Immigration Civil War – Commentary by Jim Dean

Dear folks,

Below is the New York Times rundown on the immigration compromise ploy. It has several of the false ploy arguments of the illegal immigration crowd.

1) All illegals would have to leave, wrecking the economy. This is complete baloney and I know of no immigration reform people who are proposing this. Obviously these folks would be filtered back home over at least a five year program. New people, documented workers, could be replacing them under an organized plan...but these could be NEW people, not necessarily those who broke US immigration laws and not providing future incentives to law breakers.

2) By not giving citizenship to illegals, immigration reformers are advocating a proto-slavery future America... This is more baloney, piled higher and deeper. The $10 to $12 and hour that illegals make here in Atlanta is the same $10 to $12 and hour that many non-illegal Americans make. I did not consider myself a proto slave when I was a part time cashier for Krogers back in the nineties. The NY Times would have us believe that $8-$10 an hour here is worse than a $1 an hour in Mexico...or nothing.

Cycling temporary workers back and forth, and passing the available work around among more people would not reward the illegal immigration hustlers. This is the Jim Dean immigration plan. People would cycle in to work for a season, go home...and be replaced if need by someone else whose family in Mexico needed a boost. The employer would post a med insurance/skipout bond, and the worker would use his family as a bond...i.e., no family member could ever apply for US citizenship if they skipped out while here.

These workers would be admired as 'successful' people back home, not exploited workers. And Americans here would no longer be looking down the gun barrel of the Radical immigrationists. Our community demographics, our educational and health institutions, our political structure would no longer be under assault.

The Jim Dean plan would also include a bounty system for picking up illegal immigrants, similar to what we have now for skipping bail. This would cost the taxpayer nothing as it would be self funded by the bonds that were posted when they came in. This would provide a large number of jobs for legal Americans.

By the way, I have been quietly passing this around and the approval rate of this is in the 90% range. People wonder why no one has proposed this at the Congressional level. The reason is that it would fix the problem.

It is we immigration reformers who want PEACE. The radical immigrationists want WAR. It is that simple. The Radicals declared war on us last month with their marches, demanding the right to break laws they choose and be rewarded with citizenship. And you can see they put their kids into the fight.

Wide open uncontrolled immigration is a major destabilizing influence to any country, and always has been. Historically, it has never been a good thing. It has destroyed every country where it happened. Those who propose doing this are importing troops to wage war on traditional America.

It's an immigration civil war folks. Somebody needs to just say it. There...I did.

Jim Dean is the producer of Heritage TV and a member of the Georgia Heritage Council.

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The Amnesty Trap Published: April 5, 2006 New York Times When the week began, it looked almost as if it was time to celebrate a springtime blossoming of good sense in Washington. The Senate appeared to be closing in on solid bipartisan support for a comprehensive overhaul of the nation's immigration system. That meant adopting an approach that has been on the table for months in a bill offered last year by Senators John McCain and Edward Kennedy, then revised and passed last month by the Senate Judiciary Committee. It combines, sensibly, tighter borders with a path to citizenship for people here illegally. The bill's opponents, including the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, had long derided the multifaceted strategy as "amnesty," but over the weekend even Mr. Frist appeared to have a light bulb go off. On a talk show and in a news release, he recast his definition of the word in a way that seemed to justify allowing at least some of the nation's 11 million to 12 million illegal immigrants to get in line for green cards. But it is too soon to exhale. The Judiciary Committee's bill apparently remains stuck in the amnesty trap. While it has enough votes to pass, it may not have enough to avoid a filibuster by hard-core Republicans. For them, anything other than punishment and border enforcement smacks unforgivably of forgiveness. Now Senators Mel Martinez of Florida and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska are offering a "fallback" compromise if the committee bill fails. They would not eliminate the citizenship track, but narrow it severely. Immigrants who have been here at least five years could apply, but those who arrived more recently would be treated more harshly. The details were unclear yesterday, but the newcomers might either have to leave the country to apply for citizenship, or do so from a border city, like El Paso. Arbitrarily separating the illegal immigrant population with a five-year rule would be cruel. Inviting millions of them to report to be deported would be utterly unfeasible. And turning El Paso into the "Go" square in Monopoly would just be stupid. It would add a meaningless hurdle to a citizenship obstacle course that is already long and difficult. All it would do is give a face-saving assurance to hard-liners that immigrants would suffer adequately for their green cards and allow Republicans to reassure suspicious constituents: this is so not amnesty. Half-measures and semantic trickery are not what's needed now. This country has been on a long and improbable path to immigration reform. The more it has wrestled with the issue, the more distance has grown between the thoughtful Americans and the nativists who long for a Great Wall of Mexico, or for a two-tiered nation of citizens and of immigrant hired hands, free to toil forever as guest workers but never to fully join our society. The Martinez-Hagel compromise is a bad idea. It's tempting to think flawed reform is better than none, but the wiser approach is to stand firm for what Mr. Kennedy has called "the real enchilada." We need to get it right this time, once and for all.