Follow the money on Mayorkas. He used to serve on the board of HIAS, one of the largest human trafficking NGOs. They're all in on it - Democrats get voters, businesses get cheap labor, non-profits get government funding. It's not happening, it's happening a little but it's no big deal, it's happening and it's a good thing, you're racist for complaining.
And those were the kind of immigrants we *should* be welcoming. I knew two of them in Louisville in the late '70s. In Russia she had been an MD and he was a professor of economics. Here they took jobs as an assistant in a chemistry lab and a bank teller -- and were endlessly grateful for their opportunities and loved the US. They also taught me how to make roast duck with kasha and mushrooms. They did not procure the duck from the local park.
I worked for three years for a refugee resettlement agency in NY that was funded by HIAS. My time there was during the waning of Soviet Jewish immigration.
That demographic became the biggest users of welfare in NYC. Every trick in and outside the book was used to get the maximum entitlements possible. The program under which they immigrated provided waivers for people who ordinarily would have been refused entry, including those ill with tuberculosis and a huge proportion of elderly who, once they arrived, went straight onto Medicaid etc.
And a considerable number of those grateful refugees were intensely contemptuous of Americans; they saw us--even their Jewish brethren--as unsophisticated and uncultured. And having been well-trained in distrusting government and its minions, they thought telling the truth was a fools' game.
That's really disappointing. You are able to present 'data' where I really had one anecdote, so I'll defer on that. I hope at least the elderly Jews weren't committing assaults and murders in addition to sucking up public services.
I wonder if the difference might be less the geographic origin or particular background of the immigrants and more if they are allowed to form a 'critical mass' in a particular location vs being a couple of molecules in a solution of mostly long-established citizens. Like a beaker of water can only hold so much salt in suspension.
The elderly Jews were just resource users but--you know they call Brighton Beach "Little Odessa" now and remember when Ukraine was the most corrupt country in Europe before it became Our Sainted Slavic Brotherland?
Well, no -- I had no idea about Brighton Beach. I've spent a lifetime not caring about New York City and I'm not about to start now. And I think maybe that's the pivotal issue here. Immigrant follies used to be concentrated in large, urban, corrupt, mobbed-up port cities. Now we have the technology to flood small midwestern towns with enough newcomers to tip the scales overnight. The only surprising thing about this is that it took so long for people to fight back.
but, but... I was told by people on high that Ukraine is so very different than Russia! Not at all the same people with the same history and religion and language.
It's a bit like marriage, maybe? If a couple marries without both being intent on becoming something new together, they'll always fight over everything, since they're two separate people insisting on having/their/ way.
PS: In the late 1990s my primary care physicians' office was that of two Haitian brothers--one cheery, the other a bit less so, but both of them perfectly competent doctors within the parameters of what one's insurance allows one's healthcare professionals to do for one.
It’s important to remember, though, that your Haitian doctors came in legally, and likely came in on a visa for professionals, which included vetting from their home country, and biometrics here in the US. I am a legal immigrant to the USA, and it took years, lots of annoyingly repetitive paperwork, interviews, a forced medical exam/tests, and lots of “fees“.
That system of legal immigration (limited to qualified candidates only) is in no way similar to the open borders and “Temporary Protected Status” of the Haitian migration we’re seeing today.
At this point the best move is not to play. Unfortunately they really, really hate it when people try and check out of their pyramid scheme. It's necessary for the population to seek methods of avoiding taxation as our own taxes are used to harm us. Either they fix our leadership, or we convert as many individuals as possible from contributing to the public coffers to draining them.
As Americans work harder to get poorer, is it sound policy to allow, and even incentivize, millions of new illegal workers to compete against American citizens in the job market?
This path is totally unsustainable. In the prior era of low rates and monetary repression from the Fed, large deficits seemed manageable. No longer. The costs now of financing this ballooning debt will quite literally impoverish our children.
Incidentally, it is not only against the law for illegals to come into our country, it is also against the law for them to receive most of the handouts but laws don't seem to matter to Democrats nor to sanctuary cities and states.
The hypocrisy is breathtaking, 59 percent of households headed by immigrants — naturalized citizens, legal residents, and illegal immigrants used one or more major welfare program. This compares to 36 percent for U.S. born households.
It's a shame that Democrats routinely block requirements to work for those who are mentally and physically able. They clearly want more people to be dependent on the government because they think it buys them votes.
This economic train-wreck is on purpose as the coming “fundamental transformation” will completely undo over 250 years of representative democracy and free-market capitalism.
We should learn about how ancient Rome suffered death by mass migration.
i think it's useful to consider "types of migration."
migration has been a huge benefit to america, but it need to be the kind of migration that bring people who believe in american values and american dreams. it's really quite easy to do.
1. maintain our status as a free economy and the best place in the world to bring your hard work and good ideas and get rich.
2. do not solicit, subsidize, or otherwise aid this immigration, there must be the "it's hard here and you're going to have to stand on your own two feet" selector.
put those two thinks in place and the rest takes care of itself. the issue is the welfare state. you cannot have a welfare state and open borders and we're really going to need to sort out this "naturized birth" issue that let's anyone who sneaks in hade a child and immediately claim US benefits for that kid.
You would think the left would understand this, but they are either maliciously disingenuous, willfully ignorant, or cognitively challenged. And if our so-called journalists weren't compromised, they should be asking this question of every politician on the left who supports open borders to defend how they square this particular circle.
It was a pretty slick 3 card monte from "we support legal immigration" to "all immigrants, especially low skilled third world illegal immigrants, need to become citizens". Feels like it happened overnight.
Back in the day, the U.S. attracted people with the ability and intestinal fortitude to, despite limited means and circumstances, to cross the oceans, arrive with nearly nothing, and forge a new life in an unknown land.
These are just the sort that one would want as countrymen.
Much of this was made possible by private, mutual support organizations, many based upon ethnicity, that provided assistance to new arrivals, crucially including networks for employment opportunities.
As always and everywhere, State involvement has completely destroyed this virtuous society-building immigration paradigm by creating economic incentives for the worst sort, disincentives for the best, and replacing the support systems, and the standards of support they required (e.g. good faith efforts to find employment, etc.), with a vast array of parasitical NGO's whose very nature is political and primary focus is securing ongoing State funding.
Until this infernal apparatus is dismantled, things will only continue to degrade.
It was interesting to read of the experience of the investigative reporter who tried to look into the Iowa dairy farm of Devin Nunes's relatives that employed illegals.
