Can we have the elections now? Please?

My guess: His base loves tonight's speech and he gets a boost in the polls.

Let's see. The National Guard has had major rolls in Iraq and Katrina. These are things they exist for. But stopping Mexicans from coming over the border????

Next they will be used in November as poll watchers.

All this sudden "anger" on the part of the religious right is pure stagecraft. They can read the writing on the walls; they know the GOP is going to get hurt in the midterm elections, and hurt badly. What they're doing now is a purely CYA move; they're getting out ahead of the GOP's big loss this November and making sure they get none of the blame for it. After the election, they'll point back and say, "See? We stayed home, and that's why you lost. You better listen to us next time." Nevermind that the Republicans would have lost even with the Christian right's support.

This is all about making sure the Christian right stays relevant.

For everyone decrying deploying NG troops on the border -- do they have a better suggestion?

I'm no Bush fan, but I don't see what better short-term action he can take.

Steve Sailer has crunched the numbers and figured out that Bush's plan would lead to one Guardsman on duty for every 4.5 miles of border. Not what you'd call a curtain of steel.

The tell?
Canada's border is longer and more open, yet no one's going to be posted there. I can't wait to see how non-border state Governors are going to react to seeing their people sent down into the desert to quell the fears of rabid rednecks.

Rove wants a war to help the Republicans. The generals have probably told them that they don't have enough army left to start one with Iran. So they came up with a plan to have a phony Disneyland war where no one gets hurt and there aren't any body bags: a "war" to defend the border.

This will look good until summer fire season, when governors consider deploying the state National Guard to help out, only to find that they are off serving in Bush's latest photo op.

The problem is that it's smoke and mirrors, just a piece of obvious showmanship with no real substance behind it.

Wrong Kevin. Protecting our borders from Mexican terrorists and criminals is a very real problem. Pro Illegal Alien supporters have overplayed their hand. After seeing all of the illegal aliens on the streets in demonstrations, the American people have responded by rejecting their blackmail. Bush sending troops to defend our borders is just beginning of the Backlash against illegals who want to invade America. with Bush on the offensive in his War against the Illegal Aliens, Liberal and Democrats should be running in fear or they will be swept away in a landslide in the 2006 elections.

If immigrants are drawn here for employment then why not just enforce existing laws regarding the hiring of illegal immigrants? The rich wing of republicans want them here for cheap labor but the rest want them sent back. This is a lose-lose situation for conservatives-they just divide their core with it. And as usual, they're not smart enough to even realize it.

Bush finds himself in this predicament because he made his "base" the most radical part of the Republican coalition. Now he can't move to the center without alienating them, even if he wanted to (which is not clear). But what the "base" wants now is so extreme that to pursue it would be to invite an electoral disaster even bigger than the one clearly in the offing for 2006.

Al, if Bush wants to cut down on illegal immigration, all he has to do is go after employers. If there aren't jobs, fewer illegals will come. But the employers are campaign contributors, so he won't touch them.

Did you know that the Social Security Administration knows full well who is working with a phony social security number, and they just keep quiet about it and collect the taxes? Yes, illegals pay Social Security tax, a lot of it, and they aren't going to collect benefits. That would be another angle Bush could use if he were serious. But he's not.

Are you sure, Kevin, that this blog is not being monitored? If they can monitor the phone calls of reporters, as Brian Ross of ABC reports, they can certainly do that.

I think the posters here should be careful not to post anything too critical of the admiistration unless they have the resources to fight long legal battles.

GWB's is the greatest administration in the history of the republic.

For everyone decrying deploying NG troops on the border -- do they have a better suggestion?

Enforce existing laws that do not permit employers to hire undocumented aliens. Perhaps increase the penalties. This is just one more sham to keep flowing a supply of labor not subject to US labor laws--minimum wage, workmans comp, OSHA. Oh, and raise the minimum wage.

This has a "Mission to Mars" feeling about it... when it doesn't result in any bump from the base it will be completely forgotten. I give it 10 days, 2 weeks max.

Wrong Al.

Where's osama: If immigrants are drawn here for employment then why not just enforce existing laws regarding the hiring of illegal immigrants?

Too obvious, too effective, and not nearly dramatic enough.

