Legal Showdown - Arizona's Immigration Law

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Throw him a bone and help him find the word he's looking for.

You know what he meant.

Actually, the vast majority believe that is what the police do .... and maybe many are actually there to protect and serve (but they are under no legal obligation to do so).
 
Actually, the vast majority believe that is what the police do .... and maybe many are actually there to protect and serve (but they are under no legal obligation to do so).

Well, really, the police are only there to enforce the laws. Nothing more.

Now the people they serve, whether it's the taxpayers or the government, are theoretically "protected" when those laws are enforced through preventing civil disorders.

Private hire? They will do anything you pay them to. Police? Their jobs is to maintain civil and social order.
 
There's example of NHS in UK.

NHS provides basic health care for everyone, if you are not satisfied or need elective surgery, such as cosmetic surgery so go to private health care.

In US - nothing but you can go to ER if you couldn't afford to see doctor, however you will face legal issue, such as need file for bankruptcy to wipe massive medical debt off.
 
There's example of NHS in UK.

NHS provides basic health care for everyone, if you are not satisfied or need elective surgery, such as cosmetic surgery so go to private health care.

In US - nothing but you can go to ER if you couldn't afford to see doctor, however you will face legal issue, such as need file for bankruptcy to wipe massive medical debt off.

Baaaaaaad example.

Bad, bad, bad example.

UK NHS is gross. It's horrendous compared to other public healthcare. No serious supporters of public healthcare want to touch the British with a ten-foot pole.
 
Ok, I can understand with clarity the point Reba was making about paying "twice" and I also saw how her point was lost.

Suppose you have a choice .... choice A) McDonald's choice B) Hooters.

One has cheap and fast food, the other has cheap and fast women .... er, I mean .... well .... better food ... yeah.

So, if you do not want cheap and fast food, and you want better food, why should you pay for better food at Hooters that you eat (consume) but in addition to that, you also have to pay for McDonald's (which you didn't use or eat or consume)?

If you are paying to have your children sent to a private school, why are you being taxed to pay for public schools (that you are not using?)

If you have hired a private security firm for protection, why are you paying the salaries of the local police department (that you are not using)?

Why are you paying "twice"?

That was her question.

we have been paying tax since Day 1. way before America was born. The statement is misleading.

Taxpayer pays once. It is UP to you as a private citizen to have a private service. You are not paying twice for same thing. You are paying EXTRA for EXTRA service... which is 100% OPTIONAL.

You don't like the public service which is "One For All, All For One" policy? Then get a private service for your specific needs.
You don't like the public food (supermarket)? then grow your own private food in your private yard.

but you don't like the tax system? then go live in island. your own Constitution. your own government system. your own law. your own whatever.
 
Baaaaaaad example.

Bad, bad, bad example.

UK NHS is gross. It's horrendous compared to other public healthcare. No serious supporters of public healthcare want to touch the British with a ten-foot pole.

I'm just giving a example, regardless about how lousy/bad is NHS.
 
we have been paying tax since Day 1. way before America was born. The statement is misleading.

Taxpayer pays once. It is UP to you as a private citizen to have a private service. You are not paying twice for same thing. You are paying EXTRA for EXTRA service... which is 100% OPTIONAL.

You don't like the public service which is "One For All, All For One" policy? Then get a private service for your specific needs. (which means you pay twice)
You don't like the public food (supermarket)? then grow your own private food in your private yard. (You don't pay twice in this example)

but you don't like the tax system? then go live in island. your own Constitution. your own government system. your own law. your own whatever. (The U.S. ??)


Don't tase me bro!

Sending your child to a private school = paying twice for education

Sending your child to religious private school yet forced to pay state and federal taxes on public education = infringes on church and state separation


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_voucher

Under non-voucher education systems citizens who currently pay for private schooling are still taxed for public schools.
 
Side by Side, but Divided Over Immigration - New Mexico vs. Arizona
ALBUQUERQUE — As the Arizona Legislature steamed ahead with the most stringent immigration enforcement bill in the country this year, this state’s House of Representatives was unanimously passing a resolution recognizing the economic benefits of illegal immigrants.

While the Arizona police will check driver’s licenses and other documents to root out illegal immigrants, New Mexico allows illegal residents to obtain driver’s licenses as a public safety measure.

And if Gov. Jan Brewer of Arizona, a Republican, has become, for now, the public face of tough immigration enforcement, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, a Democrat, has told any interviewer who will listen about his effort to “to integrate immigrants that are here and make them part of society and protect the values of our Hispanic and multiethnic communities.”

