South of the Border Politics

Terraformer · 2019-04-15 05:48:43

Couldn't these people be put to work in the fields harvesting the crops that are rotting?

According to the 13th amendment, we can only do that once we've convicted them of a crime.

tahanson43206 · 2019-04-15 07:52:07

For Terraformer #251 ...

Thank you for inspiring me to go back and look at the 13th Amendment.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirteent … nstitution

The letter writer quoted by SpaceNut probably was thinking of offering payment for work in the fields, but I admit your assumption of the worst of human nature is an option.

The weight of history hangs heavy over the countries from which folks are fleeing, whether from South America, Africa or parts of Asia.

It's not a surprise (to me at least) that Russia and China are probing for opportunities to extend their influence in South America. The United States has (in the past) done the same, but in recent years the capitalist system has been doing the heavy lifting.

I'm not discounting military adventures by the United States, but (it seems to me) that the capitalist system would total up to a greater share of the overall global investment.

For Venezuela in particular, my guess is that a return to the capitalist system (with appropriate supervision to prevent the worst of human nature), would be the best solution for the population as a whole.

Following up ... Venezuela still has a significant natural wealth. The issue at hand, both now and in the past, has been how to distribute that wealth to the benefit of the population as a whole. Capitalism developed the oil, but excesses led to a surge of Socialism under Chavez. The incompetence of Socialism is manifest in Venezuela as it has been elsewhere. Alaska provides an example of a capitalist culture able and willing to distribute the proceeds of natural resources to the benefit of all, while stimulating capitalist small enterprise. Alaska provides a stipend (not large but not negligible) to every citizen, from proceeds of oil recovery.

A similar system might work in Venezuela, where the standard of living is lower, but again, it would require appropriate supervision, and that capability appears (to me at least) to be absent there.

(th)

Last edited by tahanson43206 (2019-04-15 08:13:54)

Terraformer · 2019-04-16 04:25:55

Actually, we could do it without violating the 13th. It's only slavery if they don't have an option to leave. Give them room and board in exchange for their labour, and if they get sick of it, they are welcome to go home.

elderflower · 2019-04-16 05:17:30

By doing this you risk creating a large and very disgruntled underclass of people. Their frustration will eventually be highly disruptive. People arriving in developed countries must be granted rights similar to those of the general population to avoid this division. Exceptions will be made for those associated with actual citizenship, but most of the rights of citizens should apply to migrants such as the right to be heard in court and the rights of assembly and of free speech. Indentured labour turned out to be slavery by another name.

Terraformer · 2019-04-16 14:52:49

If they get disgruntled, they are free to go home. It's not slavery if you're free to leave whenever you want.

Only those arriving with an invite should be granted rights. The rest are intruders.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-16 17:22:05

Terraformer wrote:

Actually, we could do it without violating the 13th. It's only slavery if they don't have an option to leave. Give them room and board in exchange for their labour, and if they get sick of it, they are welcome to go home.

Terraformer wrote:

If they get disgruntled, they are free to go home. It's not slavery if you're free to leave whenever you want.
Only those arriving with an invite should be granted rights. The rest are intruders.

Many would take that low offer work for shelter plus food as the means to stay protected but its more than that as its another version of socialism or welfare which is being created to guarantee them safety plus aid as they would need medical care, education and other things. That would be creating another entitlement program to which they are not paying into.
Oh wait DACA create just that and more for those here .....while that was a good thing for the young it did not go far enough for those that were older as there was no effort to get them to prove that they would be faithful to the US as long as they stayed out of crime. The designated sanctuary cities were a place of protection so as to give them the chance to learn how to be american but it was not presented or made a condition of continual stay.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-16 17:24:54

elderflower wrote:

By doing this you risk creating a large and very disgruntled underclass of people. Their frustration will eventually be highly disruptive. People arriving in developed countries must be granted rights similar to those of the general population to avoid this division. Exceptions will be made for those associated with actual citizenship, but most of the rights of citizens should apply to migrants such as the right to be heard in court and the rights of assembly and of free speech. Indentured labour turned out to be slavery by another name.

