What U.S. Immigration and Customs Service?

I thought I'd give the gang here a look at the front page headline of todays Houston Chronicle:

"Work nearly grinds to halt
as immigrant-raid rumors circulate"

www.chron.com...

Here are the first four paragraphs of the article:

By EDWARD HEGSTROM
Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle

Most days, teams of Latino immigrant workers swarm over the townhouses under construction near Gulfgate, filling the air with the buzz of power tools and orders shouted in Spanish.

But the site was nearly silent Thursday. Instead of dozens of workers, there was just a handful, mostly Anglo contractors.

Like dozens of work sites across greater Houston, construction at the Gulfgate site was nearly brought to a standstill because the immigrant workers had fled, likely after hearing rumors of government immigration raids.

"The crews have just scattered, sometimes leaving their tools at the site," said Allen Griffiths, a plumbing contractor who busied himself talking on a two-way radio Thursday. "It's just brought construction to a halt."

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The immigration policy in the U.S. has gotton out of hand so bad that American citizens can't even work construction jobs anymore here in Houston.

Houston contractors only like to hire Spanish speakers. Most construction here is done by illegal aliens. If you can't speak Spanish they dont want to hire you even if you're willing to work at minimum wage with no benifits because you wont be able to communicate with the rest of the crew creating a problem of safety in the work enviroment, so the contractors turn you away most of the time in favor of hiring an immigrant worker in your place.

Here is another paragraph from the article that shows how easy it is to settle in this country illegally:

"Many of the estimated 8 million illegal immigrants in the country have lived here for years, and some have children who are U.S. citizens. Even without legal documents, some workers have been able to settle down, buying furniture on credit or even homes, Reyes noted."

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So in closing I leave you with this. If you are in this country illegally you can come to Houston, get a job, buy a house and a car, get a credit card, bank account using your Mexican National I.D. Card, or anything else you want including free health care at the County clinic with your Harris County Department of Health Gold Card. Just come over here and join the other 8 million 'known' illegals in this country. You dont have to worry about immigration catching you. As the article says:


"The government has not mounted general workplace immigration raids for years in the Houston area, Aquino-Deason said. Raids occurred at two local Wal-Mart stores last year and at Bush Intercontinental Airport in 2002. But both of those operations were tied to specific national investigations, and they resulted in the deportation of fewer than 100 people locally."

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BTW, what's to stop anyone from coming to this country illegally accross the southern border with Mexico? The answer is nothing. The border is still wide open. All this stuff about border crackdowns since 9/11 are nothing more than a smoke screen in my opinion. Just ask anyone of the 8 million known illegals that are here now.

I'm off to work now so I just wanted to let you know that things are bad when construction in a city of millions grinds to a hault because of a possible INS threat.

BTW, what's to stop anyone from coming to this country illegally accross the southern border with Mexico? The answer is nothing. The border is still wide open. All this stuff about border crackdowns since 9/11 are nothing more than a smoke screen in my opinion. Just ask anyone of the 8 million known illegals that are here now.

i agree but you have to understand the crackdown does exist it is just selective. Bush's and his administration policies on immigration are simply ridiculous. Bush is welcoming the Mexicans with open arms..His brother wants to give illegals driver licenses in florida.
And then they will act all shocked when someone (possibly a terrorist) cross the border, get a license and commit a crime.

It's shameful.

There really isn't anything more that need be said.

Shameful.

I know for a fact that the Canadian border has become very hard to cross. How do I know? Well I read articles about marijuana smugglers being burned and know one or two who have to travel via Hawaii to get into the country.

The border clampdown is not about terrorism. It's about protecting the domestic drug operations from foreign competition. The United States is the largest producer of marijuana in the world as a result of this reason.

*EDIT: If it were up to me people would be able to come and go across borders as they pleased.

Originally posted by insite
*EDIT: If it were up to me people would be able to come and go across borders as they pleased.

Please tell me you are not serious!!!! Would you let anyone...I mean just anyone....walk into your house?

