Bush Right, Democrats Wrong, on Immigration and Free Trade
by tdaxp ~ April 8th, 2008
Homeland Security (which is under President Bush’s control) extends the work permit of foreigners who graduate from American universities with Master or Doctoral degrees from 12 to 19 months.
Congress has not acted to increase the H1-B limit, meaning perhaps 100,000 high-skilled workers will be turned away, leading to a large loss of human capital and moving high-skill industries away from the United States. In spite of this, Bush’s USCIS will accept as many applicants as possible — even perhaps exceeding the Congressional cap.
As the Asia Times writes:
In any case, the AFL/CIO and its cheerleaders among the Democrats in Congress appear to have found a way to kill even bilateral trade agreements, by demanding US levels of union protections, benefits and environmental restrictions in the relatively poor countries with which they are generally negotiated. A world full of bilateral trade agreements is not flat but mildly bumpy; a world in which even these have become impossible requires serious landscaping.
The issues are too important to trust the Democrats with the Presidency.
Vote John McCain.
The New York Times uses top 1% of income, not wealth. From the legend:...
April 8th, 2008 at 5:41 pm
Aside from Iraq…. the more the Democrats act like this on important issues… the more it tempts one to wish for a McCain presidency in spite of Iraq.
What are the odds Obama would run to the right of McCain on immigration if he feels he won’t gain any ground with Latinos and aims for more of the white male vote instead? I ask this understanding that some Latinos seem to not vote based on the immigration issue, so its not as cut and dry as it could seem.
Also, does it not seem that big labor is putting everything it has in this election as if it was the last hoorah? Especially with McCain taking a “tell it like is” tack with workers about job security and education, his election could be a death knell to union regeneration in much of the country as he focuses on individuals, innovation and small business, contrary to all their tenets.
April 9th, 2008 at 11:09 am
Eddie,
My support for continuing the Iraq War comes largely from the desire to complete the COIN cycle [1] – to provide the military with the institutional & human knowledge it needs to win this sort of trouble.
Obviously, if one views COIN capacity is not a core need of the military, one’s judgment on Iraq may differ.
It would be interesting if Obama goes nativist with respect to domestic labor in the same way he’s endorsing nativist restrictions as it applies to foreign labor.
Agreed on the importance of this election to unions.
[1] http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2008/03/28/the-coin-cycle.html
April 11th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
As commented previously, I doubt COIN WRT the mil-industrial complex, as I see the USAF & USN will just shove the Army aside more and more for funding as their weapons systems cost much more but add jobs in key congressional districts, whereas a complex (perhaps your Sys-Admin-Industrial complex) with COIN as a key instrument would seem to be a far different beast that would threaten far too many people in power.
Its worth exploring though.
I think Obama will go nativist… honestly, if he can’t get more Hispanic votes, what does he have to lose if polling shows it could up his white male vote if he goes hard-line (or to the right of McCain at least) on it? The antipathy between blacks and Hispanics at the voting box is not as monolithic as suggested by some, but it does exist to a degree that it probably wouldn’t hurt him too badly.
The more I see and hear, the less I am enthused with any of them. McCain’s honor may trump Obama’s change for me though.
April 11th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Btw, why can’t DHS just go from 19 months to 2 or even 4 years for these highly educated workers? Legally, what could Congress do about it?
As a bone to the Dems, Bush could push for an advanced grant program to support American citizens to earn their Masters & PHD’s, especially those with children who have enormous costs because of the AMT and what-not?
I do guess that tends to be Bush’s problem with governance that McCain won’t have in the White House, McCain seemingly is skilled at difficult coalition building (Gang of 14, immigration reform, campaign-finance) whereas Bush sometimes does not understand the need to play small ball with various factions.
Its a skill HRC & Obama have not shown in the Senate, though Obama seemingly did it in the Illinois legislature.
April 11th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Eddie,
Great comments!
On COIN, agreed it’s a hard task. Do you have any comments for how the British SysAdmin Industrial Complex was run?
It will beinteresting to see what Obama does on immigration.
I’m not sure how OPT regulations are limited by law. Clearly the extension for science + technology graduates was done as a way around the H1B limit. Still, unless the H1B limit is actually raised, it will just baloon the number of rejections in two years or so.
The solution for too-high taxes would seem to be to lower the taxes. Agreed that college is expensive and it’s in the country’s interest to have an educated workforce.
Agreed that McCain’s skill at impromptu coalition has been something else. Really can’t think of a similar workhouse, other than Lieberman (who burned bridges with his party even more deeply than Mac did so with his own).