samcol

Why, you hire Bush's old PR firm of course. Doesn't it make you feel good that this whole mass of protests was the result of a propaganda campaign by Vicente Fox and *gasp* possibly by Bush's people as well. What's worse is it appears like they have gotten their way.

Isn't it strange also, that the LA Times article about this propaganda campaign is a only 3 months old yet has disappeared from the original site? The google cache confirms that the article did exist.

host

It looks like Rob Allyn could have written this NY Times "article", himself.......
At least they're letting us know that they've consolidated the "message" into a bi-partisan effort to "eff" us over. We saw a hint of the "synergy" in the short lived, senate version of immigration reform, last week.

One more time.....as roachboy aptly describes it....America is a country controlled by TWO, right wing, corporatist political parties, with close, working relationships with international corporations and their executives and boards. <b>Get Used to It!</b>

Seaver

One more time... America is a Democratic Republic. The TWO parties compete over the MAJORITY of Americans. The MAJORITY of Americans are to the right of you.

Just because Roachboy and you are out of the mainstream does not mean both parties are not. They are not ultra-left because there quite simply are not enough people there to run a campaign on.

ubertuber

This is an interesting point - whether our ideas of "left" and "right" are on an absolute scale of all possible political systems or just within a balance relative to the average voter in this country. Left and right here can be completely different from left and right in some other country.

__________________
Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

host

Seaver, speaking only for myself, I would like to know if you think that I am "out of the mainstream" because:

1.)host is uninformed about current U.S. political and news events

2.)host is misinformed by a liberal media with a "leftist" anti-corporate agenda.

3.)host simply repeats left-wing talking points and has no opinions of his own.

4.)host is informed and knowledgable about political news and events, but draws incorrect or inaccurate conclusions.

5.)host is teamed with the liberal media for the purpose of shaping events and opinions, such as influencing the U.S. public to be averse to an attack on Iran. (see another posters opinion that describes this scenario: http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...5&postcount=16 )

Seaver, is the difference in the opinions of American poll respondents, as to the "correctness" and accuracy of judgment , related to the decision to invade Iraq, and the overall job approval rating of president Bush, today, vs. three years ago,
more about people becoming aware of what they could have known three years ago, or is it the influence of the "message" of the liberal media, and folks like.....me?

I submit that informed opinion is the only thing standing in the way of a political right, bent on corporatist control, in the U.S., and in the world, the only thing that has a chance to thwart well financed, "PR" campaigns.

These corporatist folks invest money to influence the majority to think and act, counter to their own best interests, and they seem confident, that, when they "catapult the propaganda", they are getting their money's worth....go figure!

djtestudo

Exactly.

As my history teacher put it, back in the French Revolution, when left/right came about as ways of describing political ideas, both of what we would call "left" and "right" would have been on the left.

In another country (Soviet Union? China?) they would be to the right.

__________________
"Final thought: I just rented Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine. Frankly, it was the worst sports movie I've ever seen."
--Peter Schmuck, The (Baltimore) Sun

loganmule

Samcol, I could be a little slow on the uptake today, but I fail to see your point. Getting one's position out, and more importantly, having things your way, is to a great extent the result how successful your PR efforts are. For each voting American delving into the facts underlying the issues, beaucoup more get their point of view as the result of the implementation of PR strategies. "Propaganda" is a term used by the loser in a PR war. With power and money in the bargain, it would be naive to think that Fox would stay away from a firm in the area with links to the administration and with proven success (imagine being able to successfully sell GW to the electorate).

samcol

I guess the problem I have with it is that the media is portraying this as some massive grass roots uprising for civil rights by Mexican immigrants. When actually it's big governments and big corporations lobbying to make their slave labor/indentured servitude practice legal. What's even worse is the very party that claims to be big on border security and immigration is actually behind PR campaigns to sway the masses in favor of this. We have a few people taking advantage of huge mass of uneducated non-english speaking foreigners who think they are fighting for their rights, when in fact they are fighting to legalize their own enslavement.

It's no longer "our" government. We the people can no longer lobby the government. Only foreign governments like the dubai ports thing, china, and mexico can lobby our government. Time and time again they go against the wishes of the American people.

