The Great Wall of China vs The Great Wall of America (Earth, mission)

[greatcalgarian]

A senior US Republican is pushing for the construction of a 2,000-mile (3,200km) fence along the entire length of the US-Mexico border.

Duncan Hunter, who chairs the Armed Services Committee in the House of Representatives, hopes to win enough support to pass a bill in Congress.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4407558.stm

The Chinese built the great wall to keep the northern barbarian out from invading the civilized central China thousannds years ago. Now the American got the inspiration and is planning to build the next longest world border wall to keep the southern backward poor Mexicans from 'invading' the northern rich America.

When the US is pushing free trade for the American continent in the 34 continent, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4408804.stm
the main driving force, at the same time is clamping down on free flow of human labour trade.

Your comments?

[BUDDY]

Great. One more thing to spend billions of dollars on that simply won't work. If they can climb a fence, they can climb a wall.

But, aside from that, I have to take issue with the way you approach the subject. Every sovereign nation on earth has some sort of law aginst illegal immigration. Why is it that the US is suddenly the bad guys for wanting to enforce theirs. If I went into Canada and stayed for a long preiod of time without the proper permission, I too would be kicked out. Based upon your phrasing, one could assume that you believe racism has something to do with it. Is that true? Do you not believe that a nation has a right to enforce their immigration laws?

[almifkhar]

i am inclined to think that there is something a bit more sinister going on here. the u.s. government relies heavy on illegal workers. by this i mean illegals work and get checks and pay taxes yet cannot collect on these taxes in april. the government obviously pockets this money. why would they try to destroy a way to get free money?

[greatcalgarian]

Originally Posted by EEWRED

Great. One more thing to spend billions of dollars on that simply won't work. If they can climb a fence, they can climb a wall.

But, aside from that, I have to take issue with the way you approach the subject. Every sovereign nation on earth has some sort of law aginst illegal immigration. Why is it that the US is suddenly the bad guys for wanting to enforce theirs. If I went into Canada and stayed for a long preiod of time without the proper permission, I too would be kicked out. Based upon your phrasing, one could assume that you believe racism has something to do with it. Is that true? Do you not believe that a nation has a right to enforce their immigration laws?

Nope, I am just extrapolating again to the extreme to invite critical discussion on immigration policy, how to solve illegal immigration, how to treat illegal immigration. On top of that, I consider movement of population is always dictated by the relative wealth between the two countries, and so is the trade itself. We cannot have a blanket "free trade" treaty, just like we cannot have free movement of people across border. This will only happened when human being has got rid of their self interest, and consider all other human being the same as oneself.

For your information, Canada has relatively 'free' immigration, as it is too COLD for most people to decide to settle down for good

[BUDDY]

Originally Posted by almifkhar

i am inclined to think that there is something a bit more sinister going on here. the u.s. government relies heavy on illegal workers. by this i mean illegals work and get checks and pay taxes yet cannot collect on these taxes in april. the government obviously pockets this money. why would they try to destroy a way to get free money?

The amount that is contributed to the US economy is a pitance compared to the overall amount the IRS collects. I doubt it would be missed. Especially when you consider that the richest 5% of this country pay 90% of the taxes.

[greatcalgarian]

Originally Posted by almifkhar

i am inclined to think that there is something a bit more sinister going on here. the u.s. government relies heavy on illegal workers. by this i mean illegals work and get checks and pay taxes yet cannot collect on these taxes in april. the government obviously pockets this money. why would they try to destroy a way to get free money?

I do not think it is the government that pocketed those money. It is a few rich guys (hundreds or may be thousands) there that depends on cheap labour to make life easy for them (domestic help usually), and smaller factories/farms that can cheat the government on the tax they have to pay if they employed locals, plus cheaper labour as well. These two are the main sources that would oppose strongly to setting up this 'GREAT WALL'. Why do this senator propose this wall building? For some political purposes. For what you know, it is possible that he or his family may be utilizing the cheap labour , remember someone was forced not to accept GB offer because of this?

[almifkhar]

money is money to these guys. the amount matters not when it is free to them. this country was built on slave and cheep labor and time has not changed that fact.

[Bright-ness' Shadow]

Originally Posted by EEWRED

The amount that is contributed to the US economy is a pitance compared to the overall amount the IRS collects. I doubt it would be missed. Especially when you consider that the richest 5% of this country pay 90% of the taxes.

Income tax only. There is sales tax, gasoline tax and property tax (to name just three) you don't account for. Every "illegal's" Social Security payment is "found" money. Income tax is such a narrow perspective and paints the wrong picture.

I have to agree that the wall of fence or whatever is merely grandstanding and not effective nor effectively addressing the problem.

And speaking of the problem, Bubba is in South America right now talking about formailize a new guest worker program. I would imagine, that if "illegals" were not doing the jobs other Americans shun, California agriculture would become as fallow as the fields that would not be harvested and cost of living for the rest of America would sky-rocket. Other boarder state economies would simarily suffer.

[BUDDY]

Originally Posted by Pah

Income tax only. There is sales tax, gasoline tax and property tax

I wasn't aware that illegal immigrants can buy property in the US.

[Bright-ness' Shadow]

Originally Posted by EEWRED

I wasn't aware that illegal immigrants can buy property in the US.

A car is property as is a small trailor. Since you chose to challange property tax and not sales tax, gasoline tax, and Social Security tax, I can add the one you were mistaken about to those others. Just picking one and being wrong about it means you have little or no argument left. And you have yet to address the delterious effect on the economies of the states involved let alone that Bubba seems to think that "illegal's" are necessary for free trade.