You may recall that President Bush used the word “temporary” six times in his immigration speech last Monday to describe the “temporary worker program” [a.k.a., "guest worker program"] he advocates. In fact, he said,

“And temporary workers must return to their home country at the conclusion of their stay.”

Yet, the Hagel-Martinez “Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act” being debated in the Senate makes it extremely easy for the 200,000 low-skilled “temporary” workers who would arrive annually to win permanent legal residency, as Sen. Jeff Sessions pointed out recently.

Assuming that Mr. Bush was a man of his word and that his word was “temporary,”

“Sens. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) and Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) tried to amend the bill to stipulate that the 200,000 low-skilled immigrants allowed to enter the country [annually] under a new temporary-worker visa would have to leave when the visa expired”

as Jonathan Weisman and Jim VandeHei wrote in “Debate on How to Reshape Law Has Divided Republicans” in the Washington Post on Sunday, May 21.

On Thursday night,

“With Bush and his top political aides in Arizona, conservative Republican aides persuaded lower-level White House staff members to back the amendment, reasoning that Bush has always said he backs a ‘temporary worker program,’ not a permanent funnel of immigrants to the United States.

“‘It was a matter of truth in advertising,’ Cornyn said.”

Silly Senator Cornryn! Silly lower-level White House staff members! Trusting the President to tell the truth!

“When word reached the backers of the compromise, they were furious, according to a senior Republican Senate aide involved in the events. Immigrant groups such as the National Council of La Raza and the National Immigration Forum had said they would withdraw their support for the Senate bill if the amendment passed.”

La Raza ["The Race"] has spoken and the Republican Party must obey!

“Finally, after nightfall, first [Sen. Chuck] Hagel [R-NE], then [Sen. Lindsey O.] Graham [R-SC] and [Sen. Mel] Martinez [R-FL] reached [White House chief of staff] Bolten from the road, telling him passage of the amendment would destroy the coalition and scuttle the legislation. They pleaded with him to call off the White House lobbyists.

“After 8 p.m., a succession of conservatives went to the Senate floor to declare Bush’s support for their amendment to ensure that temporary work visas really would be temporary.

“Then Hagel walked onto the floor, announcing that he and his allies had just gotten off the phone with the White House chief of staff, who had assured them that Bush opposed the amendment.”

Hagel then denounced conservatives for daring to assume that President Bush meant what he said and that Hagel’s bill was not intended to be the giant fraud on the American citizenry that it actually is:

“‘The American people have a very low opinion of you, of me, of the Congress, of the president. Read the latest polls,” Hagel thundered. “Why are the American people upset with us? Because we are not doing our job.’”

Indeed.

Hagel furiously ranted onward:

“We talk about, ‘Let’s run to the base. Let’s run to the political lowest common denominator.’”

So, Sen. Hagel’s view, the “base” of the Republican Party is synonymous with “the political lowest common denominator? “

“That is not governing. That is cheap, transparent politics.”

I presume from this that Sen. Hagel’s stance on immigration didn’t come “cheap.”

And “transparent” is the last word for the immigration bill backed by Hagel and Bush. Instead, it has been designed to pull the wool over the public’s eyes.

Also, see Mickey Kaus in Slate on this:

Bush Lies, Base Dies!

Common Ground recently published an article from the Rockridge Institute that openly acknowledged the split among progressives on the immigration issue.

Most of the framing initiative has been taken by conservatives. Progressives have so far abstained.
Progressives could well frame the situation as the Cheap Labor Issue or the Cheap Lifestyle Issue. Most corporations use the common economic metaphor of labor as a resource. There are two kinds of employees — the Assets (creative people and managers) and Resources (who are relatively unskilled, fungible, interchangeable). The American economy is structured to drive down the cost of resources - that is, the wages of low-skilled, replaceable workers.

Immigration increases the supply of such workers and helps to drive down wages. Cheap labor increases “productivity” and profits for employers, and it permits a cheap lifestyle for consumers who get low prices because of cheap labor. But these are not seen as “problems.” They are benefits. And people take these benefits for granted. They are not grateful to the immigrants who make them possible. Gratitude. The word is hardly ever spoken in the discourse over immigration.