You don't see a problem with Vicente Fox successfully lobbying against the wishes of the American people?

SteelyLoins

This is an interesting concept. Do you have any information to indicate that these new immigrants are to be excluded from minimum wage, or ineligible for benefits, or anything else?

It's just that I'm a little fuzzy on how they are to be "enslaved." Especially since they can leave whenever they want to.

Willravel

I'll field this one.

I have worked with Mexicans for years, and thus I have as good an understanding as any gringo. Many Mexicans are too poor to make a living in Mexico, so they HAVE to come up into the South Western states in order to support their families. They take jobs that Americans cannot take and make wages that no one else can live on (well under minimum wage). Many are homeless, many starve just so that they can send money home, most are treated as a second class citizen (like a slave). The only difference between illegal immigrents are slaves is that slaves were at least given places to live, whether it was decent shelter or not. I've never seen a landscaping company or vinyard with shacks set up for the illegal Mexican immigrints working there.

They can leave if they want, but they doom themselves and their famimilies, as the Mexican econemy simply cannot support the whole populace.

One should also consider the great service they render for OUR econemy.

Edward James Olmos was in town a while back showing a movie called "Walkout". It was an exceptional movie, and he had a lot to say about it. I would reccomend it to anyone who is interested.


I know that the Mexican American community is strong enough to do this themselves. I *hope* that this is simply a protest motivated by civil rights, an d not some PR campaign.

Elphaba

I heard about "Walkout" today. I hope to catch it when it becomes available here. Thanks, Will.

matthew330

"Seaver, is the difference in the opinions of American poll respondents, as to the "correctness" and accuracy of judgment , related to the decision to invade Iraq, and the overall job approval rating of president Bush, today, vs. three years ago,
more about people becoming aware of what they could have known three years ago, or is it the influence of the "message" of the liberal media, and folks like.....me?"

..straight from the mouth of left winger. The masses are just too ignorant. They can't see what I see, when I see it - they need people like me to show them the light.

The answer to this question would be neither, with a little help from the latter. The relatively stagnant progress in the last year an half or so, would explain the opinion polls. Not that surprising.

host

Just so it will be clearer to other readers....the comments that I made that matthew330 apparently "pushed back" from, were in reaction to these comments.....in a post that I linked to, in <b>5.)</b> in my last post:

ubertuber

__________________
Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

Ustwo

host I think the answer is none of the above, unlike you I do not see agents posting on these formus and that includes your number 5 (but thanks for thinking of me). I think your reasons are deeply personal and I'll leave it at that.

__________________
Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host

Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps.

loganmule

Will, SteelyLoins succintly responded to Samcol's comments before I got back to review the thread, so let me take a turn for him, by responding to you.

I would like to see some hard evidence, as opposed to your anecdotal personal observations, which demonstrates that the "great service" rendered to our economy is greater than the cost to the U.S. in Medicaid benefits, etc., and that employers generally disregard federal minimum wage and other laws protecting employees.

Assuming you can provide it, the real issue, for me at least, relates to your suggestion that returning to Mexico isn't a viable option for illegal immigrants.
This presupposes that it was a valid option for them to illegally enter the U.S. in the first place, just because things weren't going well for them in their home country. To state the obvious, those who have illegally entered the U.S. have done so in violation of U.S. law. Mexico has made their own economic problem an even bigger U.S. problem by opting to encourage illegal immigration by its citizens into the U.S. as a solution.

If I'm in another country illegally, I expect to have no rights, and to be punished or extradited. Why should someone living in Mexico, or in any other country for that matter, receive any different treatment from us here?

