Sounds like Richardson is speaking from the heart here. I know just what he means.

Be careful, though, this post is sure to draw you-know-who out of the woodwork along with all the others who see Mexico as the greatest threat to civilization.

So what's Richardson's position on illegal aliens? Does he not agree that the status quo of having such porous borders where the government does not know who's coming across or for what purposes is a threat to national security? Does he want to keep illegals from obtaining welfare, health care and education that are supposed to be limited to citizens and legal immigrants? Does he have a problem with the new measures designed to make it harder for such persons to obtain employment in this county? Or does he feel that there should be no penalty for those who choose to violate US law?

Since no such information is provided by the post, my guess is that he is on the wrong side of this issue, at least to a substantial majority of voters who want to crack down on illegal immigration.

Now, let's take a look at what Garance forget to tell you.

1. Even as he's running for president, BR is a shill for a pan-American group, most of whose member governments profit from illegal immigration to the U.S.

2. WellsFargo profits from illegal immigration. In at least one case they send their bankers to Mexican consulates to do consumer banking. They accept the MC card, something that everyone agrees is only of use to illegal aliens. I'm not going to say they've explicitly stated that they want to profit from illegal activity, but let's just say that happens. If you now what I mean.

3. BR has taken steps to support illegal immigration for some strange reason or another. I'm sure it has nothing to do with a quest for race-based power.

4. Complaining about the Iowa fair comment is a way to portray all opposition to him as racial. Apparently that's not as transparent to Garance as it is to everyone else.

See these for more on BR:

youtube.com/watch?v=mN2o208PFhg
youtube.com/watch?v=CifLm6z32eA
youtube.com/watch?v=i0YRHXoygRM
youtube.com/watch?v=MiszkrzoOs0

Maybe for her next report, Garance could consider doing some real reporting.

You'd almost think I have a crystal ball.

Wow Steve, it's like you have ESP! Who else would have predicted this? I am a bit surprised that it took over an hour.....

And yet, I recall that not so long ago, Richardson was declaring an illegal immigrant crisis on NM's border with Mexico. Which is, I suppose, the right way to be: don't allow all immigrants to be demonized but be opposed to illegal immigration.

You can't simply handwave the issue away by pretending that everyone concerned about illegal immigration is a racist. The average American blue-collar worker has every reason to be concerned about low-wage competition from Mexico.

20 to 30 years ago, meatpacking was a well-paid, reasonably safe union job. Today, it is one of the most dangerous and lowest-paid jobs in the country. Why? Because it is performed almost entirely by Latin American immigrants, most of whom are here illegally. They can be paid and treated worse than American workers would tolerate. (And, no, legalization won't help. If $1 an hour is considered good pay in Mexico, they'll still come here for minimum wage, and drive down wages for American workers who have to deal with a much higher cost of living and aren't willing to pack 20 people into each house.)

Construction is another job that used to be performed by proud, highly paid American union men, and is now done under the table by Mexican immigrants working for a pittance.

The working class has been screwed over ever since Reagan took office. The tolerant stance taken by elites towards illegal immigration is not the only reason, but it is a major contributing factor.

These are primarily economic issues, not racial ones. There are also legitimate cultural concerns, such as the slow rate at which most Hispanic immigrants learn English. (Modern communications and transportation technology is the primary culprit here, as it permits immigrants to get a much wider variety of media in their native language than they ever could before. The fact that Mexico is right across the border, rather than an ocean away, also slows assimilation drastically.) Many Mexicans don't even want to immigrate here, just save up money and take it back home to Mexico.

The attempt of some misguided liberals to dismiss all immigration concerns as racism will be about as successful as the similar effort during the 1970s to dismiss all concerns about inner-city crime as racist.

Regardless of what his ethnicity (or ethnic allegiances) might be and despite his impressive credentials, Richardson is a clown. Even Kos admits he’s running an embarrassingly lame campaign and is making plenty of gaffs. In Richardson’s case, playing the race card is the last refuge of a scoundrel. And by the way, just what are his policies on illegal immigration? If you elect 2 oilmen—for example—to the top jobs in government, don’t be surprised what policies you get….

Yeah I don't see a racial undercurrent running under this at all...

P.S. when someone accuses someone else of "playing the race card" that usually means they're trying to deliberately avoid a neccessarily difficult discussion on race. Which is why you generally only hear that term used on right wing talk radio.

"Does he want to keep illegals from obtaining welfare, health care and education that are supposed to be limited to citizens and legal immigrants?"

Well, you know this is a real question. The Democratic base seems to be looking for an increase in public spending, which the Democratic Party (especially Clinton and Obama) can't be too happy about because it displeases their WallStreet paymasters. So, if we can't clearly define citizenship, then we can't really increase public spending. Big sigh of relief from Congress.

This is *not* just about race. No way, no how. And anyone who tries to contrue it as being only about race and nothing more comes off looking incredibly ignorant.

Long gone are the days when liberals could just tar people with the "racist" epithet, and they'd go slink off and hide under a rug somewhere.

This is a good thing, liberal junkies. Let it go. That's right. Withdraw the needle, stop the bleeding. It will be okay. You'll figure out something to say in, oh, I'd guess about 18 months.

The xenophobes doth protest too much, methinks!

Richardson doesn't believe you, and neither do we.

"So, if we can't clearly define citizenship, then we can't really increase public spending. Big sigh of relief from Congress."

That's incoherent gold.

The political naivete of some of the posters here is unbelievable.

