Illegal Immigrants eligible for scholarships and in-state tuition (CA)

MattDaddy wrote:
WipEout wrote:

Again, for your arguments you keep dismissing the fact that no one is arguing that illegal status is generally bad-- just that kicking them out completely is the wrong move, and there should be a means to make them legal immigrant workers.

I'll take that statement as the truth for a moment. What you're saying is that everyone can agree that illegal status is generally bad. Then I have to ask why we should reward bad behavior by giving the children of illegal immigrants free tuition? Rewarding bad behavior will get you more bad behavior. In this case, it encourages others to simply run across the border.

Because it's good for our economy. And is it the 4 year old children jumping the border? Should we keep increasing the number of illiterate, uneducated amount of people just to prove a moral point that a person's parents did something wrong?

Does it encourage people to run across the border? Yes.
Does our willingness to prosecute gangs and mafias that are killing and raping our citizens encourage them to also run across the border? Yes.
Does our willingness to maintain roads and higher regulation on pollution encourage people to run across the border? Yes. (maybe not in L.A.)

The reason they come across is for a better life. I doubt the only reason they come across is so that their child could receive a free college tuition.

Outsourcing jobs is a conservative hot button issue.
Government subsidies for corporations with record quarterly profits, who don't pay taxes that are also outsourcing jobs is a liberal hot button issue.

MattDaddy wrote:
WipEout wrote:

Again, for your arguments you keep dismissing the fact that no one is arguing that illegal status is generally bad-- just that kicking them out completely is the wrong move, and there should be a means to make them legal immigrant workers.

I'll take that statement as the truth for a moment. What you're saying is that everyone can agree that illegal status is generally bad. Then I have to ask why we should reward bad behavior by giving the children of illegal immigrants free tuition? Rewarding bad behavior will get you more bad behavior. In this case, it encourages others to simply run across the border.

Because in the end, the problem isn't bad behavior. It's bad results. Better to encourage more to run for the border than to deal poorly with the people already here and the people who will come anyway. The concept you're searching for is called a "moral hazard." The thing about moral hazards is, sometimes you don't bother avoiding them because it's not cost-effective.

WipEout wrote:

Plus, I don't hear a lot of liberal arguments against outsourcing-- that seems to me, at least, to be a more conservative stance. I agree that it sucks that Americans are losing their jobs to poorer countries, and I think there should be s system that dictates if Joe Company is going to remove X number of jobs from the US economy, they need to first figure out how to re-purpose their former American employees before kicking such large groups of them to the curb for maximized profit.

Life isn't fair, Wipeout ;)

You're ignoring the whole rest of the response OG made--you can't just quote someone out of context like that. That's not...fair?

OK, now the serious response. I'm not saying it's a liberal or conservative view. I just know people who are fine with illegal immigrants coming into the US to work who are also mad as hell about US jobs being outsourced to other countries. They say it's good for the immigrants that they can make more money here doing jobs US workers won't (at least not for pay they are willing to do it for). They also say it's not right for companies to send jobs to other countries just because people there are willing to do the same work for less money. Those arguments seem contradictory to me.

Well, off the top of my head, when an illegal immigrant goes to buy something with that money they spend it in stores owned by Americans, and they pay sales taxes to an American government? Sure they send some home, but they don't just come here and work like an imported robot: they conduct economic activity in America.

Especially the ones who want to come here to send their kids to college.

I think we are also overlooking the point that $5800 will essentially allow them to afford their books and nothing more.

They were born on the wrong side of an imaginary line! Can't you see how that makes them scum?!

CheezePavilion wrote:
OK, now the serious response. I'm not saying it's a liberal or conservative view. I just know people who are fine with illegal immigrants coming into the US to work who are also mad as hell about US jobs being outsourced to other countries. They say it's good for the immigrants that they can make more money here doing jobs US workers won't (at least not for pay they are willing to do it for). They also say it's not right for companies to send jobs to other countries just because people there are willing to do the same work for less money. Those arguments seem contradictory to me.

Well, off the top of my head, when an illegal immigrant goes to buy something with that money they spend it in stores owned by Americans, and they pay sales taxes to an American government? Sure they send some home, but they don't just come here and work like an imported robot: they conduct economic activity in America.