I do not care which line they have come to our nation in for illegal, legal or refugee as they all merge in time and condition for there continual stay. Thats where that crime free, working comes in other wise dump them in other nations once they are rounded up once more as unfit to be american.

kbd512 · 2019-04-17 17:45:58

SpaceNut,

Some of us do care since we're being forced to pay for invading armies of illegal aliens. American tax payers are not an unlimited resource to rob to pay for every sophomoric Democrat scheme to seize power.

elderflower · 2019-04-19 02:58:22

Economically, immigrants in the UK bring more gains in production in the country and pay more in taxes than they consume in services. This almost certainly applies in other developed economies. Economics isn't a zero sum game!

Terraformer · 2019-04-19 04:54:27

"Immigrants" don't all come from "immigrantland". Some pay more in taxes than they consume, others are the reverse. We should only be inviting in the former.

kbd512 · 2019-04-19 17:52:28

tahanson43206,

"The incompetence of socialism"?

Isn't that like saying the "stupid of stupidity"?

Evil capitalist America prevented millions of communist Russians from starving to death no less than three times in the past century. At first in the 1920's (Russia's Great Depression), then in the 1940's (WWII), and again after communism / socialism collapsed (end of the Cold War).

For some weird reason, America has a growing number of adult children who have had their brains pureed by the socialist subversives running our non-educational system in order to dupe them into believing that we need to try their socialism nonsense here.

It's rather odd to me that anyone ever thought that these little red book thumpers were "useful idiots".

What good are idiots that cause everyone to starve to death?

If socialism or communism was ever going to work at all or ever whenever humans were involved, then someone would've figured it out by now. The communists in China haven't starved to death because they had their "come to capitalism" moment. If they ever deviate from that in the future in a significant way, they're as screwed as any good little socialist / communist has ever been.

America has bankrupted itself trying to keep other countries from self-destructing. It's ultimately a losing battle and it's time to stop.

For me and mine? No thanks. They can keep that silliness to themselves. I like eating and living indoors.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-19 20:20:20

Back to the troubles of the border as towns along the U.S.-Mexico border, checkpoint closures raise anxieties now as part of of crack down to slow and stop assyum seeker which try to enter legally versus the illegal ones which have been surrendering once they come in contact with CBP.
Now we have nut jobs trying to do what CBP have the right to do and they do not... 'No authority': New Mexico governor tells militia to stop arresting migrants at border; "It should go without saying that regular citizens have no authority to arrest or detain anyone," New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham.

kbd512 · 2019-04-19 20:56:33

SpaceNut,

How can a militia group be "arresting" illegal aliens if they have no authority to do so?

Obviously the militia does have the authority to do that. The story you linked to even states in the headline that they're "arresting" illegal aliens. If the person writing the story thought the militia wasn't actually arresting illegal aliens, then they'd use verbiage indicating that militias were "kidnapping" illegal aliens.

Militias have a constitutionally granted authority to suppress insurrections and repel invasions. An entire standard US Army division's worth of illegal aliens crossing the border in less than a month qualifies as an invasion.

It should go without saying that New Mexico's Governor doesn't dictate what the laws are. She's responsible for law enforcement, not legislation or adjudication of the laws. Whether she's ignorant of what laws apply or not is irrelevant. If the law doesn't say what she wants it to say, then she pretends it means something other than what courts have already determined that it means. Unsurprisingly, she's a Democrat. That's a recurring theme with the Democrats. The laws are only laws if they believe in them or it suits the current political purpose. Oddly enough, that's not the way the law actually works.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-21 20:09:25

FBI arrests leader of armed militia that detained migrants at U.S.-Mexico border; The FBI arrested the leader of an armed right-wing militia that was detaining Central American families near the U.S.-Mexico border under the guise of working for the United States Border Patrol.

