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terpfan1980

Join Date 08/2004

+13

Maybe I shouldn't worry about illegal immigration after all

Excuse me a second while I peel myself up off the floor (where I'm rolling around and laughing a bit thanks to a point of view supplied by my spousal unit, aka wife!)....

Ah, there, back in my seat now, ready to write again.

So, why shouldn't I be worrying about illegal immigration?

Well, it goes about like this.... Tonite's episode of the excellent show Penn and Teller's Bullsh*t! series on Showtime was primarily about Illegal Immigration. If you aren't familiar with P&T's B.S. series, then you are missing a great show. The show is in the vein of the show Mythbuster's which runs on Discovery's networks. It explores various topics and blows away the expected by providing facts and serious insight into whatever the subject is.

This week, well, the subject is Illegal Immigration. During this week's episode at one point there was the usual discussion about how some people worry about Illegal Immigrants coming to this country taking away the jobs for the poor. It was at this point that my wonderful wife made such an insightful comment as to leave me rolling on the floor laughin' my rear-end off.

My wife offered up the brilliant observation that thanks to these willing workers coming to our area we now actually have *reliable* and *consistent* fast food service in the area. Instead of urbanites, or almost urbanites and inner city types working behind the counters and back in the kitchen areas at the local restaurants, we instead find a lot of people that you might find in an "English as a Second Language" class. Typically hispanic or latino. People that actually do have a good work ethic, and actually do care, or at least seem to care, about doing their jobs.

Gee, what a concept. People that actually do *work* for the money they are paid, and actually care about keeping their jobs. What a country!

Given the wife's view of the issue, it actually makes sense to just forget all about the issue of illegal immigration. When the "poor" people in this country (hate to generalize, but in my area that tends to be people of color, aka Black, and tends to be people with rednecks and bad attitudes...) actually learn (oops, probably never will happen given that stipulation!) how to *work* for a living, then I might actually start worrying about illegal immigration again.

Until then, hmm, I think I'll just enjoy my fast food without having to wait all day just to have the order taken or have the food cooked per my order.

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Darn it, the wife had to just keep on talking... In doing so, she reminds me of the one issue that illegal immigration may leave us all with -- the problem that my daughter notices repeatedly: people that come to the country, get into the work place, and then CAN'T SPEAK ENGLISH.

So, I guess I'm ok with illegal immigration, provided that the people that come here and take the jobs away from the poor people are smart enough to learn at least a few words of English so that they can understand the business transactions they want to perform for/with me.

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I can speak a good bit of Spanish(at least enough to order some food, heh heh)...so I really don't care how many illegals show up.

~Zoo

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It is a standard of living issue. Americans expect to work *any* job, buy a car, put themselves through school, maybe buy a house or at least rent a nice one, etc. The poor in our nation have as much living space and conveniences as the average person in many European countries.

So, when we go look for a job picking fruit, we are shocked, SHOCKED that we can't make our car payments and pay for good health insurance on what it pays. It's hideously unfair to us, and we decide we don't want any part of that. The ones who don't want anything that carries more responsibility find some way to get disability or limp along working retail in a state of perpetual entitlement angst.

So, there's a big window for people who live simply, and lots of jobs that allow for that at a reasonable minimum if all the family puts effort in. We say it is their lack of self respect, or feel sorry for them. In reality we're just a bunch of spoiled children.

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the illigal status was started the same day the first minimum wage was passed so that the farmers could pay the so called illigals less money becouse they couldn't afford the minimum wage at that time

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Ponder, if you will, how many fewer illegals we might have if we didn't pay government subsidies to American farmers, allowing them to crush the agricultural industries of third world countries. I love my country, and I want it to compete, but paying, say, tobacco farmers with tax dollars so they can sell their products cheaper than farmers in other nations isn't good conservatism, it isn't even free market economics.

You have to wonder how many people would stay home and work the farms in their own nations if their agricultural industries could have an even, fair market playing field in terms of exports. Mexicans can come here and get paid ten times as much to help grow tobacco that ends up being artificially as cheap as tobacco from other nations because our tax dollars pay the extra the market won't to the farmer.

Our artificial socialism, keeping prices low and wages sky-high shares a great deal of the blame for illegal immigration.

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Following up on both of the excellent points raised by BakerStreet, and those raised by danielost, the other issue was obviously the passing of welfare laws, social security and other new deal type items that have allowed people in this country that need to, and/or choose to, live off the government and society to do so.

If there wasn't a safety net and people *had* to work or had to rely upon charity and other non-mandated means to find their sustenance, then perhaps the people with the poor attitudes about taking these lower waged jobs might have a different approach about them.

As is, if you work a job that you don't like, you might very well find that you could do far better just by living off the welfare system. Even with reforms that were passed, somewhat over the objection of Bill Clinton and his Democratic party mates, back in the 1990's, there are still those that skate on by.

Regardless though, as a consumer, it certainly has benefited me to find more competent and willing employees showing up in these lower end service jobs. As these jobs have been filled with people that actually do work, and actually provide customer service, things have improved enough to keep many of these businesses going instead of watching stores closed because their business dropped off the map completely.

