Immigrants and Jobs and the Economy, Oh My!
The veteran is on a roll lately for making posts based on personal experience, so here's a new one for you.
I moved to Gray, a small town on the outskirts of Johnson City, Tennessee, a couple of months ago. Right now, I'm working for Mountain Empire Oil Company (not-so-aptly named, as their claim to fame is running a string of convenience stores in TN and Virginia) and waiting to apply to ETSU for Spring semester. I've noticed something in my time here: This area is a haven for a HUGE number of illegal immigrants. Yes, right here in Bible-Belt-Bill-Frist-Conservative Country, USA. Every night I serve a large number (anywhere between five and twenty) illegals at my store. I can't sell many of them beer, as the only identification they carry is foreign, and I can only accept U.S. or state issued ID, visas or passports.
To set the record straight, I have nothing against these people. They work hard, come in at four or five in the morning for coffee, and again around midnight for beer, cigarettes, and necessities. By all accounts, they have a massively long work day. They're good people.
My gripe is about why they're here. Am I conservative on some issues? YES. These people shouldn't be here. They shouldn't have made it across the border. They don't belong here without so much as a green card.
With that in mind, I propose two ideas: Seal the border properly, for one. We can't afford them. Their presence detracts, at least in a small way, from jobs that I could have been working. They eat up my resources. Several of them don't speak a lick of English, and the only other language I speak, even in small measure, is Japanese. Plus, I feel bad when all they want is to unwind a bit after work, I can see that they're of age by the birthdate on their (insert South American country here) identification card, but I can't sell them beer.
The second portion of the solution is this: All that foreign aid we're putting out needs to be reevaluated, and some of it needs to go toward fixing the general economic conditions in South America. Most of these immigrants are from Mexico. Look out Vicente Fox, 'cause it's ass-whuppin time. Take care of your people. They don't deserve the conditions they live in, either here or at home. The economy in Mexico and its neighbor nations is the primary cause of illegals coming here. It needs fixin', and it needs it now.
One last point: fix the immigration system. For those that need it, getting into the United States shouldn't require stealth or permanent tension headaches from trying to navigate the red tape. For those that need it, ensure they can get in and become proper, naturalized citizens. Teach them English. Give them the proper aid required to procure a roof to sleep under, jobs, and needed education. The current system is, at best, chaotic and, at worst, detrimental.
I moved to Gray, a small town on the outskirts of Johnson City, Tennessee, a couple of months ago. Right now, I'm working for Mountain Empire Oil Company (not-so-aptly named, as their claim to fame is running a string of convenience stores in TN and Virginia) and waiting to apply to ETSU for Spring semester. I've noticed something in my time here: This area is a haven for a HUGE number of illegal immigrants. Yes, right here in Bible-Belt-Bill-Frist-Conservative Country, USA. Every night I serve a large number (anywhere between five and twenty) illegals at my store. I can't sell many of them beer, as the only identification they carry is foreign, and I can only accept U.S. or state issued ID, visas or passports.
To set the record straight, I have nothing against these people. They work hard, come in at four or five in the morning for coffee, and again around midnight for beer, cigarettes, and necessities. By all accounts, they have a massively long work day. They're good people.
My gripe is about why they're here. Am I conservative on some issues? YES. These people shouldn't be here. They shouldn't have made it across the border. They don't belong here without so much as a green card.
With that in mind, I propose two ideas: Seal the border properly, for one. We can't afford them. Their presence detracts, at least in a small way, from jobs that I could have been working. They eat up my resources. Several of them don't speak a lick of English, and the only other language I speak, even in small measure, is Japanese. Plus, I feel bad when all they want is to unwind a bit after work, I can see that they're of age by the birthdate on their (insert South American country here) identification card, but I can't sell them beer.
The second portion of the solution is this: All that foreign aid we're putting out needs to be reevaluated, and some of it needs to go toward fixing the general economic conditions in South America. Most of these immigrants are from Mexico. Look out Vicente Fox, 'cause it's ass-whuppin time. Take care of your people. They don't deserve the conditions they live in, either here or at home. The economy in Mexico and its neighbor nations is the primary cause of illegals coming here. It needs fixin', and it needs it now.
One last point: fix the immigration system. For those that need it, getting into the United States shouldn't require stealth or permanent tension headaches from trying to navigate the red tape. For those that need it, ensure they can get in and become proper, naturalized citizens. Teach them English. Give them the proper aid required to procure a roof to sleep under, jobs, and needed education. The current system is, at best, chaotic and, at worst, detrimental.
posted by Mad Mod at
12/06/2005 07:20:00 PM
3 Comments:
Today, an anonymous poster placed a comment on this article that didn't show up for some reason. Thankfully, I got a copy of it in my email. Here's the original comment and my rebuttal.
On 12/12/05, anonymous-comment@blogger.com wrote:
On immigrants in this country whether they belong or not? How do think the indians feel? Having the freedom to roam this country at there will and now having to live in dry reservations while watching people coming from another country having crossed a whole ocean to get here and taking over a country that did'nt belong to them. I agree that there are some that cross the borders create problems such as belonging the gangs
and other things but these people leave millions of dollars in taxes that they cannot receive because of their status, so whats the beef if they receive some social services. They pay for it with the tax money that they can't legaly receive so basically they are paying for some if not most of their services.
been there
My point:
Now, see, I think you've taken my meaning wrong here. Toward the end, when I was talking about reforming the entire system, I believe I mentioned something about how it should be made easier for needy foreigners to immigrate LEGALLY, and how they should be supplied with the tools they need to become proper citizens. As far as the natives, yeah, they got the raw end of the deal. No argument there, as I'm sure Barbara Arrowwood (my last Cherokee ancestor) would agree. However, the several hundred year old debate on indian rights is a topic for another posting, which I'll get around to sometime. Anyway, the point is not that these immigrants aren't deserving, nor that we should round up every single one already here and evict them. The point is that the system needs an overhaul so that those who need in can get in legally without so much difficulty, and that those who want in for nefarious purposes are kept out (not to mention the need for reform in Mexico, so they have what they need at home to begin with).
One last point: As far as whether some of these illegals reap benefits from their taxes, we had a company fined by the feds recently here. ALL of their latino employees (I believe around seven) were receiving federal benefits ON THE SAME SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER. How's that one for ya?
The United States spends only 0.12% of GDP -- one-eighth of one percent -- in overseas aid. This figure mirrors the same amount of other countries such as Germany, France and Japan. At the other end of the spectrum the United States' annual military budget is $396.1 billion. That's more than the total of the next 26 countries spending for their respective militaries. Your comments on foreign aid ring hollow when the actual numbers are known.
Okay, then, scratch that. Take some of it out of corporate welfare. Happy?
I think, despite your knowledge of foreign aid (no, it ain't much better than everyone else, but it's still a buncha money), you mistook the entire point here. The post wasn't about foreign aid. Foreign aid was mentioned *once* in the post. Did you even read the rest, or did you just skim until you found the words, 'foreign aid'?
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