Hi, David.
Good posting. Thank you.
Have a good weekend
There is a new show on ABC of all places called Eli Stone, I just saw an episode about immigration that was actually positive and personal... this couple sued the company that they worked for because of pesticides and got in trouble during the trial because they thought they were citizens but found out that they were not... the episode ended on a good note for the couple...
Sadly, I doubt I can help. Unlike most others "on the Left," I really am an "open borders" person. I figure if you can establish residency here, we ought to offer you citizenship. If you qualify and you refuse, then we ought to issue you a permanent residency visa. In either case, if you can establish residency, then you're here legally and you're entitled to equal protection of the law. I realize that's not going to be a winning policy proposal at the political level, because it's overtly anti-nativist, but that's where I am.
I'm interested in seeing whether others "on the Left" can propose an immigration reform package that doesn't raise nativist hackles so much, but still manages to do something worthy of the name 'reform'.
Well, the GPCA has a platform plank that's pretty durned comprehensive.
The core theory is: "Immigration policies should be based strongly on human rights. Properly devised immigrant work policies can be of economic benefit to the worker and the host nation." Then the plank has tons of details.
It's not a framing thing, more legislative in focus but it's an idea to start from.
Thanks, JustJack.
We do have a pretty solid menu of legislative and policy proposals to pursue. I think the bigger problem is creating a compelling frame that energizes and empowers progressives, as well as a general approach to which policies we pursue and focus upon.
s9, I actually agree with your view of immigration, but I don't think it is necessarily an "open borders" view -- but I do think economic factors (rather than ethnic or cultural ones) should be the rational base for our immigration policy vis a vis the raw numbers we allow in. That is, I think we should increase the numbers of people who can immigrate according to employment-market demands, and lower it as the demand shrinks. That meshes with your criteria as well. But it hardly is an "open borders" approach.
Sadly, I don't think I can help either because it's probably the one issue where I go slightly "conservative".
Certainly I don't mean this in either a "nativist" or "status quo" sense but I do have a problem on the "too many people" and "non-assimilation" fronts.
The situation must be confronted on both the supply and the demand sides.
Donning flame suit.
I should mention that I'm registered as a Green in California, and I'm in complete support of the platform plank linked above.
However, we are a distant minority party, and I think our immigration policy preference is unlikely to be easily mainstreamed.
I can offer an interesting framing of the issue:
Suppose we were to set up a selection system for citizenship in the USA. Rather than accept just anybody, suppose we decided that we will accept only hard-working, highly motivated people who are willing to take risks to better themselves. These are the kind of people who beef up our economy. We declare to the world "Lazybones need not apply."
Ah, but how could we separate the genuine hard workers from those who merely claim to be hard workers? Well, perhaps we could set up an obstacle course. To get through this obstacle course, you have to spend a great deal of money, risk your life, and spend a lot of time getting through. That would certainly chase away the lazybones, wouldn't it?
And in fact, that's exactly what we've done: the border with Mexico is nothing more than a huge obstacle course that guarantees that we get only the best people.
So here we are, skimming the cream of the crop of Mexican talent, leaving Mexico with only the losers and lazybones. And WE'RE the ones complaining about this deal? I should think that Mexico has a much better complaint than we do.
A good place to start might be by looking at this world as a globe, mostly water, with rock outcropings... rock outcropings with people on them. The notion of Nation/State is obsolete, and like clinging to adolescent fairy tales to explain away the dark, a notion need be overcome if we are to survive the challenges of the twenty-first century (christian era).
Tim --
I think the "non-assimilation" issue is actually one addressed by the progressive approach:
There is indeed a problem with a failure to assimilate, and the raw numbers of people emigrating has a lot to do with that. But the biggest factor in this is the fact that these immigrants are illegal and forced to exist in a kind of shadow citizenship that doesn't require them to embrace Americanness either.
That is, the more of a viable path to citizenship we create, the faster and better will be their assimilation. At the same time, it's important to remember that "assimilation" isn't about adopting white values but American values, including not just hard work but also respect for the rule of law and our democratic institutions, including equality of opportunity and a tolerance of all creeds and lifestyles.
Those are the values that progressives can and should be promoting in this debate.
Great point Dave and no it's not about "white" values at all (whatever those are). I'm a Californian and a multi-cultural landscape is a good thing. Enclaves of people "hiding" (as you illustrate) is not a good thing
I agree, Dave, the frame is indeed the thing. I think the key to that is to use the human rights angle or hook as the core of the frame. Move out from there... what mainstream elements of the immigration discourse resonate with human rights and then plug that into the core and frame the whole issue on that. Thoughts?
