“Reilly characterized Healey’s criticism as ‘the same-old, same-old, pointing fingers and blaming someone else.’…’Everybody in the country, maybe with the exception of Kerry Healey, realizes that this requires a national solution.'”
Who’s he attacking? Deval? Gabrieli? No — just like at the convention, just like throughout the campaign, Reilly is more interested in winning in November and getting a Democrat into the corner office than scoring points against fellow Democrats. He realizes that our opponent is Healey, not each other.
This “ultimate insider” (who has fewer establishment endorsements than…oh, never mind) is displeasing labor unions with his decision to respect the principles of American federalism. Making a choice based on law and not convenience.
Laudable, eh? Allowing illegal immigrants a chance to do more than “depend on the welfare state”? Pretty close to what Democratic leaders are proposing on the federal level, so I’m sure that everyone is…
Democratic gubernatorial hopefuls Christopher F. Gabrieli and Deval L. Patrick criticized the use of undocumented workers on state-funded projects, but offered no specific solutions.
Oh, right, it’s campaign season. New kind of politics and all.
I just posted on this as well, sorry for the duplication of your efforts.
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I think Reilly is pretty genuine on this and I think his position demonstrates a willingness and ability to stand against political tides and say what he believes in.
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Some might say that this just proves that there isn’t any coherence to Reilly’s philosophy for governing, as he is on the liberal side of some issues and the moderate side of others. However, these same people might decry the labelling of candidates, so I will take their criticism with a grain of salt.
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Good for Reilly, he remembers where he came from.
I don’t say that very often đŸ™‚ but it’s true. Immigration law is a federal issue, and really should not be a relevent factor in state matters. And he makes some good suggestions, like enforcing wage laws more stringently, which helps worker fairness without demonizing immigrants.
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However, I think it was unfair for the article just to write off Gabrieli and Patrick as having no solutions. The focus was on Reilly as Healey was claiming the problem to be his fault. And when I’ve talked to him about it, Patrick has expressed strong support for the McCain-Kennedy process and agreed that it’s primarily a federal issue and the state issue is making sure everyone here is treated fairly. I’m sure Gabrieli has more substantial ideas, though I don’t know what.
I think it is far too simplistic to call immigration a federal issue and not relevant to state matters. The New York Times had a very interesting story yesterday about illegal immigrants who pay taxes and collect regular paychecks just like you and I (I hope!). How is that relevant? The workers were able to forge documents allowing them to get STATE IDENTIFICATION which allowed them to seem legal. The story was centered around several illegal immigrants in Minnesota and a big part of the story was how Minnesota state law made it easy to get fake identification. This is just one example.
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State face on a daily basis the issues of illegal immigration. Who educates children? Who provides medical care in emergency rooms? Who issues licenses? Who regulates businesses and their employees? These are all functions of states. The feds may set the immigration policy but states deal with the people once they are in, both the legal and illegal immigrants. This is why I support just about any other immigration policy besides building a big wall. We are talking about human beings and we simply can’t stop people from wanting the opportunities that are available in the US and our states.
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I would love to hear my gubernatorial candidates discuss how this state will deal with immigrants of any status because immigrants, both legal and illegal, are using our state’s services and need our state’s protections. This is a lot more than a federal issue alone. If any candidate suggests otherwise then I am not sure they have the best grasp of what is going on in this state.
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(Disclaimer: This comment is more a reaction to alexwill then Reilly because I haven’t investigated what Reilly said. I am a Patrick supporter.)
to the New York Times story I mentioned above.
This IS a state issue. See my post in response to DanielShays.
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That was my entire point. I think I agree with everything you wrote. If the federal government sets an immigration policy, they have to enforce. It’s the responsibility of the state to enfore the full protection of the law to all residents.
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I could write much more but should get back to work. I’m just hoping my last post wasn’t interpreted as being anti-immigrant in any way by saying it’s a federal issue (though i’m not clear at all how it would).