[Ummagumma]

If you want to stop the illegal immigration, just make willingly hiring an illegal immigrant so expensive it wouldn't make sense from a business perspective. Make the repeat offence a criminal act. Make it illegal - on federal level - to provide them with any taxpayer paid benefits. If an illegal immigrant is caught committing a violent crime, slap mandatory 5 years of jail time to their sentence, and make sure they serve it before they are deported. If a previously deported illegal immigrant who didn't commit a violent crime re-enters the country, throw them in jail for a year. In 5-6 years, you'll see a huge drop in the number of illegals.

Otherwise, just sit back, relax, and wait for these nice people with Mexican flags to show up in your neighborhood and start beating your kids up for wearing US flag T-shirts on Cinco the Mayo.

Now - I don't have any problems with any legal immigrants of any race, ethnicity or color. I do hope our country switches to the sane immigration policies like what Canada has. But mass illegal immigration is too close to an invasion. The legal immigrants have rights and responsibilities and a vested interest in the future of this country, and are expected to do their best to integrate into American society. The illegal immigrants are just opportunists who don't feel any connection to this country. I don't blame them for trying to improve their situation by taking advantage of our porous borders - I'd likely do the same if I were in their shoes - but we do need to address this issue. At some point.

[beachmouse]

Originally Posted by Ummagumma

There's plenty of them here. You are just oblivious to them.

And they don't have a giant name tag stuck to their forehead proclaiming their status either. One of my grandmother's cousins decided to get out of the Soviet Bloc in the 80s. She saved up her money for a plane ticket, convinced people in her home country and the USA that she just wanted to visit family in the States for a few weeks so she got visas and permissions for the vacation, and after those few weeks, she just never went back to Krakow again. If you saw her in Chicago, she was just another one of hundreds of little old Polish ladies taking the train to work, where she cleaned office buildings to make rent.

[craig11152]

Many years ago I worked in the residential roofing business here in Ann Arbor. In the mid 90's my boss hired 4 illegals unknowingly. They had fake but real looking green cards and social security cards. We thought they were real. After about 2 years the SS numbers were flagged by the social security administration as problematic. When the "spokesman" for the four guys, Armando, (spoke English immaculately) explained the situation he said they could come back in a week with new cards and it would take 2 years to get caught again. My boss politely declined and wished them well. At least 10 years later Armando was still in the area working. I imagine the other guys were too unless they went or were sent home.

I will say they were hard workers who showed up every day, never complained about a Saturday, and they were missed when they left.

[Ummagumma]

Originally Posted by craig11152

Many years ago I worked in the residential roofing business here in Ann Arbor. In the mid 90's my boss hired 4 illegals unknowingly. They had fake but real looking green cards and social security cards. We thought they were real. After about 2 years the SS numbers were flagged by the social security administration as problematic. When the "spokesman" for the four guys, Armando, (spoke English immaculately) explained the situation he said they could come back in a week with new cards and it would take 2 years to get caught again. My boss politely declined and wished them well. At least 10 years later Armando was still in the area working. I imagine the other guys were too unless they went or were sent home.

I will say they were hard workers who showed up every day, never complained about a Saturday, and they were missed when they left.

They are hardworking people, however the nation that can't control it's borders doesn't have the control of it's destiny.

What we need is the Canadian style, points based immigration system - combined with Canadian style enforcement. I was turned away at the border by Canadian customs more than once when traveling for work. A mere suspicion that you will be doing any kind of work in Canada, and you're going back.