truth to someone is the whole nature of televison news.

    I did an internship at a tv station while I was in college and came away with the impression that any group of reporters that are members of the Screen Actors Guild have missed the point of journalism altogether. Actors are members of SAG, so basically much of what you see on tv news is acting.

    In fact, I believe quite strongly that the reason that we as Americans are so grotesquely uninformed is because we rely on television for our news. If we read more newspapers, newsmagazines, and listened to radio news more often, we'd be a lot more on the ball.

    Posted by edwriter at 06/06/2007 @ 3:49pm

64. He can't refute my facts. Hes a typical multi-culty liberal who calls me a "bigot" instead of refuting me. If hes so right, why doesn't he read the sources? Scared of the truth? Read Steve Sailer and get a clue.

    And "black undeclass" refers to the fact that the unemployment rate among young, black males is around 30% and more are in prison than in college.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 4:00pm

65. AND btw, saying "If you oppose immigration today, you're just like the people who opposed it in 1800" reminds me of the war critics saying "If you oppose the Iraq War, you're just like the appeasers in World War II!". And both people replace facts with lies, inaccurate historical analogies, and feel-good slogans.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 4:02pm

66. And "black undeclass" refers to the fact that the unemployment rate among young, black males is around 30% and more are in prison than in college.

    This, I know.

    But, USA, do we encourage this really? Personally, I'd love to see that statistic turned on its ear.

    Or at the very least, I'd like for employers to hire these folks when they get out of jail so that they can work for a living instead of stealing or engaging in street corner pharmacy.

    Posted by edwriter at 06/06/2007 @ 4:04pm

67. I agree we should fix it Edwriter, blacks are our CITIZENS, then have been here longer than almost any other group, and we owe it to them to hire them when they leave prison rather than hiring some illegal alien from Honduras. Don't you think?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 4:07pm

68. The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) is an American labor union representing over 120,000 film and television principal performers and background performers worldwide.

    you are misinformed. the TV personalities are members of AFTRA not SAG.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 4:17pm

69. Haven't had a chance to visit the links and won't be able until later. However, I will say that I do not buy the "They do the jobs we don't want to do" argument. The reason why most folks don't want to do agricultural and domestic labor is because they generally pay crap and are worked under lousy conditions. Why, because segregationists scratched those sectors out of the Wagner Labor Act to make sure as many Black as possible weren't covered by federal labor law when it was enacted in the 1930's. The solution? Re-write the law to cover more job sectors so that more workers are covered by the law and must be paid decent wages and offered safe working conditions. Hence, employers will not find it quite so easy to rely on a largely illegal and ill-paid and easilly manipulated workforce.

    But the fight is not over. Why is meatpacking now largely staffed by legal and illegal immigrants instead of fourth and fifth generation Americans making good, union wages? Not because immigrants were imported first and the American workers were thrown out the door second. Nope, first, the union locals were forced to make "concessions" because each plant was told they were competing against every other plant (it's called "whipsawing") and because the highest paid meatpackers were told they were greedy bastards - as opposed to the corporate executives and Wall Street investors, apparently - who needed to sacrifice for the next generation of meatpackers. Well, their union International took the side of the bosses and their own self-preservation and thousands of jobs were lost and meatpackers took early retirement, to be replaced by people working at a fraction of the price at a speed that would make the Flash worry about getting carpal tunnel, or losing a hand.

    I have no problem with a nation exercising some control over its borders, and I have no truck with Capitalist or Libertarian notions of free trade or free labor (i.e., wage slavery). And I am not a slave to multiculturalism - I have no interest in compromising with homophobia or women's oppresion. Working Class Solidarity, Across the Borders and Within Them, that's what I stand for.

    And, as in the past, that's the fastest guarantee of uniting the bosses with the "Islamofascists." If we see an upsurge of unions or, heaven forbid, socialist and communist organizing in the Arab world, ten to one, the U.S. and most of the Muslim Brotherhood types will work together, AGAIN, to crush the left, just like they did in the 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's.

    Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 4:18pm

70. johannesDORK most likely lives well, up on a hill somewhere, looking down on the peasants! ILLEGAL immigrants are DESTROYING CA. among other states. They make up 29% of the prison population in the US ( and here I thought they ALL just came here to work)! They FILL emergency rooms and use them as their primary health care for things as minor as the flu! They take massive amounts of funds from our Education system, limiting resources for TAXPAYING AMERICAN CITIZENS! The left always complains about more money for health care and education, well, morons, if we weren't paying for the health care, education and incarceration of NON-US CITIZENS, idiots ( JohannesDORK ), we'd have that much needed money the looney lib's whine about! I grew up in Fresno Ca. and I am telling all of you idiots that Fresno is now a third-world city! Gunshots every night in a neighborhood that was quite, peaceful, and clean 15 years ago. Many of the convenience stores are now advertising EXCLUSIVELY in SPANISH, FOOLS! Disrespect is commonplace when out and about in FREXICO nowadays, and my old high school , once a beautiful open campus, looks like a chain linked PRISON! I was one of only 2 white kids on our HS wrestling team. The majority were hispanic. The difference: these hispanics were ASSIMILATED. They were as AMERICAN as anyone. They spoke as good English as anyone. We were united! Now: many don't speak english, don't need to because we have coddled them , therefore why learn it! They are flying the Mexican flag and demanding ( no matter what the looney left tells/lies to you )that we assimilate to their culture! I fled that shithole almost 10 years ago and I am absolutely FLOORED when I visit it and see how ILLEGAL immigrants spread like wildfire. It's part of their culture and that's fine, except when the American taxpayer has to pay for it! Drunk driving arrests are twice as high for hispanics in this country that any other race. That's not racist that's FACT! Just like serial killers are almost always WHITE! It's not racist, it's fact! Lou Dobbs is absolutely right, even though he's a lib ( one of the few rational one's ). Another point: the left, and corporate America ( mostly Republicans ) are telling us that we need the workers. BULLSHIT! We have 4.6% unemployment rate, which means we have the workers, and if we took them off the gov't dole we'd fill those jobs immediately. I'd pay 10$ a head for lettuce if I could have my once beautiful town back!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 4:24pm

71. Studly guy, my condolences that you're a liberal, but things seem to be looking up for you and Mr. Dobbs. There's still hope!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 4:25pm

72. CKA2ND

    You hit the nail on the head with many of your comments. I want to add also that I think the rich elite in this country are jealous of the rich elite in Latin America. In the USA, Middle Class people can afford all kinds of nice things, travel on the same planes they do, even live close to the same neighborhoods, and have influence over policy.

