if they came pre76 id call em colonists (many/most cajuns would fall into this category). i wouldnt count slaves as immigrants either.
i dispute that i count as an immigrant if i am here before the nation is. also indians came here as well, either across the frozen land bridge or on boats or whatever. we are all africans.
Considering it is projected that the 2011 census will have a new majority race I don't think this will ever change.
your military service idea seems decent. i would like that there would be many avenues to citizenship, and a huge increase in immigrants allowed in, from everywhere. of course this would have to be paired with a massive reduction in social services and no free health care for anyone. immigrants love to work, and are great people. we should welcome them with open arms. and again i would like to mention that the statement "we are all immigrants except indians" is false. even "native" americans came here from africa. the only real natives are africans in africa. there is no arbitrary point at which we can say that people arriving to a place are immigrants. but if you want to draw a line, you could use 1776, in which case i am most certainly not a descendant of immigrants, but of colonists.
They are immigrants. How they immigrated isn;t an issue. You are over 400 years old? Bullchit. That would make them initial inhabitants and you would be the descendant of immigrants.
The problem isn't the "average" 18-25 year old worker who works hard. His/her contribution offsets the "under the table" wages and costs associated with health care, etc. The problems starts when he/she acclimates and gets comfortable with the system. It's at this time he/she has spouse, children, parents, etc. smuggled into the country. Many of these family members don't work yet use the hospitals, schools, roads, parks, etc. without ever contributing a dime of tax revenue. Once they get very comfortable the demands for ESL, public documents in a language other than English, non-American history courses in school, etc. that really start to divide our country. Open borders is NOT the solution. The U.S. is still the most desired nation in the world for immigrants yet we can't afford to manage what we already have. We allow more people to become citizens each year than all other nations combined. That sounds pretty damn considerate to me. We also to manage who is allowed to enter as we don't need to overload the country with a single demographic. Look at Los Angeles. It's a very diverse city but nobody assimilates. It's like a city full of little cities where many never interact. The argument that no Americans will do the job is only accurate to a certain extent. It's overused by big business and politcians on both sides of the aisle. Most Americans are united over border security yet our elected officials won't listen. That's all you need to know as to why we can't accomplish more. Border security and immigration reform/control is good for America but not good for politicians and those who get extremely wealthy off of cheap foreign labor. Start moving some of the business from China to Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. Let these people offset some of the imports from China while providing them employment in their own country. It's difficult to get to America from Asia, Africa, or Europe but not as tough for those countries just south of the fence. These are the ones we need to help so they can stay home. For those you allow in we need stipulations that state this is a "temporary" permit only eligible for adjustment if certain, pro-American requirements are met.
not sure why it is somehow relevant if you are a first to a place. again, all places on earth are composed of immigrants only, except africa. would you describe the one first indian tribe as the natives and the later-arriving tribes as "immigrants" or do you only differentiate arriving tribes when they are white?
Write this down! Red is agreeing with PT. Last week it was Deek, this week it's Purp. My inner fascist is trying to get out. :grin:
Great post, great points. The irony is that the upper crust that benefits the most from illegal immigration doesn't want this supply of cheap labor cut off. No employee costs, no HR issues, hell they can subject them to abhorrent working conditions in many cases without repercussion. The immigrants need the money to survive, so in some ways I find them less to blame in this issue. It doesn't make me like them any more than the rich that take there share from this. So who suffers the most with this unlikely arrangement? The middle class who doesn't hire illegals, (I don't, never have, never will) who foots the bill for the services and tolerates both those who hire illegals and the illegals themselves for overburdening the system for the legitimate taxpayers. That's who. So Republicans who are in many cases supported by businesses that hire illegals get a chance to look PC here, under the guise of supporting "the people". When W started backpedaling on this years ago I smelled a rat. The Dems are gonna support the commoners anyway, get to keep up their human rights agenda (!) while supporting the businesses that want to look PC. The Dems DO NOT want to be directly linked to big business, so they can support them surreptitiously while maintaining their "party of the people" stance. That's why elected officials won't listen - they both have a money and PR stake in this game. The bottom line is that we shouldn't look for any real change on this for years to come.
