I have a question that I would like to have answered. When the eunuchs in Washington of both parties come up with an immigration plan, will there be a separate social security plan for them? For years the economist have been telling anyone who will listen that the social security system is not liquid. What will the influx of millions of “illegal” turned “legal” immigrants be to the system? Do what you will but leave my benefits alone. It does not surprise me that the federal, state, city, and unions support “legalization” for it will not affect their fixed retirement plans which lets them retire at a much younger age and with a much more higher benefit, if they are so for this “legalization” let them accept them to their retirement programs.

When did it become racist to inforce the laws of a country? Entering a country illegally is a crime. Lets face facts. Other civilized countries around the world don't let people come in, work, get free benefits, send the money back to where ever they came from and get a pat on the back and hear "Good Job". No, they get arrested, thrown in jail, kicked out, or worse, they disappear. I am tired of seeing illegals who don't pay in to the system, waving other country flags demanding their rights. They are illegal, they don't have any rights. If we let this continue, this country will turn in to the same third world shit holes they crawled out of. I think we as US citizens have every right to send troops to the border. In fact, we probably should have gone to war with Mexico and annexed them in to the US instead of messing around in the Middle East. Many of the Mexican people don't want to be there anyway, if they did they would break the law to get in to the US, so we would have their support , right?

If crossing a border without legal documents equals to committing a crime, why CUBANS have a special law that gives them a green card only because they were able to walk into the American shores?
If hiring illegal immigrants equals to committing a crime, why INS has so far only arrested the workers but not close their work places and incarcerate the owners?
The Government and his weakness is destroying the American dream. By acting like just an observer and allowing others to make decisions for him (Minute Men, Hispanic Organizations), the government is destroying this country and one day those that call themselves Americans will have to pack their bags and go to other lands where they will be call immigrants.
Immigrants are acting like the USA owes them something. They came here searching for a dream and they are destroying wonderland by allowing those the represent them mislead them. The owner of a house does not owe anything to their visitors except respect. Those that come should work to be accepted. Those that call themselves Americans should open their eyes and understand that there are more than Americans in this world.

Argument: This is a country of immigrants. (Thus, we should grant citizenship to those who have broken the law and entered illegally.)

None of us can argue that we are a country of immigrants, but so what? Things change. We aren't the country we were when thousands poured into through Ellis Island - legally, I might add. Even legal immigrants back then didn't get free medical care (if you don't pay the Emergency Room bill when it comes, then what is it but free?), or any of the other hand-out programs we have these days; our federal and state governments weren't obliged to spend millions duplicating official documents in dozens of foreign languages, etc., etc., etc. (This could go on from now till Christmas but let's move on).

We also had a different breed of immigrant back then. None of them came to this country and flaunted the flag of the country they'd come from demanding THEIR rights and carrying the US flag upside-down. We also didn't have Hispanics making statements like these:

AUGUSTIN CEBADA, MILITANT HISPANIC BROWN BERETS: "Go back to Boston! Go back to Plymouth Rock, Pilgrims! Get out! We are the future. You are old and tired. Go on. We have beaten you. Leave like beaten rats. You old white people. It is your duty to die . Through love of having children, we are going to take over.”

PROFESSOR JOSE ANGEL GUTIERREZ, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS: "We have an aging white America. They are not making babies. They are dying. The explosion is in our population . . . I love it. They are shitting in their pants with fear. I love it."

RICHARD ALATORRE, LOS ANGELES CITY COUNCIL: "They're afraid we're going to take over the governmental institutions and other institutions. They're right. We will take them over . . . We are here to stay."

MARIO OBLEDO, CALIFORNIA COALITION OF HISPANIC ORGANIZATIONS & CALIFORNIA SECRETARY OF HEALTH, EDUCATION & WELFARE UNDER GOV. JERRY BROWN. ALSO AWARDED THE PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM BY PRES. CLINTON: "California is going to be a Hispanic state. Anyone who doesn't like it should leave."

ART TORRES, CH. CALIFORNIA DEMOCRATIC PARTY: "Remember 187–(the) proposition to deny taxpayer funds for services to non-citizens—was the last gasp of white America in California."

JOSE PESCADOR OSUNA, MEXICAN COUNSUL GENERAL: "We are practicing 'La Reconquista' in California."

Thus, US Citizens should wake up. If the Senate bill passes not only will we be saying that it is okay to break US laws, but that law breakers are rewarded here.

And nobody is arguing that the majority of illegals don't deserve a chance, or that if we were poor that we might not do just what they have done, but we're going to have to make a choice here. That choice is simple: Will we continue to be a prosperous country and a world power? Or will we slide into obscurity as a largely poor and uneducated horde of illegal immigrants take this country from us?

We are a indeed a country blessed with much, but the bottom line where illegal immigation is concerned is this: It's them or us. Take your pick.

