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Conservative wins close Presidential election

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GG Hall of Famer

GG

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I'll bite. Please tell us how to connect the dots.  :devil:

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Once you're done with the pretty pictures, the other dots involve the criticism of Bush waving a Mexican flag, when apparently he should have been doing something more pressing. That simpleton view ignores Bush supporting Calderon's election bid, as Lopez Obrador's win would potentially be disasterous for Mexico's economic growth, and would ensure that an additional 11 million brown folk would try to cross the border.

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Bill from NYC Hall of Famer

Bill from NYC

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Once you're done with the pretty pictures, the other dots involve the criticism of Bush waving a Mexican flag, when apparently he should have been doing something more pressing.  That simpleton view ignores Bush supporting Calderon's election bid, as Lopez Obrador's win would potentially be disasterous for Mexico's economic growth, and would ensure that an additional 11 million brown folk would try to cross the border.

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Disasterous for their economic growth? Do you mean that flourishing economy that has millions upon untold millions of their citizens willing to take great risk in order for them to cross the border and live with 30 or more people in a small house?

Is there some sort of "Red Menace" lurking there that drew Bush toward Calderon? Or, was it simply yet another ploy to fatten up the wallets of his corporate friends?

 

Btw Bro, I think that the "brown folk" reference was quite uncalled for, at least when taking to me. :devil:

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cromagnum RFA

cromagnum

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Once you're done with the pretty pictures, the other dots involve the criticism of Bush waving a Mexican flag, when apparently he should have been doing something more pressing.  That simpleton view ignores Bush supporting Calderon's election bid, as Lopez Obrador's win would potentially be disasterous for Mexico's economic growth, and would ensure that an additional 11 million brown folk would try to cross the border.

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I was looking at the numbers of illegals entering the U.S. the last five years, I believe thats why everyone is talking about it, the issue moved from the southwest to a majority of the U.S.

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GG Hall of Famer

GG

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Disasterous for their economic growth? Do you mean that flourishing economy that has millions upon untold millions of their citizens willing to take great risk in order for them to cross the border and live with 30 or more people in a small house?

Is there some sort of "Red Menace" lurking there that drew Bush toward Calderon? Or, was it simply yet another ploy to fatten up the wallets of his corporate friends?

 

Btw Bro, I think that the "brown folk" reference was quite uncalled for, at least when taking to me.  :devil:

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The Mexican economy can't turn on a dime, Fox has done a decent job of liberalizing it, and Calderon is expected to continue the reforms. Lopez Obrador would stop the reform movement in favor of populist acts that would totally kill foreign investment. In that case, he would guarantee that the Mexican rich remains ultra wealthy, while the rest of Mexico remains impoverished, and be willing to take greater risks such as taking 50 of them living in a house in the US.

 

The Mexican stock market and peso valuation trend in the two days after the election forshadowed the divergent paths that Mexican economy was going to take. When the first reports of Calderon's win surfaced, the market & peso rallied. The next day, as the recount showed a slight LO lead, the markets tanked big time, only to recover with Calderon's win.

 

There's no Red Menace in Mexico, but there is the valid concern about AQ exploiting the poor living conditions in Lat Am to their advantage.

 

ps - the brown folk reference was quite intentional, because people equate illegals with Mexicans, although there are plenty of illegals from DR, Haiti, and other Central American countries, you know the people who tend to be brownish in tint.

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Bill from NYC Hall of Famer

Bill from NYC

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There's no Red Menace in Mexico, but there is the valid concern about AQ exploiting the poor living conditions in Lat Am to their advantage. 

 

ps - the brown folk reference was quite intentional, because people equate illegals with Mexicans, although there are plenty of illegals from DR, Haiti, and other Central American countries, you know the people who tend to be brownish in tint.

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I see your point, and thank you for the dialogue.

 

I don't think that either of us is really privy to the information of just how instrumental Fox was, or Calderon will be wrt terrorism/AQ. Are there Mexican Soldiers in Afghanistan? Is there a crackdown on terrorism in Mexico?

I don't know.

 

You see, I am open to arguments about why being invaded by illegal aliens is good for American citizens. So far, I haven't herard any, and I don't care about lettuce prices, nor how much more multi-millionaires would have to spend on golf, or dinner at Smith and Wollensky's.

 

What I do clearly see is that taxes are completely out of control. My property taxes just increased by 40 dollars per month due to a new school budget, and almost all of it is earmarked toward teachers salaries, this in a so-so at best district. I am also paying through the nose for social security, only to see it handed to criminals, and hearing threats of it being insolvent.

 

Actually, I hope that your implications are accurate because it looks to me as if pols are simply stealing our money and handing it over to big business people who because of their wealth, are shielded from the not so nice parts of this invasion, and benefit from the virtual slave labor.

