Reply #99: I agree with this more than you realize, but... [View All]

[lumberjack_jeff]

1) Unless the government is willing to pass a law forbidding medical providers from treating illegals with a medical emergency, refusing to pay for that treatment via medicaid just transfers the cost to citizens in a different way. In that sense the law in the OP is pointless, and yes, punitive.
2) Anyone who is born here is a citizen. I thought I said that. Children who's parents commit crimes go into foster care. Tragic? Yes. A better solution would be to prevent their parents from committing that crime.
3) Having lived through the last 25 years of Republican indignities (I'm old enough to remember that this country wasn't always like this) I'm willing to do what it takes to get them the fuck gone. One requirement is convincing voters that we represent them better.
4) This isn't a shiny object for the Republicans, it's brilliant tactics, actually. They want that cheap workforce, but they don't want to say it too loudly. Their tactic is to give amnesty (or guest worker status, or whatever) to illegals to provide that workforce, while using our public, heartfelt compassion as a wedge to divide us from the working class citizens we should be representing. ("It's all those bleeding heart liberals who passed this bill, I did what I could voters-of-my-district, but I'm sorry, the power of the liberal establishment is just too strong. Re-elect me and I'll try to get your jobs back")

We need those votes, and I'm surprised we're falling... nay, leaping, into this trap.