And another thing...

quote:

Day Laborers" (illegals waiting for lanscape and carpentry work) line the sidewalks of many towns. They are from many spanish speaking countries. They wait to be picked up by some buyer.

Sounds like an unfettered, unregulated free market economy at work. Isn't that what the Conservatives are always touting as the solution for everything?

quote:

while our politicians remained silent

Yup. But they have to. There are too many hispanic voters. To piss off hispanics is to commit political suicide.

And forget about ever pushing for English as an official language. There are so many hispanics that take offense to that (because they don't wan't to learn English) that they've effectively branded anybody who pushes for that as a "racist."

Nobody ever needed to make English official because it was always understood to be just that. No need to formally adopt it as "official." Now it's too late. Politicians like this guy in Bogota, New Jersey, who protested a McDonald's billboard in Spanish, get crucified, dragged through the mud as "racist."

re: day laborers

It's an illegal immigrant's job. It's a fair assumption. The legals aren't on the sidewalk jumping into the backs of these trucks whose drivers exploit them.

quote:

Who cares that it was their land first. Who cares that this is NOT OUR land to begin with and humans do not get to dictate where anyone should live.

Nice try at satire, and , yes, humans DO dictate where people should live. Sorry.

quote:

Whnt if they bulit a border north of Texas and told us not to cross it, should we abide by their "rules".

Now THAT is just silly talk.

quote:

There was, however, another group of individuals who did much the same, only when they left their Britan the did't assmilate at all.

That is History. Unfair? Sure. But not reversable. And you can't blame people today for the things their ancestors did. It's a useless and pointless pursuit.



I lived and worked on the Mexican Border for 10 years in Texas, and at my lowest point, I got pretty sick, and had to wait behind dozens of illegals to be seen at the hospital. I had less than them, but I am a citizen of the United States, and yet, even in my own country, I was second class.

It is a complicated situation, for sure, but we have to cap it off at some point.

My Dad works in Mexico, and said recently, "If any US citizen tried to go into a mexican hospital for free health care, they would chuck them onto the street or put them in jail and forget about them"

quote:

It's an illegal immigrant's job. It's a fair assumption. The legals aren't on the sidewalk jumping into the backs of these trucks whose drivers exploit them.

http://backstage.blogs.com/unscripted/

You may think it's a fair assumption but it doesn't happen to be factually correct. Yes, maybe many of them are, but that doesn't mean that if you are a day laborer you are illegal. I thought you taught school at one time. Seems to me you should know this is faulty logic.

quote:

My Dad works in Mexico, and said recently, "If any US citizen tried to go into a mexican hospital for free health care, they would chuck them onto the street or put them in jail and forget about them"

All the Best,

So what are you saying you want us to be more like Mexico where only the rich are treated with dignity and you have to write a check before you get medical help? Come On!!!!

Camille, I assure you the 100 day laborers milling on Anderson Ave. and in many towns in New Jersey are NOT legal.

If they are, then the IRS should be prosecuting them. They are not paying taxes!

I know I'm sounding harsh. I just saw an illegal sent back. He had been here 22 years and now is deported back to Chile, leaving his children here in Cliffside Park, NJ.

That is very sad. Towns all over here have doubled their arrests in recent years. I am sad about it.

But we cannot just keep having people flood our country and use our services and get drivers' licenses, and health care, and schooling when they are NOT LEGAL. They are ABUSING our system.

What galls me is it's too un-pc to call them ILLEGAL. (That might piss off their family, who many times are LEGAL VOTERS.) So the politically expedient terminology is "undocumented worker."

Make it easier for immigrants to come here LEGALLY.

That is the only compassionate and fair thing to do.

There's nothing compassionate or fair or kind or right about looking the other way while our streets in New Jersey get turned into illegal immigrant flophouses.

No Camille, I wasnt saying that. First of all, it was my Dad, who has worked in and around Mexico and it's border with Texas for the past 22 years, and is married to a Mexican national, who was making a point. That even in Mexico, the reverse would not happen...that we are being taken advantage of in the US. No, of course we shouldnt be "more like Mexico", but that is not the point. Have you even visited the border region? Sometimes, a wall seems like a pretty good idea.