That uniparty thingy is what's been screwing us over for a very long time now. I've been wondering about the employment status of the workers in that Boar's Head plant that had to permanently shut down and deprive us forever after of liverwurst because the sanitation conditions were so appalling.
There was a rather silly guest essay on another Substack examining the history of Detroit and the tension between older Polish immigrant neighborhoods and Southern blacks brought north in a massive union-busting operation.
Not mentioned in that outraged essay was how in those days it was impossible for blacks to join unions. Every union that enabled working-class men to attain middle-class lifestyles was virulently anti-black.
Titans of industry have always wanted the most docile workforce they can get their hands on, and now that American blacks are seen as too troublesome to bother with for hard jobs of no prestige and little chance for advancement, of course they want to import workers more suited to their requirements.
I was clearly fortunate to have eaten a good batch of Boar's Head liverwurst for last year's Christmas treat.
Even were I still in NY the German butchers' shops are long gone. They are Afghani now, and were a great source for affordable lamb leg. Something lost, something gained etc.
It was the desperate longing for a nice piece of Jewish cornbread (kornbrot) that led me to perfect my magic dough recipe.
I have happy memories of eating out in Hungarian restaurants in Yorkville (Upper East Side NY) when the street was lined with Old World shops of delight.
If the powers that be don't get ahead of this then unjust solutions will emerge. I'm inclined to think this is what reconstruction looked like. Mass migration and criminal activity leads to stereotypes leads to lynch mobs.
FAFO is real and politicial ignorance, incompetence, or egomaniacal negligence creates an environment where organized crime and "fraternal" organizations form to solve problems. Society abhors a power vacuum.
You are correct, this happened in Rome, except then they taxed the provinces to feed and house the mobs in Rome. But just like Rome, when the money runs out there will be hell to pay.
1000%!! How is the disconnect so huge? Rhetorical question by people who smugly assert their superiority and disdain. So many historical echoes in this thread - most clearly don’t recall history, or its tendency to repeat when ignored.
Scott Rasmussen recently did a poll called “The Elite 1%” ( HT Daily Signal) that answers the (rhetorical) question.
The ‘elite’ disconnect from mainstream American society is huge.
They are far, far more liberal than the rest of the population. They feel that they’re ideas are right and should be adopted by society (or imposed if necessary). Even the ‘elite’ Republicans who were surveyed were far more liberal than the rest of the party.
The ‘elites’ also don’t have the regard for the Constitution that we’d expect from our “leaders”. There’s much more….
We instinctively knew this, but it was good to see it confirmed.
Good point about ancient Rome. It was mass migration, mass granting of citizenship to people who just wanted the economic benefits and really didn't give a shit about Rome, and worst of all, filling the Roman army with Germanic mercenaries which ended the Roman Empire.
When my grandparents arrived at Ellis Island in the early 1900s, the Immigration laws required that you pass a physical, have a sponsor, have a job waiting, have a place to live, learn the English language and swear allegiance to our country. Send all illegal invaders back to their home countries and let them do it the right way if they want to come here.
Small Midwest blue state town. The 3 bedroom house on the corner recently rented out now has 11 people leaving the house through the day. Not counting the children or other adults inside. The usual vehicle shuffling is happening because they cannot park on the street after 1 am plus no cars parked on grass allowed so behind the tall wood stockade are more cars. There are ordinances against all this but no enforcement. We got the police called on us for grass clippings in the street in 1989. Ah, for the good old days.
Happens in South Florida too. Exact same thing - a dozen cars and trucks, and a stockade in the back. The real kicker was when they put up a fence across the power companies right of way to store their vehicles. That caused the county to finally step in.
A neighbor put one of those plastic orange neon construction fences up to catch our hated oak leaves. Put it across the sidewalk which is totally stupid. I reported that and it was gone. City is too intimidated to go after the illegals using our services and not paying for them. They did not approve, thankfully, a development that was going to add 500 housing units to our town that already has crumbling streets and never mind the school system burden. And every other burden it brings like Section 8 from Chicago. A few years ago a drug dealer was taken down on our deck after a chase with a policeman holding a Glock to the dealers head. This was a farming community. Not so much anymore.
yes, I believe the US govt is giving states offers they can not refuse.
I live in Loudoun County (yes, THE Loudoun County, 35 miles west of the cesspool)
What you describe was the ordinary living arrangement in Sterling Virginia (ten miles east of us) for at least the past 20 years, but these were not "sponsored illegals" back then.
This is creeping west and now people mind their own business. I do not think you will get a call on the grass clippings anymore. I live in a neighborhood with an "association" that sends you citations for tree branches too low, or shabby looking exterior, crumbling mailbox.... I know the past few years they must have bigger problems because our house is 23 years old, our fence looks horrible, our trees are over grown, and I think one of our garage lights is kaput. We'll wait.
We are having a house built already. We will fix up this house and sell it in February.
We are very fortunate to be able to move out, then call in the fix up team.
I have a long list, certainly the master bath.... and yes, the fence.
I am just surprised, laughing a bit that we have not received any scolding summons.
The fence is crumbling but our property is stellar so I guess no one notices.
Oh, to add: we have already replaced the roof (without being told) and painted the exterior. It is not really very shacky looking yet just that fence 😂
Our house is way too big (the family home with the kiddos and the teen parties etc) This house needs a family. My older son in law wants to buy it but I am discouraging it. They are in Richmond now and the pace is better there. Northern Virginia is, especially Loudoun County, is very very expensive. The property is huge, which means yard work or weekly lawn service, which we have now. I hope you are living happily and comfortably, Janet.
We would have moved earlier but I was caring for my parents in their late 90's up until just over a year ago when dad went to Heaven at age 99.5. He was happy and peppy up to the last day
The amount of stuff from a 58 yr marriage and a husband with expensive hobbies is kind of suffocating me. I’m not fine with it really. But there is little I can do about it. Even the large yard is beyond us now. I’ve started moving some of my things out. I’d have to dispose of 3 motorcycles, a 20 foot camper and lots of technology and his firearm hobby plus photography equipment. All our full bathrooms are upstairs. I feel crushed. An older friend had her husband die suddenly and he was a true hoarder with buildings on the property crammed plus the house and basement and an addition he built himself especially for his hoard overflow. She faced that at nearly 80. Took 2 years to get it cleared enough to sell. I have one daughter 1000 miles away. I wake up at night in a panic sometimes. I figure if we do sell, the 4 bedrooms will hold any number of people quite handily. Won’t give a hoot by then but I may be living in a room somewhere with 1/2 closet and 2 dresser drawers. I work mightily on my health to avoid that kind of hell. He’s the one with all the serious health issues and now cancer.