US authorities have arrested an alleged member of a militia that has been stopping migrants trying to cross the US-Mexico border. Larry Mitchell Hopkins, 69, was detained in New Mexico …“Today’s arrest by the FBI indicates clearly that the rule of law should be in the hands of trained law enforcement officials, not armed vigilantes.”

kbd512 · 2019-04-22 17:47:32

It's amazing how little interest the FBI has shown in arresting the tens of thousands of illegal aliens pouring across our southern border. I guess senior citizens are more of a threat to the power of the US government than MS-13 and human traffickers / slave traders. It's good to know that we have our priorities straight.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-22 18:02:13

From what I understand Malitia's can only be active if the governor calls them up to duty and that is what did not happen...

kbd512 · 2019-04-22 19:17:17

SpaceNut,

Well, that's interesting because the Constitution specifically states that militia can be called up to execute the laws of the Union. I'm pretty sure our federal immigration laws are still laws. USBP is part of the federal government.

Are states still obligated to enforce federal law?

If a state doesn't like the laws regarding slavery, are they free to opt out?

I thought that was settled back in 1865.

GW Johnson · 2019-04-23 16:45:32

Well, there's militias and then there's militias. The militias that the constitution and federal laws address are those organized and controlled by the states and the feds. In recent decades, we have used that same word "militia" to describe private groups not government-organized or controlled in any way. Actually, "vigilante group" would be a better word to describe these private groups than "militia".

There are already perfectly good laws on the books precluding vigilante groups from taking the law into their own hands. That is reserved to police, law enforcement groups, and the military, initially in the form of militias (meaning things like the national guard, as we do it today).

Turns out, the leader of that group taking the law into its own hands and "arresting" immigrants, has been arrested and charged as a felon in illegal possession of a firearm. Yes, there is such a thing as a citizen's arrest, but it is limited, and it is NOT intended to apply to vigilante groups.

GW

kbd512 · 2019-04-23 17:09:22

GW,

Do the governors of the states get to decide which federal laws they enforce and which they will not?

If not, then the governors can start enforcing the immigration laws, whether their political ideology agrees with enforcing the laws or not. Thereafter, they have an excellent case for disallowing ordinary citizens from enforcing immigration laws. Sooner or later, government-sponsored lawlessness leads to societal breakdown and thereafter the citizens who are tired of being preyed upon by the criminals that the government chooses to ignore will be subjected to the laws, whether the state and local government agrees with it or not.

For example, since I know our regressive leftists hate the idea that people get to use firearms to defend themselves, does that mean that states that disagree with federal firearms laws are no longer obligated to enforce them?

The regressive Democrats think they don't have to comply with or enforce the laws if they don't agree with the laws. That's government-sponsored lawlessness when committed by members of governments and plain lawlessness when committed by members of the citizenry. If the government doesn't have to follow its own laws, then neither does the citizen- assuming you subscribe to that asinine way of thinking about who the law applies to. My belief is that the law applies equally to everyone at all times. It doesn't matter if I agree with the laws or not.

We have people in governments who imagine that they're special and that's caused people outside of government to also imagine that they're special. Nothing good will come of that way of thinking.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-23 20:57:52

https://truthout.org/articles/how-the-s … ding-army/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_(United_States)

Within the United States, since approximately 1992, there have been a number of private organizations that call themselves militia or unorganized militia.

It appears that Texas is the only one still using unorganized malitia.

In states such as Texas, the state constitution classifies male citizens between the ages of 17 and 45 to belong to the "Unorganized Reserve Militia". The Texas constitution also grants the county sheriff and the governor of the state the authority to call upon the unorganized reserve militia to uphold the peace, repel invasion, and suppress rebellion, similar to the early "Texas Rangers".

Thought that I read this but not finding the story yet, On another note Mexco has also started to detain those traveling in their nation illegally in small groups.

kbd512 · 2019-04-23 21:35:58

SpaceNut,

The "organized national military", which is not supposed to be an "unorganized militia", allowed a plane with a few terrorists onboard to fly into the Pentagon, two to fly into the World Trade Center towers, and the "unorganized militia" (the general citizenry) brought down the 4th plane before it could fly into the White House. Someone probably should've "called up" the unorganized militia a little faster, seeing as how all those planes were equipped with one telephone per row of passengers.

GW Johnson · 2019-04-24 08:08:15

I said nothing about whether state governors can choose to enforce federal law or not. What I said was that vigilante groups are not allowed to enforce laws, be they state or federal. Or local.