    In Latin America, the rich elite doesn't have to deal with a pesky Middle Class. Thus, the corpratist elite in this country wishes to re-create Latin American society here. Thus, Bush's and McCain's support for massive immigration.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 4:26pm

73. Mask,

    Using the cops, etc. to enforce laws against the hiring of illegal immigrants criminalizes workers, which means that said workers will be afraid of being arrested. Scared workers are workers who will work for cheap, since shady employers figure that the cops and La Migra can only cover so many job sites, and after a while, being busted every once in a while becomes an acceptable cost of doing business. That's how it works now with employers and illegals, with not a few of the former getting out of paying the latter by threatening to call La Migra! Except the way people talk now, with the money some folks want to put in it, it will become just like the War on Drugs, another expensive failure that will create an even more violent, expensive, super-exploitative underground economy than illegal immigrants already have to put up with.

    Like drugs - and prostitution, for that matter - better to bring illegal immigrant labor out into the open, vis-a-vis labor law, and rely on the entire legal, political, economic and social structure to "police" the system instead of just the blunt force of law enforcement.

    Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 4:32pm

74. in latin america the rich elite cannot go anywhere without armored cars and bodyguards. they cannot flaunt their wealth lest their children be kidnapped. our wealthy class would not want this for themselves.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 4:32pm

75. CK, good points.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 4:33pm

76. JOHANNESROLF

    The corpratist and rich elite would LOOOOOOVE to see the middle class dissapear in this country. and they seem to be on their way to doing it. BTW , read my links yet? Or are you psychic and can tell me they are lies without reading them?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 4:34pm

77. CK, gerat idea! More gov't will fix the problem. Hey that's a new leftist concept! After all, history has shown us that more gov't programs always fix the problem, and amnesty brings us all together. Just llok at what Reagan's amnesty program did. It created cultural harmony and national unity!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 4:38pm

78. USA,

    Thank you. However, just to clarify, while I appreciate much of Lou Dobbs' economic analysis (he's an economic nationalist, which has it's limits, but is a breat of fresh air from the capitalist globalizers), I oppose his immigrant-bashing and fear-mongering. I support amnesty for illegal immigrants and an improved process for legal immigration, which should cut down on the illegal problem somewhat. On the other hand, I oppose many of the Visa exception programs for job categories that are supposedly lacking in this country; that's a con job by corporate America! I also oppose guest worker programs, by and large. They invariably are written in the interest of employers, not workers, foreign or domestic.

    The two competing visions that have dominated in Congress have been that of the liberal corporations and of the nativists. I oppose both. I think I have seen better model legislation prepared by the AFL-CIO and/or some labor- and church-backed immigrant rights organizations, but that was probably sometime last year.

    Just wanted to make sure I wasn't flying under false colors.

    Barry,

    Who's asking for more government "programs?" Well, aside from ESL classes, which we do need more of. I want less law enforcement, and I want more workers covered by labor law, which is not an expansion of government but bringing millions of people out of the black or grey market out into the open, and allowing them to organize themselves into unions, if they so choose. And I hope they do, damn straight!!!

    As for amnesty, there are good and bad aspects of multiculturalism, and as I noted before, I have no problem with putting my foot down for what I think is the latter. I'd say the busting of the unions and the wholesale corporate takeover of power and a return to a Gilded Age level of wealth disparity has done far more damage to this country than the 1986 immigration reform act's amnesty and any ill effects of multiculturalism.

    Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 4:59pm

79. I think one solution to stop illegal immigrants from coming here would be STOP SUBSIDIZING CORN! Because of our agricultural subsidies laborers can't get jobs in mexico. They can't compete with our subsidized agriculture.

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 5:01pm

80. I am amazed at the bashing of multiculturalism, when american pop culture has colonized the rest of the world. evidently it's OK when other countries practice it but no not with us.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 5:04pm

81. Joahn please discredit the links I provided for you (if you can!)

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 5:08pm

82. I'd just like to know why its racist for a country to control their borders. If demographic change of this magnitude was being forced on, say, Japan or Indonesia by a western nation a lot of people would be outraged (and rightly so!) But its OK if non-westerners do it to a western nation. Please explain the difference?

    Why is it wrong for the Chinese to send millions of Han Chinese to Tibet, but its OK for Mexico to send millions of Mexicans to the southwest?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 5:11pm

83. STOP SUBSIDIZING CORN!

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/06/2007 @ 5:01pm | ignore this person

    I agree.

    CKA

    Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 5:14pm

84. I'd just like to know why its racist for a country to control their borders. If demographic change of this magnitude was being forced on, say, Japan or Indonesia by a western nation a lot of people would be outraged (and rightly so!) But its OK if non-westerners do it to a western nation. Please explain the difference?

    Why is it wrong for the Chinese to send millions of Han Chinese to Tibet, but its OK for Mexico to send millions of Mexicans to the southwest?