It always is striking to watch old television shows and movies from the 1930s to even the late 1970s-early-1980s and all you see are native-born, working-class cab drivers, janitors, night watchmen, day labourers, line cooks, gardeners, truck drivers, warehouse workers and other blue-collar jobs that are now, um, "diverse". I mean, would *anyone* on the cast of a rebooted "Taxi" even be a native English-speaker?
I don't think a rebooted "Taxi" will work anyways - unless it is reframed as "UberLyft". Even then, the dialog would happen between software engineers, if at all.
When my sister-in-law moved from northern Virginia to semi-rural Ohio, she called a house cleaning service and requested cleaners who spoke good English. The offended proprietor asked what else she thought they would speak. She was so pleasantly surprised.
of course they would, there'd be the sassy black lady and a they/them trying to find they/themselves plus Elaine now would be an angry feminist fighting the patriarchy....
It's hardly immigration. It's invasion. And the main purpose is destabilization and erasing nations. Same method with all their schemes 'it's good for you' till we realized they're trying to kill us. Jabs, censorship, immigration, climate change. All attacks on us.
It is interesting how the group that screams about the rich paying "their fair share" of taxes, is the same group that doesn't see how millions of non-tax-paying people using public resources could be a problem.
Yes, if they’re going to make the public pay for these very special beneficiaries from the “Covid era“, then there ought to be a special tax on “excess profits“ made by Amazon, zoom etc during that period off the backs of small businesses etc. They did that during the oil crisis in the late 70s.
The big scam in all of this "illegal immigration" is that businesses still get to pay the wages of the early 80's and it works out because we taxpayers get to supplement the whole thing with our hard earned money. Think about it... We pay for their housing, food, and medical, so they don't mind the low wages.
I have become a Milton Friedman fan. Let them come, open the gates, but give them NOTHING. Not one cent of American tax dollars. That incentivizes the workers and winners to come and try to make it, keeps the losers in their home countries, and doesn't import the 3rd world at the cost of our entire way of life.
@ Chris: this statement is spot on "and it works out because we taxpayers get to supplement the whole thing with our hard earned money. Think about it... We pay for their housing, food, and medical, so they don't mind the low wages."
Exactly. Just another abject hypocrisy of the left.
They don't want to pay Americans a living wage to do jobs that they say only illegals will do....yet want mandatory minimum wages....which hurt the very people they claim it would help.
Pretty tough making a living wage if you don't have a job because a biz cant afford to without jacking up prices....
The same people espousing open borders and welfare are pissed that Walmart workers don't get enough hours so that they have to get welfare. Often left unsaid, Walmart workers aren't deserving of welfare.
There was a libertarian thread on twitterX about open v closed borders. I asked, “what would open borders even look like?” Because we don’t have open borders. We have preferentially subsidized indigent inflows of the absolute dregs of the third world. As much as I believe the NIMBYs are clueless and self-absorbed, I’m astounded that the DNC doesn’t recognize the way this is eventually going to come for Nancy’s ice cream fridge. Do they really think destroying American just to own the hicks is going to spare them and their lifestyles? It’s bizarre.
"Do they really think destroying American just to own the hicks is going to spare them and their lifestyles?" of course they do and they're probably right.
People who live at the apex of the social pyramid and who have multiple homes and multiple millions always have ways to evade any negative consequences, including moving to their second homes in Montana, Maine or the Bahamas etc if it comes to that.
And their foot soldiers in LA, NYC etc haven't raised a peep about their streets and parks being flooded by migrants or fentanyl camps, they consider this the price of Progress and/or the fault of that Satan they call "late capitalism", which is always someone else's fault.
There is almost no tangible substitute for the feeling of moral superiority and being a member of the elite, and even if we descend to a real Brazilification with armed guards in every store, they would barely blink.
America is still very rich and powerful and if our ownership and managerial classes have to live in shittier cities and have shittier lives, it's a price they're willing to pay to lock in total power.
"Immigration reform" has been an unfunny joke and indecent euphemism for legitimizing illegals dredged up by Chamber of Commerce Republicans and socialist Democrats for years. We already have numerous tools to control immigration; everyone except Trump has been unwilling to use them. I believe this is one reason that MAGA's appeal is so powerful. RINO's worry about who will maintain their pools and golf courses while Democrats see unlimited new voters. Many of the rest of us are just sick of this crap.
I'm not anti-immigration, but I don't think breaking our laws should be one's first act upon entering the country. My paternal grandfather came to the US legally early in the 20th century. He was a house painter who fathered 8 children, and insisted only English be spoken in their home. He died in his 40's of lead poisoning. My father hit the workforce in his teens, and became the best mechanic I've ever known. I'm grateful he isn't alive to witness what Obama, Biden and Co. have wrought.
Like many Americans, I became familiar with J. D. Vance by reading Hillbilly Elegy. (Skip the movie and read the book; it's wonderful.) It's impossible to square the demonization of him by the Left with the author of that book, or the person in the above interview with Raddatz. He's a more appealing and capable candidate than Trump! No wonder he scares the Hell out of the opposition.
When I was in NZ in 1997, they used the same argument there for their influx of Asians who brought tremendous burdens to their safety net and degradation of their public spaces. "New Zealanders are not willing to do those jobs!" Really? They have been doing them for 150 years without a problem.... huh? I did not buy it. Since then, I have seen the same argument used all over the place, in Europe too.
Later I understood that it was not an argument, but a manipulative strategy. Engaging with it as though it were real, means you lose. These folks are at war with us, and will say anything, even stuff nakedly absurd, to get us to tilt at the windmills while the real action is elsewhere.
If an abuser tells you you are stupid and useless, the way to deal is not to try to convince them they are wrong!!! Step one: realize you are under attack.
Got the same response just last month from a wealthy liberal. She had an illegal immigrant housekeeper. "They do jobs Americans are unwilling to do". My response: "Unwilling to do at the wages you are willing to pay".
Yah... and it occurs to me it may have a lot to do with the absurd system of workplace withholding. Just think how attractive it must be for employers to say, I pay you 10 bucks an hour, you keep 10 bucks an hour. Everybody is sick of the parasitic paperwork.
