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Politics : Ask Michael Burke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (110899)	1/30/2008 7:50:28 PM
From: Freedom Fighter	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 132070

KT, >Giving rustbelt cos. payoffs for screwing their workers doesn't help us to compete globally or internally.< Like I said, it makes no sense unless the there's a political motivation that outweighs the more apparent economic loss. For example, suppose you give an incentive to move a factory 25 miles to the other side of the Mexican border and lose 500 US jobs. But because of the overall economic stimulus in that Mexican town you prevent 1000 illegals from coming here and crowding our schools, hospitals, filling our jails etc... it may be worth it - especially if there are good alternatives for at least some of the Americans. Here's a fun tale. Yesterday I met an illegal alien from Columbia that was willing to admit to me that they had a Medicaid card and got free health care. When I asked how they got it, the person told me they had a friend that works for Medicaid. Their entire circle of friends (all illegals other than the person at Medicaid) all have Medicaid cards. The person did not know how it was done and wouldn't tell me if there was some kind of payment to get it etc.... I happen to know this person has a cash job (some kind of assistant and in a bar somewhere -pays no taxes) and living expenses that exceed 30K annually. All the friends came here on some kind of travel visa (or something like that) and then just never went home. I have a person very close to me that worked for years and paid taxes all that time. He is now unable to work, has no income, and no prospect of having an income any time soon (probably ever). While working, this person lead an extremely frugal life and was able to accumulate some savings despite an extremely modest income. This person cannot get Medicaid because of his savings and is going to be in a for a real battle for it after he is broke too. Basically, he would be better off if he was an asshole his whole life and blew it all on alcohol, drugs, etc... instead of hoping to take care of himself (either that or become a citizen of Columbia and sneak back in). This highlights an obvious problem. In this case, the program is rewarding illegal and corrupt behavior and punishing efforts to be self sufficient. No shock there. Sounds like a great idea to me....NOT