I agree 100% with J. Fred Muggs that President Bush's "wheeling out" the "old issue" of illegal immigration is "another Weapon of Mass Distraction, but this is one among many.

Another Weapon of Mass Distraction is the business about the NSA keeping records of phone numbers (with all the fuss that's been going on about it lately, you'd think most Americans want to keep secret frequent phone calls they've been making to places like Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is what the NSA has been looking for.)

Yet another Weapon of Mass Distraction is all the scandals and other controversies that have been happening, like what happened to "Dusty" Foggo yesterday. ("Dusty" Foggo..."Duke" Cunningham..."Scooter" Libby..why is it that so many of these dudes involved in scandals go by dogs' names?)

In all seriousness, the White House and Congress should focus on things that are really important--like fixing New Orleans' levees right and restoring Louisiana's coastal wetlands.

I understand perfectly the negative comments of some people about people living in an illegal situation in a foreign country.
Some have already subscribed to the Sarkozy's bill for the "chosen migration".
The idea of brain-draining poor countries thus, rendering them poorer for they don't provide these people with knowledge and means to forge their countries' destiny.
Today the alien are undesirable because they are educated and no more illiterate by the same token, getting the best jobs.
Decades ago,they were the people who have heavily contributed to the development of the country and by extension the economy because they were the only people willing to do the dirty jobs !
On the other hand,i totally agree that if one chooses to migrate,he or she must integrate the host society.It is unconceivable for a foreigner to impose his/her mode of living in an adoptive country.You must imperatively abide to the local laws and regulations.On the contrary,you are doomed to live in ghettos and confined yourself into a permanent quarantine.
A brief comment on the Sarkozy's bill about immigration :
A decision to harden the immigration law cannot be taken on one isolated incident.(Clichy sous Bois)
Discrimination on employment of aliens should be a serious issue for the French government.One cannot be recruited on the basis of his/her origin,name,skin colour,cast or creed.
On the contrary,their must be positive discrimination in thew empoloyment field and housing policy,to show the governemnt's good faith and willingness to integrate the foreigners.
Thank you

My Wife has been trying to legally gain admittance for her sister into the USA since 1998. Who will apologize to the members of all the countries of the World who were not able to enter Illegally and cannot participate in this amnesty.

Our borders are too large to be adequately guarded. 5-10,000 National Guard troops? Are you kidding me? Send those troops down to Louisiana and Mississippi to help those that are still devastated by Hurricane Katrina. That's where they are needed the most.

As for immigrants, it's immigrants who came to this country and worked to give future generations a better life. If I was in poverty like many of them I would be doing the exact same thing. I think they deserve a chance and I hope this Senate bill passes. It would take much of the stigma out of being immigrants.

Don't count for one minute on those we put in office to do what is right, and actually protect this country where the issue of illegal immigration is concerned. I doubt there is one entire backbone in the entire lot of them.

The solution, however, is super simple if there were only Congressional votes to make it happen. All it would take would be about a half-dozen LONG prison sentences handed out to a half-dozen employers. Sentence a few to real prison - not some blue-collar easy lockup - for about ten or twenty years, along with a BIG fine, and watch those jobs illegals are doing dry up faster than lightening strikes!

What happens after that? Who will do those jobs? Gosh, looks like employers would have to pay a decent wage, and we just might find out that there are workers for those jobs. Maybe we ought to lock up a few small employers, too. Then a lot of people would have to either pay a fair wage or cook their own meals, wash their own dishes, watch their own kids, cut their own lawns . . . maybe backbones would appear left and right.

It wouldn't take many lengthy prison sentences before we'd have to throw the borders wide open and watch those 11 million who no longer have jobs head south.

As a 1.5 generation Mexican immigrant I can tell you that people are crossing the border because they need to feed their families, laws or no laws. Would you let your children starve?

Yet Pro immigrant activists argue that work is a right. What about the right to work in your own country [Mexico]?

Legalization will not stop people from coming and neither will a wall! Few are looking at the deeper roots of the issue:NAFTA. NAFTA and the preperations to begin this, have devastated the average Mexican, causing more people to migrate. Since the signing of NAFTA immigration from Mexico more than doubled between 1990 and 2000 with the bulk of the migration occurring after the 1994 signing of NAFTA.

NAFTA is behind the American jobs whch have been shipped overseas. As Mexicans escaping the effects of Nafta arrive in the US they are percieved as taking something away jobs, lowering wages, i.e being a social burden on tax payers.

Consider this: Income inequality is up: from 1979 to 2001 income of the top 1% rose 139%, that of the middle fifth rose by 17%, and the income of the poorest fifth rose only 9% (Scott, Leohardt NYT).
The neoconservatives arrived in 1981 with Reagan, and they have been in power for all but 8 years. Maybe instead of pointing fingers we should all point up.

