What Would Win Tonight’s GOP Debate: Protective Tariffs and Comprehensive Immigration Reduction

By Paul Streitz

10/11/2011

[See also What’s In A Name? “COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION REDUCTION” vs. “Immigration Moratorium” etc. by Paul Streitz]

The GOP Presidential Debate being held tonight (October 11) is going to be restricted to the economy, apparently by order of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, whose news service is one of the hosts. Rush Limbaugh apparently agrees with this emphasis.[VDARE.com note: Numbers USA is liveblogging.]

And indeed “my campaign is going to create jobs," is the refrain on every politician’s lips. They are all like the magician who has a hat but never seems to pull a rabbit out of it.

The Democrats promised they would "create jobs" through massive government spending and they spent trillions. The result: unemployment went up. The “shovel ready” projects turned out to be so “shovel ready”. The money went to projects already in the pipeline or just supported state and local governments.

The Republicans promise that they will "create jobs" by reducing taxation and government spending. They say this will get American industry to invest trillions in new factories.

But American industry has already invested trillions in new factories. For example, General Electric just invested billions building a new light bulb factory — in China.

The policy of both Republicans and Democrats for the past forty years has been to replace American labor with foreign labor.

First, this has been done by shipping the jobs overseas and having low-wage Chinese, Mexicans, Vietnamese, etc., etc, manufacture products for Americans to consume here.

Corporate profits went up as jobs flew abroad. The globalist corporations made trillions by this labor replacement scheme, while the factories in America became empty hulks. Capital flows to the lowest-wage countries as long as the goods can be imported back to the high wage country, while labor flows to the highest wage countries as long as immigration is allowed.

Second, many workers in the United States have been displaced through massive immigration. Illegal immigration destroyed low-paying jobs in the private sector: construction, landscaping, restaurants replaced their American workers with illegal Hispanics. These workers had the advantages of low wages, no-benefits, no annoying taxes, no unemployment, no workers compensation and no social security taxes.

The U.S. Chamber of Congress cheered this on.

The corporate elite also cheered on the replacement of higher income Americans through massive legal immigration. The Information Technology departments of major corporations are now widely called "Little Indias", as workers from the Punjab on H1-B visas report for duty. Often the American employee is told that he can train his replacement and receive three months pay and benefits, or not train the new employee and be out the door that afternoon.

Welcome to global capitalism.

Also annoying to Americans is to calling their credit card companies and then listening to someone from India, Malaysia or the Philippines take an order or try to straighten out your account.

The question becomes "Who are these politicians creating jobs for? Americans or foreigners?"

The answer to date: new jobs are going to foreigners. They cost less.

Let us assume a politician actually dared to win an election in the face of elite disapproval. What would be the platform?

Overwhelmingly, American workers reject both massive immigration and free trade.

Polls generally are not large enough to differentiate between white-collar workers who have learned at college that free trade and immigration is just fine and blue collar workers who have experienced the loss of jobs, income and the futures of their children.

The following is a poll done among "all Americans." If it were done among only blue collar workers, the numbers would be overwhelming, not just a majority against free trade.

Pew Research Center/Council on Foreign Relations survey conducted by Abt SRBI. April 23-27, 2008.

Here is a platform for the politician that wants to win the 2012 election and sweep 46 of our 50 States:

• A thirty percent protective tariff on all manufactured goods coming into the United States.

No foreign manufactured goods should have any price advantage because of their use of low wage and slave wage labor. Manufactured goods in the United States would have higher prices but the current cost savings most benefits middle and upper class consumers, not working class Americans. A low priced TV at Wal-Mart is not a great deal if you don’t have a job. Blue-collar workers feel few benefits from free trade and experience the pain of jobs sent to China. They do not want to listen to the glorious libertarian theory of all boats rising.

• Enforce internal immigration laws.

Illegal immigration is ultimately an employment problem, not a border control problem. Republican President George Bush stopped the enforcement of immigration employment laws which led to the massive surge of illegal immigrants.

Arrest a few contractors in a local town who are using illegal workers and the problem ends in that town. Arrest a few presidents of fast food companies employing illegals and the laws will be obeyed throughout corporate American.

Illegals walked into this country. They know the route. They can walk back out.

The e-verify program can help. But e-verify was not necessary in earlier years when immigration laws were actually enforced. Arresting a few will discourage the many. I

• Comprehensive Immigration Reduction. (I prefer this term to VDARE.com’s house style “immigration moratorium” for reasons I have explained here).

The overall number of legal immigrants is about 1.2 million a year. This should be reduced to less than 100,000. This was the approximate figure from 1929 until the passage of the infamous Immigration Reform Act of 1965.

Especially onerous is refugee dumping that is promoted by the State Department and immigration activist groups. They pour thousands of immigrants such as the Hmong and Somalis into unsuspecting communities where after six months they go on welfare and never get off.

All special visas for skilled workers should be rescinded. This would include, but not be limited to, the infamous and much abused H1-B visas scheme that is a pipeline from the Punjab into corporate America.

The Democrats cannot offer immigration reduction as a way of "creating jobs". As Dick Morris observed in Behind The Oval Office, they are too tied to the Hispanic and other ethnic lobbies. In the 2008 election, many of their candidates were notably against free trade and a majority won. They may again be against free trade at the Presidential level. (Obama briefly supported the idea in 2008 and was applauded in Ohio; then reneged when he faced Wall Street Supporters.)

The Republicans can easily embrace both positions and sweep the 2012 election. Indeed, before the globalists took over the Republican Party, a protective tariff, not free trade, was the Republican platform

We reaffirm our belief in a protective tariff. The Republican tariff policy has been of the greatest benefit to the country, developing our resources, diversifying our industries, and protecting our workmen against competition with cheaper labor abroad, thus establishing for our wage-earners the American standard of living. (1912 Republican Party Platform)

The Republican presidential candidate who most effectively advocates comprehensive immigration reduction and protective tariffs for American workers cannot be beaten in 2012.

Paul Streitz was a founder of CT Citizens for Immigration Control. He was a Minuteman on the AZ border in 2005. He is the author of America First: Why Americans Must End Free Trade, Stop Outsourcing and Close Our Open Borders.

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