Immigration

Maybe we don't have a serious space problem yet. But we are definitely getting more crowded; it doesn't take a genius to see that. But let's say we have plenty of room right now, to spread out, to have privacy, yadayada. Why would we want to make it worse? Why would we want to be like Bangladesh?? Do we want migrants living in our state and national parks? Because if you think our big cities aren't too crowded, open your eyes. So, where are we going to put millions and millions more people, all entering at the same time?

 

Show proof of their necessity.

 

No one said necessity. Show the necessity of turning them away. I'm sure we are coming from completely different philosophical groundings here: libertarianism (if you want to stop someone from doing something, prove your intervention is necessary) vs authoritarianism (prove liberty is necessary, otherwise the presumption is government intervention).

 

They aren't needed by the American society and would simply be a burden on the society at large. Nice attempt at turn around, but you haven't proven their need in our society, so why should we allow them to enter?

 

Proof of the later claim? The majority of economists disagree.

 

You haven't shown proof of their necessity yet.

 

Necessity wasn't my claim. Try again. Then see if you can come up with proof of your claim.

 

All ideology needs to tempered by practicality. We can't allow everyone who isn't a crook or thug to come here who can book passage. I saw a survey that said 50m people want to immigrate to Canada. Geez, what if it's even 100m for this country?

 

The world is a different place than it was 100 years ago.

 

Ok I’ll to remember that in the future

 

Trump doesn't keep his word.

 

Yes. And?

 

But your claim was that there was no offer. Now you seem to be conceding that there was an offer, but Trump will break his agreement anyway...so you are saying that Democrats should never deal with Trump on any issue ever?

 

There are seven times as many people. We can't take a big fraction of them.

 

Why? We aren't even close to the population density of the countries where overpopulation is an actual problem. Not by a long shot

 

Correct. Any offer from Trump would have to be clearly outlined in writing.

Trump's verbal offers aren't really offers.

If I was a Democrat leader, I'd say that "we're waiting for something in writing."

 

I remember what Los Angeles was like in the 1950s and it's decidedly unpleasant by comparison today. We don't need to be like the UK where 60m people are crowded into a small country. I don't think Americans want to be jammed together like the Brits.

 

Longing memories of the 50s are a poor excuse to limit liberty.

 

Then why should the be here?

 

Immigrants are economically beneficial. Even if they weren't, as long as they are economically neutral/not economically damaging, there is no excuse for barring them. They should be here as long as there is no good reason to prevent them from being here.

 

There's no reason other than our desire to do so to allow non-citizens into the country. The country belongs to U.S. citizens, period.

 

And basic reason. There is no reason to deny non-criminal, hard-working people entry except for knee-jerk and completely irrational xenophobia.

Including the children of immigrants and including naturalized citizens.

 

Often they are, sometimes they're not.

They might be socially damaging. Why should we allow racists or misogynists into the country?

That we may not want them here is reason enough.

 

More often than that, they are.

So now it is about thought crimes?

AKA irrational xenophobia. Good reasons are reason enough. Bad reasons are irrational.

 

How do we know they're "hard-working?"

Anyway, I think setting limits to the numbers of immigrants is a good idea because it costs money to properly integrate them into our society (language lessons, housing, financial help), a concern by some citizens they're competing for their jobs, and a consensus that we don't want to add to many people to our population.

If they're citizens, yes. If they aren't citizens, no. Citizenship is the ticket to the club.