They may sit side by side on the border, they may share historical ties to Mexico; they may have once even been part of the same territory, but Arizona and New Mexico have grown up like distant siblings.

People on all sides of the immigration debate have taken notice.

“If a burglar breaks into your home, do you serve him dinner? That is pretty much what they do there with illegals,” said State Representative John Kavanagh of Arizona, a Republican. Mr. Kavanagh is one of the staunchest supporters of the new law there, which will give the local police broad power to check the legal status of people they stop and suspect are in the country illegally.

But Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice, a liberal group in Washington that advocates reworking immigration law, offered New Mexico as a model of balancing a push for border security — Mr. Richardson once declared a state of emergency there — with coping with the illegal immigrants already in this country.

“Richardson has got it,” Mr. Sharry said.

Even supporters of Arizona’s law here — and there are some — agree that such a measure would never pass in New Mexico, given the outcry among legislators and immigrant advocates that the police in Arizona might detain and question Latinos who are legal residents and citizens but are mistaken for illegal immigrants.

Why the difference?

First, New Mexico (population two million) has the highest percentage of Hispanics of any state — 45 percent, compared with 30 percent in Arizona (population 6.5 million), and they historically have commanded far more political power than their neighbors do. The New Mexico Legislature is 44 percent Hispanic, a contrast to the 16 percent in Arizona, according to the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials.

Both were once part of Mexico and, later, the same United States territory. But since they became states in 1912, New Mexico has had five Hispanic governors (including Mr. Richardson, whose mother is Mexican), and Arizona has had one, according to the group.

New Mexico’s legislators embrace the civil rights protections in the state’s Constitution — including so-called unamendable provisions akin to a Bill of Rights that historically protected Spanish-speaking citizens of the former Mexican territory — and often mount a “protective stance” toward immigrants regardless of legal status, said Christine M. Sierra, a political science professor at the University of New Mexico.

“When the community at large feels threatened, folks close ranks and join in solidarity to protect the group,” Professor Sierra said, noting that Arizona Latinos have struggled to assume the same kind of a power in a state where a greater influx of Anglos (the general term for non-Hispanic whites) over the decades has diluted their strength.

The flow of drugs and illegal immigrants over the sparsely populated, remote border here, moreover, pales compared with that in Arizona, whose border, dotted with towns and roads facilitating trafficking, registers the highest number of drug seizures and arrests of illegal crossers of any state.

The estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants in Arizona, whose population explosion of the past few decades has been a magnet for low-wage work, is more than eight times that of the estimated 55,000 here in Albuquerque, where the economy turns more on government, military and high-skill jobs.

Though concerns about immigration and the border arise, particularly in the southern “boot heel” of New Mexico, the burner setting is low.

“It’s not that there isn’t social tension between Hispanics and non-Hispanics,” said Jose Z. Garcia, a political scientist at New Mexico State University. “We just have learned to tolerate each other and get along.”

Illegal immigrants here agree. Where fear and anxiety pervade their communities in Arizona to the point that some do not venture outside or have left the state, here they live more openly and are less guarded.

“People give us food, a place to sleep,” said Samuel Duran, 35, a day laborer looking for work in a Santa Fe park. “The police bother us when they have a reason, like a fight, but in general they leave us alone.”

Marta Nebarez, who manages a grocery store in a heavily immigrant neighborhood in Albuquerque, said that newly arriving illegal immigrants had an easier time here and that word was spreading. Some customers have told her that a few families from Arizona have moved here.

“This government helps people a lot more than over there,” she said, noting several measures, including a state law enacted in 2005 that allows illegal immigrants to pay the same tuition rate as legal, in-state residents.

In an interview, Mr. Richardson promoted that measure as only fair to children who had no choice in being raised here, and said that other measures improved public health, like the Department of Health’s cooperation in a health referral service run by the Mexican Consulate for Mexican citizens.

But New Mexico’s patience could be tested, and some fear that the Arizona law will push more illegal immigrants into the state, though they typically go where the most jobs are found.

Steve Wilmeth, a cattle rancher near Las Cruces, 30 miles north of the border, said he had grown frustrated with finding illegal immigrants crossing his property and recalled a harrowing confrontation a couple of years ago with a group of 20 near a watering tank. “SB 1070,” Mr. Wilmeth said, referring to the Arizona law, which he supports, “is a desperate attempt by the people of Arizona to do something about the onslaught they face.”

