posted
Wow. I didn't realize how much of a relief it would be to read one of OSC's political pieces and agree with it. Spot on!
It does seem kinda strawmanish, but well done none the less. He gives good responces to most of the arguments I hear in favor of the expulsion of illegal immigrants.
Posts: 2596 | Registered: Jan 2006
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I totally agree with the idea that we should not be wasting our money deporting illegals who are currently in this country, however I am wary of the idea of opening up the borders. The whole point of controlling immigration in the first place is not to keep foreigners out but to control population growth. Opening up the borders could cause a sudden spike in our population that, due to reproduction, could cause our population to stabilize at a point drastically higher than it would have otherwise. I don't know whether or not this is a bad thing, however overpopulation is a real concern.
Posts: 1327 | Registered: Aug 2007
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You have to see firsthand the conditions that you send these people back to. Then your viewpoint will change, or it will at least become well informed. If you aren't willing to do that, then I don't even feel like arguing.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2006
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I don't know of anyone in Congress that seriously wanted to deport all 11 million or whatever illegal immigrants. It would cost billions, and would be devastating to America on several fronts. Even Republicans know they can't really do it, it's not even close to practical.
The little liberal/conservative skit was...well, interesting. I didn't like it. I think it plays too much off stereotypes of xenophobia and racism, to say nothing of the stereotypical stupid Conservative who think in simple them vs. us type Pres. Bush mentalities (ironic considering OSC tries not to miss or create a chance to give props to Pres. Bush). I agree it was strawmannish also. Although there's truth in those stereotypes, a lot of truth, I thought the dialogue was unenjoyable, despite the fact that I entirely agree with the points he made.
Much like I have said in several other threads, we need to have real amnesty. They're here, and they aren't going anywhere. Looking the other way while letting them stay but still railing against them isn't fair. It's dishonest on the Republican side. They rail against illegals knowing full well that they aren't going anywhere, and then they refuse to give them rights, which creates a second class citizenry. They can't vote, but they do our grunt work for us. And to think we just passed a law against buying the products of sweat shop labor in Asia. No I know it isn't that bad, but still, as Card said, how indeed do we call ourselves the land of the free?
But after we declare amnesty, we need to get serious about border security, and serious about our Mexican neighbors. If some Republicans seriously want to spend billions of dollars just to ship people home, which does nothing to solve future problems, why wouldn't they spend the same to solve the problem for good?
It's America, so immigration will never not be a part of our national framework. But that doesn't mean we throw open the floodgates and let whatever happens happen. Once we start integrating the people who are here, including English classes for non-speakers, we need to secure the border. And I don't mean thousand mile long fences that don't do much anyway. We put more people on the border, and we get high tech about it, including advanced cameras, laser tripwires, and as crazy as it sounds, blimps. A high tech sensor network will measure who crosses the border and when. It'll be expensive, but not as much as you might think.
After that, we get to work on Mexico. There's a lot of problems in Mexico that don't stay in Mexico. We have to stop pretending that the Mexican American border is a magic wall, and realize that it's an arbitrary and imaginary line in the dirt. Drug cartels live in Mexico but they operate in America. Poverty stricken Mexicans live in Mexico but they die to get across the border to earn a living here so their families back home don't die. Their problems are our problems. Let's be good neighbors, and for that matter, let's help take care of ourselves and start spending some serious time and money helping Mexico fix their problems.
Bringing Mexico into peace and prosperity is a win/win. One day we could have the same relationship with them that we have with Canada, a major ally and trading partner that enriches and enlivens both sides. But Mexico needs help to do it, and frankly we have nothing to lose and everything to gain by helping them.
To be clear, I don't think we should slam the door shut, I think we should have a large number of immigrants, especially well educated ones, but it needs to be strictly documented and controlled, and everyone else who wants to come, if there are jobs for them, we should have a guest worker program that makes it safe and guarantees their rights while they are here. Maybe some day we'll get to the point where, like Canada, we can leave the border mostly unguarded and not worry, but for now, it's time to secure the both of us, in the hopes that our future together will be productive and friendly.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Any day now the "free-market economists" will start conspiring with the "evolutionists" and the "literary gatekeepers" and we'll all be doomed.Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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I agree with him completely, but the dialog got tiresome after awhile. We actually discussed immigration in Intro to Politics and Law today. Half the class spouted the conservative lines verbatim and half the class spouted the liberal lines verbatim. Apparently there are talks about combining the Canadian, American, and Mexican currency into one unifying dollar.