In the office leasing business, NGO's have taken large sections of office buildings that suffered from the Covid regime. Owners gladly lease to "Non-profits" that hand checks out to immigrants who can't use elevators and regularly clog toilets. The cost of the rent, the checks, and the disruption to building operations is notable at a microscopic level. I wonder what the overall numbers look like for these money laundering operations.
Human trafficking is slavery, and slavery can not exist outside of a system where the government and society enforces it. Slavery is not an economic class, it is a social class that is enforced by social and legal means.
Even during the much hated period of American slavery the costs of maintaining slaves was subsidized to some extent by non-slave holders. The owners and the governments had rules about what industries slaves could work, what they were allowed to do, and had stark controls over importation and manumissions, but the enforcement of laws prohibiting large gatherings, and most telling the fugitive slave laws were pushed onto patrols that were essentially drafted from the community and pushed by law onto other states. Another "unseen" subsidy was the suppression of prices of free labor, which in part can be seen in the prohibition in allowing "leased slaves" from working in manufacturing.
What we have today is state sponsored and encouraged slavery through human trafficking explicitly to suppress labor costs, with direct subsidies of the costs from governments for medical care and housing, indirect subsidies by suppression of wages, and the unseen costs of crime, with the oppression of the people in the communities where the government and NGO's have decided to plonk massive numbers of aliens on our towns to cope with the chaos, crime, fear and shortages.
As a LEGAL immigrant, I especially appreciate this post! I'm tired of being told I'm a racist xenophobe for making the same points you just made. I spent years in the immigration system and have never taken a dime of government (taxpayer) funding. Why are we importing criminals who will never contribute positively to society? It's crazy to me because I and every legal immigrant I know have so much gratitude to be in this country. I know people who have been going through the legal immigration pipeline for years, with no expectation of any welfare handout, and are still waiting, while straight-up criminals are ushered in on the red carpet put down by Mayorkas! Yet, we are (willingly) subjected to the rightful vetting system that a proper immigration system demands, while others scam the asylum system. The ultimate slap in the face is that we citizens and legal immigrants get to pay all the benefits for those who should never have been admitted into the country. Why should I work my ass off to pay for foreign prison gangs to set up shop in the US and terrorize US citizens on our dime?!!!!!
My husband came over from Ireland 26 years ago. At the time my father had to become his sponsor and was responsible for any debts that we defaulted on for the first 10 years! We sure didn't get any handouts! I was called anti immigration by some young thing earlier this year because I said we needed to close the border. Pissed me off something fierce...
As Ron Paul used to say, “if you subsidize something, you get more of it.” That applies to illegal immigration. Who knows if we’d even need a wall if they would just stop subsidizing it.
On the construction issue, it’s interesting to me. I’ve had a lot of different contractors out to our house the past few years. The only American born tradesmen that came were both about 60 years old and both happened to be white (one worked independently, the other had a crew of Hispanic men). All of the others were either Eastern European or from South America. The roofing company I hired, its labor force was Hispanic men in their 20s and 30s and none except the owner spoke English. They did excellent work. The Ukrainian carpenter I hired also did excellent work. It’s interesting to me that American born kids have zero interest in the trades. I was told by a general contractor recently that for every 50 tradesmen retiring, only 8 are replacing them.
I work closely with a lot of contractors in my day job and every single one says they need quality labor.
We’ve got to figure out how to get American kids interested in the trades.
From personal experience I can say that this outcome, this imbalance from up-and-comers, is also a result of the situation following the Great Recession. I worked in the trades then as a young adult, along with a dozen friends. When times got hard the old-timers closed ranks, kept the jobs and the income to their cliques and connections. Us younger workers were the first to get the shaft, or worse, at least a quarter of the time (up from 5% prior) would get completely stiffed on pay. I still remember the gloating smiles on some, inviting you to sue to gain your wages, knowing it to be impossible (I could only afford one meal a day at the time). Training too all but halted, as training equated to "more competition" and was therefore "not in our best interest".
It's no wonder not one of us is in the trades anymore, I too jumped ship ASAP even though my wages were cut nearly in half doing so. If it looks like the trades learner-to-worker pipeline is busted, you can't discount sabotage by those further up the ladder.
"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
Follow the money on Mayorkas. He used to serve on the board of HIAS, one of the largest human trafficking NGOs. They're all in on it - Democrats get voters, businesses get cheap labor, non-profits get government funding. It's not happening, it's happening a little but it's no big deal, it's happening and it's a good thing, you're racist for complaining.
Like the covid jab: it'll protect you from covid, we'll you won't get really sick, at least you're still alive. Shut up and take another shot.
https://substack.com/@cara417477/note/c-72767441?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=4lf9lr
It was under Republican Presidents that emigrating Soviet Jews became HIAS's big business.
And those were the kind of immigrants we *should* be welcoming. I knew two of them in Louisville in the late '70s. In Russia she had been an MD and he was a professor of economics. Here they took jobs as an assistant in a chemistry lab and a bank teller -- and were endlessly grateful for their opportunities and loved the US. They also taught me how to make roast duck with kasha and mushrooms. They did not procure the duck from the local park.
I worked for three years for a refugee resettlement agency in NY that was funded by HIAS. My time there was during the waning of Soviet Jewish immigration.
That demographic became the biggest users of welfare in NYC. Every trick in and outside the book was used to get the maximum entitlements possible. The program under which they immigrated provided waivers for people who ordinarily would have been refused entry, including those ill with tuberculosis and a huge proportion of elderly who, once they arrived, went straight onto Medicaid etc.
And a considerable number of those grateful refugees were intensely contemptuous of Americans; they saw us--even their Jewish brethren--as unsophisticated and uncultured. And having been well-trained in distrusting government and its minions, they thought telling the truth was a fools' game.
That's really disappointing. You are able to present 'data' where I really had one anecdote, so I'll defer on that. I hope at least the elderly Jews weren't committing assaults and murders in addition to sucking up public services.
I wonder if the difference might be less the geographic origin or particular background of the immigrants and more if they are allowed to form a 'critical mass' in a particular location vs being a couple of molecules in a solution of mostly long-established citizens. Like a beaker of water can only hold so much salt in suspension.
The elderly Jews were just resource users but--you know they call Brighton Beach "Little Odessa" now and remember when Ukraine was the most corrupt country in Europe before it became Our Sainted Slavic Brotherland?