As far as "American values" goes though, as I said before, that's an extremely problematic issue. A skim of the cultural critique reveals that mostly what is mainstream for "American" is generally "white." So then what? It's like trying to forge a cogent argument for a strategy to combat climate change amongst the global warming deniers.
When I think of American Values, in the end I find human values with the American label slapped onto them. There just isn't any legitimate "American" aspect to any of them (we need a list to make this relevant, KWIM?). Unless we lie and fake our orgasm as we talk this out... which might not be so bad in the short term, I guess.
Ten bears, I'm with ya' dude. That's where my heart is... and why I have so much conflict with mainstream stoopid.
"My only nation is the international working class."
My position, in a nutshell. I'm not even fond of my own nativist compatriots. And we Quebecers at least have the excuse that we were an actual colonized nation, unlike nativist Americans whose only complaint it seems is that they might have to deign to learn a second language (welcome to the world in which most the planet already lives in!)
I think immigration is for Republicans what gun control is for Democrats--a case of simple-minded scapegoating that avoids the real issue (and loses votes while making the real issue worse). In the case of guns, the real problem is violence, and the poverty, social division, and fear that produces it. By focusing on guns rather than these root causes of violence, an entire demographic of people with deep, multigenerational, positive and law-abiding experiences with guns ends up lumped in with criminals, and the resulting cultural division actually exacerbates the real problem.
Similarly, immigration is a proxy for fears about the economic decline of the working class and middle class, and instead of working to fix the economic conditions that produce declining or stagnant wages for a majority of Americans, the finger is pointed at a group of people who are even more negatively affected by our economy, and policies are enacted that reinforce the underlying problem.
The problem is the pursuit of cheap labor at the expense of worker's rights. Undocumented workers are a great wedge for employers to use because they are cheap, can be threatened with deportation or worse because of their undocumented status, and hiring or even threatening to hire them drags down wages for Americans who can least afford to make less money.
The solution is to remove the power of this wedge. Require employers, even people hiring nannies or people to work on their yards, to pay a liveable minimum wage and all relevant taxes to all employees, regardless of whether they are citizens (say, $10-$12 an hour). Give 90-day travel visas to any Mexican citizen that does not have a criminal record or documented associations with terrorist groups. Create a new kind of employment visa that is not tied to a particular job but allows residency with proof of employment, and that reverts to a travel visa at the time of unemployment. Businesses that hire people under this visa program report hiring and firing to immigration so that these people are in the system and the visa status can be updated. Most importantly, fund an audit of businesses tied to fines for violations. If someone is hired without granting a work visa, it's the *employer's* fault, and they're on the hook for six months wages PAID TO THE EMPLOYEE. If it's found that some employees, citizen or not, are not being paid the legal minimum, then again, fine a minimum six months wages paid TO THE EMPLOYEE.
This system would mean that employers would have no leverage over immigrant workers by threatening deportation. It would transform every immigrant worker into someone with an incentive to whistleblow if they're not being paid a fair wage. It raises wages to a level that avoids poverty for everyone and means that there are no jobs in the US that "citizens won't do." That means there are no advantages to hiring immigrants, and several disadvantages (such as the language issue.) The only immigrants who would be hired would be those who honestly could do more work better for the same amount of money.
It makes every immigrant legal, but creates a situation where truly seasonal workers could work and return home, and then come back the next year, without being punished or exploited. They also can lose a job, and look for a new one without violating their visa terms. It also gets everyone documented while still preventing dangerous people from entering the country. It removes the incentives for people to cross the border illegally on both the demand and supply end, and renders the need for additional security measures moot.
As for both citizenship and permanent residency, create a point system that favors English fluency and professional skills but also gives credit to long-time immigrant workers who have been here for years. People who owe fines under the current system would still have to pay them, but that money could be garnished from their future wages, which would be at the prevailing minimum wage and in most cases higher than what people were getting paid anyway. The net effect would be that businesses would be paying fines for their past use of illegal labor. They are the real people violating US law, after all, and not the immigrants who just want to work and would work legally if that were an option.
Getting this done means shifting the narrative on this issue from one that blames workers to one that empowers workers, whether citizens or immigrants, against the unsavory practices of businesses.