TELL ME HOW I CAN BECOME A MINUTEMAN

I am a Sixth generation "LEGAL" immigrant. My people were here when their home was part of Spain. My wife is a Second generation "LEGAL" immigrant. Her father left Norway because of the NAZIS. He stood in line like millions of other "LEGAL" immigrants and waited his turn.

DEPORT ALL ILLEGAL CRIMINAL IMMIGRANTS. SECURE OUR BORDERS, NOW!

Failure to do this by our politicians will be "POLITICAL SUICIDE" for them!

I am really tired of all the finger pointing, name calling, lame blame game going on about this issue. Bottom line: If you are in this country illegally(unlawfully is more correct), you are a criminal. What makes you think you deserve the rights that you are demanding?

Amnesty? You are a criminal. Why do you deserve amnesty?

Try going through the legal process. No one said it would be easy. Freedom ALWAYS comes with a price. Isn't it a small price to pay to escape to the land of opportunity.

And last but not least, if you want to be a citizen of the greatest nation on earth, learn the language! The only and official language of the United States of America is English.

Why is all of this so hard to understand?

Lawmakers, quit politicizing the issue and fix it!

Let me offer a solution:

(1) Take all the illegal aliens' pertinent information, ie: name, address, national origin, special talents, and reason for wanting to be here.

(2) Send them ALL back to their prospective countries.

(3) Round up all the people that want to "fix" this issue (ie: Minutemen,liberals, conservatives, and immigration reform protestors) and train them as INS agents.

(4)Set up immigration offices at key points along the border and man them with the new INS officers.

(5) Invite all the people that were deported to now come back through one of those immigration offices and go through the process of coming into the US legally, be it for citizenship or work permits.

We are one of the most technologically advanced nations in the world. Don't you think we could set up a data base system that could log and track all of this activity. Wouldn't we all feel better if we knew we weren't letting freeloaders and worse terrrorists into the country?

I HAVE SERVED MY COUNTRY BY JOINING THE MILITARY. IM NOT AGAINST IMMIGRANTS. SOMEWHERE DOWN THE LINE SOME OF OUR FAMILY MEMBERS WERE IMMIGRANTS TOO. I HOPE THE BILL BEING CONSIDERD IN THE SENATE WILL PASS. YOU (IMMIGRANTS) HAVE MY FULL SUPPORT!

There are two issues here under the umbrella of immigration: 1) Preventing illegal crossing of the border, and 2) having some policy for dealing with those illegal immigrants that are already here. They are NOT the same issue, though are obviously related. Putting the military along the border to seal it MIGHT work (except that we may not have enough troops since they are in Iraq, Afghanistan, Germany, Korea, Japan, and maybe upcoming, in Iran) to solve issue #1. For issue #2, we cannot deport 11 million people (IF that's even the correct number). What we need to do is come up with a systematic approach for documenting the illegals, and those found to be law-abiding, hard-working, and civically responsible, be allowed to stay and WORK TOWARD becoming naturalized citizens. Those who are found to be criminals, deport them. Those who refuse to be found and hide from the law (much like white, anlgo-saxon, Christian, American-born criminals) should be tracked down and then deported. If they have committed a crime, like murder or drug dealing, they should be incarcerated and tried in our legal system.

My major point is, I guess, please SEPARATE the two issues. Mixing up what we're dealing with, given the crowd mentality these kinds of things often lead to, can be dangerous.

My greatgrand parents came to this country over 90 years ago. They waited patiently for their visas before coming. They respected the law and what America is about--the assimilation of all races...legally. They learned English and used it in daily dialog and didn't teach thier children thier native language of Italian. This is not about immigration...its about ILLEGAL immigration. Lets get that straight! Nor is it about racism. Those who throw that out there are have no good argument to stand by so they grasp at what they can and play the race card in an act of desperation. We watched over the last few weeks as hundreds of thousands of immigrants demonstrated and supported those breaking the law. Many carried signs that read in part: WE ARE NOT CRIMINALS. AHHH news flash...if your here ILLEGALY....yes, you are! Amnesty is wrong regardless of the ramifications. Vital to the economy or not, its wrong. A drug dealer spends an awful lot of money on good, cars, jewelery with money obtained from drug sales. He or she may even put thier children thru school or make charitable donations. Does that mean they should be given amnesty also because they contribute to an economy? Please....spare me the intolerant speech.

I'm so worried that the issue of illegal immigrants will take away the attention from the gay marriage issue!

O'Kay The Senate just approve the amnesty for immigration if you been here more them five years you can recieve amnesty are they serious, I think that we're going to have a problem here all 20 million have been here for five year you think they are going to tell people when they really came across the border. let me see what the Senate going to do then as soon they get here Amnesty they are going to break the border down to get here and if
anyone get in there way they will get hurt.this just say Okay I do anything I want to do in American, all I have to do is protest are flex my muscle and I can get there attended this is a hugh mistake by giving them Amnesty it going get real crazy in the United States I hope the U.S citizen stop this.