Immigrant gangs ye shall always have with you.
Well, no -- I had no idea about Brighton Beach. I've spent a lifetime not caring about New York City and I'm not about to start now. And I think maybe that's the pivotal issue here. Immigrant follies used to be concentrated in large, urban, corrupt, mobbed-up port cities. Now we have the technology to flood small midwestern towns with enough newcomers to tip the scales overnight. The only surprising thing about this is that it took so long for people to fight back.
but, but... I was told by people on high that Ukraine is so very different than Russia! Not at all the same people with the same history and religion and language.
It's a bit like marriage, maybe? If a couple marries without both being intent on becoming something new together, they'll always fight over everything, since they're two separate people insisting on having/their/ way.
sounds like they were ahead of their time, lol
PS: In the late 1990s my primary care physicians' office was that of two Haitian brothers--one cheery, the other a bit less so, but both of them perfectly competent doctors within the parameters of what one's insurance allows one's healthcare professionals to do for one.
It’s important to remember, though, that your Haitian doctors came in legally, and likely came in on a visa for professionals, which included vetting from their home country, and biometrics here in the US. I am a legal immigrant to the USA, and it took years, lots of annoyingly repetitive paperwork, interviews, a forced medical exam/tests, and lots of “fees“.
That system of legal immigration (limited to qualified candidates only) is in no way similar to the open borders and “Temporary Protected Status” of the Haitian migration we’re seeing today.
It would be best not to read into any of my remarks here anything I have not said.
Yeah, this is all Trump’s fault.
I hope that was a joke. If not, please provide at least a little real evidence for your assertion…..
Don't feed the leftist troll.
I know that you’re right, but sometimes it’s hard to resist.
Reading comprehension a challenge for you, kid?
?
What are you questioning?
We are not talking about Soviet Jews, who may well have met the old definition of asylum. If you welcome open borders, just say so, and why.
Is reading comprehension a challenge for you, too?
Yes. Try to improve your ability to communicate with we lesser intellects.
Nothing obliges you to pay attention to my remarks.
What's your point?
At this point the best move is not to play. Unfortunately they really, really hate it when people try and check out of their pyramid scheme. It's necessary for the population to seek methods of avoiding taxation as our own taxes are used to harm us. Either they fix our leadership, or we convert as many individuals as possible from contributing to the public coffers to draining them.
As Americans work harder to get poorer, is it sound policy to allow, and even incentivize, millions of new illegal workers to compete against American citizens in the job market?
This path is totally unsustainable. In the prior era of low rates and monetary repression from the Fed, large deficits seemed manageable. No longer. The costs now of financing this ballooning debt will quite literally impoverish our children.
Incidentally, it is not only against the law for illegals to come into our country, it is also against the law for them to receive most of the handouts but laws don't seem to matter to Democrats nor to sanctuary cities and states.
The hypocrisy is breathtaking, 59 percent of households headed by immigrants — naturalized citizens, legal residents, and illegal immigrants used one or more major welfare program. This compares to 36 percent for U.S. born households.
It's a shame that Democrats routinely block requirements to work for those who are mentally and physically able. They clearly want more people to be dependent on the government because they think it buys them votes.
This economic train-wreck is on purpose as the coming “fundamental transformation” will completely undo over 250 years of representative democracy and free-market capitalism.
We should learn about how ancient Rome suffered death by mass migration.
i think it's useful to consider "types of migration."
migration has been a huge benefit to america, but it need to be the kind of migration that bring people who believe in american values and american dreams. it's really quite easy to do.
1. maintain our status as a free economy and the best place in the world to bring your hard work and good ideas and get rich.
2. do not solicit, subsidize, or otherwise aid this immigration, there must be the "it's hard here and you're going to have to stand on your own two feet" selector.
put those two thinks in place and the rest takes care of itself. the issue is the welfare state. you cannot have a welfare state and open borders and we're really going to need to sort out this "naturized birth" issue that let's anyone who sneaks in hade a child and immediately claim US benefits for that kid.
we agree.
THIS: "you cannot have a welfare state and open borders". spot on
You would think the left would understand this, but they are either maliciously disingenuous, willfully ignorant, or cognitively challenged. And if our so-called journalists weren't compromised, they should be asking this question of every politician on the left who supports open borders to defend how they square this particular circle.
Subsidized immigration.
Anything the government does this to causes costs to go up.
Common sense
Unfortunately it used to be common
It was a pretty slick 3 card monte from "we support legal immigration" to "all immigrants, especially low skilled third world illegal immigrants, need to become citizens". Feels like it happened overnight.
Exactly.
Back in the day, the U.S. attracted people with the ability and intestinal fortitude to, despite limited means and circumstances, to cross the oceans, arrive with nearly nothing, and forge a new life in an unknown land.
These are just the sort that one would want as countrymen.
Much of this was made possible by private, mutual support organizations, many based upon ethnicity, that provided assistance to new arrivals, crucially including networks for employment opportunities.
As always and everywhere, State involvement has completely destroyed this virtuous society-building immigration paradigm by creating economic incentives for the worst sort, disincentives for the best, and replacing the support systems, and the standards of support they required (e.g. good faith efforts to find employment, etc.), with a vast array of parasitical NGO's whose very nature is political and primary focus is securing ongoing State funding.
Until this infernal apparatus is dismantled, things will only continue to degrade.
spot on. very well said.
but, we'd be considered raaaaacist for saying that in public
Don't be silly, Ryan -- we're considered racist for saying it here, too.
Keep saying it … I’m sick of their crap
To paraphrase Tricky Dick Nixon: "We are all racists now".
What surreal and ridiculous times these are.
anything that hurts their grift is racist, xenophobic, or Putin-loving.
anyone with any sense at all knows all of this, yet there is so much easy money for the right people in taxpayer funded human trafficking complex.
It was interesting to read of the experience of the investigative reporter who tried to look into the Iowa dairy farm of Devin Nunes's relatives that employed illegals.
That uniparty thingy is what's been screwing us over for a very long time now. I've been wondering about the employment status of the workers in that Boar's Head plant that had to permanently shut down and deprive us forever after of liverwurst because the sanitation conditions were so appalling.
Agree 100%, SCA
There was a rather silly guest essay on another Substack examining the history of Detroit and the tension between older Polish immigrant neighborhoods and Southern blacks brought north in a massive union-busting operation.