Yeah, so how are the Mars landings going? New Orleans has been rebuilt bigger and better than before, right?

It looks like the Republican al-Qaeda ("base") is finally losing its trust in Bush.

lib wrote:

I think the posters here should be careful not to post anything too critical of the admiistration unless they have the resources to fight long legal battles.

Republicans should drop this immigration issue immediately and try to make everyone forget that they brought it up. As long as there are jobs paying substantially more here than in Mexico immigrants will come no matter how big a wall is built or how many guard the border. It's like metal drawn to a magnet. Fine businesses enough to bankrupt them and they'll stop hiring illegal immigrants. But is this one of the "plans"? No. Which is why bush was never serious about actually stopping illegal immigration anyway.

Al, stop snorting Kool-Aid. The American people no longer believe Bush can manage a home aquarium, let alone a problem of any importance.

I'm no Bush fan, but I don't see what better short-term action he can take.
Posted by: Alan

why do some people feel that SOME action, even the stupidest, is somehow better than no action. There are courses which actually make things worse. Illegal immigration is nothing new ... what suddenly fucking mandates troop presence? ... other than a 29% approval rating?

dipshit.

According to Glenn Greenwald the nativist racists are calling for impeachment.

So they're, for the first time, admitting to the existence of the smoke and mirrors.

Bush is gonna break Nixon's record. And there's still absolutely nothing good on the horizon.

Anybody know where Fox is ending up on this issue? With the authoritarian cultists or with the racist nativists?

Snow's first press conference is tomorrow, right? Gotta make sure there's enough space on the DVR.

I think MDS @12:33 is on the right track: the whole National-Guard-to-the-Border circus is probably just a desperation ploy to boost Decider-in-Chief Dubya's anemic approval numbers - any bets on how loudly the WH spin-machine is going to trumpet any percentage uptick? - and, hopefully: stem the tide of criticism (including, amazingly, "impeachment" calls) from the starboard rail - the "nativist" types whose notion of "border security" is probably close to Vlad Dracula's (impaling illegals on stakes, and decorating the desert with them as a warning to would-be wetbacks).
Nope: finding itself deep in a public-opinion hole: the Bush 43 Administration is reverting to its typical response - calling, loudly, for a bigger shovel.

Last December Bush signed leglislation to add 10,000 border patrol agents.

But in February when his budget was released we found that he had only funded the addition of 210 border patrol agents.

Why should anyone take this inconsistent fool seriously?

Maybe he has found a way to shift the cost to the states by using the Guard and that way he can still claim his tax cuts are working.

There is probably some truth to what Joe Buck has said. Iran is too tough of a nut to crack even for a good election pseudo-event. But faux war on the faux immigration crisis may fit the bill. We will have to see if this comes out like the Schiavo miscalculation or if it gets the lemmings to the polls like the faux gay-marriage crisis. Certainly the moneybags Republicans can’t risk really giving the cultural conservatives the godly nation they so desire. We will see who has the muscle and the smarts.

One major problem with this plan is that the National Guard is supposed to be a reserve force deployed only in times of crisis. If the government keeps thinking up ways to exploit their low-wage military status (instead of, saying, hiring more Border Patrol agents), finding new recruits will be even more difficult than it already is.

You'd think they (Bush's-base-that-doesn't-profit-from-his-policies) would catch on, wouldn't you? More people than ever are neutral on the subject of gay marriage. There's not going to be an anti-gay marriage amendment to the Constitution. Television and video games continue to provide ever more sex and violence for viewers. There's never been a serious Republican attempt to introduce an anti-abortion amendment to the Constitution. There's no plan to get tough with employers who employ illegals. More Americans are without health insurance each year. Not enough jobs are being created to keep up with those entering the work force, and the jobs being created do not provide benefits and pay as good as those exported out of the country. Meanwhile the income gap between the unfathomably rich and the rest of us continues to grow.

But so far most of this unfortunate base emulate Charlie Brown. THIS TIME Republicans will not yank the football away. THIS TIME their "family values" will be forced on the entire nation. Public Christian prayers will be recited in public schools again. I wouldn't be surprised if Bush got a temporary boost in the polls just for creating the mental image (aka smoke and mirror illusion) of sending the National Guard to defend the southern border.