    Posted by USARESISTANCE 06/06/2007 @ 5:11pm | ignore this person

    I don't know whom you are discussing with. no one claimed these things. what the chinese have done in Tibet is a crime. I have no problem with controlling the border. what I do have a problem with is the wholesale smearing of a race and and the millions of "aliens" who are here and who are productive members of this society. and no, I will not read your sources, as I disagree with the premise. I can tell a lie without reading the sources.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 5:16pm

85. JohannesDORK is quite the deep thinker. He and the left Loooooove multi-culturalism even though all it does is divide/separate tne nation. How can we be united, all of us Americans, and yet be multi-cultural? The left doesn't want to distinguish between homo and hetero marraige, because it discriminates/divides, yet they want us all to be labeled white, black, hispanic, arab, etc. and somehow that's not discriminating or divisive! Multi-culturalism will eventually bring destruction to the US as we know it. Fresno, Ca. is a perfect example. The blacks hate the mexicans, the mexicans hate the blacks, the hmong hate the vietnamese and according to the left and the MSM ( same thing ), the whites hold the exclusive title of hating EVERYONE! This nation is less unified than ever, at least the last 50 years, and this is due more to liberalism and multi-culturalism ( not assimilating people to becoming real, unified America loving citizens , than it is to the war and the EVIL GW Bush!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 5:18pm

86. I stand corrected, Johannesrolf, but being members of AFTRA doesn't give me much hope for the verasity of TV reporters, either. In either case, no union for performers should be representing journalists. It's an apples/bananas grouping.

    And yes, USA, I agree that employing our citizens is something that we should focus on. But I also believe that the problem here lies with those industries that believe that they should be able to pay folks $5 a hour to do such manual labor tasks as construction, farming and childcare. You get what you pay for in my opinion. Maybe if folks paid a living wage to do this work, we might find Americans willing to do it. As it stands now, I have a problem with how little the immigrants who do this kind of work are being paid for their service.

    And here is something that is never brought into the immigration discussion that I wish would be: the part that American foreign policy has played in this mess. Let's be honest with ourselves. America has stuck its nose into the economies of so many countries to benefit its own interests. We've been particularly nosey in those countries that occupy our hemisphere, such as Mexico.

    Maybe, just maybe, if we'd stop trying to bend the economies of other countries to our will, they'd be able to produce work for their own people, thus eliminating the need for them to come here and work for next to nothing. That $5 an hour may not do jack here in the states, but in Mexico, you can probably live like a king because of how jacked up the economy is there....thanks to our intervention.

    And Zero, you bring up a very good point. Why isn't Lou Dobbs coming down on companies like Microsoft that use the HB-1 visa like it's a slot machine in Vegas? Aren't there American college students graduating as we speak that can do those jobs? I know there are a bunch of them coming out of Philadelphia.

    And can we keep the not-so-borderline racism to a minimum please? I'm still wondering why we haven't decided to build a fence to keep Canadians out while building a fence on the Mexican border in the name or stopping terrorism....especially since most of the wanna-be terrorists seem to keep coming from our North flank.

    Posted by edwriter at 06/06/2007 @ 5:20pm

87. Heres another article that tells us whats really behind the immigration boondoggle.

    http://amconmag.com/2007/2007_06_04/article.html

    And btw, Johan, what was so bad about those sources anyway?

    Posted by USAResistance at 06/06/2007 @ 5:20pm

88. It's not the " wholesale smearing of a race " you racist idiot! It just happens to be HIPANICS that are the ILLEGAL immigrants, jackass! Typical liberal race card/raCE BAITING. wHEN THE LIBERAL HAS NO ARGUMNET, THE GO STRAIGHT TO THE RACE CARD;. aS i EXPLAINED BEFORE, THE HISPANICS THAT WERE Legal citizens, AMERICANS, had as much right to be here and are as much of an American as I or anyone else! If it were about race, it would be against ALL hispanics, not just the illegals. You are a pathetic, twerp, johannessdork, and that argument ( race ) is tired and falling on more deaf ears by the minute! Pure scum is what you are , son!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 5:22pm

89. correction: hispanics are the " vast majority " of illegal immigrants. Proposal: the INS will target WHITE illegals first. After all white illegals are deported, or even a majority, then they'll go after the hispanics, and we can all celebrate the touchy feely tactic used to make sure were not seen as racist ( because when you target/discriminate against whitey, like with affirmative action, it's politically correct, and socially acceptable )!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 5:27pm

90. Res, let's talk about our own circumstances for a moment. I live in Manhattan, way uptown, past Harlem, in what is called Washington Heights.I live in a predominantly jewish neighborhood, which is the midst of a latino neighborhood. new york has absorbed 300,000 Dominicans, former residents of the second poorest nation in the western hemisphere. lately most of the new immigrants have been mexicans. if these immigrants had not come, these neighborhoods would stand empty or be burned down, as were large parts of the Bronx after white flight, the move to the suburbs.

    feel free to share your condition.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 5:39pm

91. I think it is wrong to demonize the "illegal" immigrants. they are a part of a system they did not create. the people who hire them are as much if not more to blame. it does little good to demonize them either. when we pay a low price for a goods or service that was created by an illegal we too are complicit. by all means tighten the border. for the ones here, we need to be humane. they are not criminals, they are workers. so perhaps I should retire the phrase illegal aliens, and substitute WORKERS. their contributions to this society are not as easily measured as the expenses incurred by our society, but they are considerable.

    Posted by johannesrolf at 06/06/2007 @ 5:46pm

92. Can anyone blame them ( evil whitey ) for fleeing gang violence, trash, third-world values, residents they can't communicte with because they aren't required to learn the english language?

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 5:48pm

93. Pure insanity! They created the situation when the CHOSE to break our laws and cross our border ILLEGALLY ( this term means BREAKING the law MORON )! The corporation, farmers, business owners who employ them are just as guilty if not more guilty and I support jail time for anyone knowingly hiring any ILLEGAL immigrant! It's treasonous! To plame the average citizen for not starving themselves and completely disassociating themselves from society in order to protest illegal immigration is silly, juvenile, liberal hogwash. MORON!

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 5:52pm

94. ...i am with the immigrants....

    Posted by ZERO 06/06/2007 @ 12:53pm

    ...where i live in seattle, the illegal variety are not the real problem. it's the H1B category that is the real problem - every H1B ...is a major assault on middle class jobs and wages....

    Posted by ZERO 06/06/2007 @ 12:59pm

    ZERO sees ZERO conflicts in his own posts....but I do!

    The initial comment is decidely pro-immigrants, of ALL kinds! In the next, what the hell is going on, he rails against the LEGAL H1B types who come with sponsoring employers! These H1B workers do become `Americans' while helping us to maintain our edge in High Tech and reduce outright outsourcing of entire departmental functions. My wife works in corp. IT and this is exactly what's happening.....Heard of Referral Bonus? She snagged one when she referred someone into her company! Hard fact is companies can't find enough US citizens when national unemployment rate among professionals is at 2%!

