13 May 08 - 02:39How MTV, Labor and the Democrats are selling Immigration
Is two posts I want to make on this. The video and the below article. I will tomorrow start my "Veiwpoint" posts on issues on my website rather than my blog. The MTV "Chose or Lose" speaks for itselfLabor on Immigration
There must be a better, more effective way than the spectacle of a plant raid to deal with the nation's immigration dilemma, a labor spokesman and a University of Iowa sociology professor said Monday.
Scott Frotman, spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers in Washington, D.C., said raids like the one Monday at the Agriprocessors Inc. plant in Postville disrupt families, schools and communities and typically result in the detention of some who are either U.S. citizens or have appropriate documentation to work here.
"The federal government has failed to pass comprehensive immigration reform, so this seems to be their get-tough, attention-grabbing, big-headline sort of massive raid, and I just don't think they take into account the ramifications that these raids have on their communities," Frotman said.
The union's international office had become aware via news accounts of the impending Postville raid and sent a letter to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office asking that the raid be put off.
Frotman said the union doesn't represent workers at the plant, but had been meeting with some to listen to concerns about health and safety. He said a state and/or federal probe is under way at the plant, and the union is worried what Monday's raid will mean to workers who were preparing to testify, Frotman said.
At the University of Iowa, Kevin Leicht, professor of sociology and director of the Institute for Inequality Studies, expressed skepticism of Monday's immigration raid and doubted it would produce anything but local disruption and momentary results.
"Just engaging in one dramatic raid after another is really not going to do very much except clear a plant out and allow the labor market to reopen with new immigrants, many of whom will be undocumented, and the whole process will start over again," Leicht said. "That's really not a long-term solution that will work. It might make people feel good for a short period of time. But that's about it."
Leicht said the nation needed to find some sort of compromise between a build-a-wall strategy to keep everyone out and a look-the-other-way strategy where you let nearly anything happen. Immigration raids like Monday's and one at Swift & Co. in Marshalltown in late 2006 are really part of the look-the-other-way approach, with a spectacle tacked on the end of it, the professor said.
"There's got to be some middle ground that gives people an official existence while they are here, so they are not working underground, they're not exploited, they're subject to labor laws and all that, and we know they are here," Leicht said.
Another approach, he said, would be to upgrade the wages and the quality of the jobs so U.S. citizens would take them. No comments No trackbacks
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