If he actually does send them, at least they'll be within quicker deployment distance of relieving some of the destruction caused by this summer's hurricane and wild fire (real smoke) destruction. Until then, I'm sure guardsmen stationed at intervals of four to five miles across the border will prove that Bush is serious about enforcing the borders, at least to Charlie Brown clones.

I give Smirky a lot of credit here. It takes a well-rounded, diversified, multitasking fuckup of a president to so thoroughly offend so many audiences for so many reasons.

The last group still defending him: the criminally insane.

How low did Nixon go? When will W beat the record?

The whole pseudo-reality-based project could be run with about 100 guys and some cool equipment. The only uniformed troops/actors that would be needed would be for photo ops and for the reporters imbedded in the Potemkin project.

"We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

The protests screwed up the Republicans' long-running scam (of using illegals as cheap labor and bogeymen) by scaring the GOP's base enough that now they want a real fix. ...
Bush's mission: feed them bullshit so the GOP can go back to just using their dumb asses ... again.
-Texas KOS
.

What would be very pleasing to me, is that Bush deploys the National Guard on the border and forces home owners to house them, just like the British did back in the 1770's. That will please his base.

Plan on hearing stories about how the National Guard destroys private property and does not observe civil rights. Maybe we will be treated to a firefight along the border.

My interest-only adjustable rate mortgage just reset itself, thanks to illegal immigration.

Institutional Photo OP.

I'm no Bush fan, but I don't see what better short-term action he can take.

Your fear has been created by media masters in NYC and DC who work for the Republicans and DLC. There is absolutely no threat to the USA from the people migrating here to work hard labor. Instead, the people migrating here make our country stronger.

Let's see. The National Guard has had major rolls in Iraq and Katrina.

BTW - What is a "major roll"? Is it a military pastry? Is it the fat on underworked commanders? Is it perhaps an incredibly agile downhill maneuver allowing your supine body to rotate as it careens down an incline? Perhaps a snare drum technique applied in a piece that is not in a minor key?

I believe you meant "role". Sorry to nit-pick, but this misspelling was just too fraught with alternate meanings to leave alone. I know that I often make mistakes when typing comments, so perhaps I should not throw stones.

Are you sure, Kevin, that this blog is not being monitored?

Several months ago there was a report from AmericaBlog that its commenters were being contacted by either the government or political operatives. Always assume you are being video taped and that your communications are being monitored. Every commenter leaves behind their IP and the government has the resources to obtain and cross reference.

I don't think there's any question at this point that every lefty blog is being watched; ditto for many or most regular commenters. (If I were a man, this would probably be a good place to insert something about how good the NSA guy's sister was last night. Well, maybe the Hot Lesbian Cheerleaders can do so.)

Bush may get more of a bump from his base if he deploys the National Guard troops in courthouses around the country to prevent activist judges from performing gay marriages. Or maybe instead of invading Iraq in response to 9/11 he should have invaded Mexico. He is sure to reveal the connection tonight.

Almost forty posts so far and not one suggestion on what we should do, other than go after employers.

Here's a suggestion, in all seriousness:

1) physical barrier from San Diego to Brownsville. At the very least that stops the despicable 'coyotes' who prey upon the decent people who just want a better life.

2) as you get that into place, you can go after the employers who hire illegals. Make it painful for them

3) an appropriate program for legal immigration that fits our needs. I'm easy on whatever you call it, just make it fair and simple.

4) an appropriate program to regularize the status of current illegals, the overwhelming majority of whom are decent people in search of a decent life. Again, fair and simple. We're not going to evict 12 million people.

The key to this is a physical barrier -- otherwise it's 1986 all over again.

There's a proposal. Do progressives have a counter, or is it all just gloating over poll numbers?

Boy oh boy when Santa Ana shows up at the Alamo, are we gonna be glad we've got the National Guard pre-deployed!

Wait, it's an army of unarmed poor men and women who want to mow our lawns and clean our houses for $40 a day? Uh, this seems like a great use of our national guard!

I'm just wondering how we're gonna get the Aircraft carrier into the Arizona desert so Bush can declare mission accomplished after we catch 3 guys sneaking over the border with gardening tools.