My comment to the above: most folks claiming immigration increases productivity, don’t understand the meaning of productivity. Productivity is related to output per unit-not costs or profits. In fact, nations with low immigration like Japan are having the highest rates of recent productivity increases in terms of output per worker.

What these folks were also missing: there has been real decline in disposable income among American workers since immigration policy has loosened in America. The article also failed to show the connection between concentration of wealth and loose immigration.

The Rockridge Institute characterizes the policies of Progressives on immigration as:

Progressives

Progressivism Begins at Home: The immigrants are taking the jobs of American works and we have to protect our workers.

African-American Protectionists: Hispanic immigrants are threatening African-American jobs.

Provide a path to citizenship: The immigrants have earned citizenship with their hard work, their devotion to American values, and their contribution to our society.

Foreign Policy Reformers: We need to pay attention to the causes that drive others from their homelands.

Wage supports: Institute a serious earned income tax credit for Americans doing otherwise low-paying jobs, so that more Americans will want to do them and fewer immigrants will be drawn here.

Illegal Employers: The way to protect American workers and slow immigration of unskilled workers is to prosecute employers of unskilled workers.

We can see why this is such a complex problem and why there are so splits within both the conservative and progressive ranks.

Again, what these folks are missing is the possibility for the US to return to a high wage, high productivity economy with greatly expanded social services. Unfortunately, it seems like these progressives are failing to even set their sights high-and to acknowledge that by really standing apart from global norms of oppression of workers, the US will have to have strong border protection.

Yesterday, I attended Colorado’s statewide Republican Convention, run by Party Chair and Raza Republicano Bob Martinez–who should resign over this unmitigated disaster. Martinez drew national attention last year when he demanded Congressmen like Tom Tancredo halt their “demagoguery” on the immigration issue.

“Ninety-nine percent of the Mexicans that cross that border are not coming across the border with the intent to kill anyone,” mind-reader Martinez claimed, adding, “I’m defending the president’s position. That’s all I’m doing.”

Defending the indefensible, some would say.

Gov. Bill “Open Borders” Owens, impotent on the illegal invasion, was on hand as his chosen successor, Congressmen Bob Beauprez and challenger Marc Holtzman faced off, focusing (!) on immigration policies they would institute as Governor. (The name “Bush” was notably missing from the podium.) Delegates then began what became an hours-long wait to get ballots. (Martinez later blamed Holtzman, the stronger candidate on immigration control policies, for the snafu to certify delegates prior to the vote–even though all had shown photo ID to register that morning. (Today’s newspapers report Holtzman secured 28% of the delegate vote, just 2% short of votes needed for a Beauprez/Holtzman primary.) In a pot-calls-kettle-black move, Martinez says he may ask Holtzman to step aside rather than gather Citizen signatures, another option to force a primary run-off. [ Beauprez seizes GOP By Karen E. Crummy and Chris Frates Denver Post May 21, 2006]

As the wait for ballots stretched into the lunch hour, 2,000+ delegates discovered that (English-speaking, for a change) food service workers had failed to replenish hot dog grills. Hungry, huddled masses chose between nasty-looking nachos or icy, cold “hot” dogs served by gloved workers handling money, food, and their hair with no concern for sanitation. Heading out to my car for uncontaminated foodstuffs, I saw scores of angry, still undocumented, delegates bailing out of this sinking ship without being able to vote. After lunch, I headed to the ladies room to wash my grimy hands, and found soap in only one dispenser The Third World has come to Colorado!

At 2 pm, Martinez managed to change his idiotic rules, finally permitting Candidate ballots to be distributed along with what were to be separate Resolution ballots. An hour later, I got my voting package, minus text for the Resolutions. I finally found a delegate with a copy of the Resolutions, and cast an informed ballot. Shuffling along with hundreds of tired, poor, delegates, yearning to be free of this mess, I found my car–now much closer to the gates thanks to rightfully disgruntled delegates who had left earlier without being able to vote.

As delegates’ cars crawled towards the freeway, ambulances coming from the direction of the Arena screamed past. I can only guess that Bob Martinez and his cohorts were beng rushed to local hospitals to check for brain activity. Is this Party over?

