Laser Guided Gatling Guns . . .

Some folks need a group of people to blame. Personally I am sure it is all the illegal immigrants to blame for most illnesses beit bodily or economically.

I blame the Russians... 😟

I'm kinda curious what would happen when the first armed private citizen shoots a boat of divers coming in from a night or early morning dive.

Giving private citizens guns and the idea they have any responsibility whatsoever to guard anything other than their own personal land and health is a bad idea.

Yea if they slowed down instead of russian around they would make less mistakes and cause less rework.

true.. true....

They should own all the Ukraine by now.... 😟

WOLVERINES!!!!!

I notice teedub and victor like to make light of our illegal immigration problem.

Here's some honest questions:

1. Do you agree we have a problem?

2. If you do agree, how would you tackle that issue if a wall is not the answer?

Landmines has been played out... you're going to have to come up with a lucid, intelligent response, or forever STFU on the issue. This is not a small problem. It is a ginormous problem and it seems to be getting worse every day.

Making fun of TML(whatever) aside, this has to be one of the top issues our country faces right now.

we need to build a wall around Tony Stewart too... 😟

Nah. Just let him drive that dirt track car around the border area... 😟

MACS, I think the problem needs to be addressed from multiple directions. Take away employment opportunities by making the penalty so large for an employer that they would never hire an illegal immigrant. Take away benefit opportunities through the federal government. No healthcare, welfare, education and so on. Create a penalty for those caught that is significant enough to make them not want to try to be here, such as never being able to become a citizen.

Also let the border patrol do their job, give them enough funding, and the appropriate weapons. Just my 2 cents.

I see this as a two part answer.

1 - Are we sure it is "one of the top issues our country faces right now"? I'm by no means an expert, but let's do some numbers. DHS says we have about 11.5MM illegal immigrants in the US. That's what... 3.5% of the US? Hell... our population on welfare is 109MM... that seems like a bigger problem. The complaints I always hear revolve around these illegal immigrants stealing any number of the following things: Jobs, Public Services, Emergency services. About the only one of those things which I see as a particular problem are Emergency Services, and that comes down to very localized problems (ie, areas with high illegal populations and low emergency resources) not really a "national" problem. As for public services? Most local public services are paid out of local taxes... illegal immigrants have to pay a lot of local taxes... sales taxes, property taxes (even if they're renting, they are contributing to the property tax of the owner). Hell, if these illegal immigrants steal a SSN, then they'll be paying state and federal taxes as well. As for jobs... well,our local workers are demanding 15$/hr for the most menial tasks... I say ship them out and import more illegals if that's the case.

2 - Even accepting that it's really a BIG BAD PROBLEM... there's nothing at the border you can do. I look at this as an issue of osmosis. You have a high concentration side and a low concentration side with a semi-permeable membrane in between. As long as there is a difference in molecular concentration, you'll get molecules crossing the membrane to try to equalize. You can make the membrane less permeable... but that just slows the inevitable. As long as there are jobs here and not there, people will try to cross. Put up a wall, they'll go under or around... you won't know because you'll be so focused on your big neat wall (the wall is itself a distraction and would likely cause as much harm through a false sense of security)... add seismic sensors and they'll go over, or they'll just get better at forging documents and go across on the road. Search every truck and you slow shipping and commerce to a grind. And they can still just go to canada and walk across.

My point is, these silly little endeavors at the southern border aren't really going to do much. And even reducing the flow by 50% likely won't impact our nation's economy in any appreciable manner. These projects ("build a wall!!!" "citizens militia!!!") are really nothing more than posturing to make our citizens think they have a solution to fix a problem that probably isn't that bad, but can easily be used to deflect from problems that may actually be bad, and may actually be the fault of non-brown skinned citizens of the US (i'm talking about politicians).

But... if you insist on doing something about illegal immigration, then gryph is closest to the mark. You stop the employers from giving them jobs, and you suddenly have reduced a lot of the pressure across the membrane. That will do more, and require less investment than anything you can do AT the border. But you're gonna have to teach americans to work or something...

MACS it's not something I could put into a short blurb in here. It is an issue and a big one.