What was that old movie that had the Mexicans--some descendant of Santa Anna, I think--attempting to retake the Alamo? They charge into San Antonio on horseback, racing past the Walgreen's and waiting for the traffic light and so forth.

When I was in the Illinois National Guard, back in the 90's, the part I hated most was the "chance" at having to go do something full-time. Yeah, I know that was part of the deal -- I did "sign on the dotted line," but most of these citizen-soldiers have a real life they're trying to live as well as performing a necessary service to their community/state/nation. Local service is one thing, but border security?!?!?

If Bush thinks that the National Guard is a ready laboor force he can tap on a whim, he's sorely mistaken.

Look for National Guard retention numbers to take an even greater hit. If these guys wanted to be in the full-time military, they'd be in the full-time military.

Open the borders.

From Immanuel Wallerstein's Commentary No. 185, May 15, 2006:

"So, back to our two questions. Are walls moral? Are walls effective? The morality of walls constructed to keep people out comes down to the morality of property rights. And the morality of property rights is a question of how the property was acquired. The owners of the property claim it was the result of their hard labor, and others often argue that it was the result of theft, aggression, or other illegitimate (if not illegal) seizure. There is no generic answer to this question, and in practice the answer in particular cases is the result of political negotiations and political compromises.

Of course, one might think that persons committed to the endless virtues of the free market should feel that individual movement should be governed by the market and not by monopolies (restriction of rights of access through a system of visas, for example). But in practice, few advocates of the free market ever say this. They claim that goods and capital should move freely, but they tend not to extend this market principle to the movement of people."

I have a feeling President Bush is going to make life painful for all of us, Steve.

Bush is between a rock and a hard place here.

True enough, but you go downhill from there. In order for his plan to have credibility on the right, it has to guard the border for real. In order to be practical in execution, it has to allow a process for the illegals who are here to become citizens, and then be expelled only if they do not become citizens. In order to be fair, it has to quit treating illegal aliens from Mexico as a special class; there is no greater right to immigrate illegally from Mexico than from China, only a greater ease. In order to pass Congress, it has to be not too punitive.

A majority of Americans prefer a policy of restricted legal immigration. A small minority oppose all immigration, and another small minority oppose all restrictions. At least a large minority and maybe a majority do not believe that restrictions will be enforced if there is any sort of "amnesty" (no matter how it is named or described).

Bush started pushing this a few years ago, and he has essentially brought the issue to a deciding point. Congress is at a tipping point where a hard push in the right direction will get a law passed. He ought to have been pushing this when he was pushing Social Security reform. On the other hand, he got some help on border security from all those people carrying Mexican flags in marches organized by ANSWER.

Just what are the rules of engagement? Does the administration plan to give the troopers bullets? Shoot on sight? Call in the professionals to actually arrest? What?

a few more points:

about half of the illegal aliens are from Mexico, about half from all the other countries. guarding the Mexican border is a reasonable priority, but obviously not sufficient in itself.

large numbers of legal immigrants oppose leniency for the illegal aliens.

In order to get re-elected, the members of Congress will do what their constituents want, and see to it that the law is enforced at least through election time.

Almost forty posts so far and not one suggestion on what we should do, other than go after employers.

The best idea in your post as far as I can see.

1) physical barrier from San Diego to Brownsville. At the very least that stops the despicable 'coyotes' who prey upon the decent people who just want a better life.

Ha ha ha ha ha
This Steve White character is quite naive...

What makes you think the "coyotes" wouldn't do great business with a physical barrier in place, so that it becomes impossible to cross the border without paying them for use of their tunnels they will dig under this thing?

2) as you get that into place, you can go after the employers who hire illegals. Make it painful for them

Why can't we go after employers who hire illegals now? Why do we need to build a porous wall first?

3) an appropriate program for legal immigration that fits our needs. I'm easy on whatever you call it, just make it fair and simple.

As long as we avoid the "dual track" second-class citizenship that has given countries in Europe a permanent foreign underclass that does not assimilate. If you're the type to complain about national anthems not being sung in English, you will certainly not be happy with the results of a "guest worker" program.

4) an appropriate program to regularize the status of current illegals, the overwhelming majority of whom are decent people in search of a decent life. Again, fair and simple. We're not going to evict 12 million people.