Initially thinking about it, I'm in favor of such a move. In the long run it will help our economy, even if initially the dollar takes a value hit.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote: Initially thinking about it, I'm in favor of such a move. In the long run it will help our economy, even if initially the dollar takes a value hit.
Hitting the dollar with a sledgehammer is a great way to destroy the American economy.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Any day now the "free-market economists" will start conspiring with the "evolutionists" and the "literary gatekeepers" and we'll all be doomed.
posted
The person in the comments is right. Those he terms 'free market economists' are not, and hopefully would not characterize themselves as such on immigration issues. Free movement of people is an economic principle (check out the Four (economic) Freedoms of the EU), and the more barriers there are to it, the greater the disequilibrium. While the market will optimize under the constraints (most likely), that will not be an optimum solution in comparison to the situation without the constraints.
Combining the dollar with the peso and the canadian dollar doesn't make much sense for us, or for the other two nations. All three nations are fairly healthy economically, notably monetarily, and their ability to adapt to shocks will depend on their ability to respond. Merging the currencies takes that away, with little benefit; currency exchange among the three is easy, and not a significant barrier to trade.
Also, while it will not be catastrophic, there's an adjustment coming for US exchange rates that the other two would probably rather not be dragged along for.
In other words, I don't see a reason why beyond symbolism (which is rarely a sufficient reason for major economic changes), and I see several reasons against.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Wow, the boxes really went overboard in that. I'm definitely getting a new keyboard this Friday.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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What OSC doesn't say in his article, but that really needs to be said far more often is that the current Immigration system in the US is broken. The laws are simply unworkable. The US has jobs which need to be filled and non US nationals who are willing and anxious to fill these jobs, but no legal and practical way to get the people into the jobs.
As of July 2007, there were 7.1 million Americans unemployed (unemployment rate of 4.6%. That is very close to what economists consider full employment. If there are 11 million illegal immigrants working in the country, then without them we would have millions of unfilled jobs and severe wage inflation.
These illegal immigrants are NOT sloths who are mooching off the US system, they are largely hard working individuals, many of whom are paying taxes for services (like Social Security) that they will never be allowed to enjoy. The make a valuable contribution to our economy. They are suffering under the effects of an unjust system. They deserve a right to be here legally and to receive the protection of US law.
We shouold give amnesty to illegal immigrants who are working honest jobs and their children because our immigration laws are quite simply bad laws which are causing human suffering. Insisting on punishing people for breaking a law most of us agree is bad, is simply ridiculous.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
The dialog may have been excessive, but as for some of those points that seem to be ridiculous, I can see them being made on many of the news channels. Sad as it is, discussion like this on Hatrack is too rare when watching television.
I am trying to imagine the reaction (national and international) if what OSC gave a preview of actually came to be. It's a horrible world. And people will recognize that and avoid it, but some people will not recognize it, and be too busy researching Angelina Jolie and Paris Hilton to have an opinion until too late.
Posts: 1711 | Registered: Jun 2004
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Perhaps if people research Angelina Jolie enough, they will try to emulate her example wrt charitable works .
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
I'm confused on one point. I thought the debate was way more complicated than Republican/Democrat or conservative/liberal. After all, many liberal/Democrats favor unions who traditionally want less illegal immigration so their workers get more money. And many conservative/Republicans tend to favor letting immigrants stay since it helps the big businesses they favor get cheap labor and keep their profits up.
Am I wrong about that?
Also, the thing I really want to see before we get complaining about immigration is a complete audit of the system. How much money does it really cost to get here compared to what people make? If my uncle can pick up $5 tee shirts in the touristy parts of Mexico, how long does it take to get $400? How corrupt are the officials and how much does it cost when you factor in bribes? I want undercover immigration folks to apply for green cards from other countries and see how long and how much money it takes to get here.
It's the scientist in me. I want to know the actual facts.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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quote:I'm confused on one point. I thought the debate was way more complicated than Republican/Democrat or conservative/liberal. After all, many liberal/Democrats favor unions who traditionally want less illegal immigration so their workers get more money. And many conservative/Republicans tend to favor letting immigrants stay since it helps the big businesses they favor get cheap labor and keep their profits up.
Am I wrong about that?
Well, on the vast majority of issues, I'm solidly on the "conservative" side, and I favor amnesty and increased immigration, but more because I think it's the right thing to do than because I think it will help big businesses and their profits.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I favor amnesty and increased immigration for both reasons - it's the right thing to do (clearly we have this problem because the current laws are inadequate) and because it would be good for the economy.