Go on pretending that there isn't really a problem with illegal immigration and that anyone concerned about it is a racist xenophobe. That worked out really well last time, during the 1970s when the Democratic Party pretended that there wasn't really a problem with crime and that all of the complaints about it were just veiled racism. Well, maybe some of it was, but guess what? There was a real issue, an important and significant issue, and it drove ordinary Americans into a rage to see it dismissed so casually by the overclass.

You can tell people all day long that they're racist if they complain about cheap illegal labor from overseas. But you can't stop them from taking action on it when they get into the voting booth.

And if Democrats won't take action against it, then someone else will. And you and I probably won't like those other people.

Do you think Rudy Giuliani would ever have gotten elected in NYC if the Dinkins administration had been serious about crime control? His fascist political career could have been nipped in the bud if ordinary citizens' legitimate concerns about crime had been taken seriously. Instead, New York City Democrats chose the easy way out. And now the whole nation may pay the price. There is a realistic possibility that this megalomaniac nut, who believes in war without end and the abolition of civil liberties, might be elected president. And all because David Dinkins couldn't say no to Al Sharpton.

I don't want to see President Buchanan or President Tancredo in 2012 (or ever). But we might have them, or someone worse, if citizen concerns about immigration continue to be arrogantly dismissed by the elite.

Is it really that hard, or that morally problematic, to crack down on employers who knowingly hire illegal labor so that they can violate wage, hour, and safety laws?

""So, if we can't clearly define citizenship, then we can't really increase public spending. Big sigh of relief from Congress."

That's incoherent gold.

Posted by: WelcomeFuture | August 15, 2007 07:49 PM"

No, I get it. You don't want to pay your taxes. I bet you're one of those nuts who thinks the IRS is isn't even, ah, legal. I bet you'd like to outlaw the IRS, if it isn't even, ah, legal. Wouldn't you? Come on, you can tell me.

This debate needs to come to the table along with all the nuts that come along with it. Dems, especially need to talk more about it and stop 'disliking' talking about it.

Damned straight this is about race--or actually ethnicity since "Hispanic" is not a racial category. Since progressives half-secretly despise almost everything that is American culture and have also miserably failed to attract white voters whether working class or not, these selfsame progressives need to promote hardcore ethnic engineering by importing future voters. Thereby they can break down American culture and marginalize (white and other uncooperative)American voters. Of course, if millions of Americans were pouring into Mexico, the progressives would be the first to shout “cultural imperialism” and “alien conquest” of idyllic Mexican culture—but then political correctness means never letting (white) Americans have a say in preserving or shaping their own society. For that matter, the application of political correctness to illegal immigration isn’t working too well for African-Americans either. In the eyes of progressives, African-Americans are “so yesterday.” The anti-democratic re-engineering of American society depends wholly on immigrants, preferably illegal immigrants who can be bought with amnesties and welfare benefits and the fetishization of their cultural heritage by progressive elitists. Quite literally, this progressive project is unashamedly racist.

You don't get to be President by telling other people what questions they are allowed to ask or what issues you find acceptable.

Dems are likely to lose the debate. Between NAFTA and 30 years of wage stagnation, any attempt to open up immigration will be seen by a majority of working Americans as an attempt to import cheap labor at their expense. That's not their fault. That's the fault of you, the elite, who have abused their trust through corrupt trade practices.

Richardson urged tolerance -- "Nobody should be demonized"

Except for people who don't necessarily agree with you.

The immigration debate is about racism and xenophobia. Harsh words but its true. I especially like it when anti-immigration types bring up economic issues, it amounts to a classic divide and conquer with the weakest members of society blamed for the deeds of the most powerful (see the arrival every new large ethnic group in the 19th and 20th century: the Irish, Italians, Chinese etc.)

Regardless of my disagreements with BR on a number of things, it is very refreshing to hear a candidate talk like a human being and not a script machine. More of that, please, from all the candidates, on any topic.

Liedog is right. And concern trolls like Josh G. need to read the posts of their bedfellows, like Shambles, who represent a somewhat polite version of the xenophobe right. You should hear what they say to each other. These xenophobes don't just want to fine a few employers, they want roundups of all illegal immigrants, de-Naturalization of their US-born children, and more. There is, in fact, a progressive way to deal with immigration while protecting US workers: it's called legalization and protecting the collective bargaining rights of all workers in the US, legal and illegal. Just because we disagree with the restrictionists, and see them as the xenophobes they are, doesn't mean we can't have a plan of our own.

In fact, many Dems listened to concern trolls like Josh G. on the crime issue. Some decided they wanted to demagogue the issue for themselves. For a recent example, see idiot Joe Biden introducing the RAVE Act. If the Dems had refused to to "solve" the crime issue by agreeing to the Republican solution (i.e. locking up most young urban African-Americans for drug crimes), maybe we wouldn't have the largest prison popualation in the world. It's all a pretext for an expansion of law enforcement. Say no thank you to concern trolls.

Pretext, disagreeing with you doesn't make someone a concern troll. Josh G made no attempt to derail conversation. In fact, your accusation is trollish behavior because YOU are the one trying to shut down this conversation and lock out anyone who disagrees with you.

There was a time in this country when the Democratic party was the Party of working Americans. That is also the time when they had a near permanent majority. Now, they're the party of right white women and rich gay men. We have two parties only looking after the interests of the wealthy and leaving everyone else out of the equation.

Soullite, you ultimate concern troll, my comments were actually building on this thread. I disagreed with Josh and engaged him. You haven't engaged anything I wrote at all, you just quibbled about terminology and introduced a silly notion that the Dems are the "party of right white women [Huh?] and rich gay men." Keep talking: the more you say, the dumber you sound.