Again, either grant citizenship or evict. Don't create a hostile, permanent, non-assimilated underclass like France has got.

The key to this is a physical barrier -- otherwise it's 1986 all over again.

A physical barrier looks nice and makes people feel comfortable because they can't see the tunnels being dug underneath it. So we know Steve White is in favor of feel-good solutions. The rest of us agree: the real solution is to address the problem at its cause: CHEAP ASS EMPLOYERS.

But I thought that Bush was a straight-talker with resolve. A man's man with resolve who didn't pay attention to polls or sagging approval. Did I mention he's got resolve?

My previous query re. monitoring of this blog were quite serious. As someone above has suggested, there has been some evidence of monitoring in another blog.

I think Kevin should tell us what the policy of the Washington Monthly is regarding the confidentiality of the IP addresses of the posters. Do you store them in the database along with the comments?

The National Guard is being posted to avoid the visuals of an Israeli-type fence. The Guard members can be kept relatively invisible and removed as soon as the pressure is off. The press will notice if a fence is demolished. Not to mention the pro-immigrant groups' screaming about Mexican would-be workers' being treated like Palestinian would-be suicide bombers.

"Wrong Kevin. Protecting our borders from Mexican terrorists and criminals is a very real problem. Pro Illegal Alien supporters have overplayed their hand. After seeing all of the illegal aliens on the streets in demonstrations, the American people have responded by rejecting their blackmail. Bush sending troops to defend our borders is just beginning of the Backlash against illegals who want to invade America. with Bush on the offensive in his War against the Illegal Aliens, Liberal and Democrats should be running in fear or they will be swept away in a landslide in the 2006 elections."

LOL....Al don't quit your day job......waitaminute trolling around opposition comment sections probably is your job.....so please do quit....then maybe they will hire someone who is either funnier or is capable of making something close to a compelling argument.

'...Anybody know where Fox is ending up on this issue? With the authoritarian cultists or with the racist nativists?...'

I just got off the encrypted netphone with Rupert who said FOX will remain ' FAIR and BALANCED '. FOX newstainment will have people putting the arguments for BOTH these fine home grown Amerkin fascist traditions. Hillary then told him to shut the fuck up and suck her strap-on clean but you get the picture. FOX reports - you believe.

I agree that the Bush plan for border control is largely useless, but opposing strong border control is a political loser for either party

Apparently George Bush will announce tonight that he plans to deploy thousands of National Guard troops to the Mexican border. But why?

Because the deployment of National Guard troops to Iraq wasn't taking enough emergency-resposne capacity away from the states?

For everyone decrying deploying NG troops on the border -- do they have a better suggestion?This is just temporary (till the elections). It's pretty obvious Bush supports illegal immigration in one form or another.

To understand the fork tongued Texan, it must be realized that he is a business crony first and an American second. Bush/Cheney view the American people as adversaries, not fellow citizens.

Can't someone petition Pope Tim Russert for birth control for these savages?
Freakonomics might be to send them more wire coat hangers...hang them on the razor ribbon.
If the worst comes to the worst send ol Deadeye back down Brownsville way. Judge Dick ' full choke' Cheney - First shotgun law west of the Pecos.

My guess: the base sees right through tonight's speechifying and it does him no good.

For once, Kevin is exactly right.

The key to this is a physical barrier -- otherwise it's 1986 all over again.

This is worse than 1986. The bill being floated by the Senate could lead to the U.S. adding some 100 million people to the population in 20 years once you calculate the rate of possible inflow increases and family reunification.

100 million new people, most of whom have sub-high-school education. If you think our social services are in trouble now, you ain't seen nothing.

millionthmonkey,

Haven't you ever heard the expression "defense in depth"? The fence isn't the only step its just the well, first line of defense. Sure some illegals will tunnel in, but its like football, just because a quarterback is sometimes sacked isn't an argument for not putting an offensive line on the field.

Interior enforcement and employer verification of work documents and requiring proper ID to wire money internationally are also necessary.

For everyone decrying deploying NG troops on the border -- do they have a better suggestion?

Er, yeah. Realign the country-by-country limits on immigration in line with demand, so that a particular nearby country from which it is the most easy to immigrate illegally isn't also one of the countries from which it is most difficult for a legally qualified immigrant to immigrate legally.