Legal immigration by Mexicans or citizens of other countries is O.K. Illegal immigration is not, and taken to its logical extreme, effectively destroys U.S. sovereignty.

roachboy

i have come to almost enjoy those moments when someone to the right of me tries to cast me out of places--the "mainstream" the country, etc.. these moments make me laugh. i dont take them as personally as host does. there are just funny. arguments like seaver's above seem to me little more than variants on the old adage:

eat shit--a hundred million flies cant be wrong.

and to have about as much power.
which is why the arguments are funny, you see.

anyway---
on the general level, i find it strange that folk from the right are concerned about this fiction of national sovereignty when it comes to transnational labor flows (legal or not, it hardly matters) but were not so concerned about it during the phase of the reorganization of production processes in ways that effectively erased most national boundaries.
it seems that the logic, such as it is, behind this is that what firms do is a priori ok, not a problem, no questions to be asked.
maybe that's because the outcomes feed consumers sense of entitlement--for example, in a supermakret produce aisle, you encounter produce from a wide range of countries presented to you in a series as if all was interchangeable---you should be able to constantly get all produce and the effective erasing the reality of seasons is simply a consequence of the imperious desires of consumers---who could imagine themselves to benefit from a highly ordered global system as they select which gas-ripened flavor free bit of produce, were the produce aisle not such an engrossing place---and if abstractions like national soveignty were being progressively erased through the modes of economic activity that enable the range of produce you want to be continually available, then so be it. convenience uber alles.

besides, the production and distribution systems behind that converge on the abstract completeness of a superarket produce aisle vanish behind the unity of the presentation of consumer goods.....and so constitute no problems.

but workers are, apparently, different from that.
the equation of legality of labor flows and national sovereignty seems to me a joke.
maybe these flows are mostly a psychological problem for conservatives insofar as they indicate the complexity of such flows and present them with the obvious fact that the american economy is not self-contained, that it is not even necessarily dominant when you look at the details. or maybe the problem is that labor flows are more difficult to erase behind the unity of outputs.

as for the op and the extension of it into the manufacturing of protests. movements, etc: this is by now an old tactic. tobacco corporations did it. the christian coalition pioneered it. pr firms rationalized it. anyone can buy it.
a such, the only clear motivation that i can see behind the fact of this kind of social-action model is the undercutting of the meaning of public protest.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

pan6467

Will, I love ya, and we agree on many issues. However, ILLEGAL is just that ILLEGAL. Once you cross over into this country ILLEGALLY you have no rights.

I am tired of people making excuses for ILLEGALS to be here, there is no excuse.

Yes, they take jobs.... and it is a concern but there are deeper concerns for me.

They are:

The BILLIONS the cost taxpayers for healthcare, housing, the criminal system and so on.

Hell, I posted here the law Congress and the president signed giving $1 BILLION to SouthWestern hospitals (that claimed they were going broke treating illegals) for FREE healthcare to illegals.

They are freaking ILLEGAL and they get FREE healthcare??????? I work my ass off, go to school and when I got treated I have my credit destroyed and sit on $25,000 worth of bills????? WTF, is that fair to me a TAXPAYING LEGALLY BORN US CITIZEN??????

Is it fair that some of these ILLEGALS get to use tax payers services? Where I work we have an ILLEGAL who has been here 25 years and he abused the system to get "detoxed" once a month for about 6 months consecutively (until he was banned). He would stay, get medicated, sleep, eat and leave. So the taxpayers of Summit County and Akron paid close to $2500 for this ILLEGAL, who paid NOTHING.

This same ILLEGAL uses our drop-in as his own little hotel and demands Detox every night. HE'll go to the hospitals in Akron and claim he needs "detoxed" and they call us having a doctor tell us to treat him (until the Dr. finds out his past). How much is that costing taxpayers??????

And this is in Akron, Ohio, I can only imagine how bad it is in border states. It's no wonder services like these are closing down because of lack of funds.

How about crime??????

In Hartville, Ohio a farm that works closely with a Jam/Jelly company hired ILLEGALS. 3 of them got trashed held up a convienence store shot and killed 2 adults and 3 kids. These ILLEGALS were caught, but instead of facing trial for murder they got deported back to Mexico WITH NO FINES and were back in the US a year later. If you need proof I'll scan the newspaper article for you.)

I know for a fact having lived in Phoenix, this is nothing new.

WTF?????????

Legal immigration is what this country was founded on and is our life blood. But ILLEGAL immigration needs to be stopped.

I have no qualms against a SHOOT TO KILL policy on the border. I figure we shoot and kill a couple illegals trying to come over.... that will deter a few of the 1000's that come over daily.

