[u]After[/u] all of the riff-raff have arrived!

President Bush has plans of tightening immigration rules NOW, after we've been effectively invaded by terrorist cells.

See story at:[url]http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011029/ts/bush_67.html[/url]

From the article:

"Fleischer did not offer more details on the task force or say which agencies would work with it. But those involved, he said, will be directed by Bush to 'work together to locate, detain, prosecute or deport any aliens who are already here who may be engaging in terrorism.'

"'Obviously people got in and committed the crimes they committed, and that's one lesson we should take from it,' Fleischer said."

No, Mr. President, with all due respect, let us work together to locate, detain, prosecute and/or deport any illegal aliens who are already here, [u]whether they are engaged in terrorism or not[/u]!

I mean, why wait til after they engage in some terroristic act to prosecute and/or deport them?

Eric The(OneDayThey[u]May[/u]GetThisRight)Hun[>]:)]

And while we're at it, lets send the H1B visa's home, too.  At least those that are working in industries that have been hit hard by the economic slowdown.  That way, guys like Lordtrader might get a better pick of jobs cause there'd be more openings.

Just my $.02 - but yeah, it is a bit like closing the barn door a bit late.

Personally I think we need a halt to the issuance of visa's for at least a month or two.  Just to sort things out, and maybe put a better system in place.

Have the State Dept enter the visa info into a database to that when the person arrives at INS, they can look it up on their work station... Ah, it'll never happen.

raf,

You would be wrong. The politicians did not support throwing out the illegals, but public opinion was definitely against illegals. A Gallup poll taken at the end of August showed that 67% of Americans were strongly opposed to "normalizing" illegal immigrants.

The problem is that politicians are, at their core, cowards. They pick on weak or very unpopular groups, and cow to vested interests that can hurt them. Immigrant lobbies are a 100 lb weakling masquerading as an 800 lb gorilla, but the politicians are vulnerable, ever since Props 187 and 209 "appeared" to blow up in the faces of Californian Republicans.

The immigrant lobbyists are able to exert so much pull because people are too stupid to differentiate between legitimate immigration and illegal, and the special interests play to that ignorance.

Maybe 9-11 will change things, but judging from this initiative, it seems the Pols are still too timid.

Madkiwi
- a LEGAL immigrant.

What are you saying? That the voters would say on the one hand, "No we don't want to reward lawlessness" but on the other "Let them stay?"

One begets the other. If popular opinion is negative towards illegals, the prospect of inviting them to leave is not going to diminish that support, because logically (although I know the American public sometimes can't follow logic) if they want these people not to be rewarded for their actions, they would also say they should not be here.

If there is anything that Sept 11 should teach us is that the very essence of sovereignty is the power and duty to safeguard a nation's borders!

If we lose the 'battle at the border' it's all downhill from there!

Eric The(Exasperated)Hun[>]:)]