So you want to put a stop to illegal immigration, do you? Those damn immigrants, taking American jobs and taking advantage of government hand-outs!
What about the legal immigrants – the ones who work within the system? Millions of hard working people are legally in the United States, working hard, paying taxes, and getting – screwed. Legal immigrants pay all the same taxes you do – federal and state income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, real estate taxes when they own property; they also pay legal fees to work their way through the Kafkaesque immigration system – work visa, sponsorship, green card, citizenship. And yet, despite paying the full freight, they can’t vote in any elections, and thus have no political representation, and little or no political influence. You remember the original rallying cry of the American Revolution, don’t you – something about “No taxation without representation!”
And incidentally, those illegal immigrants? They’re the ones building the houses you live in – doing the real grunt work of masonry, carpentry, and general construction labor. Once the houses are built, they’ll be the ones you call to clean your house. And serve you at fast food restaurants. And help you find your stuff at Home Depot. And man the cash register at Wal-Mart. And be a nanny to your kids and caretaker to your elderly parents. And do all the other hard, grinding, thankless labor that you, and other Americans, really don’t want to do.
Glad you’re back Outrage!
Excuse me, but I am offended by anyone who claims that we should accept large amounts of immigrants – legal or illegal – and most Americans are not for globalization as it is being played out under this administration. For starters it is insulting to immigrants to say that they “take the jobs that Americans won’t do”, and besides – that comment is B.S.! There are plenty of Americans who would do those jobs but they don’t get a chance because there are so many immigrants lining up to take low pay and limited or no benefits. I think most Americans would be willing to pay a higher price for products to have them made here in the USA by legal American citizens. I don’t think anyone feels that their quality of life has improved just because they now can buy cheaper products made with low cost labour.
Anyone making the comment that Americans should be happy with immigrants because they “build and clean our homes, etc.” is not looking at the big picture. Again, as I said before, there are plenty of Americans who would be glad to have those jobs but they are undercut by foreiners who take the jobs for minimum pay. Americans would not have a problem paying slightly more for labour and perhaps sacrifice some space or a luxury to make up the difference in cost. We’re not as materialistic by nature as big corporations and the media want us to be. I see a growing population of Americans who are actually concerned about our environmemt and quality of life. We don’t want to be overrun by a third-world culture that lowers our quality of life, takes away jobs, and degrades our schools and communities. Think what you want – keep your eyes closed to reality – but a good number of these illegals don’t care about our country as a whole. They only want more money for themselves and more money to send overseas to their poor family members. Eventually they bring the rest of the clan over here and where a majority of these people will become dependent on The System (the one WE pay for!). Sure, the initial person who crossed the boarder and went through the legal process may have a desire to attain the “American Dream” but that doesn’t mean that the entire family is so thrilled with that kind of hard work and our way of life. They almost always stay isolated in their own communities and when they do cross paths with Americans they don’t seem to care about assimilating to our culture. Once clean and friendly neighborhoods where hispanics have taken over have quickly become low-class and dangerous places where white’s don’t feel welcome. It is also a fact that a majority of Mexicans who live in the American Southwest believe that the land belongs to them and that the “gringo’s” stole it from them without reason. They want nothing less than to populate the area with their own kind and then take over the areas government and culture. They don’t stop to think that the American Southwest would be just as poor as Mexico if they still controlled the area -duh!
BTW, it doesn’t help these people to make it easy for them to run away from their homelands, including Mexico, Central America, and South America. If these people were forced to stay home then maybe they would do what is needed to change their government and other living conditions.
I also find it ironic that so many of these people comming from poor areas say they come here for a better life yet when they get here they refuse to change most of their low-class behaviors.
I’m very glad you’re back. Since certain events I don’t want to mention, we were confirmed in our prejudices on the Usa.
This issue will absolutely vaporize given the now pending North-American-Union of Mexamericanada. See what GWB and the Globalization machine is doing now http://spp.gov and http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=14965
I am outraged that your column does not seem to recognize the meaning of Illegal!!
