The Real American Immigration Consensus

by

Link: Foreign Affairs – Immigration Nation.

It is not always apparent in the mainstream media what Americans really think about immigration. We see crosstabs on polling suggesting that immigration is the most important issue to voters by pluralities as much as 45%. It makes quite an impression when only 10-15% cite the war in Iraq. Immigration has captured an overwhelming mind-share this election cycle, but the raw numbers says nothing about how those voters think about the issue, or whether they are likely to vote on the basis of a candidate’s position on that issue.

Those studying the attitude of Americans toward immigration find that the vast majority of Americans, and almost all those who think immigration the most important issue, are not reactionaries who want to militarize or seal the border with a wall.

…an overwhelming majority — between two-thirds and three-quarters in every major poll — would like to see Congress address the problem with a combination of tougher enforcement and earned citizenship for the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already living and working here. A strange-bedfellow coalition — of business associations, labor unions, and the Catholic Church, among others — has endorsed this position. In Washington, the consensus behind it is even more striking, with supporters spanning the spectrum from conservative President George W. Bush to left-leaning Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), from mavericks like Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) to party regulars like Senator Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) and all but a handful of congressional Democrats.

Most Americans do not agree with the relatively tiny minority who think that immigration is bad for America and that draconian measures are necessary to stop immigration. Those shouting slogans such as "No Amnesty" and "Build a Wall" and "Stop the Invasion" are simply a noisy periphery, not a major factor in electoral politics, save that the GOP has willfully ceded a mythic position to such fanatics.

Mostly male, white, and lacking
college degrees, these naysayers believe immigrants are bad for the economy; they want to build
a wall along the southern border and adamantly oppose allowing illegal immigrants to become citizens.
Only about half are Republicans, and they account for no more than a quarter of the GOP. But many Republicans
in Congress, particularly in the House, are convinced that this group is more intense — more
concerned, more motivated, more likely to vote on the basis of this single issue — than anyone
else likely to go to the polls. So the naysayers have become the tail wagging the dog of the immigration
debate, and they may succeed in blocking a solution this year.

The take-away message here is that if you are like most Americans, wanting a comprehensive and intelligent solution to the ills attendant upon our current system of immigration, you want a Democratic majority in Congress. Leaving the GOP in control with a bare majority will do nothing but empower the spoilers of the anti-immigrationist right- the fringe elements like Randy Graf and Tom Tancredo – who will use their newly powerful swing positions to get further political mileage from a broken immigration system to elect more and more extremists to office.

The immigration extremists’ political incentives will push them to make the problems worse, build bureaucratic constituencies by throwing money in to huge projects at the border, and further polarize our nation and demonize immigrant communities to grow their political base. Occurring nowhere in that list of priorities is ameliorating the problems caused by illegal immigration and crafting an immigration regime that reflects global realities and addresses the economic underpinnings of the flow of immigrants into this country.

You want action? You want results? Vote for a Democratic Congress.

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12 thoughts on “The Real American Immigration Consensus”

  1. Iam getting fed up with The Mexican Government influencing The Pima County Court System. Mexican officials that tell Judges how to rule on any United States Law based on the Rule of Law and The United States Constitution will be exposed and dealt with. Its only a matter of time before YOU are exposed as I exposed the Corrupt Sheriff Waldon V. Burr in 1968 and brought an end to Drug Dealers,Prostitution,Gambling,Deputies giving $500.00 for a job to the Burr Campaign for Sheriff,Stealing Copper wire from the mines by Sheriffs Deputies and County vehicles, and 80 plus more inditements buy a Pima County Grand Jury! Those of you who are employed by The pima County Judicial System and are taking orders from the Mexican Consulate beware!

  3. In Hardy Weinberg derivation at wiki, they assume, dear friend, no migration.

    “No migration (gene flow)”

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardy-Weinberg_principle

    “Of course, from a scientific standpoint Old Atlantic’s blather is complete nonsense. Hardy – Weinberg equilibrium calculations only track the survival of a mutational gene in a population, and have zero bearing on human immigration patterns.”

    Who is blathering my friend? You try to apply a model with no migration to a migration situation? Who is blathering?

  4. Genes are large enough to be thought of as tagged or identifiable, they are not quantum particles that are indistinguishable.

    You can think of the above proof as applying where we track each gene in perpetuity. Hardy Weinberg doesn’t try to do that in its proof, but simplifies to a form of identical particles, although using classical statistics.

    You don’t have to know anything about Hardy Weinberg to follow either the proof or the numerical example. Both of those are valid on their own.

  5. Consider this proof. Suppose the genetic survival probability , p, was greater than epsilon > 0. (We really have p(t,T) where t is some start date and T a later date, but we suppress that notation).

    Let N be immigrant genes in from date t at date T.

