Illegal immigration
Bush has got a pretty coherent explanation of his guestworker program. He is opposed to amnesty for people who are already here, which Kerry supports. Unfortunately, as usual, the debate has conventional boundaries which preclude questioning why there are any quotas for Mexican immigration. Why not let people (who aren't criminals, terrorists, or carrying some dread disease) live where they want?
We didn't always have immigration quotas. They were only instituted in the 1920s, after Birth of A Nation sparked a revival of the Ku Klux Klan and nativist, racist hysteria. In the 1960s, it was reformed so that Chinese and other Asians could finally immigrate, but there are still quotas, and for the life of me, I don't know why. There's still plenty of room in this country, plenty of land, plenty of resources, and immigrants themselves are a great resource. They are a self-selected, highly motivated group of people who want to make their lives better for themselves and their families. The current regime, where people crowd into delivery trucks, or die of thirst in the deserts where U.S. border patrols push them. That only happens because men with guns stop people from living where they choose, and it's not right.
We didn't always have immigration quotas. They were only instituted in the 1920s, after Birth of A Nation sparked a revival of the Ku Klux Klan and nativist, racist hysteria. In the 1960s, it was reformed so that Chinese and other Asians could finally immigrate, but there are still quotas, and for the life of me, I don't know why. There's still plenty of room in this country, plenty of land, plenty of resources, and immigrants themselves are a great resource. They are a self-selected, highly motivated group of people who want to make their lives better for themselves and their families. The current regime, where people crowd into delivery trucks, or die of thirst in the deserts where U.S. border patrols push them. That only happens because men with guns stop people from living where they choose, and it's not right.