Not mentioned in that outraged essay was how in those days it was impossible for blacks to join unions. Every union that enabled working-class men to attain middle-class lifestyles was virulently anti-black.
Titans of industry have always wanted the most docile workforce they can get their hands on, and now that American blacks are seen as too troublesome to bother with for hard jobs of no prestige and little chance for advancement, of course they want to import workers more suited to their requirements.
I stopped eating Boar's Head products many years ago. Now I get my liverwurst straight from the German butcher shop.
I was clearly fortunate to have eaten a good batch of Boar's Head liverwurst for last year's Christmas treat.
Even were I still in NY the German butchers' shops are long gone. They are Afghani now, and were a great source for affordable lamb leg. Something lost, something gained etc.
True, German butcher shops are getting harder to find, and I have to drive over an hour to find a decent Jewish Deli.
It was the desperate longing for a nice piece of Jewish cornbread (kornbrot) that led me to perfect my magic dough recipe.
I have happy memories of eating out in Hungarian restaurants in Yorkville (Upper East Side NY) when the street was lined with Old World shops of delight.
Sounds heavenly!
that's a long schlep! ; )
If the powers that be don't get ahead of this then unjust solutions will emerge. I'm inclined to think this is what reconstruction looked like. Mass migration and criminal activity leads to stereotypes leads to lynch mobs.
FAFO is real and politicial ignorance, incompetence, or egomaniacal negligence creates an environment where organized crime and "fraternal" organizations form to solve problems. Society abhors a power vacuum.
You are correct, this happened in Rome, except then they taxed the provinces to feed and house the mobs in Rome. But just like Rome, when the money runs out there will be hell to pay.
1000%!! How is the disconnect so huge? Rhetorical question by people who smugly assert their superiority and disdain. So many historical echoes in this thread - most clearly don’t recall history, or its tendency to repeat when ignored.
Scott Rasmussen recently did a poll called “The Elite 1%” ( HT Daily Signal) that answers the (rhetorical) question.
The ‘elite’ disconnect from mainstream American society is huge.
They are far, far more liberal than the rest of the population. They feel that they’re ideas are right and should be adopted by society (or imposed if necessary). Even the ‘elite’ Republicans who were surveyed were far more liberal than the rest of the party.
The ‘elites’ also don’t have the regard for the Constitution that we’d expect from our “leaders”. There’s much more….
We instinctively knew this, but it was good to see it confirmed.
Bingo.
Well said. Tighter than a bulls ass at fly time.
Exactly.
There are only two laws of history:
1. The Law of Unintended Consequences
2. Histories most important and enigmatic lesson; people forget history.
I've said it before, but those who don't learn history (or are taught false history), neither have a "future"........or a past.
"To be ignorant of history is to remain always a child."
~ Marcus Tullius Cicero, De Oratore, II, c. 80 B. C.
We are ruled by children.
All part of the replacement theory that was roundly criticized as raaaaacist & white supremacy conspiracy theory but now proven to be true
It's the Replacement and Destabilizing plan.
it's so obvious, right?!
Bill Clinton admitted it yesterday while campaigning for Harris.
The more the other side screams “raaaacist”, “safe & effective” & all the rest, you know the “conspiracy theories” are true
I saw this today from 2005 Pelosi speaking to responsible immigration laws and borders. My my my how far the left has fallen
https://x.com/mazemoore/status/1845626677616885777
Good point about ancient Rome. It was mass migration, mass granting of citizenship to people who just wanted the economic benefits and really didn't give a shit about Rome, and worst of all, filling the Roman army with Germanic mercenaries which ended the Roman Empire.
When my grandparents arrived at Ellis Island in the early 1900s, the Immigration laws required that you pass a physical, have a sponsor, have a job waiting, have a place to live, learn the English language and swear allegiance to our country. Send all illegal invaders back to their home countries and let them do it the right way if they want to come here.
yes. My parents came to the US from Holland after WW2.
Dad already had a job with an accounting company in Holland that had an office in NY
Small Midwest blue state town. The 3 bedroom house on the corner recently rented out now has 11 people leaving the house through the day. Not counting the children or other adults inside. The usual vehicle shuffling is happening because they cannot park on the street after 1 am plus no cars parked on grass allowed so behind the tall wood stockade are more cars. There are ordinances against all this but no enforcement. We got the police called on us for grass clippings in the street in 1989. Ah, for the good old days.
Happens in South Florida too. Exact same thing - a dozen cars and trucks, and a stockade in the back. The real kicker was when they put up a fence across the power companies right of way to store their vehicles. That caused the county to finally step in.
A neighbor put one of those plastic orange neon construction fences up to catch our hated oak leaves. Put it across the sidewalk which is totally stupid. I reported that and it was gone. City is too intimidated to go after the illegals using our services and not paying for them. They did not approve, thankfully, a development that was going to add 500 housing units to our town that already has crumbling streets and never mind the school system burden. And every other burden it brings like Section 8 from Chicago. A few years ago a drug dealer was taken down on our deck after a chase with a policeman holding a Glock to the dealers head. This was a farming community. Not so much anymore.
yes, I believe the US govt is giving states offers they can not refuse.
I live in Loudoun County (yes, THE Loudoun County, 35 miles west of the cesspool)
What you describe was the ordinary living arrangement in Sterling Virginia (ten miles east of us) for at least the past 20 years, but these were not "sponsored illegals" back then.
This is creeping west and now people mind their own business. I do not think you will get a call on the grass clippings anymore. I live in a neighborhood with an "association" that sends you citations for tree branches too low, or shabby looking exterior, crumbling mailbox.... I know the past few years they must have bigger problems because our house is 23 years old, our fence looks horrible, our trees are over grown, and I think one of our garage lights is kaput. We'll wait.
Maybe you should spruce up the house, sell it, and move further west.
we are.
We are having a house built already. We will fix up this house and sell it in February.
We are very fortunate to be able to move out, then call in the fix up team.
I have a long list, certainly the master bath.... and yes, the fence.
I am just surprised, laughing a bit that we have not received any scolding summons.
The fence is crumbling but our property is stellar so I guess no one notices.
Oh, to add: we have already replaced the roof (without being told) and painted the exterior. It is not really very shacky looking yet just that fence 😂
We’re in our late 70’s. We are stuck here until one of us leaves the house for good.
I hope you are very content about that.