Cascaduan - I like your idea a lot but in order to give it some teeth any fines levied against a company engaged in shady practices must hit profit margins hard. If the fines are too small they'll just be counted as business expenses and bad practices will continue if the company is still in the black even after being fined.
WhatWhat, the reason I chose six months wages is because it's an amount that's not going to cripple someone who hired a single gardener and screwed up the paperwork, but the big-time employers that get audited will be charged six months per employee which at $10/hour is roughly $10K per employee for full-time work. For big companies that are employing hundreds of employees illegally, you're talking fines in the millions. By my back-of-the-envelope calculations, it seemed to scale well.
But this is just what I came up after sitting down one day and thinking through my own ideas on immigration. I'm sure the specifics would be difficult to work out, but it's as detailed a proposal as I could contribute in response to David's request for ideas.
By focusing on guns rather than these root causes of violence,
Guns are the root cause of violence!
If you don't count the drive-by stabbings, and long range beatings, and those disgruntled former employees who go back to their former place of work and slap everyone they find!
And what about those people who situate themselves in a high tower, and spit on passers-by!
Not to mention all those people who commit suicide by punching themselves in the face until they are dead. Or looking in the mirror, and telling themselves they don't deserve to live!
Of course, I've been cut dead, by a look from ex-girlfriends. Some others simply let loose a string of epithets which can kill at 200 yards.
Now I think about it, we are so lucky we have guns to defend ourselves against those people!
Do you think we will ever love each other as much as we love guns, and film scripts and TV shows?
I like Cascadian's idea. It does seem scalable, from small to large businesses. If more 'punishment' of businesses is needed, let a second offense require a revocation of the state business license (AZ's law just upheld).
But the 'frame' of this issue needs to be bigger than 'fences', or 'illegals', or 'nativism'.
Way back, the UFW struggled to enunciate its position against illegal workers, finding it to be a 'strikebreaker' issue, a way farms could hire around the union. It was an economic rights issue, not an 'illegals' issue. Right now, Giordano, over on The Field, is reporting that Chavez's grandkids want to endorse Obama. That's a way into the issue.
But again, it's gotta be 'framed' big: treat the economic flow of undocumented workers as part of a much larger North/Central/South American issue (because most of the issue concerns people who are arriving on foot, sometimes over vast, international journeys); let the Democratic candidate frame it not as an 'immigration' issue, but as evidence for the need of the US to confront its own Truth & Reconcilliation over decades and decades of contradictory and damaging foreign policy in the Americas, policy too often driven by narcopolitics, rightwing repression, and economic explotation.
Let's redefine, with participation of all the countries of the Americas, a new 21st century Monroe Doctrine. One that recognizes the strengths of both Jeffersonian and Bolivarian democratic theory. One that unifies the Americas pole-to-pole under the banner of democratic human rights, not NAFTA.
I grew up in a US that was PROUD that we had huge unguarded borders on our north and south--let's get there again!
Stop looking at the issue from just one side of the border. As long as the standard of living is so much higher in the US than in Mexico, Mexicans will be coming over here looking for work. The only way we can stop the flow of Mexican immigrants (legal or illegal) is to improve conditions in Mexico to where people want to stay.
There is plenty of room to argue about how this can best be done, but that's what we should be arguing about.
We do have to deal with the undocumented as the backbone of the low wage work force in this country, but any immigration reform ALSO has to deal with families and family reunification. Dealing with people just as workers is not enough. A great many of the people in our existing undocumented population are in families with mixed citizenship -- US citizen kids sure, but also more distant relatives in and out of status. This creates very human dilemmas that don't respond well to bureaucratic remedies. We need to keep this front and center in the discussion.
I gotta admit, on immigration as I see it (mostly Mexicans and Latin Americans coming to the Putrid Sound area) is a very emotional issue for me.
I don't have a lot of facts, just a deep emotional feeling that these immigrants are some of the best things which could have happened to America, and will be a good addition to us. And my experience with the people confirms that.
I'm sure there are some issues with pie slices, but my emotional reaction is a big "Yes" on so many levels.
I agree with the Zionist racist/Israeli apologist Brooks...
Hoop
"Zionist racist/Israeli apologist"! Wow, Ken! Whatcha gonna do next, join Al Queada?
You Ken, are truly among the "unguilty"!
Zionist lackeys like you are usually ensconced among the guilty.
"Zionist lackeys"....
You just can't make this shit up. Ken is one a one man crusade to put comedy writers out of work.
Ooops. That should read "on a one man crusade"..
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