Easiest, simplest, cheapest way to cut down on illegal immigration.

I sincerely hope that Kevin is right and the Right-Wing base sees through this charade. But it depends, I suppose, on whether they're more interested in an effective policy that actually improves border security or whether they're interested in macho, chest-thumping displays of patriotism. Ever since 9/11, Bush has served up policies that feel tough rather than policies which actually make us more secure, and his base has until recently seemed to have an unlimited appetite for this swill.

If you want to secure the border, beefing up and reforming the existing agency that handles the job is the only real solution. But that will take time, and the results won't be seen for many months. A few thousand Guardsmen, sent in without any knowledge of the INS procedures, and a separate chain of command, won't be much more useful or effective than the Minutemen. But it will *look* tough.

My guess is this will be effective in calming down many of the people who are angriest about illegal immigration, because these are mostly people who care more about style than substance in politics.

KTH: One major problem with this plan is that the National Guard is supposed to be a reserve force deployed only in times of crisis. If the government keeps thinking up ways to exploit their low-wage military status (instead of, saying, hiring more Border Patrol agents), finding new recruits will be even more difficult than it already is.

in October-2005, the Army had such a hard time filling its slots that 12-percent of that month's active-duty recruits were Category IV.

Category IV recruits = applicants who score in the lowest third on the armed forces aptitude test.

For the past 20-years, that number was kept at..less than 3%

meanwhile,

"The Army spent approximately $426 million on reenlistment bonuses in fiscal year 2005 or almost 8-times more than its budgeted amount to meet its retention goals." - gao.gov

"We're ruining an Army that took us 30 years to build," said Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE).

.
who is this "we're" he's talking about?

Just returned from the post office in the county seat of my extremely (82/14) Republican area where the general discussion in the line was about the border, how Bush had screwed up everything he'd touched, and how the deployment of Nat Guard to the border was just another example of FUBAR (not their phrase). Looks like the base is getting smaller and smaller and sm......

Tough one. Somethings to remember. Central American birthrates are falling and approaching normal, we have NAFTA, we have free trade zones in Northern Mexico, and Central America deserves a special relationship. Mexico has restrictive property right for business ownership south of the free trade zone.

I would not fault any president for using troops to protect American borders.

Otherwise, my solution. Central Americans can work here on a temporary basis if they sign up for and get a bonafide work card and they renounce American citizenship for 10 years. Employers must withhold 20% of their wage payments into long term savings accounts for the workers. Workers must be born in Central America, and they should have American employer sponsers, though I would at times relax this requirement.

Now you have a much easier problem to police with respect to the employers. If they get caught cheating, they get hefty fines.
Temporary workers are motivated to rat on employers who cheat.

The 20% withholding is designed so that entitlement taxed American workers are not at a disadvantage. The differential tax rates for temporary workers and American workers will always be a problem until some fixes in the tax code are inserted. But, ultimately, the USA and Central America cannot run a partitioned economies, it just causes too many problems.

The chickens are coming home to roost for Bush. I'm thinking primarily of the federal government's disastrous finances.

It's true that some of Bush's base will never accept any type of immigration reforms that smack of liberalization (amnesty, increased legal quotas, etc) -- I refer here to the anti-immigrant, nativist yahoos. But I suspect a decent portion of Bush's base would support such measures, if they were implemented along with a massive, concerted, substantive intensification of enforcement -- a sort of grand bargain, if you will: a comprehensive liberalization that both big business and progressive immigrant rights groups can get behind combined with sharply tougher enforcement and border guarding.

But the problem for Bush is that doing the latter takes money. And there's nothing in the piggybank. The US is a pretty rich place. I estimate that spending 1/7th of 1% of economic output over the next five years would translate into $100 billion. With that kind of money we could fund an effective ICE of 200,000 agents and roll out a nationwide biometric ID program for use in the employment process. Combining these sorts of muscular enforcement efforts with a generous increase in legal immigration quotas (the Grand Gargain) would pretty much bring illegal immigration to an end.