If the citizens of this country do not realize that we are headed for an armed conflict inside the borders of the United Stated then they are blind and foolish. The opportunities that have existed in this country draw millions here. The old saying is that if you do not earn it you will not appreciate it. We can see that with so many who support illegal immigration. If we deported those American citizens who support illegal immigration to Mexico then they would feel differently about protecting the US and its way of life. The reality of just how good life in the United States is would sink in. I scratch my head as I have read recent articles where Americans who have retired to Mexico have returned to the States following mistreatment at the hands of corrupt officials. The rampant corruption in Mexico is common knowledge amongst Mexicans. One must ask itself how can a country which has sat on the border of one of the most powerful countries ever to exist still be so poor and possess so many uneducated citizens. The biggest blame stands on the shoulders of the citizens of Mexico. While China and India soar you flounder. Immigrants from China and India come to this country and push their children through the education system. These children learn English and prosper. All this takes place while the majority of Mexican immigrants undermine the education of their children by conversing in Spanish and indentifying themselves as Latino or Mexican. Ethnocentric thinking is a major reason why the Hispanc/Latin population in the Unites States lags far behind the the dominant Caucasian and Asian populations. Look at the ethnic breakdown of the college campuses acros this country. The future of this country wil be in the hands of Asians not Mexicans or Hispanics. If you don't believe me due your own research.

I'm a teacher in Houston. I have several students from Mexico, some legal, some not. Some of my best students have told me that their parents crossed the border (after several attempts) so that they could have a better life. At the same time, some of my poorest and 'slowest' students tell me the same story. Regardless of how they came to be in my classroom, my job is to educate all of them. When the protest and 'day with out immigrants' happened I had seveal students wanting to know my view (I teach History/Government). It was difficult, but I told those inquiring students that I believed this whole matter was very simple. If you broke the law then you need to suffer the consequences, regardless of what impact it has on your family. It is hard to say that in the teaching profession, but sometimes the truth just hurts. Further, I think it is a sad time in our Country when no politcal party is willing to stand up and take a stand and HOLD THEIR POSITION, istead of swaying in the wind. I know that my votes are NEVER going to the Dem's or Reps. An old phrase comes to mind my teachers used to ask me, do the times produce the hero's/leaders, or are leaders simply born. Either way, our country is in of HONEST, HARD WORKING LEADERS.

I switched from Democrat to Republican during the Clinton administration because their party platform had abandoned the working man and Christian values. now the Republicans are bowing to pressure and making compromises every day, I can see myself moving towards and independant candidate now. If we can find one who has enough backbone to do THE RIGHT THING! The ILLEGAL Immigrants in this country by the very definition of the word (ILLEGAL) are CRIMINALS!
why should we give them legal status? Why are the allowed to cross our borders? why arent our Congressmen, Senators, and our President doing anything about this problem? All that is required for the success of evil is that good men do nothing, and that is what has been done about Illegals for years. Pull our soldiers home from the country's that dont want us and station the stateside on our borders, round up the Criminale both on the street and in our jails and deport them. Sure as a country we would have to adjust to the loss in work force. but the increased opportunity for our citizens, the decrease in drain on our social services, the decrease in crime, and many more benefits would make adjusting easier to swallow. Grow some nerve Ladies & Gentlemen of the U.S. Congress, make some tough decisions, serve the country not just your personal constituants & special interests. Make us proud!

where were the Minuteman when the white man crossed over to Native american land illegally and killed them

Just another 'American' tired of Congress and my state Gov Easley not doing their jobs. Time to vote all of them out. We are being invaded and they've done nothing to protect the American people from it.

Illegal Immigrants need to go home and fix their own countries. Those hiring them need to be fined heavy enough to make others think twice before breaking our laws. The laws are already on the books, we need to enforce them amd slap down judges that seek to over ride them. They too must obey the laws.

The immigration issue is a ruse created by the conservatives as a distraction only. They do not want changes because the standing immigration matters cater to conservative coffers in many ways. The only thing conservatives want with this immigration matter is to distract people with the current NSA probing. Other than that immigration is a non-issue to the repubs and Congress demonstrates this all too well. The Sensenbrenner legislation was thrust at us only to be castigated as that was its purpose. Thus, it gets thrown out with baby and bathwater. Don't look for conservatives to aggessively change the current labor trends because these trends are what republicans want: lower wages, greater stresses upon unions, and so forth.

It's funny how "anti-immigration" groups seem to focus on Mexican immigrants only and then have the audacity to deny that their cause is based on racism. Funnier still is the "we will die on our feet before we submit on our knees" comment, somebody needs to inform that lady that said it that she's quoting a Mexican Revolutionany Hero