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kingbee

Join Date 04/2004

+42

Mexicans can come here and get paid ten times as much to help grow tobacco that ends up being artificially as cheap as tobacco from other nations because our tax dollars pay the extra the market won't to the farmer.

if it were only tobacco. while it may be a major cash crop in your state, tobacco isn't the stuff of life. sadly that's not the case with the types of corn grown in mexico...or tomatoes, for that matter. thanks to american agribiz subsidies and nafta, mexicos farmers costs exceed market prices leaving them unable to support themselves much less hire help.

it certainly has benefited me to find more competent and willing employees

one reason you'll never see a reality show in which crews of native-born citizens are pitted against immigrant crews of equal number doing exactly the same jobs (housecleaning, fieldwork, factory production, etc.) is nobody wants to watch the same team win time after time after time.

as far as the english/spanish thing goes, remember many are from very rural areas and often too shy or lack confidence in their ability to express themselves in english. i believe most people would be surprised at just how much english they understand.

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wow the king of bees and bakerstreet both replying in one article, I am happy.

good to "see" you kingbee btw, where you been?

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I am NOT in favor of illegal immigration at ALL. In any sense of the word. What I am for is a liberalized work program that allows people who want to work to come across, because THOSE people ARE needed, they ARE welcome, and they are part of what this country is all about.

****aside: our fast food places are all staffed by Latinos, and, sorry, the service sucks as bad as if Americans worked there. Guess they're TOO WELL assimilated****

The flip side nobody wants to show you is the inner city Latino gangs that spring up out of illegal alien communities and bring nothing but death and destruction. The nearly half a million illegals wanted on outstanding felony warrants. The disproportionate number of illegals sitting in our federal prisons. And a 1500+ mile unprotected border that could easily be exploited by al Qaeda, China, or any nation with the infrastructure to wage war on the United States and pay enough cash to a government that has long been for sale to the highest bidder.

I have heard only a small number of Americans who oppose immigration by Hispanics who want to work. What we oppose are: 1) the immigration of known felons and deviants who will bring their garbage to our country; 2) immigrants who abuse our welfare system for personal gain creating an unrecoverable budgetary crisis; 3) Those who refuse to assimilate and demand multilingual signs to accomodate them as they come into our country; and 4) the security risks presented by a long unprotected border that our government REFUSES to defend, in blatant violation of the Constitution. If Bush should be impeached for ANYTHING, it should be for dereliction of duty in neglecting the southern border.

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If Bush should be impeached for ANYTHING, it should be for dereliction of duty in neglecting the southern border.

if this is true then so should every member of the house and the senate

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if this is true then so should every member of the house and the senate

The COMMANDER IN CHIEF of the Armed Forces bears ultimate responsibility. As to the House and Senate, they should be voted out of office. Both parties.

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The COMMANDER IN CHIEF of the Armed Forces bears ultimate responsibility. As to the House and Senate, they should be voted out of office. Both parties.

i agree and have said so for 10 years

but congress is also fighting anything that would slow down or stop the flow mostly the demos but a lot of republicans too

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Years ago back on our farm it seemed like rocks grew every winter, for in the spring when we were getting our fields ready to plant our crops there was always a lot of rocks we had to clean up. And we did it all by hand there was my mother and my self for dad was always working in other fields, any way mom was not in the best of health and she was never very strong. But for some reason this one year the rocks were a lot bigger then normal so dad tried to hire some people to help us out for we had about 600 acres to do., and the people that applied at first seen what and how we were moving the rocks and then they left. About 5 days later these two Mexicans came by they had not seen the ad but they were looking for work we showed them what we were doing and they jumped right in to help out, they did not even ask how much they would be paid. The next morning at the crack of dawn the same two guys were back but this time they brought 3 more guys to help we were very grateful, and the nicest and neatest thing is that any time my mom tried to pick up a rock that they felt was to big for her they would take over and tell here no no, I think the largest rock they would let her pick up was maybe 10lbs. any way my point is I thank God that they were around and if they want to work they should be allowed too and the so called poor let them go hungry for a while for then they will learn to work. I have been a single mother of 3 children for the past 20 years, I never asked for hand outs, or welfare, and if a single mother can do it then these lazy couples should be able to do it. When my kids where under the age of 5 till they grew up I worked on three different farms at the same time with the kids right behind me. Like I said if the Mexicans want to work let them and for these lazy Americans let them go hungry for they will learn how to work if they are hungry enough. ALSO QUITE GIVING THEM (LAZY AMERICANS) EVERYTHING THEY WANT FOR IF THEY GET EVERYTHING HANDED TO THEM FOR FREE WHY SHOULD THEY WORK, FOR OUR TAX DOLLARS ARE PAYING THEM TO SIT ON THERE A_ _, GET FAT AND THEY DO NOT HAVE TO DO ANYTHING FOR IT, AND IF WE ARE PAYING THERE WAY AT LEAST THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD MAKE THEM DO COMMUNITIE SERVICE AT A MINIMUM WAGE RATE PER AN HOUR. THEY NEED TO WAKE UP. NOW I DO BELIEVE IN HELPING PEOPLE (THAT WANT TO HELP THEM SELF) GET ON THERE FEET AND GET STARTED BUT NOT FOR A WHOLE LIFE TIME. So it is good to hear that there are othere americans out there that feel the same way I do. If a person really wants to work they can find something to do.

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entering and remaining here legally is outrageously expensive (to date, we've spent almost $7000,

Is $7,000. the norm now or is your circumstance unusual? When I went through it about 14 years ago the total cost was well under $1,000.

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