Yes, there is an "unorganized militia" in Texas. It is a certain subset of the population. The intent is to draft them into an organized group, analogous to the Texas rangers. That would be a group under state control, not a self-directed vigilante group.

Self directed vigilante groups are nothing but mob rule or lynch mobs. THAT is why they are discouraged. They CANNOT enforce laws of any kind. Such mobs have a long history of bad behavior and violence.

What I had to say has absolutely NOTHING to do with Democrats or Republicans, either. I was just dealing with militia (in the older sense) versus violent mobs.

As to the border "crisis", there has been a shift from illegal guest workers to refugees seeking asylum. The crisis comes from not recognizing the change, and refusing to staff up to deal with it. THAT is how it was "manufactured". This is traceable to a "no immigrants are welcome" ideology, among those currently running the government's executive branch, something most of us think is evil. Simple as that.

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2019-04-24 08:14:39)

kbd512 · 2019-04-24 17:52:17

GW,

If the militia group was deputized by the USBP for the purpose of enforcing immigration laws, then they can indeed enforce federal law. The Democrats are the ones who refuse to enforce federal immigration laws, going so far as to tip off convicted felons that ICE is coming in California. Anybody who does that is aiding fugitives from justice, no matter their politics / personal beliefs / etc. That is a crime according to existing laws, whether it's ever prosecuted or not.

The Democrats in Congress have refused to properly fund border enforcement and have stated that there is no "crisis" at the border. Strangely, Republicans have never stated that immigrants aren't welcome, rather that illegal alien invaders who sneak across the border in the dead of night aren't welcome. Refugees don't sneak across the desert in the middle of the night. Human traffickers routinely do that. Your "manufactured" Democrat talking point is another bright shining L-I-E, as it pertains to our welcoming of legal immigrants. We have one of the most generous, if not the most generous, legal immigration policies on the planet.

My wife is a first generation immigrant from Saigon, Viet Nam. She came to the US legally, the way all immigrants are supposed to. I sincerely doubt she believes any of the malarkey that the Democrats have been spreading about immigration policies or illegal alien invaders since she voted for President Trump. I've never heard her state or even suggest that she doesn't feel welcome here in America or that President Trump is in any way hostile towards legal immigrants such as herself.

SpaceNut · 2019-04-27 11:09:55

A good use of troops as its turned into a humanitary mission with the sheer numbers heading north. The Pentagon plans to send about 300 more U.S. active-duty troops to the border as cooks and drivers, some of whom will come into contact with migrants as they hand out food to migrants as part of the mission to help U.S. Customs and Border Protection deal with the large number of migrants arriving at the southern border.

Allowing some of the new 300 troops headed to the border to hand out meals to detained migrants has led the Pentagon to come up with an exception to a previous Defense Department policy to allow "incidental contact" with migrants.

Pentagon officials stressed that U.S. troops will continue to not engage in law enforcement duties.

GW Johnson · 2019-04-27 14:38:09

Kbd512:

What you say about Democrats and immigration policy has some elements of truth, but is way overstated, to the point of net falsehood.

At this time, the Republicans are too rigidly anti-immigrant, and the Democrats are too lenient. That is ideology-driven nonsense to promote conflict for electioneering purposes.

The real truth lies somewhere in-between their party positions, and very probably not along the straight line drawn between them.

Believe me I understand, and can appreciate what the naturalized citizen faces. My own wife is half-Japanese, and was born in Japan. She is a naturalized citizen, like your wife. Mine was naturalized as an infant.

Fundamentally, almost all of us derive from immigrants. The aborigines were the "American Indians", and even they crossed over from Siberia tens of millennia ago. I have a small percentage of that heritage, far larger than Elizabeth Warren's, but still small at around 6-12%. If you were actually born in Texas, you probably do, too. That's just history.

The rest of my heritage is from northern Europe, but not from Spain. Yet, the Hispanics were here in New Spain (including what is now Texas and much of the southwestern US) long before any of northern European heritage arrived in these parts. That's also just history.