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GG Hall of Famer

GG

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Actually, I hope that your implications are accurate because it looks to me as if pols are simply stealing our money and handing it over to big business people who because of their wealth, are shielded from the not so nice parts of this invasion, and benefit from the virtual slave labor.

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Instead of writing a long winded response, I'll just plagiarize WSJ:

 

Monday's OpEd

 

Conservatives and Immigration

The debate on the right about freedom, culture and the welfare state.

 

Monday, July 10, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT

 

No issue more deeply divides American conservatives today than immigration. ......

So with Congress holding hearings on the issue around the country, perhaps it's a good moment to step back and explain the roots of our own, longstanding position favoring open immigration.

 

A position, by the way, on which we hardly stand alone. There is also President Bush, and before him the Gipper. (See our editorial, "Reagan on Immigration.") ......

 

The most frequent criticism we hear is that a newspaper called "The Wall Street Journal" simply wants "cheap labor" for business. This is an odd charge coming from conservatives who profess to believe in the free market, since it echoes the AFL-CIO and liberals who'd just as soon have government dictate wages.

 

Our own view is that a philosophy of "free markets and free people" includes flexible labor markets. At a fundamental level, this is a matter of freedom and human dignity. These migrants are freely contracting for their labor, which is a basic human right. Far from selling their labor "cheap," they are traveling to the U.S. to sell it more dearly and improve their lives. Like millions of Americans before them, they and certainly their children climb the economic ladder as their skills and education increase.

 

.......

 

We realize that critics are not inventing the manifold problems that can arise from illegal immigration: Trespassing, violent crime, overcrowded hospital emergency rooms, document counterfeiting, human smuggling, corpses in the Arizona desert, and a sense that the government has lost control of the border. But all of these result, ultimately, from too many immigrants chasing too few U.S. visas.

 

Those migrating here to make a better life for themselves and their families would much prefer to come legally. Give them more legal ways to enter the country, and we are likely to reduce illegal immigration far more effectively than any physical barrier along the Rio Grande ever could. .......

 

Some conservatives concede this point in theory but then insist that liberal immigration is no longer possible in a modern welfare state, which breeds dependency in a way that the America of a century ago did not. But the immigrants who arrive here come to work, not sit on the dole. And thanks to welfare reform, the welfare rolls have declined despite a surge in illegal immigration in the past decade.

 

......

 

By far the largest concern we hear on the right concerns culture, especially the worry that the current Hispanic influx is so large it can resist the American genius for assimilation. Hispanics now comprise nearly a third of the population in California and Texas, the country's two biggest states, and cultural assimilation does matter.

 

This is where the political left does the cause of immigration no good in pursuing a separatist agenda. When such groups as La Raza and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund push for multiculturalism, bilingual education, foreign language ballots, racial quotas and the like, they undermine support for immigration among even the most open-minded Americans. Most Americans don't want to replicate the Bosnia model; nor are they pining for a U.S. version of the Quebec sovereignty movement. President Bush has been right to assert that immigrants must adopt U.S. norms, and we only wish more figures on the political left would say the same.

 

But the good news is that these newcomers by and large aren't listening to the left-wingers pushing identity politics. Mexican immigrants, like their European predecessors, are assimilating. Their children learn English and by the end of high school prefer it to their parents' native tongue. They also marry people they meet here. Second-generation Latinos earn less than white Americans but more than blacks and 50% more than first-generation Latinos. According to Tamar Jacoby's "Reinventing the Melting Pot," the most common last names among new homeowners in California include Garcia, Lee, Martinez, Nguyen, Rodriguez and Wong.

 

Which brings us to the politics. Contrary to what you hear on talk radio and cable news, polls continue to show that the conservative silent majority is pro-immigration, and that it supports a guest-worker program as the only practical and humane way to moderate the foreign labor flow.

 

According to the most recent Tarrance Group survey, 75% of likely GOP voters support immigration reform that combines increased border and workplace enforcement with a guest-worker system for newcomers and a multiyear path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already here--provided that they meet certain requirements like living crime free, learning English and paying taxes. "Support for this plan," the poll found, "is strong even among base Republican voter demographics like strong Republicans (77%), very conservative Republicans (72%), white conservative Christians (76%), and those who listen to news talk radio on a daily basis (72%)."

 

House Republican leaders, who passed an immigration bill last year focusing only on enforcement, want to frame this debate as a choice between more border security or "amnesty" for the 11 or 12 million illegals already here. But that's a false choice. A guest-worker program that lets market forces rather than prevailing political winds determine how many economic migrants can enter the country actually enhances security. How? By reducing pressure on the border, just as the Bracero guest-worker program in the 1950s and early 1960s did.

