C. Cox reflected:
And without exception probably every single undocumented migrant to the u.s. has tried to get documented. Not asking is the same as asking if you know 50 people exactly like you who have been refused. In studies of unemployment they have the category of "discouraged workers." You are talking for the most part about a categoy of "discouraged migrants." They know (accurately) that there is no damn way they are going to get a visa. They know (accurately) that working in the u.s. is their best, perhaps only, way to escape a desperate situation. Do you really think that those millions of people flocking around the world (not just into the u.s.) wouldn't choose such a superior way if it were open to them. It isn't as though U.S. embassys had big neon signs saying Come One Come All Get Your Documentation here! I think your advice is simple cruelty.
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I think leaving people to die in the desert or at sea is cruel. Further, if you'd read what I wrote in the first place, you'd know that I don't claim that the left is control of the government : it's the capitalists' politicians who guide State policy. Immigration policy in the U.S. is a bit different now from what it was in say, 1900, when most immigrants were legal--Ellis Island and all that. So, what I'm saying is that immigration policy (brain and brawn draining), even from the point of view of the employing class could be different because it *has* been different before. Remember, back in Woody Guthrie's day a large proportion of the workers in the fields of California were citizens...and they began talking union. Of course, the employing class didn't like that. Then, after WWII, there was that "Bracero" program--sort of like the later "guest worker" program in Germany. Those were legal trickeries to get the needed labour into the country and then export it when finished--disposible workers. Plus, no unions!
What I'm saying is that the way immigration policy runs now, with semi-porous borders and virtually no serious criminal sanctions on the employing class, that this situation leaves the working class divided against itself by ethnic tension and a market competition mentality of, "race you to the bottom." What I'm saying is that this policy is in the interests of the employing class and that the employing class controls the State, not me or the "mythical" left. What I'm saying is that if punitive measures are to be taken, why not suggest taking them against the employing class instead of the workers as is done now with Border Patrols, fences, detention, vigilante squads and death in the desert or high seas. What I'm saying is that neither the working class in Mexico or the working class in the U.S. are beyond nationalism yet--that this "tradition still weighs like an alp" on them at this point in history, so deal with it.
Kind regards, Mike B)
Read "The Perthian Brickburner": http://profiles.yahoo.com/swillsqueal
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