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<p>Some laws exist for justice. </p>
<p>This is where you apply, uncompromising deontological ethics.</p>
<p>Some laws exist for social utility.</p>
<p>Apply consequentialist, less hardliner ethics here. (Ends justify the means.)</p>
<p>Ok, you’ve said deontological how many times? Well I look at the consequences of an immigration policy that lets everyone in and rewards those that come in illegally and its not pretty. You can use 8bit words all you want – it doesnt make you better, or even more educated.</p>
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<p>Wth? </p>
<p>The split between deontological v. consequentialist ethics is a very fundamental and basic divide in legal and policy arguments. The issue’s popularity in forensics and debate almost rivals the use of the Categorical Imperative in rounds. </p>
<p>It’s like asking a chemist not to use the word “aromatic”.</p>
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<p>See, this is a disputed point. </p>
<p>Before, you analysed it from the point of duty.</p>
<p>Firstly, you keep on mentioning the “costs” of immigration but you NEVER RESPOND to the points of the payoff. Investment, so to speak. Your faction fails to respond to this point.</p>
<p>Secondly, if the consequence of rewarding those migrants who proved themselves productive means that more migrants become more productive, hardworking and self-improving honors students and star workers, then so be it. A good consequence.</p>
<p>The only thing that should not be offered of course is unemployment benefits or welfare for illegal aliens.</p>
<p>This is how it should work: you enter the country sort of “on probation” – you have to prove yourself. You may be deported at any time. You get a measure of access to preventive healthcare (prevention is much cheaper than cure!), etc. but cannot receive most forms of welfare (except financial aid, etc. for self-improving vocations or college admissions). But, should you prove yourself to be loyal, trustworthy and productive, you should not be deported (or you move on to the next stage). </p>
<p>Admission to this country should be staged. To even get to the probationary period, there should be a quick routine check for (international) criminal background, health concerns, etc. and maybe a preliminary test to study for (with study materials). Something that would take less than a month if not one or two weeks to complete.</p>
<p>Then to get past the probationary period, you’ll take a second battery of tests. Between each stage, there is a filter, that comes with increasing amount of rights and/or privileges. Final Naturalization (or even just PR) is the big one.</p>
<p>It’s the pragmatic way, and this girl would have probably been past all those stages long ago.</p>
<p>Galosien, those are some very interesting ideas you have there. I would definitely be open to some of them. I’m impressed (and hadn’t realized) that you’re serious about the responsibilities of the state and the immigrant. It seems that you are also an advocate of responsible immigration policies.</p>
<p>Galo, go back and read my earlier posts, I have constantly looked at the consequences of letting anyone in – if there werent such awful consequences, I wouldnt care as much – if at all. As to measuring costs v. benefits – I don’t see you trying to do that. Your proposal would appear to let anyone who wants in – I’m not for it.</p>
<p>Dear Seat:</p>
<p>I hope that you are enjoying your university experience. I really appreciate your input. It is unfortunate that so many people view a country based on so little information. It is as though the United States could be defined by New York city OR Applachia. If we were to define the United States by way of Applachia we would be viewed simply as a socially, economically and educationally deprived country.</p>
<p>Mousegrey: Ok, you didn’t get my post. I may have been obscure. But, most blue collar workers do not make $20 per hour. Nor do many Americans (legal) receive health insurance or paid vacations. My housekeepers do. While being a housekeeper may not be a career goal it is a way (if one is legal) into mainstream America. Remember that many Irish, Italian, Asians, Jewish immigrants worked as domestics or in sweatshops to gain their foothold. Their children had the opportunity to succeed as did they. As I said, my housekeeper’s son is attending UCLA. Legally. He has a full scholarship because he is a citizen, he has financial need, and qualified academically.</p>
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<p>Why thank you zoosermom. :)</p>
<p>I don’t know why you didn’t think I was serious before 
– immigration is a passion of mine.</p>