 

When border patrol agents don't have to chase down people coming here to work, they can concentrate on genuine threats, like gang members and terrorists. The real choice is between throwing more resources at an enforcement-only policy that has failed, or a larger reform that's had some past success in reducing illegal border crossings and meeting the demands of our economy and of human dignity.

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Bill from NYC Hall of Famer

Bill from NYC

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>>>>> The real choice is between throwing more resources at an enforcement-only policy that has failed, or a larger reform that's had some past success in reducing illegal border crossings and meeting the demands of our economy and of human dignity.<<<<<

 

The demands of our economy just about sums it up. After all, it IS the WSJ.

As for the "human dignity" thing, please tell me that you don't believe this. :w00t:

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Gavin in Va Beach Veteran

Gavin in Va Beach

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Instead of writing a long winded response, I'll just plagiarize WSJ:

 

Conservatives and Immigration

The debate on the right about freedom, culture and the welfare state.

 

Monday, July 10, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT

 

No issue more deeply divides American conservatives today than immigration. ......

So with Congress holding hearings on the issue around the country, perhaps it's a good moment to step back and explain the roots of our own, longstanding position favoring open immigration.

 

A position, by the way, on which we hardly stand alone. There is also President Bush, and before him the Gipper. (See our editorial, "Reagan on Immigration.") ......

 

The most frequent criticism we hear is that a newspaper called "The Wall Street Journal" simply wants "cheap labor" for business. This is an odd charge coming from conservatives who profess to believe in the free market, since it echoes the AFL-CIO and liberals who'd just as soon have government dictate wages.

 

Our own view is that a philosophy of "free markets and free people" includes flexible labor markets. At a fundamental level, this is a matter of freedom and human dignity. These migrants are freely contracting for their labor, which is a basic human right. Far from selling their labor "cheap," they are traveling to the U.S. to sell it more dearly and improve their lives. Like millions of Americans before them, they and certainly their children climb the economic ladder as their skills and education increase.

 

.......

 

We realize that critics are not inventing the manifold problems that can arise from illegal immigration: Trespassing, violent crime, overcrowded hospital emergency rooms, document counterfeiting, human smuggling, corpses in the Arizona desert, and a sense that the government has lost control of the border. But all of these result, ultimately, from too many immigrants chasing too few U.S. visas.

 

Those migrating here to make a better life for themselves and their families would much prefer to come legally. Give them more legal ways to enter the country, and we are likely to reduce illegal immigration far more effectively than any physical barrier along the Rio Grande ever could. .......

 

Some conservatives concede this point in theory but then insist that liberal immigration is no longer possible in a modern welfare state, which breeds dependency in a way that the America of a century ago did not. But the immigrants who arrive here come to work, not sit on the dole. And thanks to welfare reform, the welfare rolls have declined despite a surge in illegal immigration in the past decade.

 

......

 

By far the largest concern we hear on the right concerns culture, especially the worry that the current Hispanic influx is so large it can resist the American genius for assimilation. Hispanics now comprise nearly a third of the population in California and Texas, the country's two biggest states, and cultural assimilation does matter.

 

This is where the political left does the cause of immigration no good in pursuing a separatist agenda. When such groups as La Raza and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund push for multiculturalism, bilingual education, foreign language ballots, racial quotas and the like, they undermine support for immigration among even the most open-minded Americans. Most Americans don't want to replicate the Bosnia model; nor are they pining for a U.S. version of the Quebec sovereignty movement. President Bush has been right to assert that immigrants must adopt U.S. norms, and we only wish more figures on the political left would say the same.

 

But the good news is that these newcomers by and large aren't listening to the left-wingers pushing identity politics. Mexican immigrants, like their European predecessors, are assimilating. Their children learn English and by the end of high school prefer it to their parents' native tongue. They also marry people they meet here. Second-generation Latinos earn less than white Americans but more than blacks and 50% more than first-generation Latinos. According to Tamar Jacoby's "Reinventing the Melting Pot," the most common last names among new homeowners in California include Garcia, Lee, Martinez, Nguyen, Rodriguez and Wong.

 

Which brings us to the politics. Contrary to what you hear on talk radio and cable news, polls continue to show that the conservative silent majority is pro-immigration, and that it supports a guest-worker program as the only practical and humane way to moderate the foreign labor flow.

 

According to the most recent Tarrance Group survey, 75% of likely GOP voters support immigration reform that combines increased border and workplace enforcement with a guest-worker system for newcomers and a multiyear path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already here--provided that they meet certain requirements like living crime free, learning English and paying taxes. "Support for this plan," the poll found, "is strong even among base Republican voter demographics like strong Republicans (77%), very conservative Republicans (72%), white conservative Christians (76%), and those who listen to news talk radio on a daily basis (72%)."

