Okay, what can we realistically expect from a Trump presidency?

[Ben Kenobi]

Ben, you're lucky Colorado river drains (used to drain) into the ocean, it's just as ****ed up as Amu Darya is.

Yeah, California is terrible with water management, but even they are better than the Soviets. I think you ended up having water losses of 70 percent with your irrigation for cotton along Amu and Syr Darya. Can't blame the Americans for that.

[kentonio]

If you came to the United States, you would not think so.

This is a stupid argument. It's like saying 'well you might be well fed, safe and happy, but I have caviar fed to me on a golden platter by a team of nymphs. Oh and we throw the platter away each time so it's never used again'. Yes, the US might have a higher standard of consumption than Russia, but that doesn't mean Russians lives aren't perfectly good as they are (Caveat, I'm not Russian and I've never been to Russia, so I have no idea how good their lives are).

In the west we live incredibly wasteful consumptive lives. That isn't going to be sustainable forever, and when it ends we're likely to be the ones whining not the people who always lived with moderation.

[Grandpa Troll]

So, you are saying that no one can know, but then later that you know due to anecdotal evidence? Take a look at this: http://www.pewhispanic.org/2015/03/2...grant-workers/

Forgive me for not properly explaining what my thoughts were: We have no idea how many undocumented persons are in the USA, I believe we should all be able to agree upon that, hopefully. When I am speaking of seeing jobs gone over the last 5 - 10 years and no it has not changed in my area of the country, that Hispanic crews have 1) cut the price of doing construction work and 2) extort a fee from those undocumented workers on their crews, "pay to play" if you will. Ok, how in the world would I know that? God forbid someone trust a person who works in the real world versus a study on the internet, but here goes:

I know many concrete contractors (persons who prepare, purchase,place and finish ready mix concrete) this is known as Turn-Key Contracting. Ok so a non-Hispanic crew does the same job as an Hispanic crew WITH Undocumented Labor, the crew doing things legally have a certified payroll turned in assuring they are paid "X" dollars an hour and have to have documented STA's done each morning and turned in to meet Federal OSHA Guidelines for Safety Training on these projects. They have their Labor rate cut by 33-35 % by crews who say they have documented workers, be it naturalized citizens, temporarily work VISA'd or any other legal way. Now they (The Hispanic crew shows up with what is supposed to be 10 workers but have actually 7, then later in morning more show up, post safety inspection, part timers if you will. ) Now how could I possibly get this information, not that I have been doing this 31 years and know from bidding work with different crews that the Hispanic crew took the job for the GC, saved them over 30 % labor costs, which makes them very competitive at bid time, no one does a lot of searching. Meanwhile the crews (including legally vetted Hispanic,African American and Caucasian crews) have an extremely hard time competing.

Of course I must be deriving this from fantasy, but no just last year the Federal Govt did a crackdown and busted a large group who were falsifying documentation to gain entry. They were passing Contractor ID's back and forth, you see, they check inbound traffic only, no onboard traffic or exiting traffic. Remember I brought up about the mid morning arrivals, yeah they were caught using the early morning arrivals, for entry into these Federal Installations.

Now it is getting tighter and tighter to gain access and progress is being made on removal of undocumented Federal construction workers.

The problem exists however off base, as no one checks on their status. Ok so how could I know this? Again one day a crew is full then get spooked and disappear, we have to cancel our deliveries until they can reform in sufficient numbers.

From that report, it would appear the problem in construction work was getting better on its own:

Somewhat but not their yet, I could not speak for anywhere but eastern North Carolina and assure you it is very evident of extremely cheap labor undercutting people who have to provide a very competitive wage,benefits and work backlog in order to maintain a future for their company.

Again hope this explain where I derived my thoughts from, and no have no fancy studies to point or use in debate. I am not disagreeing that it may in other areas of the country better but not that much better here yet.

Gramps

[Grandpa Troll]

Doing a job isn't a drain on society. Jesus.

My point is if an undocumented worker does it, get paid money under the table and sends most home to their home country why yes it is money not being spent here while being earned here, praise Jesus indeed!

[giblets]

If they send dollars to their home country, those dollars will probably be spent on American exports. If they aren't spent on American exports and the dollars never come back, then we received someone's labor in exchange for pieces of paper.