Especially the ones who want to come here to send their kids to college.

Bolded for emphasis. On the surface these arguments may seem contradictory, but only in regards to who has the job. I think the result of where the job is makes a very different impact.

I keep reading all these comments about families "running across the border" to nab this free state money for their kids college tuition. I have a hard time imagining some family in Juarez looking at their 18 year old kid and saying "Quick! To the border!" and then magically getting this scholarship for their kid.

Instead, it seems the more likely scenario is a family that came here illegally a decade or more ago with their kid. The kid goes to public school, has a fully Americanized education, works hard, does well and then beats out hundreds if not thousands of other applicants to qualify for this small scholarship.

Is illegal immigration a crime? Yes. But I'm almost of the opinion that if you've lived here for 15 years and been a productive member of society that whole time, that the government has missed their chance. It's almost like squatters rights at that point. The only crime I know of that doesn't have a statute of limitation is murder. Is illegal immigration equal to murder under the law? The fact that so many people can live and work here for so long without interference is an indictment of the system itself. We can't control our borders and, until now, most of us haven't gotten all bent out of shape about enforcing it. We need to just change the system instead of suddenly deporting families that have lived here for the majority of their child's lives.

I just think this is a case of pulling the cart before the horse. I'm for supporting the hardworking individuals trying to make it through college, even if they are illegal. It's just that the problem is that our federal government cannot efficiently and seems unfit to tackle the issue of illegal immigration, so what are the states to do in the interim?

Kehama wrote:

I keep reading all these comments about families "running across the border" to nab this free state money for their kids college tuition. I have a hard time imagining some family in Juarez looking at their 18 year old kid and saying "Quick! To the border!" and then magically getting this scholarship for their kid.

Instead, it seems the more likely scenario is a family that came here illegally a decade or more ago with their kid. The kid goes to public school, has a fully Americanized education, works hard, does well and then beats out hundreds if not thousands of other applicants to qualify for this small scholarship.

Is illegal immigration a crime? Yes. But I'm almost of the opinion that if you've lived here for 15 years and been a productive member of society that whole time, that the government has missed their chance. It's almost like squatters rights at that point. The only crime I know of that doesn't have a statute of limitation is murder. Is illegal immigration equal to murder under the law? The fact that so many people can live and work here for so long without interference is an indictment of the system itself. We can't control our borders and, until now, most of us haven't gotten all bent out of shape about enforcing it. We need to just change the system instead of suddenly deporting families that have lived here for the majority of their child's lives.

That's a great point.

They're not illegal Mexican immigrants. They're common law Americans.

CheezePavilion wrote:

They're not illegal Mexican immigrants. They're common law Americans.

That's a damn fine turn of phrase, Cheeze, and a very apt description of the situation.

A lot of them aren't even Mexicans =P

fangblackbone wrote:

A lot of them aren't even Mexicans =P

We already stated that they were common law Americans.

As a Reaganite Republican who joined the party in 1984, I've often been puzzled by why the GOP seems dead set on making immigration an issue. Here are folks that are willing to risk their lives, often belly crawling through hundreds of miles of the Senora Desert, so they can have the opportunity to clean pools, mow lawns, and tar blacktops. They start small businesses in extraordinately high numbers, serve the military in rates staggeringly above their proportion, are deeply religious and morally conservative, and have a far greater reason to resent paying taxes than just about any other resident of the United States of America. And yet the GOP sees these folks as the enemy.

Seriously folks. If the GOP wanted to lock up the next 100 election cycles, they'd be fast tracking citizenship to illegals and building a superhighway to Juarez.

Paleocon wrote:

As a Reaganite Republican who joined the party in 1984, I've often been puzzled by why the GOP seems dead set on making immigration an issue. Here are folks that are willing to risk their lives, often belly crawling through hundreds of miles of the Senora Desert, so they can have the opportunity to clean pools, mow lawns, and tar blacktops. They start small businesses in extraordinately high numbers, serve the military in rates staggeringly above their proportion, are deeply religious and morally conservative, and have a far greater reason to resent paying taxes than just about any other resident of the United States of America. And yet the GOP sees these folks as the enemy.