 

House Republican leaders, who passed an immigration bill last year focusing only on enforcement, want to frame this debate as a choice between more border security or "amnesty" for the 11 or 12 million illegals already here. But that's a false choice. A guest-worker program that lets market forces rather than prevailing political winds determine how many economic migrants can enter the country actually enhances security. How? By reducing pressure on the border, just as the Bracero guest-worker program in the 1950s and early 1960s did.

 

When border patrol agents don't have to chase down people coming here to work, they can concentrate on genuine threats, like gang members and terrorists. The real choice is between throwing more resources at an enforcement-only policy that has failed, or a larger reform that's had some past success in reducing illegal border crossings and meeting the demands of our economy and of human dignity.

 

 

Monday's OpEd

721292[/snapback]

 

 

It is to laugh. First, since they know that everyone will know that they are schilling for big business, they just state it up front and then weakly try to deny that's the only reason and throw in some emotional blather about 'human dignity' to further deflect the criticism. Nice try, but try and sell that schit to the tourists.

 

Second, play the 'Ronald Reagan Ace-In-The-Hole' card to further make conservatives ashamed to be against illegal-immigration/amnesty. They fail to mention that the 1986 Immigration plan Reagan signed was a disasterous failure. Reagan was if anything a pragmatist and would likely be rethinking his stance on illegal immigration today.

 

From the link-

 

***Amnesties clearly do not solve the problem of illegal immigration. About 2.7 million people received lawful permanent residence ("green cards") in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a result of the amnesties contained in the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986. But these new INS figures show that by the beginning of 1997 those former illegal aliens had been entirely replaced by new illegal aliens, and that the unauthorized population again stood at more than 5 million, just as before the amnesty.

 

In fact, the new INS estimates show that the 1986 amnesty almost certainly increased illegal immigration, as the relatives of newly legalized illegals came to the United States to join their family members. The flow of illegals grew dramatically during the years of the amnesty to more than 800,000 a year, before dropping back down to around 500,000 a year.

 

While it might be supposed that the increase in illegal immigration was caused only by the Special Agricultural Worker (SAW) provisions of the 1986 amnesty, the INS report indicates that this was not the case. Figures in the report itself show that illegal immigration surged more dramatically from countries other than Mexico. Since the vast majority of those amnestied under SAW were from Mexico, the increase should have been mostly Mexican if the SAW provision had been responsible for the surge.

***

 

Then they try to minimize the concerns people have about the strain illegals place on public services, that secretly we love having these workers that drive down labor costs so that lettuce remains cheap, citing polling done by the Tarrance Group. From their 'Who We Are' page- Founded in 1977, The Tarrance Group is one of the most successful full-service polling and strategic research firms in the United States.

Our clients include political candidates, trade associations, and major corporations. No conflict of interest here. :w00t: Even more funny from their 'Why We Are Different' page- What sets The Tarrance Group apart from other firms is our commitment to make research findings "actionable." Translation- tell us what you want the facts to say so you can justify your 'actions'and we'll make sure to get you your desired results.

 

IMO Thomas Sowell is worth 5 WSJ editorials, and Dr. Sowell states in clear language what many of us are thinking:

 

The media, the politicians, and the intelligentsia may all be overwhelmingly on the opposite side but the people will prevail. That is how bilingual education was defeated at the polls in California and why the amnesty bill is now dead in the United States Senate.

 

Make no mistake about it. The elites always think they know better, that the public's views are just mindless stereotypes or ugly prejudices.

 

They think we can always be fooled with a little rhetoric and clever political spin. Sometimes these elites succeed in confusing the issues and pulling a fast one on the public. But, as Abraham Lincoln said long ago, "You can't fool all the people all the time."

 

No small part of the outrage over the immigration issue came from people's sense that their intelligence was being insulted by those they elected.

 

The biggest insult was the endlessly repeated claim that illegal aliens "take jobs that Americans won't take." Even in agriculture, where illegal aliens have their biggest impact, three quarters of the workers are not -- repeat, not -- illegal aliens.

 

In some particular localities, some particular work may be done primarily by illegal aliens. But that does not mean that this work would go undone without them. More pay attracts more people.

 

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/column....l&comments=true

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Crap Throwing Monkey All Pro

Crap Throwing Monkey

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No small part of the outrage over the immigration issue came from people's sense that their intelligence was being insulted by those they elected.

721387[/snapback]

 

Really, you could replace "immigration" in that sentence with just about any issue.

 

First thing I flashed on when I read it was that utterly ridiculous letter KRC got from his Congresscritter over Dubai Ports...

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