Our arrogant politicians have allowed the creation of a new class of non citizen… one who collects all the benefits of a citizen in good standing without the pesky task of asking permission and then waiting for an invitation to participate. This attitude makes for an unwelcome guest and unacceptable neighbor who refuses to play by the rules the rest are held by.
The Following is an excert authored by by Susan Fassanella. Many Americans including myself agree with Susan:
______
I am angry that my government meddles in the lives of people all over the world but looks the other way on the catastrophic issue of what to do about the millions of illegals who have crashed the gates of this nation. My country’s laws are ignored and mocked, yet I am told I must accept with open arms those who are here illegally. My taxes are used to educate their children in their native language. Hospitals are overrun with indigent people seeking medical care. Untaxed dollars earned in the underground economy are sent to the family back home while social services here are stretched to the limit. I read job want ads stating if you aren’t bilingual don’t bother to apply. What would happen to me if I placed an ad that said don’t bother to apply if your English isn’t understandable? Marches are conducted in my cities’ streets waving their countries’ flags as they shamelessly demand their “rights.” I am told they deserve the same opportunities that brought my forefathers here. I am scolded that it is un-American to ask why they are not sent home. I am told that the term “illegal alien” offends them and that they prefer to be called “undocumented workers” and that my economy would die without them. I will happily pay more for fruits and vegetables if it means enforcing sensible immigration laws. But immigration isn’t about the cost of lettuce. It is another facet of an agenda that is bent on changing the face of America. When America is no longer a wealthy country of white European descent, it will be a place worse than anything Orwell could have imagined.
______
When I was a boy I had two paper routes and mowed my neighbors yards for lunch money. Today our young men and women are now competing with Illegal Aliens for their Lunch Money and school clothes.
I resent and refuse to accept a gate crasher who has not been invited and refuses to obey the very laws we are all held by.
If you want to write controversial material to provoke people into responding you should at least be accurate when discussing an issue. You wrote:
“…they also pay legal fees to work their way through the Kafkaesque immigration system ? work visa, sponsorship, green card, citizenship. And yet, despite paying the full freight, they can?t vote in any elections, and thus have no political
representation, and little or no political influence.”
Of course you must know that as soon as they achieve citizenship they can vote. And until they do become citizens they shouldn’t be able to vote.
If any foreigner wants to live in the US they come here legally, and should be able to speak English.
The other points in the article are without merit and just there to add flame to the fire. Get a grip you guys.
It has been years since I read the original outrage. It was controversial, inflammatory and even a tad racist. But most of all it was funny. I loved the sarcastic, cynical humor. No offense, but what I read today was insipid.
We subsidize illegal immigrants with a free pass on taxes and social welfare so our own growing underclass can continue not to work.
I have an idea. Cut welfare to the bone and make it very unpleasant to hire illegals. We’ll see what jobs Americans will do.
Oh, by the way. We long ago replaced our lawn with stone and minimal ground cover, replaced maid needs with technology and skill and god help the contractor who shows up at my door with illegals on his payroll.
Since my home was built in 1885 the immigrants who built it (if they were) would have been in the same citizenship classes as my great grandfather.
I walk out of fast food places where English isn’t spoken and I’ve never seen an illegal at home depot.
Did I miss anything in your whining quasi-liberal rant?
I suggest you take a deep breath and a step back and return to your roots, the old Outrage.
As far as I can tell from what is known about my family tree, all of my distant relatives, except for one American Indian, were immigrants. None came here illegally and, I assume all were obliged to go through much more stringent citizenship requirements than any legal applicant for entry into the American dream in these times. Illegal migrants in their millions constitute the new American nightmare. I do not feel obliged in any way to feel sorry for those who intentionally violate our laws when there are tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands waiting and working to gain citizenship legally, as did most of all of our ancestors.