If people want to take advantages of what america has to offer;healthcare, free school, welfare etc move here. It would seem very pretentious of me to suggest that because I moved to say france for example, never became a citiczen and tried to get myself a free education. Nobody has said in my opinion, that illegal immigrants are unwanted, but either join our country, adhere to our rules and become a citiczen. Once you do this, you can have the power to organize and correct laws that disable and disarm new immigrants to this country. This country is based on immigrants, many of whom went through the nescessary channels to legally be here. If everyone assumes they can get a free ride so to speak in america, eventually someone has to pay for all of free rides.As it is evident, the govt is tired of this and now the turn is that of the everyday person. Either accept our laws, our policies and stop bitching or go somewhere else. I would not live in france and live for free and then criticize their governements. Being open minded is one thing, am i open to paying for every illegal immigrants free ride, theres the difference.
Ben

They will never send the illegals back, at least not the ones who should be.

One point of reference being used when speaking of the illegals is about the mass media crawling with criminals who use their medium to commit crimes so they are more secure financially and in their jobs. This issue is directly connected to Ted Kennedy and Arnold Swarzennegger and the US government will NEVER tear down an infrastructure that made Arnold a billionaire as it would risk Arnolds fortune. Technically, if he was unaware a crime was being committed, he could keep his money, but politically it would be unsound for him to not make a gesture.

Technically Arnolds personal friends and business associates are a few of the "twelve million illegals" they refer to in congress and Arnold does not want to wipe out his friends lives. They lobbied congressmen and women in all fifty states to protect them selves and laws have been written that protect the mfrom arrest and deportation to "Iraq".

The current news media will never report this type of story as it fractures the picture perfect system in america and might reduce viewership.

Let me clarify my point . I am for LEGAL immagration..LEAGAL. we have to stop this now. It is and has been out of control.

We can not be the dumping ground for the 3rd world.

Bleeding heart liberals chill. You are wrong.

I love the bleeding heart liberals thing, it's as if it's bad to have empathy.

Sure illegal immigration is a problem, but I think how we handle it as a country is whats important, rounding up and sending back millions of illegal immigrants is just not realistic, I'm not saying I have some streak free answer to it, but I think if you did send immigrants all back, it would actually damage our country and especially our economy.

You know every time you go out to dinner, go to a bar or club, or any service industry establishment, many many of those working in the kitchen and behind the scenes are mexican and many illegal, why is that?
I believe it's because thats who's willing to do the work, even our legal white,black,asian, etc etc, teenagers won't do those kinds of jobs, and we've got find a way to keep that part of the job market around.

I read a really great article a while back, about farmers in california who went through some raids taking away just about all of the illegal immigrants working on these giant farms, and the farmers couldn't get people to replace them, why because they couldn't find ANY americans who wanted to do the work, so what happened, there production went down, and they had to raise prices to compensate, as well as there was few of these produce getting to stores, restaurants in the area had to up their prices a bit to as well compensate and then their customers were paying more.

It's all cyclical, one effects the other and in turn effects the other.

Another thing I find interesting, when I was doing construction, we always had illegal immigrants cause we couldn't find many workers, and you know what, their work ethic was astounding and the americans that we'd hire, not all, just didn't want to be there or work hard, there was just no drive or motivation to be there.

I don't feel like they should be getting the same care as us or not paying taxes, but theres got to be a middle ground.
we've got to stop the huge influx of illegals coming through just for securitys sake.

Comparatively though, the U.S. gives the least amount of foreign aid, per capita, than ANY other country, if all the countries were equal in size, we'd be at the bottom of the list, thats sad considering our resources.

I think I read that some said TELEMUNDO, so big that it was about to acquire NBC?

Thats just not the case, NBC, owns telemundo, and is operated by a company in Colorado.


KDEN is a full-power television station based in Longmont, Colorado, that operates with 5000 kw of power and owned and operated by NBC Universal, broadcasting on analog channel 25, digital 29, Cable 20. It is affiliated with NBC Universal's spanish-language network, Telemundo.

NBC recently purchased KDEN from Longmont Broadcasting, making it NBC's second owned-and-operated station in Denver, the first in that market since NBC operated KCNC-TV during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and their seventeenth Spanish-language TV station.

If i was in mexico and illegal do you think I would be stunned if all I could get was say cash jobs?It's not my problem or concern as to why illegal immigrants do what they do. However, to demand equal treatment, rights, variations in language when they do not pay taxes and i do is wrong. If were gonna talk about this, I want free healthcare and other amentities granted to say mexican citicizens even tho I am american. If you add to our culture, great,if you add to the history great. Just because you add to a country does not make you void of paying the same taxes everyone else does and contributing in society in more than just your god given gifts. Its idealistic and quite silly to assume that because people have a hard life, or maybe they dont get the best jobs that it's our problem. Sorry that illegal immigrants have such a hard time,I really am. Are many of these people attempting to learn english,which can be done often times for free?I don't think so. If people want rights, they are not just handed down with a lolli pop, they are earned. Just because their struggle or life is hard does not mean that the ridiculous taxes I pay week after week are exactly fair either.