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If you read your posts as they are, without making any assumptions or leaps, it seems as if you are advocating unrestricted immigration. I’m glad that you clarified. We aren’t as far apart as might have previously appeared.</p>
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<p>I’m not sure if you actually read people’s posts. </p>
<p>You say you constantly look at the “consequences” of letting “anyone” in. I actually haven’t you seen you do that. What you do is use a fallacy known to debaters as “misleading vividness”. It’s not quantitative and it’s based mostly on fearmongering. You do not do a real cost-benefit approach.</p>
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<p>then respond to my specific arguments. Attack my points. Please do not dismiss entire arguments with one liners. Why won’t my proposed reform work?</p>
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<p>Actually it imposes a filter. Our first concern is to prevent epidemics and criminals from coming in, so we have some very quick filters to take care of a large proportion of those issues. The next concern is hardworkingness and productivity. Another filter. Our third concern is loyalty to the country. Another filter. Another might be cultural familiarity. Another filter. Green card status might be another filter, before citizenship.</p>
<p>At the same time, you have the payoffs. Responsible, hardworking, self-improving immigrants. Why should a country refuse? With such a framework, why should a country refuse admissions to this girl?</p>
<p>You play on fear by suggesting “anyone” but in fact admissions would be selective. I’m sorry it’s not as selective as the Ivy League schools, but the idea generally is that those migrants proven to be useful and loyal would be given longer-term admission and a greater set of rights and privileges, on the road leading to citizenship.</p>
<p>Citizenship is a long road – really, it’s kinda illogical to have so few proving grounds in between. Establish a gradual road with a smaller slope, and you won’t have such backlog issues. Lastly, outsource some of the work to a private and reputable company with public accountability. I seriously don’t know what kind of incentives the folks at Immigration have to speed up their work, but their inefficiency is hurting the country.</p>
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<p>Maybe it’s the philosophy. I do support open immigration in spirit. To me, a country should grant admission to mostly everyone, with exceptions. These exceptions are based on concerns of security, productivity, loyalty, etc. So therefore, I propose that we establish some filters along the way.</p>
<p>The goal is not to treat immigration like a “privilege”, because IMO immigration is one of the forces of the international economy that helps connect a supply source to a demand source, and because in my eyes, those who are American would be <em>anyone</em> who would be 1) productive 2) loyal to democracy 3) non-criminal 4) culturally familiar, and so forth. (List not exhaustive.) That is, we should be proud, and we should want, to call anyone who would fulfill such a set of characteristic “fellow American”, especially if they have proven themselves valuable to the country.</p>
<p>OK – some consequences – </p>
<p>Non-citizens are putting the hurt on our hospitals. A study by the Florida Hospital Association estimates that uninsured non-citizens cost the state’s hospitals an average of $63,612 per patient last year.
The tab is rising as the number of immigrants continues to swell from coast to coast. The American Hospital Association reported that its member facilities provided $21 billion in uncompensated health-care services last year.
While not all those costs can be attributed to undocumented aliens, new Census data show that non-citizens are, by far, this country’s largest group of uninsured residents — 43 percent of the total. </p>
<p>Crime
One fourth of the federal prison population is foreign-born, and the INS must deport over 30,000 criminal aliens every year. (INS statistic; agreed not everyone illegal) </p>
<p>Schools
By 2002, the school population will grow from 49 million to 55 million—because of immigration.11 Without school-age immigrants (about 250,000 a year) and the children of immigrants (about 725,000 a year), school enrollment would not be rising at all.12 The estimated cost to the American taxpayer for the education of immigrants’ children is over $30 billion a year.13 </p>
<p>Skill Levels
The median education level for adult immigrants is less than a ninth grade education. And the gap between native education level and immigrant education levels has quadrupled in the last twenty-five
years14</p>
<p>Sources - 11. The National Center for Educational
Statistics.
12. The Center for Immigration
Studies.
13. The Net Costs of Immigration:
The Facts, The Trends, and
The Critics, Donald Huddle, October
22,1996.