Posts: 1753 | Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
I think OSC did a good job of showing what might happen if we successfully deported all of our illegal immigrants. I wish he'd do more columns in this mode.
I agree that good behavior after coming into the U.S. should count when deciding how (and whether) to punish an illegal immigrant. Still I was against the failed immigration bill because it allowed only 24 hours to check the background of an illegal immigrant before declaring his or her record to be clean; that hardly seemed enough time.
Posts: 781 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
Other Conservative Reasons to support an Amnesty/Guest Worker program:
1) Export Democracy. Sure Mexico and other countries that send us immigrants are Democracies, but some necessary things that truly support a truly democratic (as in Democracy, not political party) state are missing. Things like Officials not being bribed, free press, election withouth the threat of force, etc.) When these illegal immigrants come to the US they experience these things as norms, and when they return home, the demand those norms as well.
2) Most Latino immigrants are Christian, and greatly pro-family, anti-abortion. Indeed, if it wasn't for the percieved conservative bias against immigrants, these immigrants are great fodder for becoming conservative Republicans themselves.
3) Most immigrants send part of their income back to their home country. This means there is less need for the US to send aid money. Aid money is what many conservatives consider a "Waste of my Tax money."
On the flip side, there is one good reason for Liberals to be against such Amnesty.
When Corporations started exporting manufacturing jobs out of the country, the Corporate paid Economists responded "Don't worry. We are becoming a Tech economy. We'll have more, stronger, better paying Tech jobs soon."
Then when the Corporations started exporting the Tech Jobs, the Corporate paid Economists responded with "Don't worry. We are becoming a Service Economy. We have plenty of Service Jobs."
So when the Corporations realize they can't export Service jobs, what do they do to keep their payroll low? We import workers.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by AvidReader: I'Also, the thing I really want to see before we get complaining about immigration is a complete audit of the system. How much money does it really cost to get here compared to what people make? If my uncle can pick up $5 tee shirts in the touristy parts of Mexico, how long does it take to get $400? How corrupt are the officials and how much does it cost when you factor in bribes? I want undercover immigration folks to apply for green cards from other countries and see how long and how much money it takes to get here.
It's the scientist in me. I want to know the actual facts.
If you have a Ph.D. in a technical field and a job in the US, it costs about $10,000 to get a green card and it takes about 4 years. (I know a bunch of people who've done it).
I had two friends who married non-US nationals about 10 years ago. Ones wife was a Philipino living in Canada and the other was Spanish living in Spain. In both cases it took 2 years for them to get green cards. During that period the wives couldn't even get visitors visa's to enter the US because the laws prohibit the issuance of a visitors visa to anyone who had applied for residency.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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If you broaden that a little bit, that's actually more of a reason for Democrats to support it. The continued competitiveness of the US economy hinges on our ability to become more efficient in our production of consumables, and on our R&D continually coming up with high tech things that can't be produced cheaply elsewhere because of a skilled labor pool.
The only way to get all that is a very, very well educated workforce. And the only way to get that is to have a very, very good education system. So what looks like a negative democratic position on immigration is actually proof positive of the need to enact Democratic ideas for reform on education.
Democrats: Turning Lemons into Lemonade since 1832.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
Considering that our economy is a service economy, and that the world economy is driving harder and harder at services, I would say that no, our continued competitiveness doesn't depend at all on our ability to become more efficient in the production of consumables.
Our GDP is under 1% agriculture, around 20% industry, and nearly 80% services.
Over 75% of our workforce is employed in non-manufacturing positions, with over half in managerial, professional, technical, sales, and administrative support positions.
Our ability to make consumables efficiently has almost nothing to do with our competitiveness. Our ability to design high demand consumables, however, plays a decent part of our competitiveness. We do well no matter where they are produced, here or abroad. I bet that all or almost all of the high tech consumables you can name are all or mostly manufactured outside the US, and it doesn't hurt us. Rather, it helps us.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Btw, there has been no significant export of tech jobs. The number of outsourced(/offshored/whatever you want to call it) positions in tech is tiny, has always been tiny, and has not been significantly increasing for a little while now (some major outsourcers gave up on it).
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote:I bet that all or almost all of the high tech consumables you can name are all or mostly manufactured outside the US, and it doesn't hurt us. Rather, it helps us.
Until the collapse of intellectual property law, of course. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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If the intellectual property regimes in most of the countries that do the manufacturing don't count as 'collapsed' (particularly when they first started doing major high tech manufacturing), I don't know what would. Strangely, things still worked out.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
I don't have any qualms with offering the immigrants here amnesty, or allowing more into the country.