The Anglos who settled in Texas during the 1820's lived alongside the pre-existing Hispanics quite well. There was a lot of intermarriage. It was friendly and beneficial. (You still see a lot of that around San Antonio, even today.)

This persisted through and after the Texas Revolution. About half the heroes of the Texas Revolution were mostly Hispanic heritage, the other half being mostly Anglo. Depending upon whose books you read, this may or may not be evident. But it's true.

The change came with the waves of Anglo immigration to Texas after it joined the Union in 1845, and especially after the conclusion of the US-Mexican War in 1848. Hispanic-heritage folk have been downtrodden to one degree or another ever since, until very recently, and now it ramps-up again under Trump.

My point is that the ties between the US and Mexico run very deep, in terms of heritage, in terms of social culture, and in terms of economics and trade. We had an essentially-open border from the 19th century through to end of WW2. It benefited both countries.

All that being said, it makes no sense at all to set the quotas so disastrously low for guest workers and for immigrants seeking to become citizens. We have done exactly that since WW2, which is why there is something like 10-12 million illegal immigrants living in the US. This is a problem of our own making, aggravated by about 7 decades of congressional neglect.

The guest worker problem is easily solved at a stroke: reset the quotas to match the actual labor market. The jobs are here, the labor force is there. If legal, wages will rise, the guest workers will pay taxes, and some will apply to become citizens. I'm all for that. It worked fine until the end of WW2 that way.

The refugees seeking asylum is the new twist in recent years. Why they come is NOT under our control, and our laws say they have the right to cross the border and ask. That law DOES NOT CARE whether they cross at a port-of-entry or not.

The solution is brute-force but very simple: just staff-up adequately to process them, something Trump's administration refuses to do. They are motivated by a racist ideology not to accept any Hispanic immigrants at all. Those racists are demonstrably part of Trump's voter base, and he panders to them, to the detriment of the rest of us.

Arbitrarily criminalizing refugees for crossing the border, then misusing the existing law to separate families because of that criminalization, and then putting children into detention cages, is NOT the way to handle this! THAT is too much like what the Nazis did at their death camps, and it shows!

Thinking about this in real human terms, and attempting fair-minded rational solutions, has nothing to do with Republican or Democratic ideologies, it has everything to do with real human ethics and morality, as taught by the Christian (and other) religions.

Damn the political parties to hell. Let's just fix this. We know right from wrong already.

GW

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#251 2019-04-15 05:48:43

Re: South of the Border Politics

#252 2019-04-15 07:52:07

Re: South of the Border Politics

#253 2019-04-16 04:25:55

Re: South of the Border Politics

#254 2019-04-16 05:17:30

Re: South of the Border Politics

#255 2019-04-16 14:52:49

Re: South of the Border Politics

#256 2019-04-16 17:22:05

Re: South of the Border Politics

#257 2019-04-16 17:24:54

Re: South of the Border Politics

#258 2019-04-17 17:45:58

Re: South of the Border Politics

#259 2019-04-19 02:58:22

Re: South of the Border Politics

#260 2019-04-19 04:54:27

Re: South of the Border Politics

#261 2019-04-19 17:52:28

Re: South of the Border Politics

#262 2019-04-19 20:20:20

Re: South of the Border Politics

#263 2019-04-19 20:56:33

Re: South of the Border Politics

#264 2019-04-21 20:09:25

Re: South of the Border Politics

#265 2019-04-22 17:47:32

Re: South of the Border Politics

#266 2019-04-22 18:02:13

Re: South of the Border Politics

#267 2019-04-22 19:17:17

Re: South of the Border Politics

#268 2019-04-23 16:45:32

Re: South of the Border Politics

#269 2019-04-23 17:09:22

Re: South of the Border Politics

#270 2019-04-23 20:57:52

Re: South of the Border Politics

#271 2019-04-23 21:35:58

Re: South of the Border Politics

#272 2019-04-24 08:08:15

Re: South of the Border Politics

#273 2019-04-24 17:52:17

Re: South of the Border Politics

#274 2019-04-27 11:09:55

Re: South of the Border Politics

#275 2019-04-27 14:38:09

Re: South of the Border Politics

Board footer