    ZERO is concerned about H1Bs' "major assault on middle class jobs and wages"??? Has she checked to see what Bill Gates is paying in Seattle in order for Seattle to be among the most expensive cities? $100k +/- per year IT jobs are decidedly NOT middle class.

    What troubles Conservative PRO-legal-immigration folks like me, is the massive number of illegal immigrants who are directly responsible for the low wages at the lowest end of the economy. I have a great deal of sympathy for unskilled native Americans who, daily, are being screwed by the sheer over-supply of low skilled labor!

    Supply and demand works in labor as well as goods! For bleeding Libs NOT to recognize the impact of illegal immigration, is HYPOCRACY of the worst kind! What's more, without an effective means to stop further illegal immigration, there is NO END to the supply of such labor and consequently, no real solutions to the underclass! The more we `social engineer' and give them handouts, the more will come, illegally!

    Posted by Happy at 06/06/2007 @ 8:05pm

95. Posted by CKA2ND 06/06/2007 @ 4:32pm

    Ratchet it up, CKA, with every succeeding bust. Fine equal to 10% of the declared net profits first time....20% second time...30% third time.

    Those bougeouise capitalist exploiters will eventually stop hiring undocumented workers when the "cost of business" becomes too much to continue doing it.

    Doesn't "hurt the workers" if they DON'T COME HERE for the jobs...and busts your favorite target (the capitalists) where it hurts...evil, stolen-from-the-labor-of-the-masses profits.

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 8:07pm

96. Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 5:52pm

    So BARRY how do you feel about Bush's immigration plan (that he worked with McCain and TED KENNEDY) to hammer together???

    Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 8:08pm

97. I've lost an incredible amount of respect for Bush concerning "Illegal" immigration. I still have some left for him, and I'd like to believe that he's just out of touch on this issue! If he was eligible for re-election, I would not vote for him because of this issue alone! Almost the entire GOP has betrayed the country on this issue and with this bill! I like Gulianni, but he has no chance for my vote due to his stance on " ILLEGAL" immigration! Fuck McCain! It's either Romney, "No-chance" Tancredo, or possibly Fred Thompson, or I don't vote ( good news for the soulless, immoral Dem's) for a Republican. I'm already an Independant ( left the GOP due to the "ILLEGAL" immigration issue ).

    Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 8:33pm

98. Pure insanity! They created the situation when the CHOSE to break our laws and cross our border ILLEGALLY ( this term means BREAKING the law MORON )! The corporation, farmers, business owners who employ them are just as guilty if not more guilty and I support jail time for anyone knowingly hiring any ILLEGAL immigrant! It's treasonous! To plame the average citizen for not starving themselves and completely disassociating themselves from society in order to protest illegal immigration is silly, juvenile, liberal hogwash. MORON!

    Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 5:52pm | ignore this person

    Right on Barry. Like Mask says, we've already got the GD laws on the books and the Fed refuses to enforce them.

    All the crap about racism and inhumanity is just sickening and pathetic. This kind of deception makes me even more convinced that we have to enforce our laws NOW, and stop illegal immigration in its tracks. We take away the jobs, they will pack up. No need to spend billions on a huge new bureaucracy, and no need to track illegals for deportation. Take away their paycheck and they will leave. I want jobs for citizens of this country not Mexicans. This is just plain commonsense. OUT NOW!

    Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 8:59pm

99. Doesn't "hurt the workers" if they DON'T COME HERE for the jobs...and busts your favorite target (the capitalists) where it hurts...evil, stolen-from-the-labor-of-the-masses profits.

    Posted by MASK 06/06/2007 @ 8:07pm | ignore this person

    This is what is so ridiculous about the liberals who decry loss of jobs in US and lack of bargaining power, low wages, etc., and at the same time feel that those who oppose our open border policy with Mexico are racists. Flaming hypocrits who just can't put two and two together. If you are for worker's rights, you can't be supportive of keeping the illegal immigrant gravy train going. They are mutually exclusive positions.

    Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 9:06pm

100. Onevote, you give me hope! Well stated. Finally, a sane voice in a sea of insanity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 9:09pm

101. I'd like to see on of these "Illegal " families break in and squat in the homes of elitist liberals like Edwards or even the nuts on this blog, and see what they would do! Would they let them stay, or would they call the police and inhumanely " break up the family" of the illegals who were just trying to find a better life?

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 9:12pm

102. Onevote, you give me hope! Well stated. Finally, a sane voice in a sea of insanity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

     Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 9:09pm | ignore this person

     Welcome to the ranks of the Independents. I really can't decide whether Repubs or Dems disgust me more. Just fricking unbelieveable.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 9:12pm

103. I'd like to see on of these "Illegal " families break in and squat in the homes of elitist liberals like Edwards or even the nuts on this blog, and see what they would do! Would they let them stay, or would they call the police and inhumanely " break up the family" of the illegals who were just trying to find a better life?

     Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 9:12pm | ignore this person

     These $400 haircut folks and trust fund babies from mob money never have had to worry about losing a job to an illegal. Fact is, they are the ones enjoy cheap illegal domestic laborers to clean their houses, take care of their kids, and wash their dirty laundry. Their positions are just theoretical bullshit. They have never walked a mile in the shoes of workers who are at the losing end of this "no-action" on illegal immigration. I won't be voting for any of them. You are right, this is a make or break issue, right up there with the war in Iraq.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 9:23pm

104. I'd like to see on of these "Illegal " families break in and squat in the homes of elitist liberals like Edwards or even the nuts on this blog, and see what they would do! Would they let them stay, or would they call the police and inhumanely " break up the family" of the illegals who were just trying to find a better life?

     Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 9:12pm | ignore this person

     These $400 haircut folks and trust fund babies from mob money never have had to worry about losing a job to an illegal. Fact is, they are the ones enjoy cheap illegal domestic laborers to clean their houses, take care of their kids, and wash their dirty laundry. Their positions are just theoretical bullshit. They have never walked a mile in the shoes of workers who are at the losing end of this "no-action" on illegal immigration. I won't be voting for any of them. You are right, this is a make or break issue, right up there with the war in Iraq.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/06/2007 @ 9:23pm

105. Mask, in what fantasy land version of American capitalism do you live where any business, let alone whole, vast numbers of businesses, get hit with graduated fines of 10%, 20% and 30% of net profits by the regulators? We are not talking about the courts here (even in some right-wing nightmare of tort law driven bankruptcy) or asset forfeiture laws. Your fine system will never, ever, EVER happen. Dream on!

     Plus, we also have to kill the IMF and the World Bank, abrogate NAFTA and the other Free Trade Agreements, and force an end to all of the other wretched ways our rulers exploit our fellow workers of the world. :)

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 9:35pm

106. Mask, in what fantasy land version of American capitalism do you live where any business, let alone whole, vast numbers of businesses, get hit with graduated fines of 10%, 20% and 30% of net profits by the regulators? We are not talking about the courts here (even in some right-wing nightmare of tort law driven bankruptcy) or asset forfeiture laws. Your fine system will never, ever, EVER happen. Dream on!

     Plus, we also have to kill the IMF and the World Bank, abrogate NAFTA and the other Free Trade Agreements, and force an end to all of the other wretched ways our rulers exploit our fellow workers of the world. :)

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 9:42pm

107. We take away the jobs, they will pack up. No need to spend billions on a huge new bureaucracy, and no need to track illegals for deportation. Take away their paycheck and they will leave. I want jobs for citizens of this country not Mexicans. This is just plain commonsense. OUT NOW!

     Posted by ONEVOTE 06/06/2007 @ 8:59pm | ignore this person

     And how, pray tell, do you propose to do this? More raids? More cops? The National Guard? The Army? A national TIPs program of informants calling up in the FBI? I've tried to be reasonable in this discussion, but you and Barry are throwing around insults and assuming your opponents are idiots. I've studied the history of American immigration and followed the fight over immigration reform in the 1980's very closely at the time. I've been a union man all my life. I read The American Conservative - and disagree with it on this issue - and The Nation, as well as Libertarian and Socialist publications, so I get a pretty broad perspective on these matters. This is complicated shit, so chill out and have a little damned respect, OK!

     And to USA and Johannes - pull the zippers up, boys.

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 9:52pm

108. Happy,

     Though I'm not a liberal, let me just say that one of the legitimate areas of disagreement is over the relative impact of illegal immigration on wages. I liken it to the chicken and the egg. I would argue that the breaking of the labor movement in the private sector in this country had far more to do with lowering wages than illegal immigration, and that the latter has been encouraged to serve as a lever to keep wages down and keep the working class unorganized. As I've said before, meatpacking is the classic example of this, but I am only an interested lay person, not an expert on the subject. But I don't think you can say with absolute certainty that illegal immigration is the main cause of lower wages in America, by any means.

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/06/2007 @ 10:00pm

109. Posted by CKA2ND 06/06/2007 @ 9:42pm

     Well, CKA, your socialist parties are never, ever going to win....yet you still vote for them.

     And I wasn't saying it would happen, merely offering a solution that I THOUGHT would appeal to both sides and solve the problem. It eliminates illegal immigration (no jobs, no reason to come to Estados Unidos)...and hurts the business owners (which you and others should love).

     Posted by Mask at 06/06/2007 @ 10:01pm

110. You guys have showered enough noise, if no light, on the question of illegals getting, or not getting, welfare.

     But there's another contradiction. Are employed people eligible for welfare? Isn't "taking our jobs and going on welfare" open to question?

     Is there room for compromise here? How about allowing illegal immigration from Mexico only into those parts of the country that were seized from their forebears at gunpoint?

     Posted by Cassandra at 06/06/2007 @ 10:17pm

111. CKA2nd, it's actually quite simple, even though you seem to think it's impossible! Again, steep, steep fines for ANY business that KNOWINGLY hires illegals. 2nd offense: can be any number of things from shutting down businesses, to forfeiture of property to jail time. This, hiring illegals, is and should be a serious offense. I'm sure there were those that said implementation of discrimination laws was impossible, but as we see, it wasn't! Nowadays, businesses are actually being held hostage by discrimination laws and must hire less qualified people, keep worthless/lazy/incompetent morons on any given payroll for fear of lawsuits or fines! How was this implemented on such a large scale when you say the same is impossible concerning ILLEGAL immigration? Give it a break, I just FLAT OUT proved you wrong, so please stop using that tired old argument and run back to the race card like the rest of the looney left!

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 10:44pm

112. And just think of it this way, it'll create more gov't jobs, which will most definitely be filled by liberals who depend on jobs within the security blanket of gov't, where there is no accountability or competition, because they can't make it in the real world. We all know how lib's like to be coddled, so this should make both sides happy!!!!

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 10:48pm

113. Onevote, you're right once again, but there's hope! According to reports, conservatives are fed up, and they're finally speaking/shouting out, and they may yet be heard! McCain is done, Romney is gaining, and Fred Thompson ( a real conservative ) has high ratings with informed conservatives, which speaks volumes considering the fact that he's had little to no airtime or publicity compared to his GOP counterparts! Let's hope conservatives rise up and take IT ALL back from the clenches of the despicable left, the out of touch, elitist, one-world right, and the greedy corporations!

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 10:54pm

114. CKA, how many times does socialism have to fail before you get it? Please give a straight forward, illiberal answer please!

     Posted by barry25 at 06/06/2007 @ 10:55pm

115. Though I'm not a liberal, ....I would argue that the breaking of the labor movement in the private sector in this country had far more to do with lowering wages than illegal immigration,...but I am only an interested lay person, not an expert on the subject. But I don't think you can say with absolute certainty that illegal immigration is the main cause of lower wages in America, by any means.

     Posted by CKA2ND 06/06/2007 @ 10:00pm

     I am a capitalist through and through and schooled in both business and engineering. Knowledge of real-world economics is, today, my main means of making a living. For me, I am absolutely certain that illegal immigrants are, as I said, "directly responsible" for lower wages in the unskilled and low-skill sectors of our economy.