I do have a very severe problem with how they get into the country. It's fairly obvious from his article that OSC doesn't live in, or even adjacent to, a border state that feels the effects of illegal immigration (in this case, I'm referring to Florida, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California).
Several of the issues that have become hot-button topics in those states are blown way out of proportion, but there are still deep seated problems with the current system that need to be fixed, regardless of whether or not amnesty or mass deportation is chosen as the end result.
Coyotes (of the smuggling, non-quadruped variety) are a dispicable and dangerous lot. Dangerous to both citizens as well as the illegal immigrants they're 'assisting'. There have been I believe two (at least) gun battles between competing coyote groups on the Interstate between Tucson and Phoenix. I will say it again so it can sink in: Two SUVs going down a very busy highway, in a populated area, exchanging large amounts of gun fire. These are the same people that will leave their charges in a semi-truck, or in the deep desert, regardless of conditions if they feel they may be caught. Those groups, unless they're found by law enforcement, typically die. They have no reservations about shooting others, about leaving someone to die, about threatening anyone. This is a result of the current system, and is truly despicable.
The above outlines another problem. The current system is so flawed that 100's of people die every year trying to circumvent it. I personally believe the border should be secured for our safety as well as those trying to immigrate. We do need to have some idea of who is getting into our nation, and how to hold them accountable for their actions. Illegal immigrants are held to blame for the majority of crime, depsite statistics that say different. They are held thus because they're an unknown figure. When an undocumented person hits and kills someone in a car accident, they're told that if they return to Mexico they'll never be held accountable or go to jail. And honestly, this is more than likely true. There are no lines to track these criminals, they're simply an unknown criminal who would be charged with manslaughter if they could ever be located. The above, by the way, was outlined in great detail by an undocumented immigrant who did in fact hit and kill the young mother of a family while driving drunk. I despise his actions up to that point, but at least he had the decency to stand up and take responsibility, and that the family deserved that much and more from him.
It's fine and dandy to stand at a reasonable distance and say well the cure is worse than the disease (apologies for that analogy, it really isn't a disease but bear with me). Arizona as a state strains a great deal more than, say, North Carolina from the demand put on our local governments. I'd like to compare the costs associated with educating the children of undocumented workers here in Phoenix, and the cost in Raleigh. How about amounts spent for emergency health care in Tucson for undocumented immigrants and say, that spent in Kansas City.
Yes, their landlords pay some property taxes, the problem is that fairly often the number of people living in a small residence is both illegal, and exceedingly unhealthy. One family may own the house, but four additional families may be living in it. The problem here is that on average, these families are only paying 20% of the property taxes, and none of their state or federal income taxes. The bigger problem is they're probably living in unsanitary conditions, and most often at least one of those families will have children.
The border regions of this country are breathtakingly beautiful in many places, but the way the border is currently administered by both nations, I would not want to live there. If you have a fence, it's destroyed for the sake of expediency. If Coyotes decide your property is prime for transporting through, look forward to several well armed and organized criminals hanging about at night. Small niches of your land will become trash dumps for anything that can't be carried across the hot desert. Old clothes, rotting food, human waste, and god forbid, human bodies are possible discoveries.
These are most often good people making this trek and for good reasons, but the process they choose to enter into this country is simply barbaric, disrespectful, and more often than not it is dangerous.
Posts: 1368 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: If you have a Ph.D. in a technical field and a job in the US, it costs about $10,000 to get a green card and it takes about 4 years. (I know a bunch of people who've done it).
I had two friends who married non-US nationals about 10 years ago. Ones wife was a Philipino living in Canada and the other was Spanish living in Spain. In both cases it took 2 years for them to get green cards. During that period the wives couldn't even get visitors visa's to enter the US because the laws prohibit the issuance of a visitors visa to anyone who had applied for residency.
This rings true with me. One of my coworkers came here on an academic visa for grad school, and stayed to work afterwards. He has a Master's degree, and has been progressing through the green card process for almost five years now. He just got a letter saying he would be in the next batch to be accepted through the second section of the process, and the third shouldn't take more than another year. It's a nightmare because he's locked into his dismal job, and can't leave for fear of starting the process all over again.
