Definition of Amesty

Blind-Faith Amnesty (HT: Michelle Malkin):

...What is a good definition of amnesty? Pardoning lawbreakers for their offense and rewarding them with the object of their intention.

Does the Senate proposal constitute amnesty? The answer has little to do with the diversionary “path to citizenship” that politicians get so worked up about.

Certainly, immigration lawbreakers shouldn’t be able to gain U.S. citizenship. That privilege should be the first thing they are denied from ever obtaining.

If you let an illegal alien remain in this country, that is amnesty. If you let an illegal alien keep the American job he came here to steal, that is amnesty. If you make an illegal alien eligible for government programs and benefits, that is amnesty. If you let an illegal alien engage in his own “chain migration,” that is amnesty.

If we did grant any limited legalization, then legalized aliens should never be able to obtain any benefit that immigrants who abide by the law receive, including a green card, the right to sponsor any family members for visas or any exclusively American entitlements such as Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid. Yet Washington politicians are headed toward just that kind of lavish reward with the objects of the illegal aliens’ intentions.

How can you deal, then, with an illegal alien population that’s four times the size it was in 1986? The only realistic solution is Attrition Through Enforcement. Otherwise, you’ll overwhelm taxpayers, government agencies and American communities...

...What is Attrition Through Enforcement? Steadily, systematically enforce the immigration laws on the books. Secure the border. Make America an illegal alien-free workplace. Cooperate with state and local law enforcement when they encounter illegal and criminal aliens in their routine duties.

Make electronic employment verification mandatory. March employers of illegal aliens on a high-profile perp walk. Go after multiple usage of a Social Security number. Make US VISIT mandatory for all foreign travelers, including Mexico and Canada, at land borders as well as airports, and for exit as well as entry.

If you make it more likely that illegal aliens can’t continue getting away with their offenses, they will find fewer employers willing to face prison for hiring them. With less opportunity, greater accountability, higher risk and less reward, fewer and fewer illegal aliens will come here. More and more illegal aliens will leave on their own (that is, self-deport, on their own dime).

What matters is reversing the trend. It took decades to get into the immigration problem of this magnitude. It’s OK if it takes a decade or so to finally solve it. But we have to reverse the trends starting now.

The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that Attrition Through Enforcement will cut the illegal population by 1.5 million a year for only about $400 million a year more...