Ha Ha!
Your illegal immigration tractate is a joke because no one is THAT stupid. At least, I hope so.
One point I never hear mentioned is the poor workmanship of many, or is it most, legal and illegal immigrants. This creates work for the skilled craftsmen, both immigrants and native Americans because they have to correct the mistakes and shoddy workmanship so that the customer pays the bill. Of course, this can be both bad and good. Bad, in that even though the poor job was corrected, it isn’t the same quality as original good work. Good, in that it proves the value of skilled craftsmen, and of course, employs the skilled craftsmen.
I suspect at some point we will hear an uproar from legal immigrants who payed to get their citizenship and now want to be reimbursed.
My house was built in 1955 by a local company, way before the “reforms” of 1965 and 1986. I don’t have a nanny. I don’t have cleaners. My local Home Depot is staffed by retirees, as is Walmart.
There is no job that can’t be filled by an American. I didn’t suffer at all on the “Day without illegal aliens”, although I do suffer plenty when I can’t work in software while the industry is claiming that there is such a desperate shortage that they have to legal import non-immigrant programmers.
As for “Taxation without Representation” that was a rallying cry at a time when plenty of Great Britain wasn’t represented in parliament, but it isn’t law: just ask anybody from New Hampshire who works in Maine or Massachusetts. Taxation with Representation isn’t much better.
Immigrants have the right to vote as soon as they become citizens — most native-born Americans have to wait 18 years to exercise that right.
Welcome back, but if all you’re trying to do is stir up outrage, this is trolling of the worst sort, and you may as well advocate sending folks into our homes to beat up our puppies.
To the editor: good to have you guys back. To everyone else: I take it this site is about building fires, about discussing issues and debating the merits and failures of various policies regarding these issues. If that is correct, the editor/staff of Outrage got things off to a good (new) start.
I find it hard to understand why this “illegal immigration” thing has created so much confusion, and so much animosity toward the immigrants themselves.The wetbacks in this country are mostly very good, hard working people. They didn’t come here to hurt us, but to make better lives for themselves and their families. In this respect they are no different from hard working citizens here. Think: if you and I apply for the same job and we both really hope to get it, that’s not because each of us wants to see the other go hungry, it’s just because we need the job. Each of us will try to sell the employer on the idea that we’d make the better employee. These folks are the same. They don’t mean to take our jobs, they just mean to get jobs. And I’ve worked with some of these folks; most of them work *hard*. My point: don’t blame them for trying to improve their lot in life. That’s why they’re immigrants, and they probably sacrificed much to get here.
However, there is a second point: they are *illegal* immigrants. Now we could spend all night debating our immigration laws, and I’ll be the first to say that the U.S. has handled these laws about as badly as it handles most of the others, but right now, right or wrong, they are laws. Until they are repealed they should be enforced. The way this is supposed to work is the Executive branch (that’d be the President and his flunkies) are supposed to make people conform to laws our idiot Legislators pass. As it happens, in this as in many other cases, it does not please our current President to do this.
The key word here is, “Illegal”. We could debate the wisdom of their being illegal, but until that changes they are in the same boat as everyone else in this country who is trying to better his lot in life by defying the law… crack dealers, bank robbers, burglars, muggers, politicians… well, you get the picture.
The bottom line is simply this: people are like fluid under pressure, or electrons moving through wires, in that they will follow the path of least resistance. People who steal or murder or sell crack or enter this country illegally or make moonshine or drive an 18-wheeler or mine coal or run for county councel… whatever they do… they know there will be risks. Nothing is without risks. So whatever you do for a living, you do it because you perceive the carrot as being bigger than the stick. People choose the paths they follow because they believe those paths will provide the easiest, best way of reaching their goals.
Are you with me so far? What it boils down to is that very few things should be illegal, but those things that are illegal should be strongly discouraged. Every law costs us all money and it’s way past time we were getting our money’s worth. If the government is not able to do anything to discourage certain behavior it shoudn’t bother to spend taxpayers’ money on it (the “war on drugs” comes to mind).