Our house is way too big (the family home with the kiddos and the teen parties etc) This house needs a family. My older son in law wants to buy it but I am discouraging it. They are in Richmond now and the pace is better there. Northern Virginia is, especially Loudoun County, is very very expensive. The property is huge, which means yard work or weekly lawn service, which we have now. I hope you are living happily and comfortably, Janet.
We would have moved earlier but I was caring for my parents in their late 90's up until just over a year ago when dad went to Heaven at age 99.5. He was happy and peppy up to the last day
The amount of stuff from a 58 yr marriage and a husband with expensive hobbies is kind of suffocating me. I’m not fine with it really. But there is little I can do about it. Even the large yard is beyond us now. I’ve started moving some of my things out. I’d have to dispose of 3 motorcycles, a 20 foot camper and lots of technology and his firearm hobby plus photography equipment. All our full bathrooms are upstairs. I feel crushed. An older friend had her husband die suddenly and he was a true hoarder with buildings on the property crammed plus the house and basement and an addition he built himself especially for his hoard overflow. She faced that at nearly 80. Took 2 years to get it cleared enough to sell. I have one daughter 1000 miles away. I wake up at night in a panic sometimes. I figure if we do sell, the 4 bedrooms will hold any number of people quite handily. Won’t give a hoot by then but I may be living in a room somewhere with 1/2 closet and 2 dresser drawers. I work mightily on my health to avoid that kind of hell. He’s the one with all the serious health issues and now cancer.
Fenbendizol… please research… Tippon’s protocol… ivermectin…
🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
I told him I would find a way to haunt him from the living side if I’m left with this. LOL.
Can we put Thomas Sowell in a Time Machine and have him train with Mike Tyson, and then kick Krugman in the balls?
These woketards ADORE Krugman and have no idea who Sowell is. Uuugghhhhj
I tend to confuse Krugman with Krauthammer. Both are detestable Termites.
"she does not know anyone like that"
It always is striking to watch old television shows and movies from the 1930s to even the late 1970s-early-1980s and all you see are native-born, working-class cab drivers, janitors, night watchmen, day labourers, line cooks, gardeners, truck drivers, warehouse workers and other blue-collar jobs that are now, um, "diverse". I mean, would *anyone* on the cast of a rebooted "Taxi" even be a native English-speaker?
I don't think a rebooted "Taxi" will work anyways - unless it is reframed as "UberLyft". Even then, the dialog would happen between software engineers, if at all.
When my sister-in-law moved from northern Virginia to semi-rural Ohio, she called a house cleaning service and requested cleaners who spoke good English. The offended proprietor asked what else she thought they would speak. She was so pleasantly surprised.
Old TV shows and movies did not show what was true in the real world. Most of those jobs were "diverse."
Yes they did, the “diverse” just rarely had speaking roles.
of course they would, there'd be the sassy black lady and a they/them trying to find they/themselves plus Elaine now would be an angry feminist fighting the patriarchy....
representation matters!
It's hardly immigration. It's invasion. And the main purpose is destabilization and erasing nations. Same method with all their schemes 'it's good for you' till we realized they're trying to kill us. Jabs, censorship, immigration, climate change. All attacks on us.
nailed it
"Invasion" - and "erasing nations" - "All attacks on us." - exactly!
It is interesting how the group that screams about the rich paying "their fair share" of taxes, is the same group that doesn't see how millions of non-tax-paying people using public resources could be a problem.
Yes, if they’re going to make the public pay for these very special beneficiaries from the “Covid era“, then there ought to be a special tax on “excess profits“ made by Amazon, zoom etc during that period off the backs of small businesses etc. They did that during the oil crisis in the late 70s.
The big scam in all of this "illegal immigration" is that businesses still get to pay the wages of the early 80's and it works out because we taxpayers get to supplement the whole thing with our hard earned money. Think about it... We pay for their housing, food, and medical, so they don't mind the low wages.
I have become a Milton Friedman fan. Let them come, open the gates, but give them NOTHING. Not one cent of American tax dollars. That incentivizes the workers and winners to come and try to make it, keeps the losers in their home countries, and doesn't import the 3rd world at the cost of our entire way of life.
@ Chris: this statement is spot on "and it works out because we taxpayers get to supplement the whole thing with our hard earned money. Think about it... We pay for their housing, food, and medical, so they don't mind the low wages."
Often, we're paying part of their wages, too!
Exactly. Just another abject hypocrisy of the left.
They don't want to pay Americans a living wage to do jobs that they say only illegals will do....yet want mandatory minimum wages....which hurt the very people they claim it would help.
Pretty tough making a living wage if you don't have a job because a biz cant afford to without jacking up prices....
The same people espousing open borders and welfare are pissed that Walmart workers don't get enough hours so that they have to get welfare. Often left unsaid, Walmart workers aren't deserving of welfare.
This might work in a society where people wouldn't blow your brains out for your ham sandwich
There was a libertarian thread on twitterX about open v closed borders. I asked, “what would open borders even look like?” Because we don’t have open borders. We have preferentially subsidized indigent inflows of the absolute dregs of the third world. As much as I believe the NIMBYs are clueless and self-absorbed, I’m astounded that the DNC doesn’t recognize the way this is eventually going to come for Nancy’s ice cream fridge. Do they really think destroying American just to own the hicks is going to spare them and their lifestyles? It’s bizarre.
If anybody cares, I wrote a libertarian case for closing borders last year.
https://simulationcommander.substack.com/p/if-borders-are-imaginary-why-should
"Do they really think destroying American just to own the hicks is going to spare them and their lifestyles?" of course they do and they're probably right.
People who live at the apex of the social pyramid and who have multiple homes and multiple millions always have ways to evade any negative consequences, including moving to their second homes in Montana, Maine or the Bahamas etc if it comes to that.
And their foot soldiers in LA, NYC etc haven't raised a peep about their streets and parks being flooded by migrants or fentanyl camps, they consider this the price of Progress and/or the fault of that Satan they call "late capitalism", which is always someone else's fault.
There is almost no tangible substitute for the feeling of moral superiority and being a member of the elite, and even if we descend to a real Brazilification with armed guards in every store, they would barely blink.
America is still very rich and powerful and if our ownership and managerial classes have to live in shittier cities and have shittier lives, it's a price they're willing to pay to lock in total power.
"Immigration reform" has been an unfunny joke and indecent euphemism for legitimizing illegals dredged up by Chamber of Commerce Republicans and socialist Democrats for years. We already have numerous tools to control immigration; everyone except Trump has been unwilling to use them. I believe this is one reason that MAGA's appeal is so powerful. RINO's worry about who will maintain their pools and golf courses while Democrats see unlimited new voters. Many of the rest of us are just sick of this crap.