Seriously folks. If the GOP wanted to lock up the next 100 election cycles, they'd be fast tracking citizenship to illegals and building a superhighway to Juarez.

Honestly, I thought that's the direction they were going back in 2000-2001, when Bush first got in. The xenophobic wing of the party stomped his first tentative ideas pretty hard, though.

Paleocon wrote:

As a Reaganite Republican who joined the party in 1984, I've often been puzzled by why the GOP seems dead set on making immigration an issue. Here are folks that are willing to risk their lives, often belly crawling through hundreds of miles of the Senora Desert, so they can have the opportunity to clean pools, mow lawns, and tar blacktops. They start small businesses in extraordinately high numbers, serve the military in rates staggeringly above their proportion, are deeply religious and morally conservative, and have a far greater reason to resent paying taxes than just about any other resident of the United States of America. And yet the GOP sees these folks as the enemy.

Seriously folks. If the GOP wanted to lock up the next 100 election cycles, they'd be fast tracking citizenship to illegals and building a superhighway to Juarez.

It is a good point. I wonder if it's that Republican strategy--and survival--depends on picking up the sparsely populated states that nevertheless get two electoral college votes just for being a state (not arguing it's a bad thing, just pointing it out). You can appeal to the South and the...Midwest, sorta, at the same time. You might have a much harder time appealing to those small states if you actively court a Latino Arizona or New Mexico.

You mention Reagan, and it makes me think of the Reagan Democrats. A lot of them were Catholic, and that was a big era for Catholics and Abortion. That--and for a lot of other reasons--I'm just not sure Mexicans are in the same situation as the Irish or Italians or etc. in the 80s were as far as bringing them into the Republican party.

CheezePavilion wrote:
Paleocon wrote:

As a Reaganite Republican who joined the party in 1984, I've often been puzzled by why the GOP seems dead set on making immigration an issue. Here are folks that are willing to risk their lives, often belly crawling through hundreds of miles of the Senora Desert, so they can have the opportunity to clean pools, mow lawns, and tar blacktops. They start small businesses in extraordinately high numbers, serve the military in rates staggeringly above their proportion, are deeply religious and morally conservative, and have a far greater reason to resent paying taxes than just about any other resident of the United States of America. And yet the GOP sees these folks as the enemy.

Seriously folks. If the GOP wanted to lock up the next 100 election cycles, they'd be fast tracking citizenship to illegals and building a superhighway to Juarez.

It is a good point. I wonder if it's that Republican strategy--and survival--depends on picking up the sparsely populated states that nevertheless get two electoral college votes just for being a state (not arguing it's a bad thing, just pointing it out). You can appeal to the South and the...Midwest, sorta, at the same time. You might have a much harder time appealing to those small states if you actively court a Latino Arizona or New Mexico.

You mention Reagan, and it makes me think of the Reagan Democrats. A lot of them were Catholic, and that was a big era for Catholics and Abortion. That--and for a lot of other reasons--I'm just not sure Mexicans are in the same situation as the Irish or Italians or etc. in the 80s were as far as bringing them into the Republican party.

I think, though, that much of the Republican strategy depends also on it being very much a Southern party. The problem arises, of course, when the most populous parts of the American South start browning in significant fashion. This is already happening in Texas, Arizona, and the rest of the Southwest. This trend is likely to continue. Texas is like Okinawa for the GOP. If that falls, it's over.

Paleocon wrote:

I think, though, that much of the Republican strategy depends also on it being very much a Southern party. The problem arises, of course, when the most populous parts of the American South start browning in significant fashion. This is already happening in Texas, Arizona, and the rest of the Southwest. This trend is likely to continue. Texas is like Okinawa for the GOP. If that falls, it's over.

I guess the issue is what happens when the Southwest and the Southeast--to say nothing of the Midwest--start looking very different. Does the GOP wind up in a situation where the more they do to court one set of voters, the more they alienate the other?

jowner wrote:

The obvious solution to me if illegal immigration is actually a problem would be to help Mexico (and keep going further south) raise its standard of living to the point where people are happy to stay put.

Bandit what is your stance on the War on Drugs™.

Because IMO getting out of that mess and weakening the cartels would go a long way in helping Mexico get back to a manageable country with legitimate growth potential.