I make fun of the knee jerk reactions which I beleive a "fence" to be. I also make fun of problem creep like the illegals are destrying our health system, our economy, our educaton system, spreading ebola, taking all of our jobs, jacking up the crime rates, threatening our national security (cue patriotic music and anothr patriot act), etc. There is a problem and it needs to be addressed. But the hysterics are hysterical and illegals are often are used as a scape goat. There is never any proof and anything suggesting otherwise is fatally flawed. On the health care issue alone I know enough to call BS. All the illegals get free health care and education didn't you know that?

It is a complicated issue and I don't pretend to have the ultimate soluiton. No one does. Not knowing how to fix something doesn't mean you can't identify things that are absurd.

Here are my general thoughts.

1. Protect the borders better. Not a wall (that won't work) and nothing is 100% fool proof but we do need to beef things up. I think it should be human and technology driven.
2. When an illegal is caught, send them home. However I am not for requesting ids randomly from all brown people just because as a white person (ie someone whom would not in reality be imnpacted by that) I have no issue with that. It will cause more harm than good. We may need to live with some amongst us for awhile. Same as the 10 guilty go free to prevent 1 innocent from jail concept.
3. Relax immigration laws. Not amnesty. If you broke or are breaking the law you go home and start from scratch if you want to come back. But the truth is our limits on immigration encourage illegals. Relax the cap numbers dramatically and make the legal path doable. That is the rub for me. We carp around about not being against mexicans, just law breakers. That is convienient. In reality there is virtually no legal path for them to come in here and we just don't want mexicans illegal or otherwise.

that doesn't do it justice I could go on much more. Until you do #3 they are illegal and need to go and be prevented from comming. But we do need to do #3 as well. And I do beleive some of the ranting is not based on fact and does border on bigoted. It is just protected by a cloak of convienience. Saying that will get me rideculed by folks in here but it is true and I am not talking about eveyone being a bigot. To claim that in either direction is a reason not to have to put real thought in to anything. tony Stewart is a racist.

I also think the problem is wayyy over stated. Yes it is a problem, yes it needs to be addressed but common' man everything is relative. I think ISIS is another over stated problem but that is another issue that I think george Will summed up pretty well.

Meh... typing quickly off the top of my head typos and all. I'd love to smoke one with you and really discuss it. It just can't be done well in here.

I will say this..... and this comes from all my years of contract negotiaitons and conflict resolution.... if both sides stay dug in it is next to possible to actually resolve anything. Sometimes the fence post is a badge of honor. If you can get folks to move off their mark a bit things can actually get resolved or at least get better. This is often lost in here.

It IS a problem. I'm not saying it's causing us to go broke, but they are a drain on an already drained system.

I, too, agree with Gryphon. It has to be approached from more angles than just putting up a wall. But to stick your head in the sand and say it's a non-issue is just plain retarded. All due respect to retards.

I work with folks that will spend $1000 dollars to save or recoup $500. Sometimes it's ok to do that out of pricipal thinking it very well may save millions if it is known certain things will not be tolerated. Sometimes it is just a waste of $1000 (or $500 however you look at it).


I have yet to see a good analysis of actual costs on the economy. i have seen a lot of garbage thrown out there by both sides. I get it it's hard to get at so it is fertile ground for the cooks and the junk economists. It's global warming ish. in some regards.

I generally can take one quick look and roll my eyes based on my expertise alone. Now I expect some expert analysis to be posted here by the experst LOL.

Sorry, but that's complete bullshizzle. My wife immigrated here, legally, from an Island nation halfway around the world. How is it more difficult for a Mexican to do it?

Pardon me while I blow the bullsh!t horn... (*sound of a ship's whistle blowing buuuuuuuullll shiiiiiiiiiiiiit*)

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/01/24/in-2014-latinos-will-surpass-whites-as-largest-racialethnic-group-in-california/ 

For your reading enjoyment... whitey is already the minority in CA.

Have you looked at the quota numbers per country? Maybe you should unblow the horn.

Compare the number of slots verses the number of people that would love to fill those slots. Proximity alone drives some of that.

It's a given and the other states are on their way too. I'll read it later but I doubt it has any real dollar amounts tied to the illegal problem.

And the brown movement scares the **** out of whitey. We are lucky. We married in (I realize your wife isn't hispanic but the minority thing will still help you stay out of the worst camps).

I'm always curious about this.

Why is being a minority a problem?

I ask this seriously... because no one seems to think minorities have any problems in society when whites aren't the minority... so if whites become the minority, that won't be a problem either, right?