[Ben Kenobi]

This is a stupid argument. It's like saying 'well you might be well fed, safe and happy, but I have caviar fed to me on a golden platter by a team of nymphs. Oh and we throw the platter away each time so it's never used again'. Yes, the US might have a higher standard of consumption than Russia, but that doesn't mean Russians lives aren't perfectly good as they are (Caveat, I'm not Russian and I've never been to Russia, so I have no idea how good their lives are).

It's a stupid argument because you don't know Russians. Every Russian that I have met coming off the boat has commented that they had no idea what America was actually like until they came.

It's also a stupid argument, because you're not an immigrant to America. America is awesome compared to Canada let alone Russia.

In the west we live incredibly wasteful consumptive lives. That isn't going to be sustainable forever, and when it ends we're likely to be the ones whining not the people who always lived with moderation.

Actually, most of the pollution isn't coming from the west anymore.

[Uncle Sparky]

John- (writing Revelations) So the End is signaled by trumpets?
God- Trump/Pence.
John- Right. Trumpets
God- Fine. They'll know...

[Proteus_MST]

How embarrassing:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/people-arrested-portland-trump-protests-didn-vote-article-1.2874408

AT the moment there are several ANti-Trump protests running ... some of them rather violent.

At a violent protest in Portland, ~120 poeople had been arrested.
A private TV station made the effort to check the names provided by the police wqith the voting registers and found out that more than 60% of the protesters didn't even vote
Reminds me of Brexit, where the victory of the Pro-Brexit movement can, to a large part, attributed to young people (who had a lot of interest in being against Brexit) not voting

(On a sidenote ... is it actually legal in the US that police just gives out names of arrested people to reporters ... and that said reporters can just search for names in voting registers?)

[kentonio]

It's a stupid argument because you don't know Russians. Every Russian that I have met coming off the boat has commented that they had no idea what America was actually like until they came.

It's also a stupid argument, because you're not an immigrant to America. America is awesome compared to Canada let alone.

You don't have to be an immigrant to know what a country is like. America is great fun and I could very easily (and already kind of have) fallen in love with the dine out food, but the store stuff isn't a million miles away from the U.K., and there's a lot more sugar heavy trash on sale. Good country but very consumption based, in a way that Scandinavia for instance shows you up on. Over there the normal working person has a much healthier and happier live without feeling like that needs to be based on a constant influx of pointless purchases. You can't call any one country or region just 'better' than the others, but how much random **** you can buy certainly isn't a measure of greatness.

[Dinner]

Ben, you're lucky Colorado river drains (used to drain) into the ocean, it's just as ****ed up as Amu Darya is.

That is mostly Mexico's fault as the US always provides more water than the treaty requires but Mexico diverts it all so none reaches the sea.

[Dinner]

How embarrassing:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/people-arrested-portland-trump-protests-didn-vote-article-1.2874408

AT the moment there are several ANti-Trump protests running ... some of them rather violent.

At a violent protest in Portland, ~120 poeople had been arrested.
A private TV station made the effort to check the names provided by the police wqith the voting registers and found out that more than 60% of the protesters didn't even vote
Reminds me of Brexit, where the victory of the Pro-Brexit movement can, to a large part, attributed to young people (who had a lot of interest in being against Brexit) not voting

(On a sidenote ... is it actually legal in the US that police just gives out names of arrested people to reporters ... and that said reporters can just search for names in voting registers?)

Those are both matters of public record.

[Proteus_MST]

Those are both matters of public record.

Fascinating ... I would have assumed that at least the voting registers would/should be subject to some kind of privacy protection

[Ben Kenobi]

You can't call any one country or region just 'better' than the others, but how much random **** you can buy certainly isn't a measure of greatness.

Personally, it's the people that make America great for me.

But yeah, on my first trip I was impressed by the supermarkets, etc. I come from Podunk, Canada so it's not surprising.

[Ben Kenobi]

Yeah, that's so they can check whether someone voted more than once. Also - they can tell someone voted - ie, stepped up to the booth - but they can't tell who they voted for.

[pchang]

So, it appears to me that every problem Grandpa Troll cites is actually an illegal act perpetrated by the employer (Grandpa Troll's competitors). Wouldn't the most effective way to combat this is to go after the hundreds of employers instead of trying to round up the thousands of workers (of whom perhaps 50% are actually illegal)?