USC Goes All Out in Support of Amnesty, Part II

On April 30, USC and the Schwarzenegger Institute hosted an event to put a stamp of approval on the Gang of Eight amnesty legislation.

Gang of Eighter Sen. John McCain said he believes that with new technology and E-Verify, “We can have 90 percent effective control of our border.”

Why quibble over a mere 10 percent?

“We’ll never totally secure our borders, as long as jobs are a magnet,” McCain said. He then added that we need the workers for Social Security, a position that can be argued against with reliability.

He believes effective control of the border can occur after five years. Yes, he said FIVE years. Just imagine how many more illegal aliens can pour through porous borders in that time. I think in the McCain mind, which believes that “the real answer is technology,” there will be some sort of Terminator-like SkyNet surveillance capability where border patrol can, according to McCain, “sit back and watch the border.”

As mentioned in Part I of this post, McCain repeated several of the standard lines of the open-borders, pro-amnesty folks. This included the “jobs Americans won’t do” line. No pro-amnesty dialogue can be complete without trotting out that line, and McCain did just that.

One of my favorite McCain comments was: “11 million people are now going to be able to stand up and say, ‘I want a good job.’”

Great. They can join the huge number of unemployed, underemployed and other American citizens who have just given up looking for work in our new reality of persistent high unemployment – and demand benefits.

Perchance I am too hasty on my assessment though. Former U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, another event speaker, said that immigration reform will help us reduce unemployment.

Magical thinking?

Not according to Gutierrez, who provided an example of a restaurant business. (Gotta love anecdotal evidence!) Gutierrez said a restaurateur he spoke with couldn’t find enough workers. If he could, he told Gutierrez, “I’d have eight restaurants.”

Pardon my skepticism to that and the statement, “Immigration is our secret weapon,” as well as the fear-mongering that “farms will close … hotels won’t open,” if we don’t pass this mass amnesty.

Moving on …

The session moderator asked Gutierrez how many had chosen citizenship in the 1986 amnesty, to which he replied 41 percent.

If the current amnesty plan passes, I wonder if the rate will be similar. But more importantly, how will those who are still “in the shadows” be addressed? What’s the plan to identify and deport these people, particularly those with criminal intent, and those who have committed crimes and are “out and about?”

Apparently that’s not an issue for Gutierrez, who said, “We shouldn’t get hung up on this one concept of citizenship or not.”

Nor should we get hung up on the idea of assimilation, said Gutierrez. “There’s a magic in this country,” he said, which apparently takes care of that.

So even though there are numerous communities throughout the country where Spanish, Chinese or Vietnamese are the primary languages spoken – perhaps the only language spoken – and there is no need to assimilate, because these are self-contained communities where the members’ needs may all be met, Gutierrez isn’t concerned about assimilation, because we’ve got magic!

Listen to all the event speakers at http://priceschool.usc.edu/immigration-forum.