They have it so bad in Mexico, then they need to stay the fuck in Mexico and find ways to change their own damned country and not come over here, live off taxpayers and cry how we don't accommodate them or that we are prejudiced against them, or that we don't bow down and kiss their asses and wipe them as they shit all over our country.

BTW come to Akron, I'll show you the "shacks" Yoder's farms has set up for ILLEGALS.

As for "slaves" They fucking CHOSE to come here ILLEGALLY....... WTF are we supposed to do baby their fucking asses, further erode our economy and services and tax dollars to make sure they have the same rights as people who work their asses off and were born here or went through the proper systems and became LEGAL???????

If that's the case, I'll rescind my US citizenship, move to Mexico and come back ILLEGALLY....... Hell, I'd get free healthcare and people more worried about how I, as an illegal am treated than I do now as a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN. I'd get more and pay no taxes?????? Hell yeah sign me up for that.

__________________
I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"

Seaver

I'm amused with the way I'm attacked for stating the obvious. That I'm a common right winger who seeks to personally attack everyone who disagrees with me.

Yeah maybe millions of flies eat shit, however the term "right" and "left" when talking about American politics are relative to who lives in the US. Therefore two parties who represent opposite sides of the US populace can not be both on one side but on opposite sides of the bell curve of politics otherwise one of the two would not survive.

Therefore, in order to survive one must find itself representing the "left" of America. The relative conservative slant of the "left" party (strictly compared to European countries) shows that the left party in America relies on keeping as many people in it's realm appeased. To do that the party must stay as closely as possible to the politics of the majority of the people.

Therefore, if the majority of the people in a bell curve type of situation are so conservative to the point that you consider the liberals as conservative... you are out of the mainstream.

While it may be true you can't see the forest from the trees, you also can not judge relativism from the outside.. it scews as the view changes realtive to the comparison.

roachboy

seaver: i dont actually have much of a disagreement with the portion of your argument that you just elaborated on--all seems straightforward--
i just thought the way you chose to set it up in your first post to this thread (with reference to me, for some reason) was funny. i can see how you'd take the post as an attack, but i meant it as far less pointed than you seem to have read it as being. a passing banter joke between beers 5 and 6 kind of thing.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

SteelyLoins

Some of the above begs further discussion. In your example, do you remember any LEGAL immigrants who were in such a situation? The entire reason the illegals are subject to such conditions is that they're afraid to go to the authorities. Grant them citizenship, and what you will get is millions more people who "won't do XXXX kind of work." And who will be very insistent upon receiving government largesse, which would more accurately be called taxpayer largesse.

I once hired a LEGAL immigrant who quit upon receiving her first paycheck, when she saw that I was withholding taxes from it. To her, taxes were to be paid by everyone else. Come to think of it, she sounded like a great many Americans.

Your anecdotal evidence also bothers me in that you say your "slaves" are trapped economically, but they can still send money home. In my observations, some of them only come to the US for the growing season, and spend the rest of the year in their home countries. It surprises me that you have not met any of those.

Lastly, I don't limit my discussion of illegals to Mexicans, as you do. The US is unlikely to be able to absorb every inhabitant of Mexico, China, Vietnam, or the subsaharan countries who thinks the opportunities are better here.

Which is why amnesty is such a horrible precedent.

SteelyLoins

I know your remark was sarcastic, but I'll play along and caution you against one thing: Moving to Mexico and expecting any government benefits, even if you go there legally.

What they say WE should do, and what they do to their own non-citizens, are two VERY different things.

Elphaba

Please explain what you mean by this. (It is my intention to move to Mexico and from what I have read differs from your statement). Thanks.

