As I mentioned yesterday, the economic and social reality of the United States today is that we need and want the 12 million illegal immigrants. We require the labor they provide, and even if we didn’t, there is absolutely no way the country can round up 12 million people and deport them. Not only is it impractical and immoral, but it would be economic suicide. That being said, the loudest opposition war cry is that o f Amnesty. For some reason, the country has been swept up in the notion that allowing immigrants to stay in the country, with a defined (albeit incredibly difficult) path to citizenship is paramount to forgiving someone for committing murder. There is so much heat regarding the amnesty issue, that the current bill being debated requires illegal immigrants to go back to their country of origin before they can become citizens here. That is just an impractical, stupid, and very costly requirement that is totally out of place and accomplishes nothing.
Let’s talk about amnesty. Firstly, what crime was committed? Illegal immigrants entered into the US without proper papers. Good point, but is that it?
What about the businesses that hired illegal immigrants?
What about the businesses that didn’t pay overtime?
What about the businesses that paid below minimum wage?
What about the country that stood by and allowed the exploitation of immigrants?
What about the social conscience of the nation that mistreated them?
On the one hand you have a dedicated, hard working person, who crosses the border because there are readily available jobs. He pays taxes, he lives in terrible conditions. He works hard. He is exploited. On the other hand you have illegal activity happening every single day by the 10s of thousands of businesses that hired illegal immigrants.
Shouldn’t we allow someone who has been exploited by our country, who has served us so well, and who only came because we asked him to, allowed the chance to become citizens?
This isn’t amnesty, its fairness!
Popularity: 17% [?]
May 31st, 2007 at 2:49 pm
Very interesting thoughts. I haven’t yet completely formed my opinion on this issue, but your comments have given me another perspective to consider.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:22 pm
There’s too much wrong above to try to correct. If many IllegalAliens went home we’d invent machines to replace them, or “industries” like strawberry production would move offshore, both of which would be better for us. Second, the option isn’t between amnesty and MassDeportations; that’s a standard FalseChoice that hacks constantly use. The alternative is to start enforcing our laws. Third, “we” didn’t “ask” IllegalAliens to come here: they were only able to come here because of massive PoliticalCorruption.
Much, much, much more education on this topic is needed.
June 3rd, 2007 at 10:26 pm
[…] Amnesty – Offensive, Unfair, and Immoral to Immigrants […]
July 31st, 2007 at 3:27 pm
Good points, Mr Portnoy.
I am an undocumented worker myself, and I firmly believe that we deserve some sort of legalization path.