     It could even be the "main cause", as you said I said (but I actually said "directly responsible" NOT "main cause"......there is a difference).

     Blaming union-busting is of course, par for the course for Leftists of all stripes. But, consider this: In industries that have always been unionized and where America remains highly competitive or even globe-leading, the unions have not suffered.

     Consider Boeing, though its machinists do have to, on occassions, `give back' some when times (ie competition from Air Bus or post-9/11) are tough. Also, in my area (Houston) where something like a quarter of the US's refineries and petrochemical plants are, the unions are doing fine and its members are prosperous. What do these two~three industry sectors have in common? Both are capital and technology intensive. This is the fact of life today! Weak industrial unions go hand-in-hand with weak industries.....and what causes weak unions is global competition and over supply of labor for these weakeend industries.

     For service-type unions, like janitorial, retail and food & restaurant workers whose jobs aren't outsourceble, where do the labor come from?....and Continues to come in large numbers? Most of these union workers are probably legal but still, just behind them, are a huge hord of almost-legal immigrants just waiting get out of those truly dirty and back-breaking work the newest arrivals are almost always doing. IF we break this food chain from the very bottom and stop illegal immigration, in a matter of a couple of years, wages will rise dramatically while employers will also be forced to find ways to increase the productivity of the more limited labor they do have.

     Posted by Happy at 06/07/2007 @ 12:26am

116. Isn't this a bit...odd?

     "Let's hope conservatives rise up and take IT ALL back from the clenches of the despicable left, the out of touch, elitist, one-world right, and the greedy corporations!"

     Posted by BARRY25 06/06/2007 @ 10:54pm

     Do conservatives usually "take it all back" from "greedy corporations"?

     WWRD? (What Would Rush Do?...heheh)

     Posted by Mask at 06/07/2007 @ 09:26am

117. very good Cass. it might be good to remember that by treaty the mexicans in the southwest were promised they could hold on to their language, spanish. so much for declaring english the official language of the US.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 10:12am

118. If you are for worker's rights, you can't be supportive of keeping the illegal immigrant gravy train going. They are mutually exclusive positions.

     Posted by ONEVOTE 06/06/2007 @ 9:06pm | ignore this person

     the illegals immigrants are WORKERS. not surprised that you would be a nasty nativist.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 10:15am

119. Viva la Raza!

     Posted by lewwelge at 06/07/2007 @ 11:03am

120. Pero, estan...como se dice "limitations" or "constraints" en Espanol?

     Posted by lewwelge at 06/07/2007 @ 11:04am

121. Y Jo, usted eres bien en ayudando me "ignor" los stupidos.

     Posted by lewwelge at 06/07/2007 @ 11:07am

122. Posted by ONEVOTE 06/06/2007 @ 9:06pm | ignore this person

     the illegals immigrants are WORKERS. not surprised that you would be a nasty nativist.

     Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/07/2007 @ 10:15am | ignore this person

     "Nativist"? hahahahahahaha.

     I would classify the illegals are CRIMINALS and those that support them as HARBORING CRIMINALS.

     I don't want to see any more derogatory comments from you about the plight of the working class and our greedy corporations. You've lost your soapbox. You are sympathetic to Mexicans before Americans, and I call that a TRAITOR.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 11:17am

123. Lew, yes, we all need to use the ignore feature more. I look at the comment section of , say Hutchinson, and I am envious. they are spared the pornographic, and the jejeune attacks that take up so much time and space here. no mas.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 11:17am

124. Posted by ONEVOTE 06/06/2007 @ 8:59pm | ignore this person

     And how, pray tell, do you propose to do this? More raids? More cops? The National Guard? The Army? A national TIPs program of informants calling up in the FBI? I've tried to be reasonable in this discussion, but you and Barry are throwing around insults and assuming your opponents are idiots. I've studied the history of American immigration and followed the fight over immigration reform in the 1980's very closely at the time. I've been a union man all my life. I read The American Conservative - and disagree with it on this issue - and The Nation, as well as Libertarian and Socialist publications, so I get a pretty broad perspective on these matters. This is complicated shit, so chill out and have a little damned respect, OK!

     And to USA and Johannes - pull the zippers up, boys.

     Posted by CKA2ND 06/06/2007 @ 9:52pm | ignore this person

     We've got more than enough INS agents right now to visit employers on a regular basis. And the process won't be accomplished over night, but we certainly don't need significant additional personnel. The whole problem is that high Fed has refused to prosecute employers breaking the damn law, and there is a unspoken directive to INS to treat employers who hire illegals with a "hands off" approach.

     Now, it is not a secret that many illegals maintain contact with their native lands, and send money back home. You take away the incentive to be here by taking away their chance of working here, and they will clear out. No dinero....No Illegals.....

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 11:28am

125. Is there room for compromise here? How about allowing illegal immigration from Mexico only into those parts of the country that were seized from their forebears at gunpoint?

     Posted by CASSANDRA 06/06/2007 @ 10:17pm | ignore this person

     You mean the lands claimed by Spanish conquistadors? Talk to such folks such as Mescalero Apache about whose land this is eh? I sure as hell don't feel that Mexicans have an inherent right to be in US territory because of Spanish claims for the monarchy centuries ago.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 11:55am

126. FYI

     'Apache Nations

     Settling the Plains and Southwest around 850 A.D., Apache Indians live today on the Ft. Apache and San Carlos reservations in Arizona, and the Jicarilla and Mescalero reservations in New Mexico. The Apaches' reputation as fierce warriors began in the 1500s, when Spanish colonizers disrupted and forever altered tribal trading relationships, territorial boundaries, and access to buffalo. In the 1800s, the US government waged a war of extermination against the Apaches to facilitate settlement in the west. Apache chiefs such as Mangas, Cochise and Geronimo led the Apaches in battles against the US, fighting even after the Southwest became American territory.

