An article on foxbusinessnews.com http://www.foxbusiness.com/... admits that immigration is actually a net benefit to states. Even Fox publishes this information. This article prompted me to call in to my local right-wing talk show, where they were talking about deporting immigrants and making pregnant "illegals" give birth at the Mexican consulate so the kids would not be American citizens. I came up with following list of points to make, but the host cut me off and hung up, leaving me with the remark, "well, you can have them come stay at your house."
Immigration talking points:
Even Tancredo, rightwinger, thinks the Arizona law is unconstitutional
Of course I believe in Customs/Immigration service, but let's give them a law they can enforce. The 1965 Immigration Act allows 120,000 immigrants per year from the entire Western Hemisphere. Estimates are 500,000 "illegal" immigrants/year come from Mexico.Some laws are just stupid, arbitrary, and have no basis in the real world. Think about liquor prohibition in the 1920s or pot prohibition now. What if we arbitrarily set the speed limit on Interstates to 30 mph. Everyone will drive 60-70 because that's the "natural" speed of the road. Shall we deport everyone we catch driving over 30 mph?
If we raise the quota to 500K, then all these "illegals" are legal, they're paying taxes, they go back across the border if they can't get a job (instead of staying here fearing they can't come back). Or make them "guest workers"—we actually did this until the 1960s.
So the penalty for violating a stupid law shouldn't be to kick them out; instead, make them pay back taxes, penalties, but give them a path to legality, and eventually citizenship. The only reason there are so many "illegals" is an unreasonable quota system set up in the 1920s. It's impossible to deport 10 million "illegals" And if you build a 50' wall across the entire border, they'll just build 51' ladders. And if you throw every employer in jail, we won't have any employers, because all big business, especially in agriculture & construction, hires illegals.
Bush actually was proposing a reasonable way to allow the "illegals" a path to citizenship, & the Republidiots shot him down.
Yes, if you get stopped by law enforcement, you have to show ID. The 4th amendment to the constitution reads, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." So a cop has to have a reasonable suspicion of a crime. The Arizona law as drafted basically says the police must ask for papers of anyone they think is here illegally, making them have to ask every Mexican-looking person. Thus, they will be performing searches on every Brown person, which is unreasonable. It will be overturned, it's only a matter of time.
And the 8th Amendment: "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted." The 10th Amendment isn't the only one in the Bill of Rights
I do not consider myself leftwing. I am a centrist Democrat. I am very pragmatic. Show me something that works, I don't care if it's leftwing or rightwing, I'll support it