In a rare praising of George Bush by faint damnation Robert Scheer at Common Dreams opines:

“In fact, the best way to stem the flow of cheap immigrant labor is to substantially increase the minimum wage requirement to a living wage, and to deploy sufficient U.S. Labor Department inspectors to enforce it. At the very least, existing laws protecting workers must not continue to be ignored — but Bush’s speech contained no reference to enforcing the wage, working conditions, and occupational safety laws on the books that might make those jobs more attractive to workers here legally.”

Does this matter? There are billions of people living in countries poorer than the US. Do you really think that it isn’t plausible that every single american worker could be replaced by a foreign worker that is brighter, more skilled, more compliant-not to mention better looking and more charming. Lack of English skills among those foreign workers is a problem for many existing employers-but it becomes less of a barrier as entire companies develop crews proficient in Spanish, Chinese or other languages.

I strongly support enforcing-and expanding- all labor regulations around use of illegal alien labor. However, simply raising the US minimum wage will more likely exclude some immigrant groups-and attract others. Dramatic expansion of the EITC remains a better means of income support-and one which can plausibly be restricted only to US citizens.

“What is needed is a free market for labor in which workers with clearly defined and protected rights bargain for full payment for their worth. If the working conditions and pay rise to the level that they become attractive to workers here legally, then the market for undocumented workers will dry up and border controls can function relatively efficiently.”

The problem is we’ve already seen what guest worker programs have done to US technical workers. The draw of a US green card is so enormous that it attracts the “best and brightest” from throughout the world. This meant that US tech workers were(and are) competing against Indians with extraordinary business skills utterly willing to cater to American management-and the result is displacement of hundreds of thousands of US tech workers. Normalization of status and free markets in labor are no real protection for US workers.

American workers deserve progressives that steadfastly stand up for their interests. Until that happens, the Left in America will fail to obtain broad support among working people.

The UK Guardian reports that:

a chief immigration officer at Lunar House in Croydon, south London, targeted an 18-year-old Zimbabwean rape victim over a two-week period in which he offered to help her with her application to claim asylum in the UK and made it clear that he would like to have sex with her.

The issue of refugees is a global problem. No one country-or even all developed countries can solve this problem by simply opening their borders more. The world has developed in a direction that means relatively few countries really place a value on having additional people.

I would suggest we need stable, regional refugee centers throughout the globe. However, humanity also needs to expand its technologically practical resource base by opening new frontiers. It is that kind of development that will mean many of todays refugees become truly valued workers.

A relationship based on the dependence of a less competent party on a more capable one rarely makes the dependent person appreciative, only resentful. So it is with Mexicans and the United States.

Such disagreeable aspects to human psychology don’t always reach exalted academics in the ivory tower, who are free to live in a world of unlimited possibility [Give and take across the border: 1 in 7 Mexican workers migrates, SF Chronicle, May 21, 2006].

“We want Mexico to look like Canada,” said Stephen Haber, director of Stanford University’s Social Science History Institute and a Latin America specialist at the Hoover Institution. “That’s the optimal for the United States. We never talk about instability in Canada. We’re never concerned about a Canadian security problem. [...] That’s the optimal for Mexico: a wealthy and stable country.”

What isn’t wanted, Haber said, “is an unstable country on your border, especially an unstable country that hates you.”

Depite Mr. Haber’s hopeful fantasies, that’s exactly what we have, a failing state where half of Mexicans believe the country is near chaos. Furthermore, a largely ignored March Zogby poll showed that Mexicans do indeed hate Americans.

President Vladimir Putin of Russia recently

ordered parliament to more than double monthly child support payments to 1,500 rubles (about $55) and added that women who choose to have a second baby will receive 250,000 rubles ($9,200), a staggering sum in a country where average monthly incomes hover close to $330.

This action is being taken in the midst of a significant demographic transition in Russia similar to what we’ve seen in the West.

Some say that Russia must open its doors to immigrants, as many Western countries have done. But Putin insists that only ethnic Russians - about 25 million remain stranded in former Soviet countries - will be eligible for easy entry. Polls show large majorities remain hostile to the idea of mass immigration of non-Slavs.

Now, I suspect Russia will need to be significantly more generous in its payments to families to make a real difference(and will need to persist in these policies for some time). If it continues in this trend we may see a real test case comparing different solutions to demographic changes. What will it mean if conditions in the US continue to deteriorate for American workers(as they have the last 30 years)–and another large country with fewer resources manages to produce substantial improvements for its people?