"US Task Force Urges Sweeping Immigration Reform"

Curious:
The Independent Task Force on Immigration argues that America's immigration system is dysfunctional to the growing detriment of the nation. Task force co-chairman Lee Hamilton, a former Democratic U.S. congressman from Indiana ["who also served as vice chairman of the U.S. 9/11 Commission"], says the United States cannot afford to throw away the many benefits provided by immigration.

"It is vital in an economic sense, to sustain our growth, to give us the skills we need at both the lower end and the higher end of the labor market," said Lee Hamilton. "It is needed because immigrants have been such a driving force in our country over a period of many years. It is needed because the openness of America is one of the great traditions of our country. The benefits of immigration far, far outweigh the disadvantages of it."
The Director of the Task Force is former head of the INS Doris Meissner, who was part of an interesting meeting in Canada recently.

UPDATE: Holy moley! From today's "Gullible or Just a Propagandist" file comes "Think tank lays out plan for immigration overhaul" by Christina Sanchez:
Here's what immigration could look like in the years to come: Social Security cards are replaced with national ID cards that use fingerprints or eyeball scans to identify the cardholder; job applicants are run through a national database that spits out their immigration status; only three types of immigrants are allowed into the country -- temporary, provisional and permanent.

Those and a host of other changes are needed to overhaul an outdated and inefficient immigration system if the country is going to get a handle on its immigration problems, a respected Washington, D.C., think tank said in a report released Wednesday.

The report by the Independent Task Force on Immigration and America's Future, an arm of the Migration Policy Institute...

...The nonpartisan task force, made up of a cross-section of elected officials, businessmen and immigration experts, released 16 recommendations to stave the tide of illegal immigration...

...Other suggestions include establishing a governing body in the executive branch to monitor and recommend changes to legal immigration levels to meet labor market needs; integrating the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in the United States; and setting up a "smart border" that combines technology, equipment and personnel to keep illegal immigrants from crossing...
We really need to get illegal immigration under control through other means so such anti-American, authoritarian measures do not get any traction.

Comments

A lot of "urging" has been going on for a while, but so far it hasn't done much good.