    Np is the average number of genes. Since p > epsilon, Np is greater than N epsilon.

    Thus Np > B, for N > B/p for any B.

    However, the population must be bounded above by some B.

    Thus the expected number of genes is greater than an upper bound, a contradiction.

    Thus there does not exist epsilon > 0 such that p > epsilon. Thus the genetic survival probability, p, must asympote to zero as N increases.

    “Hardy – Weinberg equilibrium calculations only track the survival of a mutational gene in a population, and have zero bearing on human immigration patterns.” The first post gives a numerical example. The second gives a prove for a stochastic process.

    This is largely independent of the mechanism.

  6. This goobledigook is to real population genetics what ID is to evolution; the use scientific-sounding terminology and numbers to support what is, at base, a thoroughly unscientific and politically motivated world view.

    I believe that what Old Atlantic is trying so desperately to dress up in respectable sounding verbage is that the Mexicans are going to come here, out-reproduce us, and take over. In a 100 years or so there will be no ‘proper white folks’ left, and Mexico will have re-colonized us demographically. Put this way, the idea is nonsensical and racist on its face – which might be why he doesn’t put it that way…

    Of course, from a scientific standpoint Old Atlantic’s blather is complete nonsense. Hardy – Weinberg equilibrium calculations only track the survival of a mutational gene in a population, and have zero bearing on human immigration patterns. Last time I checked, the border between Mexico and the US does not mark a border between two species, nor do Mexican carry some gene that is going to colonize the US population – though I suppose people like Old Atlantic might think that to be the case in some twisted social-Darwinian sense.

    Stated clearly and simply, this person is full of shit.

  7. Sustained immigration causes genetic survival ratios of those here and each annual cohort of those who come here to asymptote to zero. This can happen faster than one might imagine.

    “unpleasant immigration arithmetic”

    At 300 million steady population, a 75 year lifetime gives 4 million deaths per year. 2 million immigrants then leaves 2 million births in the steady state. 2 million births over 4 million deaths gives a per generation genetic survival ratio of 1/2. Thus in 3 generations one is down to 1/8. If 25 years is the relevant birth to parent time span on average, then one gets extinction in 75 to 100 years. This applies to each annual cohort that comes here. Even if we went to 450 million and had 1 million immigrants per year, similar consequences apply, the deaths per year are 6 million and one gets 5/6 survival ratio per generation. That leads to to about 1/2 in 3 generations or 75 years. So in 150 years one is down to 1/4.

  8. Thanks for the post. The sad thing about these times is that EVERYTHING is about the election and NOTHING about a sincere, long-lasting meaningful solution. I’ve been thinking this is a tough one, since if there was an easy/actual answer, we would have already embraced it! From what I understand, the funding isn’t “there” for the damn wall anyway. Nonetheless, I am on the team that welcomes immigrants as well as abiding by and enforcing our current laws. Fence-building bad, love-thy-neighbor good. I am so hopeful that the message of common-sense and true mutual-respect comes through in this election for the sake of our country, and for the world.

    bobJuan.

  9. It is getting pretty bad when Judges and even the Pima County Sheriff is afraid to enter The Pima County Jail, because of gangs and threats inside the jail.
    I condemn the Pima County Sheriff for loosing control of The Pima County Jail. The Jail IS the major responsibility of The Sheriff. Past Sheriffs made it a point to design and place there Office right in front of the Jail Entrance so with there door open they could see themselves who went in and out , including all the Deputies. Today Sheriff Dupnik has moved his office 5 miles away to the Benson Highway and to make things worse surrounded himself inside that complex on the third floor with a glassed in enclosure to keep out the Deputies.

    It is clear its TIME FOR A CHANGE in the Pima County Sheriffs Department and the condition of The Pima County Jail being Dirty and run by Mexican Nationals and Mexican Gangs must be dealt with personally by the Sheriff and stop trying to hide from doing his job!

  11. I think the thing that Dems should do is use the language of Republicans…when it comes to gun and drug control laws. What does the NRA say whenever there is talk of new gun control laws? “Enforce the laws on the books first.” If employers were actually fined for hiring illegal aliens to the extent they could be, I think word would get out real fast that it wasn’t so easy to to get a job in the U.S. anymore and the number of border crossers would fall alot. Isn’t this the same sort of reasoning Republicans back in the drug war as well. If you put users in jail everyone else will be scared to use drugs and the amount of drugs coming into the U.S. will drop.

  12. Good post. What bothers me is why Democrats have to talk in the same language as Republicans and even extend the fear mongering.

    I know I know. They have to get elected to do any good, but where is the conversation and the teaching if we say the same basic things that they do.

    You just can’t teach in a 30 second ad…at least nothing but knee-jerk rhetoric.

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