I think that people are going to do drugs if they choose and that most of the money spent in the war on drugs is wasteful. I think that it would be pretty easy to cut off drug cartels at the knees by legalizing and taxing marijuana, putting it under similar restrictions as alcohol for sale and consumption. I also think a better use of our military rather than running off to Afghanistan would be joint operations with the Mexican government to kill the kidnappers, human traffickers, and drug gang members and invest in a better infrastructure, education system, stability in return for discounts on their oil reserves.

CheezePavilion wrote:
Paleocon wrote:

I think, though, that much of the Republican strategy depends also on it being very much a Southern party. The problem arises, of course, when the most populous parts of the American South start browning in significant fashion. This is already happening in Texas, Arizona, and the rest of the Southwest. This trend is likely to continue. Texas is like Okinawa for the GOP. If that falls, it's over.

I guess the issue is what happens when the Southwest and the Southeast--to say nothing of the Midwest--start looking very different. Does the GOP wind up in a situation where the more they do to court one set of voters, the more they alienate the other?

I think Reagan demonstrated pretty well that it was possible to court a pretty wide demographic without a tremendous amount of alienation. He certainly did his part to bring Hispanic voters into the GOP fold (e.g.: Amnesty, guest worker program, etc.) and the party generally held. He had some complaints from the nutbar John Birchers, but he did the party a favor by telling them to go fornicate with themselves. Now it seems, the [sp]Birchers[/sp] Birthers have taken over the party.

Actually if you look at surveys of 1st and 2nd generation latino immigrants their stances on social issues (being largely catholic) align very nicely with social conservatives. I think that democrats really need to play up the race thing to keep them from voting republican.

Look at the gay marriage thing in California. Obama was on the ballot at the time which brought out the black vote, but socially most black families are very anti-gay in their viewpoints and what helped Obama personally in the polls really hurt the gay movement. Most polling data I've seen shows that Whites are more prone to be in favor of gay rights than latinos and blacks, which is odd to me because you would think if a minority group was traditionally repressed they'd be less likely to do that to other groups.

bandit0013 wrote:

you would think if a minority group was traditionally repressed they'd be less likely to do that to other groups.

You would be wrong.

NSMike wrote:

Mexico is like Ravenholm. We don't go there anymore.

So, there are mute nerds running around killing everybody with big saw blades?

Paleocon wrote:
bandit0013 wrote:

you would think if a minority group was traditionally repressed they'd be less likely to do that to other groups.

You would be wrong.

Oh I know I'm wrong, it was tongue in cheek, it just never ceases to amaze me.

Paleocon wrote:
bandit0013 wrote:

you would think if a minority group was traditionally repressed they'd be less likely to do that to other groups.

You would be wrong.

I don't intend to take this conversation further into racism territory (although most would be amazed at how pervasive the issue actually is throughout our society), but one of the reasons racism continues to exist is that society perpetuates it by creating standards to which sub-groups attempt to adhere, in order to gain acceptance from the dominant group. On an almost sub-conscious level, oppressed minority groups in a racially driven society will turn on one another based on the cultural standards (or lack thereof) set by the dominant group. To put this case bluntly, White Christians don't like gays, espouse that view throughout their culture, and thus African-Americans, Latinos, Irish, Italians, and so forth adopt that view to gain acceptance.

So, they passed some extremely strict laws in Georgia cracking down hard on immigrants, forcing even legal immigrants to carry papers at all times and forcing police to check citizenship status of pretty much anyone they stopped. Net (desired) result: lots of immigrants left the state, both legal and illegal. Net (undesired) result: hundreds of millions of dollars of produce rotting in the fields, unpicked.

Lots more info and links in this excellent Metafilter post.

Malor wrote:

So, they passed some extremely strict laws in Georgia cracking down hard on immigrants, forcing even legal immigrants to carry papers at all times and forcing police to check citizenship status of pretty much anyone they stopped. Net (desired) result: lots of immigrants left the state, both legal and illegal. Net (undesired) result: hundreds of millions of dollars of produce rotting in the fields, unpicked.

Lots more info and links in this excellent Metafilter post.

The same thing is happening in Alabama right now thanks to an anti-immigration law that just went into effect.