     The Mescalero Apache Tribe is located in the Sierra Blanca Mountains of southern New Mexico and was formally recognized by the US in 1874. Its membership consists of the original Mescalero Apache Tribe, as well as Lipan and Chiricahua Apaches who came to Mescalero in 1903 and 1912, respectively, after suffering hardships in wars with the US. The Jicarilla Apache Tribe is located in the mountains of northern New Mexico, at the Colorado border. The Jicarilla historically traded and farmed alongside Taos and Picuris Pueblos, all of whom hunted buffalo and were influenced by Tribes of the eastern Plains.'

     Source: New Mexico Tourism Department

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 12:04pm

127. You mean the lands claimed by Spanish conquistadors? Talk to such folks such as Mescalero Apache about whose land this is eh? I sure as hell don't feel that Mexicans have an inherent right to be in US territory because of Spanish claims for the monarchy centuries ago.

     Posted by ONEVOTE 06/07/2007 @ 11:55am | ignore this person

     you are confused. we took the lands from Mexico.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 12:18pm

128. Treaty of Cordoba - 1821 establishes independent Mexico.

     Spanish take the land from Apache and we take the land from Mexico who held the land because of the Spanish. Live by the sword...die by the sword. I fail to see the inherent injustice in Mexico ceding territory it never was entitled to to begin with.

     Now lets talk about the here and now.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 12:42pm

129. Posted by ONEVOTE 06/07/2007 @ 12:42pm | ignore this person

     with this line, all the new world belongs to native people. in other words, nonsense from this poster.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 1:08pm

130. Live by the sword...die by the sword. I fail to see the inherent injustice in Mexico ceding territory it never was entitled to to begin with.

     so another country could come here and take the southwest from the Us, and that would be fine with you.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 1:59pm

131. and they did not cede, it was taken from them in a war.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 2:00pm

132. Is there room for compromise here? How about allowing illegal immigration from Mexico only into those parts of the country that were seized from their forebears at gunpoint?

     Posted by CASSANDRA 06/06/2007 @ 10:17pm | ignore this person

     very good Cass. it might be good to remember that by treaty the mexicans in the southwest were promised they could hold on to their language, spanish. so much for declaring english the official language of the US.

     Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/07/2007 @ 10:12am | ignore this person

     with this line, all the new world belongs to native people. in other words, nonsense from this poster.

     Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/07/2007 @ 1:08pm | ignore this person

     Whew.....not my contention it was Cassie's with whom you apparently agreed. My point is that history is irrelevant to Mexicans' rights to come here illegally -- like we owe them something. Using Cassie's logic, and with your agreement, Mexico's historical claim to US territory would be trumped by Native American's like Mescalero Apache. First in time first in right....except Cassie and you don't want to look back too far because that would hurt your argument.

     I say possession is 100% of the law in this case, and we are being invaded by illegal immigrants.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 4:15pm

133. with this line, all the new world belongs to native people. in other words, nonsense from this poster.

     Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/07/2007 @ 1:08pm | ignore this person

     BTW JR....stay off of tribal lands. You might just have a hard time explaining your position on this issue. Tribal police might just escort you off their land, or else tribal elders might throw you in jail for being anti-native American. Sounds like you are a little bit of a racist here....love Mexicans and their historical land claim rights against US but disclaim Native American's right to lands taken by force from them by European new world settlers and their offspring. Not too consistent, but then again you rarely are.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 4:22pm

134. one, cass point was somewhat in jest, one presumes.and you are correct, they have no special right based on Mexico's previous ownership of the land. but they are here. we had better get used to it, as they aren't leaving too soon.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 4:23pm

135. Sounds like you are a little bit of a racist here....love Mexicans and their historical land claim rights against US but disclaim Native American's right to lands taken by force from them by European new world settlers and their offspring.

     I never said any of this.following your line would mean all the western hemisphere

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 5:35pm

136. should be returned.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/07/2007 @ 5:36pm

137. one, cass point was somewhat in jest, one presumes.and you are correct, they have no special right based on Mexico's previous ownership of the land. but they are here. we had better get used to it, as they aren't leaving too soon.

     Posted by JOHANNESROLF 06/07/2007 @ 4:23pm | ignore this person

     Ultimately JR, you are right. They are not going to leave and our political process won't make them. Lets not pass ridiculous legislation legitimizing it when we don't even bother to enforce the laws we have.

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 5:39pm

138. Fascinating. I don't remember Kennedy & Specter filling us in on this "minor detail." Ah....its good to be an illegal immigrant in the USA. I am glad that this bill appears to be doomed. But shame on its drafters.

     'NLPC Says Immigration Bill Would Make Taxpayers Pay Legal Bills of Illegal Aliens Seeking Amnesty

     Date: May 22, 2007 Contact: Ken Boehm or John Carlisle 703-237-1970 Website: www.nlpc.org

     Falls Church, Virginia- Ken Boehm, Chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), today criticized the immigration bill crafted in secret by Senators led by Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Arlen Specter (R-PA).

     Boehm said, "If passed, this bill will make taxpayers pay the legal bills for illegal aliens seeking amnesty. Tucked away on page 317 is a provision that would allow lawyers in the federally-funded legal services program to represent illegal aliens, which they are presently barred from doing."

     John Carlisle, NLPC's Director of Policy, said, "Many taxpayers will be chagrined to learn they may soon have to provide a lawyer for illegal aliens who should not be here in the first place. Activist lawyers, illegal aliens and government money are a bad mix."

     The federally-funded Legal Services Corporation (LSC) supports a network of lawyers in hundreds of communities in the country to provide civil (not criminal) day-to-day legal help to poor people. This year, LSC will receive $330 million. Since it was founded in 1974, LSC has received over $6 billion.

     The authorizing language states:

     Section 504(a)(11) of Public Law 104-134 (110 Stat. 1321 et seq.) shall not be construed to prevent a recipient of funds under the Legal Services Corporation Act (42 U.S.C. 2996 et seq.) from providing legal assistance directly related to an application for a Z-A visa under subsection (b) or an adjustment of status under subsection (j).

     This negates a provision approved by Congress in 1996, with NLPC's input, that prevents LSC-funded lawyers from representing illegal aliens. The restriction was necessary because legal services lawyers have a long history of promoting illegal immigration and showing contempt for the ban on representing illegals.