Willravel

Every time I take a bite of an apple, I am doing so because of the work of ILLEGAL immigrint work. That's not anecdotal. Every time Someone wants to go up to Sonoma to enjoy a wine tour, they reap the reward of using illegal workers. The entire California agriculture economy would collapse without illegal Mexican workers. What does that leave us with? Hollywood? Tech jobs that are being drained overseas? As a Californian, I respect their role in our society and our economy. To ignore what they do is to ignore the obvious. So how do we treat them? We have people that monitor our already deadly borders with the intent of turning them in. The next day, those same people go to the supermarket and buy food to feed their family. They go home to a well maintained yard. They sit down in a house that was built by illegal work. To me, it doesn't scan.
They do return. They have to come here to afford to live down there. Take Daniel Hernandez, for example. This man was born in Mexico and recieved a Mexican diploma (about a 1st grade reading level in spanish), and tried to find work between the ages of 5 and 13 in Mexico, with no success. His family was starving (and please don't tell me this is anecdotal), so he HAD to come to the only place where he could get a job: San Jose, CA. He crossed the border with 17 other people. 15 survived the crossing, btw. As a 14 year old, he worked here for 2 years, saved his money, and went home. Did he ever break any US law other than immigration? Absolutly not. Did he spend much of the money he made at his $3.50 an hour job on rent, food, and a car right here in the US? Yes. You see it seems like they are draining our econemy on the surface, but they are actually putting more work in than they are taking money out. That's good for us.

The Mexicans return to Mexico until the small amount of money they could save for their families runs out, then they have to either find work in Mexico, which is very difficult, or return to the US.
That may be, but if you're family was going to starve, what would you do? I'm not saying it's right, but I'm not willing to simply shut them out and say, "deal with it on your own".
Read my first response. If a lot of US citizens immigrated into Mexico illegally and supported their econemy, they'd probalby throw us a party (or fiesta). They come up here, and we treat them like they are less than human.
We should allow more of them to come here legally then.


This is nothing but a big threadjack. The reason this thread is here is to suggest that the massive protests lately were actually planned as PR. If anyone wants to discuss the finer points of immigration, I'll gladly start a thread.

Elphaba

Please do, Will. This is obviously topical news and deserves it's own thread.

Pen

SteelyLoins

Most people (at least the ones I know) have heard dozens of stories regarding land ownership, paying for health care, and the rights (or lack thereof) of non-citizens. A brief seach yielded the following. If you need more information than this, it should at least get you pointed in the right direction.

Link


Link

http://www.novahomeloans.com/cms/ind...3/93352/93358/

There are periodic situations in which land is offered for sale to foreigners. There can be official promises that the title is secure, but it isn't. Once the property is developed, there is a good chance that the Mexican government will discover a "problem with title." I have in-laws who had their Mexican home seized by the Mexican government about 30 years ago. They usually wait ten or twenty years between seizures of the land, in order to give the gullible a chance to forget what happened to the last foreigners who thought they had purchased Mexican land. And to build homes and hotels the government can confiscate.

The most recent one I heard of is Punta Banda/Baja Beach and Tennis Club.


http://www.mexican-car-insurance.com/Mex_info.htm

http://www.amnestyusa.org/regions/am...256900006932A2

And yet, the recent demonstrators in the US waved Mexican flags.

The following link alone makes all of the complaints about Camp X-ray appear laughable. All of the recent demonstrators should read it as well.

http://www.amnestyusa.org/countries/...256F5C0047BAFD

I probably shouldn't write any more, because doing so just increases the scorn I feel for those demonstrators. However, I suggest that after you move to Mexico that you refrain from participating in any demonstrations.

host

pssst....Elphaba, <a href="http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/chreares.html">this is where</a> the "rest of us" are headed....(we are concerned about the prospects for the water and pollution level in the lake, but it's doing better since the rains returned....)

The bold print, in "Poorsouls" post sez it all.....and...if you're near retirement or you have some wealth to sustain you....
Fred made the leap......
There are better places for American's to reside, than we allow ourselves to consider...

ubertuber

I've got nothing against this particular conversation, but if the original topic is dead, I'm going to lock this. Counting down...

Everyone, host started a new thread .

__________________
Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

Elphaba

My apologies for the thread jack.

SteelyLoins

Just for the sake of thoroughness, I have talked to a few real estate people. You can now buy US title insurance for property in Mexico. That goes a long way toward security.

Also, some Americans are buying where I would have thought they wouldn't be allowed to, so maybe the laws I quoted have changed.

Just trying to maintain accuracy.