14. U.S. Department of Education.</p>
<p>And btw, I can’t buy ocean front land in Mexico (which is entirely their right to make and enforce laws) – but they should be able to come here and have same rights as me???</p>
<p>You appear in favour of restricting immigration in general, even beneficial immigration. That’s where I must strongly disagree with your xenophobia.</p>
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<p>Until you isolate the undocumented migrants from the documented migrants, this statistic is irrelevant. I am a non-citizen too, and I have been in the low-income boat before (and still somewhat am.)</p>
<p>Oh wait, I guess you’re anti-immigration in general.</p>
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<p>Wow, what a misleading statistic. You make it sound like one fourth of migrants end up in prison, which is not the case. Criminals then make up a small minority of migrants – and I must question, how many of those are for victimless crimes?</p>
<p>Why not establish a preliminary filter for probation-based migration. This would open up the route of access for all non-criminal migrants, who would be more willing to rat on the criminal migrants who couldn’t get through those filters. Basically, allow productive migrants to dominate over the criminal ones. In general, a lot of migrants turn a blind eye to their more roguish fellow migrants (not report them) – because it would hurt their own interests to rat them out (avenues revealed, communities compromised, they would be asked how they know, etc.). Now, if you categorised them differently under the law…</p>
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<p>And expansion of the number of schoolchildren is bad because…?</p>
<p>I’m incredibly offended that you cite this statistic as evidence. I am a school-aged migrant (and a child of an immigrant). I’m sorry that you see me as an unnecessary burden on the state. Maybe you’d prefer that I drop out of college? You’d probably like to pull my sister too, and 1/3 of my friends.</p>
<p>Okay, here’s my address</p>
<p>1815 JPA
Charlottesville VA</p>
<p>If you want to take action, call up your Congressman and have him expel me.</p>
<p>I also suggest you call him up and ask him to impose legal regulation on the number of children Americans produce. </p>
<p>That way, the number of schoolchildren enrolled in school will DECLINE, thereby saving taxpayer money.</p>
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<p>What about the median education level for American citizens? Count all the senior citizens who dropped out of HS; count all the GIs who never continued their education; count all the schoolchildren in the 1940s and 1950s who never went to high school (they’re now adults) but worked in coal mines instead.</p>
<p>Oh did I mention all those older immigrants and refugees from WWII who never went to school.</p>
<p>What about the median education level for migrant schoolchildren, aged 15?
Please contrast this with the median education level for citizen schoolchildren, aged 15. </p>
<p>The migrant schoolchildren would probably face a slight penalty, but much less severe than what you suggest and would improve with less social stigma.</p>
<p>Adults in general, are harder to educate. Would you be willing to go back to school? Imagine being aged 45 and trying to be enrolled in a high school. You’d have to be enrolled in a GED program, that’ you’d have to pay for.</p>
<p>So please, cite more misleading statistics.</p>
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<p>You also can’t buy ocean front land in North Korea.</p>
<p>Clearly this is sufficient justification to prevent any North Korean refugee (who would manage to escape his country) from migrating here. I mean, eye for an eye is such an effective policy, never mind that there is a disjunction between a national State and its people.</p>
<p>I even have a better suggestion: we should just carpet bomb them all.</p>
<p>Galosien, what is your view of the cost of uneducated and, arguably, uneducable immigrants? What is your view of the responsibility owed to them by their own countries/governments?</p>
<p>Where do the better adult education programmes lie? And how productive can they be? And do they have children?</p>
<p>Firstly, I think society in general stigmatises adult education, even “lifelong education” for people with degrees. Having to go to school at age 45 is seen as a shameful thing. That is one of the first things that must be fought. </p>
<p>There is also less generous funding for adult education, despite its dividends.</p>
<p>If they are truly uneducable and pose productivity issues, and they do not have children or their children are not doing well in school, then they (along with any children) can be deported. How much have we tried educating them though? </p>
<p>You can also have employers and teachers write recommendations – a sort of “performance review”.</p>
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<p>In a country plagued with political corruption and nepotism, would citizens feel that their own government is “their own”? Short of organising a revolution, how are they supposed to act?</p>
<p>Well, for an update, Maria has taken the fight to Capitol Hill. She met with Rep. Goodlatte and Senators Webb and Warner. </p>
<p>Friday, the New York Times will be sending a reporter and photographer down here to interview her to run a story. Hundreds of people have written to letters to Webb, Warner and Goodlatte to try and save her.</p>
<p>Her teachers have also set up a fund to help pay for a decent immigration attorney, as those don’t run cheap.</p>
<p>And while the article I’m referring to ([The</a> Daily News Record: Top News](<a href=“http://dnronline.com/news_details.php?AID=38787&CHID=1]The”>http://dnronline.com/news_details.php?AID=38787&CHID=1)) does not mention it, rumor has it CNN is also going to be visiting to run a story.</p>