     For instance, legal services lawyers filed lawsuits to overturn California's Proposition 187, a ballot measure approved by the state's voters in 1994 that banned most government services for illegal aliens. California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA), a major LSC grantee, is currently under investigation by the LSC inspector general for representing undocumented workers.

     CRLA has joined with the American Civil Liberties Union in overturning a day labor law in Vista, California.

     In 2006, the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee successfully sued the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development because the notice it issued to a legal immigrant denying him unemployment benefits was written in English.

     The Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago (LAF) is currently trying to prevent the deportation of a Mexican citizens convicted of crimes.

     Prior to the enactment of the congressional restriction, legal services lawyers filed lawsuits to require state agencies to give drivers licenses to illegal aliens.

     NLPC promotes ethics in public life, and sponsors the Legal Services Accountability Project. Boehm is a former Counsel to the LSC Board.'

     Posted by OneVote at 06/07/2007 @ 7:13pm

139. Happy,

     My apologies for misquoting you ("main cause" instead of "directly responsible"). It was unintentional but sloppy.

     Interesting points about capital and technology-intensive industries having strong companies and strong unions, while you seem to be saying that companies without these advantages are subject to global competition based on labor costs. Automation certainly must be recognized as a major factor in the loss of jobs in many sectors, from service to manufacturing.

     However, not to beat a dead horse, but meatpacking is not an industry that is generally subject to foreign competition, or at least it wasn't in the 80's and 90's, when it was transitioning from high-wage to low by breaking the backs of its local unions one after the other. And free trade agreements and tax incentive programs are not products of the invisible hand of global competition but of the visible actions of lobbyists and governments (not to say the auto companies don't deserve what they're getting for how many decades of bad, short-sighted decisions).

     Closing off the spigot of European immigration in the 20's did not result in a jump in wages. A few years later, we had the Great Depression, instead, not that I see a connection between the two. However, once a third of the workforce was unionized and the world saw the greatest strike wave in history break out in the United States of America in 1945-46, the American working class enjoyed its golden age for 30 years. I'll go with that historical example.

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/07/2007 @ 10:48pm

140. Posted by CKA2ND 06/07/2007 @ 10:48pm

     Even compared to when I got out of college (the `70s'), the economy, like everything else, has gotten much more complicated. Look at politics today, with the absolute explosion of interest groups.

     No question some union-bustings were not driven by global competitive pressures....and will probably still happen in the future....but I expect this to be less and less the case.

     Industries that aren't capital and/or tech-intensive are competing heavily on the cost of labor. Let's take examples of textile/sewing and Big Oil. I'll use some guess numbers to illustrate.

     An industrial-grade sewing machine costs, say $1,000 and just about anybody in any country can easily set up a shop with say, 100 machines. Now, how can an American Co. in El Paso compete with Mexicans across the Rio Grande in Juarez sewing blue jeans? In this example, the absolute cost of the risk capital (for equipments) are dirt-cheap and the return demanded on that capital, say at 20%, is just $200 per year. The annual cost of labor, just 1 shift per day, to man that sewing machine? $20k in the US vs. maybe a quarter of that in Mexico. Here, clearly, the yearly cost of capital ($200 on both sides of border) is negligible in relation to labor ($20k vs. $5k).

     Now consider the capital-intensive Exxon, with a market cap of $400 billion and something like 200k+ workers world-wide. On average, each employee is `backed' by $2 MILLION of capital. The return demanded on that capital (that's me, as a stockholder) per worker, is something like $200k to $250k while the workers' cost is say, $50k. This is a rough analysis since a Nigerian Exxon oilfield worker isn't likely to earn $50k. In this case, the yearly `cost' of capital far exceeds the labor costs. Result, minimal fear of outsourcing of core skills (there is some outsourcing of internal services like IT)! If I chose a purely domestic oil co., the numbers would be even more illustrative but I hope I have conveyed some sense of how capital is truly key to labor's desire for high wages! Patient and risk-loving Capital also plays the incubator role to spur innovations through investments in R&D!

     One thing our education system ought to do is, upon graduation from High School, each graduate is given $500 to buy 5 different stocks that they can't sell for ten years. By following their stocks, they will learn to appreciate our capitalist system and know when they are being conned by Populist pols!

     Posted by Happy at 06/08/2007 @ 12:13am

141. it would be good to pay heed to the experience of some small towns, who got rid of their illegal workers, and then found out that half the businesses on main street closed because of lack of custom.

     that these workers support the economy has gone unmentioned, until now.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/08/2007 @ 10:58am

142. HAPPY,

     Thank you for the useful examples of the different pressures industries may feel based on their relative capital costs. However, low-capital cost industries face labor cost competition for specific, man-made reasons that we can exercise control over, reasons that are in fact driven by policies and practices put into effect by governments and business owners today.

     We do not have to allow our governments to set up tax incentive programs for companies to move manufacturing plants to "free trade zones" in third world countires. We can stop free trade agreements that favor the owners of intellectual property and agribusiness while throwing to the wolves consumers, farmers, workers and the environment. We can deny military and financial aid to nations that condone the kidnapping and murdering of union activists on a regular basis, or that execute them on television as a matter of course. If international standards for intellectual property laws or currency trading are a good idea, then why can't we have a global minimum wage (or at least a regional one) and a worldwide 8-hour day?

     I am not an economic nationalist, but I can respect the critique that many economic nationalist capitalists have of capitalist globalization. As the European Union is showing, turning over economic sovereignty to a bunch of central bankers and bureaucrats is bad news for the working class. Unfortunately, this immigration issue has served to sideline any possibility of labor, the left and social and economic liberals to work with economic nationalists and conservatives to set aside their myriad differences on social issues to come together around some economic, trade and labor reforms.

     Posted by cka2nd at 06/08/2007 @ 11:11am

143. Ck, there is no laissez faire in this or any other country. the corporations have their snouts firmly planted at the public trough.

     Posted by johannesrolf at 06/08/2007 @ 11:31am