Open door policy is fine only if you have all the other checks and balances in place and truly have a handle on the status of immigrants trying to cross the border and followup procedures for when they overstay their time. This country is no where near the stage where an open door policy would be feasible...to think so is absolutely foolish.

Originally posted by worldwatcher
Open door policy is fine only if you have all the other checks and balances in place and truly have a handle on the status of immigrants trying to cross the border and followup procedures for when they overstay their time. This country is no where near the stage where an open door policy would be feasible...to think so is absolutely foolish.

I may seem foolish to you, but there are serious benefits from an economic standpoint. No one would overstay their time if they were allowed to be there anyway. Give me some reasons why open immigration is a bad idea without being vague like "we need checks and balances" and I'll try to do my best to refute them. To call me a fool because I'm a proponent of an open border policy is pretty arrogant on your part.

I've been waiting for fecking months to get a work permit and I'm fecking well legal !

Originally posted by insite
I may seem foolish to you, but there are serious benefits from an economic standpoint. No one would overstay their time if they were allowed to be there anyway. Give me some reasons why open immigration is a bad idea without being vague like "we need checks and balances" and I'll try to do my best to refute them. To call me a fool because I'm a proponent of an open border policy is pretty arrogant on your part.

calm down, I didn't call you a fool....I called the idea of an open door policy foolish....unless you are the inventor of the concept..then you shouldn't take it personally.

In order for an open door policy to work, the U.S. Immigration service needs to be up to date with the thousands of pending immigrations currently tied up in the system. The ability to check the background of all visitors needs to be coordinated with the govt of the country of origin....(currently this process takes months and is not anywhere near effective...criminals and felons do enter this country...i personally feel they should not be allowed to do unless they are going to be tried and jailed here) there is much more I could say about the system itself, but i'm too out there right now to fully use my brain.

what do you mean no one would overstay their time if they were allowed to be here???? they are allowed to be here, that is how they get the option to overstay their time.

There are many more issues to discuss on this, but like i said, not now...i'll get back to you when i am fully functioning.

Yeah, lol I called your response vague and mine was about as clear as mud, sorry 'bout that.

Anyway, this may seem crazy to you, but if I were in control the immigration department would be completely disbanded. America is full of criminals and felons and what someone had done prior to their transit should legally have no implications on their ability to cross the border, legally. Morally is another story, just us discussing this illustrates different points of view. If someone commits a crime within' the U.S., then obviously law enforcement would need to be utilized. But what does it matter if someone had committed a crime previously? That socail idea requires one to not believe in retribution and rehabilitation. If this is the case then the problem lies with the foreign prison system, not immigration.

Economically, the labor supply would be enormous. This might pose problems with inflation but if you believe in money illusion then you will know that people will be working for less while corporations gain. Those who were educated in America will seek higher positions in order to avoid competing with the unskilled immigrant labor. "Native" American families will be better off. Soon the families of immigrants will be seeking higher positions because there are so many people to compete with at the lower tier and we can all get this money together! (This is a basic, one sided argument that ignores obvious problems, but it's on you to prove me wrong).

If there were no time limits on how long a person could stay in America then it's impossible for them to overstay their time, that's what I meant. Sorry for the confusion.

Yes there are plenty more issues to discuss, but I'm feeling lazy so I'm going to give up. You did actually call me a fool, but I don't care:

Originally posted by worldwatcher
This country is no where near the stage where an open door policy would be feasible...to think so is absolutely foolish

I think it's feasible.

*EDIT: Yeah it really takes no time at all to immigrate. You fill out the forms, papers get filed. Everything is gravy, I've done it thrice. It was a pain in the ass getting the cat in, but that was the only problem. Bureaucratic BS would be eliminated in my utopian immigration system and it would be up to the employer of the alien to fill out the important visa information.

lol...alrite my bad....my apologies.
let's agree to come back to this at another time

Yeah for sure worldwatcher. Maybe not though, we'll see when the time comes, heh.