But again, there's no money in the till. So King Georgie will give us smoke and mirrors, and further degrade the effectiveness of the National Guard in the bargain. I'm not going to lose sleep over this, as I don't find illegal immigration a very serious problem. Still, one of these days, there will be a major terrorism incident, and it will eventually come to light that the culprits snuck in through the Sonoran desert disguised as Honduran peasants.

MillionthMonkey writes, A physical barrier looks nice and makes people feel comfortable because they can't see the tunnels being dug underneath it.

I must say, your analysis is, um, shallow :-)

Tunnels are easy to deal with. Technology and manpower fix that. If your objection to a physical barrier is 'tunnels', then you have no real objection.

A physical barrier is expensive. It's also not perfect, but it doesn't need to be. If it cuts illegal immigration enough that, coupled with a simple legal immigration program the number of new illegal immigrants in our country falls dramaticallly, then you can work on the other issues with the knowledge that it won't be un-done in the near future.

We can't grant citizenship or amnesty to 12 million people if it means that another 30 million pack their bags and head our way. But we can grant citizenship/amnesty to the current illegals if our border is more secure.

The physical barrier is a key to solving the problem: first, make no more new illegals. Then help the illegals currently here, and bring into balance the need for legal immigrants and the need to enforce employer sanctions.

Without a barrier nothing changes.

We've been hearing a lot of lefty types here sneering about the 'ignorant, nativist yahoos' who want illegal immigration stopped.

Those 'ignorant, nativist yahoos' are White, Black and Hispanic 'nickel and dimed' working Americans whose wages are being driven down by competition with cheap labor illegals. Those 'ignorant, nativist yahoos' are Black males who are being practically driven out of the labor market by competition with cheap labor illegals. And Black Americans sure are steamed about it.

The class perspective of limousine lefties who want an enormous welfare underclass that will provide them with a political base isn't at all different from that of Wall Street Journal cheap labor globalists who want a pool of serf labor. Both want to be 'compassionate' at the direct expense of law abiding, tax paying working class Americans.

Those 'ignorant, nativist yahoos' are White, Black and Hispanic 'nickel and dimed' working Americans whose wages are being driven down by competition with cheap labor illegals.

There is scant evidence that immigration, illegal or not, exerts downward pressure on wages for even the least skilled American workers. And the evidence is getting scanter.

Er, yeah. Realign the country-by-country limits on immigration in line with demand, so that a particular nearby country from which it is the most easy to immigrate illegally isn't also one of the countries from which it is most difficult for a legally qualified immigrant to immigrate legally.

But then employers would have no source of illegal immigrant labor. Their costs would rise and profits would fall. Clearly that is unacceptable. So...our "leaders" will talk about border enforcement and guest worker programs that will ensure a large supply of official, yet essentially unregulated, cheap labor. No minimum wage, no OSHA, no overtime, no disability, no sick leave, no....

Of course the suggestion quoted above is the most reasonable, logical and likely to succeed (in reducing illegal immigration) option. Anyone who expects this to become part of the national debate say "aye".

(crickets)

uhh...anyone? Is anyone out there?

(crickets)

Steve,

Without a barrier nothing changes.

Would you acknowledge that the society that was most successful in eliminating illegal immigration was the Soviet Union? If so, is that really the society you want us to model our policies after?

There is scant evidence that immigration, illegal or not, exerts downward pressure on wages for even the least skilled American workers. And the evidence is getting scanter.

Tell that to the thousands of Americans who used to work good construction jobs once upon a time. Tell that to the Black workers who used to work at Tyson foods. Indeed, tell that to the inner city black males who are finding themselves practically run out of the labor market by competition with illegals. To argue that a policy of glutting the unskilled labor market with cheap labor will exert no downwards pressure on wages is to think the rules of capitalist supply and demand have somehow been repealed.

Tell me, why should the impact of illegals on low skilled workers be any different from the impact of offshoring, outsourcing, and H1B's on white collar professionals ?

Tell me, why should the impact of illegals on low skilled workers be any different from the impact of offshoring, outsourcing, and H1B's on white collar professionals ?

It's not any different. These other phenomena you cite have no little or no impact on wages, either. Wage growth is overwhelmingly a matter of productivity growth. If your view were correct, slow-growing Europe would be leaving the US in the dust when it comes to wages and living standards. Indeed, if your view were correct, wages in the US should have peaked in 1607.