I'm not anti-immigration, but I don't think breaking our laws should be one's first act upon entering the country. My paternal grandfather came to the US legally early in the 20th century. He was a house painter who fathered 8 children, and insisted only English be spoken in their home. He died in his 40's of lead poisoning. My father hit the workforce in his teens, and became the best mechanic I've ever known. I'm grateful he isn't alive to witness what Obama, Biden and Co. have wrought.
Like many Americans, I became familiar with J. D. Vance by reading Hillbilly Elegy. (Skip the movie and read the book; it's wonderful.) It's impossible to square the demonization of him by the Left with the author of that book, or the person in the above interview with Raddatz. He's a more appealing and capable candidate than Trump! No wonder he scares the Hell out of the opposition.
the left loved him until they hated him
When I was in NZ in 1997, they used the same argument there for their influx of Asians who brought tremendous burdens to their safety net and degradation of their public spaces. "New Zealanders are not willing to do those jobs!" Really? They have been doing them for 150 years without a problem.... huh? I did not buy it. Since then, I have seen the same argument used all over the place, in Europe too.
Later I understood that it was not an argument, but a manipulative strategy. Engaging with it as though it were real, means you lose. These folks are at war with us, and will say anything, even stuff nakedly absurd, to get us to tilt at the windmills while the real action is elsewhere.
If an abuser tells you you are stupid and useless, the way to deal is not to try to convince them they are wrong!!! Step one: realize you are under attack.
Got the same response just last month from a wealthy liberal. She had an illegal immigrant housekeeper. "They do jobs Americans are unwilling to do". My response: "Unwilling to do at the wages you are willing to pay".
Yah... and it occurs to me it may have a lot to do with the absurd system of workplace withholding. Just think how attractive it must be for employers to say, I pay you 10 bucks an hour, you keep 10 bucks an hour. Everybody is sick of the parasitic paperwork.
nice. The guy across the street had his house robbed by one of those illegal housekeepers two years ago.
In the office leasing business, NGO's have taken large sections of office buildings that suffered from the Covid regime. Owners gladly lease to "Non-profits" that hand checks out to immigrants who can't use elevators and regularly clog toilets. The cost of the rent, the checks, and the disruption to building operations is notable at a microscopic level. I wonder what the overall numbers look like for these money laundering operations.
Human trafficking is slavery, and slavery can not exist outside of a system where the government and society enforces it. Slavery is not an economic class, it is a social class that is enforced by social and legal means.
Even during the much hated period of American slavery the costs of maintaining slaves was subsidized to some extent by non-slave holders. The owners and the governments had rules about what industries slaves could work, what they were allowed to do, and had stark controls over importation and manumissions, but the enforcement of laws prohibiting large gatherings, and most telling the fugitive slave laws were pushed onto patrols that were essentially drafted from the community and pushed by law onto other states. Another "unseen" subsidy was the suppression of prices of free labor, which in part can be seen in the prohibition in allowing "leased slaves" from working in manufacturing.
What we have today is state sponsored and encouraged slavery through human trafficking explicitly to suppress labor costs, with direct subsidies of the costs from governments for medical care and housing, indirect subsidies by suppression of wages, and the unseen costs of crime, with the oppression of the people in the communities where the government and NGO's have decided to plonk massive numbers of aliens on our towns to cope with the chaos, crime, fear and shortages.
I just learned a new word: manumissions
Thank you.
As a LEGAL immigrant, I especially appreciate this post! I'm tired of being told I'm a racist xenophobe for making the same points you just made. I spent years in the immigration system and have never taken a dime of government (taxpayer) funding. Why are we importing criminals who will never contribute positively to society? It's crazy to me because I and every legal immigrant I know have so much gratitude to be in this country. I know people who have been going through the legal immigration pipeline for years, with no expectation of any welfare handout, and are still waiting, while straight-up criminals are ushered in on the red carpet put down by Mayorkas! Yet, we are (willingly) subjected to the rightful vetting system that a proper immigration system demands, while others scam the asylum system. The ultimate slap in the face is that we citizens and legal immigrants get to pay all the benefits for those who should never have been admitted into the country. Why should I work my ass off to pay for foreign prison gangs to set up shop in the US and terrorize US citizens on our dime?!!!!!
My husband came over from Ireland 26 years ago. At the time my father had to become his sponsor and was responsible for any debts that we defaulted on for the first 10 years! We sure didn't get any handouts! I was called anti immigration by some young thing earlier this year because I said we needed to close the border. Pissed me off something fierce...
🎯
As Ron Paul used to say, “if you subsidize something, you get more of it.” That applies to illegal immigration. Who knows if we’d even need a wall if they would just stop subsidizing it.
On the construction issue, it’s interesting to me. I’ve had a lot of different contractors out to our house the past few years. The only American born tradesmen that came were both about 60 years old and both happened to be white (one worked independently, the other had a crew of Hispanic men). All of the others were either Eastern European or from South America. The roofing company I hired, its labor force was Hispanic men in their 20s and 30s and none except the owner spoke English. They did excellent work. The Ukrainian carpenter I hired also did excellent work. It’s interesting to me that American born kids have zero interest in the trades. I was told by a general contractor recently that for every 50 tradesmen retiring, only 8 are replacing them.
I work closely with a lot of contractors in my day job and every single one says they need quality labor.
We’ve got to figure out how to get American kids interested in the trades.
From personal experience I can say that this outcome, this imbalance from up-and-comers, is also a result of the situation following the Great Recession. I worked in the trades then as a young adult, along with a dozen friends. When times got hard the old-timers closed ranks, kept the jobs and the income to their cliques and connections. Us younger workers were the first to get the shaft, or worse, at least a quarter of the time (up from 5% prior) would get completely stiffed on pay. I still remember the gloating smiles on some, inviting you to sue to gain your wages, knowing it to be impossible (I could only afford one meal a day at the time). Training too all but halted, as training equated to "more competition" and was therefore "not in our best interest".
It's no wonder not one of us is in the trades anymore, I too jumped ship ASAP even though my wages were cut nearly in half doing so. If it looks like the trades learner-to-worker pipeline is busted, you can't discount sabotage by those further up the ladder.
Spot on.
"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
- The Gipper