Violence on the Mexican side of the border — one of the bloodiest cities, Ciudad Juárez, is an hour’s drive from Las Cruces — has heightened anxiety. So, too, has the shooting death of a rancher in southern Arizona near the New Mexico border by someone the police theorize may have been connected to smuggling.

Mr. Richardson responded by sending 35 National Guard troops to the boot-heel area and repeating a call for more help from the federal government.

Border and immigration issues have spilled into political campaigns, but the issue has not topped residents’ concerns, said Brian Sanderoff, a veteran pollster here.

One Republican running in her party’s primary for governor this year, Susana Martinez, a southern New Mexico prosecutor, has filmed a commercial promoting border security and a promise to revoke the law granting driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants and deny taxpayer-supported scholarships to illegal immigrants.

Last year, the mayor of Albuquerque, Richard J. Berry, won office after a campaign that included a vow to give the city police more discretion to check the immigration status of offenders. Five months into office, Mr. Berry has said he is still reviewing the policy.

Mr. Richardson, who believes that illegal immigrants should pay back taxes, learn English and take other steps as a condition of getting legal status, makes no apologies for seeking to integrate them, calling them a net plus for the state.

“I just have always felt that this is part of my heritage,” he said, noting his early years spent in Mexico City. “There is a decided positive in encouraging biculturalism and people working and living together instead of inciting tension. The worry I have about Arizona is it is going to spread. It arouses the nativist instinct in people.”

a very smart, long-term strategy right there. The illegals will eventually pay back to system in the end - typically thru their children. Because of less social tension - this saves New Mexico taxpayers millions of dollars by not having to pay for legal costs, incarceration costs, police costs, etc.
 
so what do you suggest? not pay tax?

My suggestion is to stop voting career politicians in office .. Democrat or Republican. Thoroughly research candidates before you go to the voting booth. Are they really going to defend the Constitution, even if it means their views are "controversial" or are they going to squander hard earned tax payers money (i.e. public schools really suck, police are becoming Judge Dredd Commando Bullies, politicians have a "wide stance" etc. etc. etc.)

Things are FUBAR.

Enforcing the law when it comes to illegals 20 years ago would not have caused the problems today.
 
My suggestion is to stop voting career politicians in office .. Democrat or Republican. Thoroughly research candidates before you go to the voting booth. Are they really going to defend the Constitution, even if it means their views are "controversial" or are they going to squander hard earned tax payers money (i.e. public schools really suck, police are becoming Judge Dredd Commando Bullies, politicians have a "wide stance" etc. etc. etc.)

Things are FUBAR.

Enforcing the law when it comes to illegals 20 years ago would not have caused the problems today.

so what your ideal candidate's background is like?
 
nah ... just a politician dedicated to defending the U.S. Constitution and the rights of U.S. Citizens.

at the expense of Arizona's economy and budget with this misguided agenda as illegal immigration problem is a smokescreen for bigger problem?
 
Many illegal immigrants pay up at tax time
NASHVILLE — The tax system collects its due, even from a class of workers with little likelihood of claiming a refund and no hope of drawing a Social Security check.
Illegal immigrants are paying taxes to Uncle Sam, experts agree. Just how much they pay is hard to determine because the federal government doesn't fully tally it. But the latest figures available indicate it will amount to billions of dollars in federal income, Social Security and Medicare taxes this year. One rough estimate puts the amount of Social Security taxes alone at around $9 billion per year.

Paycheck withholding collects much of the federal tax from illegal workers, just as it does for legal workers.

The Internal Revenue Service doesn't track a worker's immigration status, yet many illegal immigrants fearful of deportation won't risk the government attention that will come from filing a return even if they might qualify for a refund. Economist William Ford of Middle Tennessee State University says there are no firm figures on how many such taxpayers there are.

"The real question is how many of them pay more than they owe. There are undoubtedly hundreds of thousands of people in that situation," Ford said.

But some illegal immigrants choose to file taxes and write a check come April 15, using an alternative to the Social Security number offered by the IRS so it can collect income tax from foreign workers.

"It's a mistake to think that no illegal immigrants pay taxes. They definitely do," said Martha Pantoja, who has been helping Hispanic immigrants this tax season as an IRS-certified volunteer tax preparer for the non-profit Nashville Wealth Building Coalition.

Among those she has assisted is Eric Jimenez, a self-employed handyman who has worked in Nashville for several years. He feels obliged to pay taxes — even though, as Pantoja said, "nothing would happen" to him if he did not.

