(08-24-2018 01:03 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-24-2018 12:37 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(08-24-2018 11:01 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-24-2018 10:51 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(08-24-2018 10:26 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  OO, I called something you said Trump-esque because you literally said:

"The people you want to allow to enter unimpeded and unknown to us are the dregs of Mexico."

That's pretty darn similar to Trump saying Mexico is not sending its best, which is why I called it Trump-esque. Do you disagree with that?

I agree agree with Trump that Mexico is not sending its best, because Mexico is not sending anybody at all. Is there some government program I have missed of them exporting people? The best educated and prepared have good jobs and family money and status there. Why leave? I cannot begin to tell you number of business executives i met who had degrees from Michigan, Harvard, Texas, and so forth. Those people go back to Mexico to work in the family business, armed with a degree and working English. I never met a plant owner who did not speak English, and all of them had learned in the States.

The next level, the mangers or professionals, such a pharmacists, have no reason to leave. Who wants to quite working in a pharmacy to go someplace where they can work as a roofer?

The next level, non professionals with some skills and education, are the ones who wait in line for legal immigration, if they cannot get a job with a factory. If they can, they stay.

The ones crossing illegally are from the rest, the bottom of the barrel, thus the dregs. They are the ones who do not have the connections, the education, the skills of the others. They come here because they can get a good price, relatively speaking, for their labor. But don't believe the myth that they are noble and honest. "They" are a wide spectrum, and the lower ends of the spectrum are not people we want or need. They are not people you would be comfortable around.

Quote:And I didn't call you a racist, and sorry you felt that I implied that. I just pointed out that you pretty much parroted a talking point that Trump has when discussing illegal immigrants from Mexico.

So now it has to be "parroted"? No leeway for me coming to similar conclusions based on my experiences and my intelligence? The only way I can say those things is to mindless parrot them?

I think you are the one parroting positions, much more than I am.

Quote:


But your bolded paragraph is where I think we've come to an impasse. You seem to be arguing with "the left" and not with me. Interpreting the points I'm raising through a lens that turns me into a caricature of the left that you hold. So said that "enforcement is what many of the left have a problem with," yet I did not argue for less enforcement. I argued for a revision to our current worker visa program to make the application easier to navigate. For starters, you could change it so that the employer does not have to be the one sponsoring an individual, but allow migrants to do so. Then put them through a screening process like you mention. I've never suggested otherwise, yet you act like I have.

I never said it had to be employer sponsored. It's enough for me that they can say "My cousin Julio works in Dallas as a roofer, and he will get me on his crew and show me the ropes." it's also enough for me if they demonstrate a skill, such a welding, that suggests they can find a job quickly. It's the guys wading the river with no plan, no tools, and no prospects that worry me.

But I would still let in the high school grads before the third grade dropouts.

And like it or not, Lad, on this board you represent the "left', as you defend many things from a left wing viewpoint. You may be center left, and certainly more open minded than many of your colleagues, but would you say you are on the right? If not, you are on the left.

What a crock that last bit is.

You're seriously trying to justify that you've been intentionally ignoring my own words because you think I represent the left as a whole? My goodness.

Well with JAAO off hiding from the monsters, you pretty much have been the sole opposition to the right wingers. Although I see you have some aid showing up.

I may be on the left, but I am anything but a monolith of the left. I would doubt that even JAAO and I agree on every issue. So it's quite shocking that you've seemingly ignored very specific parts of my posts and painted me as the left-wing token poster in your mind.

Certainly not a monolith, and neither the left nor the right is a monolith. There is a wide wide range, I call it a spectrum, and I think of you as left of center, maybe center left. I consider myself center right. I also think you are the only left winger I know who is willing to discuss and consider other viewpoints. You are unique in that (and I do mean unique). But my painting of you as representing the left is no worse than you saying I was "parroting" someone else's views about "those people". Largely it is because you are the only leftist here defending leftist viewpoints. It is like having the left guard explain the offensive production - if nobody else from the offense is on stage, you are the offense. You can explain the blocking schemes for the left guard all you want, but you are representing the entire offense.