However, if our esteemed elected Republicrats and Democritters in Congress decide, in their infinite wisdom, that something should be against the law, and the courts don’t condemn them for the idiots they so obviously are and force them to write the U.S. Constitution 500 times, it falls upon the Executive branch to enforce it.
The problem lies within the mangled abortion our government has become. It will not.. cannot be fixed until We, The Sheeple, recognize and confront the problem.
Our problem is obvious: when any behavior reaches a socially unacceptable level, either it must be changed or society must change to accommodate it. Bush is trying to change society, bring in more immigrants, and merge our country with Canada and Mexico. This is one more step toward a world government, and it is being driven by a force far greater than even our President knows. If we fail to stop it we will deserve exactly what we get.
I live in Papua New Guinea, a Pacific nation, though am myself white.
The local (Melanesian and Polynesian) population — almost to a man (forgive the “political incorrectness”) — complain about the Asian immigrants, both legal and illegal, for the same reasons as many Americans do about their immigrants.
This is basically because there is a particularly strong sense of tribalism in PNG — and it’s refreshing to note this still exists in America despite it being a “modern” country.
Tribal ties are an extension of family.
I agree with the following posted comments:
Charles (sternedwards@aol.com) Time: 7/12/2006 (10:8:10)
Excuse me, but I am offended by anyone who claims that we should accept large amounts of immigrants – legal or illegal – and most Americans are not for globalization as it is being played out under this administration. For starters it is insulting to immigrants to say that they “take the jobs that Americans won’t do”, and besides – that comment is B.S.! There are plenty of Americans who would do those jobs but they don’t get a chance because there are so many immigrants lining up to take low pay and limited or no benefits. I think most Americans would be willing to pay a higher price for products to have them made here in the USA by legal American citizens. I don’t think anyone feels that their quality of life has improved just because they now can buy cheaper products made with low cost labour. Anyone making the comment that Americans should be happy with immigrants because they “build and clean our homes, etc.” is not looking at the big picture. Again, as I said before, there are plenty of Americans who would be glad to have those jobs but they are undercut by foreiners who take the jobs for minimum pay. Americans would not have a problem paying slightly more for labour and perhaps sacrifice some space or a luxury to make up the difference in cost. We’re not as materialistic by nature as big corporations and the media want us to be. I see a growing population of Americans who are actually concerned about our environmemt and quality of life. We don’t want to be overrun by a third-world culture that lowers our quality of life, takes away jobs, and degrades our schools and communities. Think what you want – keep your eyes closed to reality – but a good number of these illegals don’t care about our country as a whole. They only want more money for themselves and more money to send overseas to their poor family members. Eventually they bring the rest of the clan over here and where a majority of these people will become dependent on The System (the one WE pay for!). Sure, the initial person who crossed the boarder and went through the legal process may have a desire to attain the “American Dream” but that doesn’t mean that the entire family is so thrilled with that kind of hard work and our way of life. They almost always stay isolated in their own communities and when they do cross paths with Americans they don’t seem to care about assimilating to our culture. Once clean and friendly neighborhoods where hispanics have taken over have quickly become low-class and dangerous places where white’s don’t feel welcome. It is also a fact that a majority of Mexicans who live in the American Southwest believe that the land belongs to them and that the “gringo’s” stole it from them without reason. They want nothing less than to populate the area with their own kind and then take over the areas government and culture. They don’t stop to think that the American Southwest would be just as poor as Mexico if they still controlled the area -duh! BTW, it doesn’t help these people to make it easy for them to run away from their homelands, including Mexico, Central America, and South America. If these people were forced to stay home then maybe they would do what is needed to change their government and other living conditions. I also find it ironic that so many of these people comming from poor areas say they come here for a better life yet when they get here they refuse to change most of their low-class behaviors.
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