First and foremost the company's etc that employee illegals should be fined heavily. If illegals are found to be in there employment They should have to pay for the deporting costs.

IF THERE IS NO WORK HERE THEY WILL NOT COME COMMON SENSE.

All these opinions mean nothing the illegals are breaking the law from whatever county they are from and this has to stop. If we don't the USA as we know it will fall. We are being taxed not only to support a war that I believe is to line the pockets of the George Bushes of the world as is the fact that they the government turn a blind eye to illegals flooding OUR country's business owners large and small keep cheap labor.. Only now with the beginnings of public outcry's such as this are the politicians taking notice. The bleeding heart liberals and we still have more power in the vote than the latino community who no doubt want and feel that illegals have a right to be here don't have the voting power the mass majority have( yes those who stayed silent to be politically correct such as myself have had enough are now beginning to speak enough ) are akin to Nero played as the city burned. We as LEGAL US citizens have a obligation to stop this.

Any points valid or not mean nothing the law is the law and must be enforced.

One myth I always hear is "the illegals are doing the work that regular Americans won't."

That's bull shitt. The illegals jumping in the backs of trucks for day labor are not going out and picking cotton or berries. They're doing construction!

There are plenty of legal Americans who do construction. In New York City the prevailing wage is THIRTY DOLLARS PER HOUR with benefits.

The illegals make something like 80 and up cash a day.

quote:

One myth I always hear is "the illegals are doing the work that regular Americans won't."

That's bull shitt. The illegals jumping in the backs of trucks for day labor are not going out and picking cotton or berries. They're doing construction!

There are plenty of legal Americans who do construction. In New York City the prevailing wage is THIRTY DOLLARS PER HOUR with benefits.

The illegals make something like 80 and up cash a day.

http://backstage.blogs.com/unscripted/
Posts: 1881 | Location: New York, NY | Registered: May 26, 2006

The wages you quote are only for those in skilled construction jobs or in the construction Unions. And those who aren't in Unions usually have no benefits even if their hourly wage is high. Union jobs tend to be jobs for big corporations or the government.

Now this is something I know about intimately so there's no use arguing with me on this one

Yes, but you said yourself the hourly rates are high, even without benefits.

The illegals have no experience and they're being paid 80 dollars cash to 150 cash a day. (I got that from the NY Daily News the other day).

Don't you think plenty of teen agers or people in their twenties would take that salary?

80 cash a day is NOT paltry. That's 400 a week CLEAR.

There have been slow times at temping where I would have taken any job to clear 400. Temping can dry up at times.

Point is, we need to squash that myth that they're all out doing the work that "nobody" else would do.

Shay,

I just read your post. Thanks for the points you are making.

The main point I was trying to make in my original post in this thread is that we have to look at this issue without all the hysteria. Some of the ranting that goes on is shocking in it's inaccuracies, and also in its demonizing of Hispanics.

Well I hope nobody thinks I'm demonizing Hispanics.

I live in a city that's 99 percent Hispanic. I've always loved hispanic peeps, the language, the culture, the value on family, church etc.

quote:

Yes, but you said yourself the hourly rates are high, even without benefits.

The illegals have no experience and they're being paid 80 dollars cash to 150 cash a day. (I got that from the NY Daily News the other day).

Don't you think plenty of teen agers or people in their twenties would take that salary?

80 cash a day is NOT paltry. That's 400 a week CLEAR.

There have been slow times at temping where I would have taken any job to clear 400. Temping can dry up at times.

Point is, we need to squash that myth that they're all out doing the work that "nobody" else would do.

http://backstage.blogs.com/unscripted/

My husband has been in construction for many years, both here and California, and he would disagree with your above statements. And above Shay made some of the same points about the labor force. Once again, though, not all of those in construction who work for $80/ day are illegals--just uneducated, unskilled laborers. Actually that's not even entirely true as some qualify to do something in their country that they can't do here. The guy who's truck we rented from the parking lot at the Home Depot in Queens when we moved in together was a political refugee who had been an air traffic controller in his country.

I think when you get right down to it what you are really complaining about when you use the example of the day laborer is what's called the underground economy--jobs where people are paid under the table and don't pay income taxes. (BTW everybody pays taxes when they purchase goods that have a sales tax.) Many American citizens also do that, but because many illegals are part of the underground economy the two issues get intertwined.

Okay, I didn't mean to go on so long. I'm done here.

What would your husband disagree with?