"I have an idea, a mentality, that to be a good citizen you have to pay taxes," he said. "Also, I'm conscious of the fact that the money we pay in taxes supports the schools and all the public services."

Pantoja said she has helped a number of construction workers who, because they are classified as independent contractors by their employers and have no taxes withheld, owe big tax bills come April. Beyond income tax, they have to pay the full Social Security and Medicare taxes due.

The Social Security Administration estimates that about three-quarters of illegal workers pay taxes that contribute to the overall solvency of Social Security and Medicare.

The agency estimates that for 2005, the last year for which figures are available, about $9 billion in taxes was paid on about $75 billion in wages from people who filed W2 forms with incorrect or mismatched data, which would include illegal immigrants who drew paychecks under fake names and Social Security numbers.

Spokesman Mark Hinkle says Social Security does not know how much of the $9 billion can be attributed to illegal immigrants. The number is certainly not 100%, but a significant portion probably comes from taxes paid by illegal immigrants.

Nine billion dollars sounds like a lot of money, and it is, but it is only about 1.5% of the total $593 billion paid into Social Security in 2005.

The impact on Social Security is significant, though, because most of that money is never claimed by the people who pay it but instead helps cover retirement checks to legal workers.

Federal law prohibits paying Social Security to illegal immigrants, but the administration factors in both legal and illegal immigration when projecting the trust fund's long-term solvency.

This is especially important as the 78 million-member baby boom generation begins to leave the workforce and draw Social Security checks.

"Overall, any type of immigration is a net positive to Social Security. The more people working and paying into the system, the better," Hinkle said. "It does help the system remain solvent."

The Social Security Administration drew from census and Immigration and Customs Enforcement data in 2007 to project the effects of higher and lower immigration patterns.

If net immigration is high at 1.3 million people a year, the SSA's combined trust fund would be exhausted in 2043. But the fund runs out four years earlier if annual net immigration amounts to about half that — 472,500 legal immigrants and 250,000 illegal immigrants.

The Internal Revenue Service doesn't have an estimate of how many illegal immigrants pay income tax.

But one indicator is the 9 million W-2 forms with mismatched names and Social Security numbers it received in 2004. The IRS said the W-2 forms with invalid Social Security numbers reported about $53 billion in wages and about three-fourths of that, $40 billion in wages, had taxes withheld.

The IRS also has been issuing Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers, or ITINs, for 12 years to foreigners without a Social Security number. It's believed that many workers who seek the ITINs are in the country illegally, and the IRS reported that there were 2.5 million tax returns filed with an ITIN in 2004.

In 2006, then IRS Commission Mark Everson told Congress that "many illegal aliens, utilizing ITINs, have been reporting tax liability to the tune of almost $50 billion from 1996 to 2003."

An IRS spokesman said more recent figures aren't available.

The Social Security and Medicare taxes from mismatched W2s for the same period was $41.4 billion, Hinkle said.

That adds up to roughly $90 billion in federal taxes during they eight-year period.

The IRS defends the ITIN system, despite criticism that some illegal immigrants have used it to open bank accounts, get mortgages and establish a record of residency and taxpaying they hope might someday lead to legal status.

"The ITIN program is bringing taxpayers into the system," Everson told Congress.

Ford, of Middle Tennessee State University, said a majority of economists agree that illegal immigrants are a net benefit for the U.S. economy.

He said the tax contributions from illegal immigrants, including sales taxes, property taxes and excise taxes (such as the gas tax), are significant.

He calculates that illegal immigrants contributed $428 billion dollars to the nation's $13.6 trillion gross domestic product in 2006. That number assumes illegal immigrants are 30% less productive than other workers.

"If anything we need more immigrants coming into the country, not less, especially with the baby boomers retiring," he said.

wondering how much some American citizens are evading taxes.....
 
at the expense of Arizona's economy and budget with this misguided agenda as illegal immigration problem is a smokescreen for bigger problem?

That's your prediction. Only time will tell.
 
That's your prediction. Only time will tell.

but what about Virginia's Prince William County example? I've already posted the links that several businesses in Arizona is already facing economical trouble.
 
but what about Virginia's Prince William County example? I've already posted the links that several businesses in Arizona is already facing economical trouble.

From what I gather, Arizona has been facing economical trouble for quite some time. Their economy is having to sustain half a million illegals.

I am sure the most vocal opposition will be from businesses whom employ illegals, but that is just a guess.
 
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