Posts: 1368 | Registered: Sep 2002
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posted
I knew a teenage kid who was quite annoyed cause all those Mexicans were taking HIS lawnmowing jobs. I know I prefer my money going to a teenager buying a car (I asked why he was working) then a Mexican paying to feed his family (also, the way the kid said Mexican, it was a racial slur not a statement of origin). So, see, there is an American who our immigration policy is hurting.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Considering that our economy is a service economy, and that the world economy is driving harder and harder at services, I would say that no, our continued competitiveness doesn't depend at all on our ability to become more efficient in the production of consumables.
Our GDP is under 1% agriculture, around 20% industry, and nearly 80% services.
Over 75% of our workforce is employed in non-manufacturing positions, with over half in managerial, professional, technical, sales, and administrative support positions.
Our ability to make consumables efficiently has almost nothing to do with our competitiveness. Our ability to design high demand consumables, however, plays a decent part of our competitiveness. We do well no matter where they are produced, here or abroad. I bet that all or almost all of the high tech consumables you can name are all or mostly manufactured outside the US, and it doesn't hurt us. Rather, it helps us.
I disagree, and I agree. We wouldn't have what's left of our manufacturing capacity if not for major increases in efficiency. Much of heavy manufacturing, and the advanced manufacturing we're good at, at least in some parts of the country, would not be here if we hadn't of become more efficient. Efficiently producing, and producing efficient products will be important for our future.
And I'd argue that design is a part of R&D and of production, which is included in what I said. Feel free to dispute that as you will.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote: I know I prefer my money going to a teenager buying a car (I asked why he was working) then a Mexican paying to feed his family
Is this really what you meant to say?
If so I hope most people hold the opposite view. How can buying a car possibly be more important than feeding your family, regardless of nationality?
Posts: 169 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Sure, but there's no particular need to have the manufacturing capability. It isn't inherently more valuable than other forms of production, any more than agriculture was inherently more valuable than other forms of production, and it is a relatively low-productivity activity, meaning that it will tend to shift to places with low marginal cost -- cheaper labor. Even that's happening in interesting ways, currently, with a lot of countries 'skipping' manufacturing job creation to go directly to services from agriculture.
As for design being part of manufacturing capability, you can be free to say that, just know that those people classifying jobs and production aren't going to agree. Design can take place in the absence of anything we would normally call manufacturing, and can be done at a completely different firm, with or without intent to shortly transfer that to manufacturing.
If that is how you're classifying it, though, then I agree that growth in the design part of what you call manufacturing is probably good.
Interesting factoid from a very recent report: for the first time ever (as of sometime in 2006 or 2005), services account for more of world employment than agriculture.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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I've always wondered why we don't just make Mexico part of the US and take over their government. They all want to be US citizens anyway. It's not like they could put up much of a fight. (lol ok I know I'm going to get blasted for that idea) Otherwise, we should do something to make it easier to apply for citizenship, like have booths set up along the border that do immigration paperwork for you. Certainly seems like it couldn't be more expensive than rounding them up. I don't know how to solve the problems Alcatraz delineated of people living in border states. Maybe busing families to different areas? It's true we don't see the coyote gunfight aspect of immigration, but we do have a lot of immigrants here in NC due to farming, so I guess we tend to see the human side more than the dangerous side. Perhaps if we made the coyotes' job obsolete it wouldn't be as much of a problem.
Posts: 31 | Registered: Aug 2007
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quote:I've always wondered why we don't just make Mexico part of the US and take over their government... It's not like they could put up much of a fight.
Indeed. This is one of the most common misconceptions that I have heard from my fellow US citizens.
When my husband was (reluctantly but necessarily) applying for a Visa to work in the US, our immigration lawyer literally could not understand that he did not want to also become a citizen. She kept trying also to submit that paperwork for him (although we gave her plenty of work to keep her busy otherwise! *grin), and she was continually perplexed when he said "no." And just about everyone that each of us worked with assumed he wanted to move to the US permanently.
Believe me, he did not. Circumstances forced the point temporarily, but only under the expressed agreement between us that he go back to Canada in a few years. He gave the US good service while he was with me in Wisconsin, and I currently return the favor to his country.
posted
I was being sarcastic. I am more of a world citizen kind of person. I want to see immigration policies changes, but more to protect immigrants and make it easier.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote: Initially thinking about it, I'm in favor of such a move. In the long run it will help our economy, even if initially the dollar takes a value hit.
Hitting the dollar with a sledgehammer is a great way to destroy the American economy.
I don't know why you think that would be the case if Canada, the US, and Mexico combined currency. The euro certainly seems to be holding it's value well, and yet Brits still don't want to add the pound to it.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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