Here is what we wrote on January 16th, 2004:

One of the justifications the President (President George W. Bush) gives for this policy proposal is that the illegals come here to do the jobs that Americans will not do. This belies such a horrendous state of affairs, on so many levels, that one barely knows where to begin.

The fact that any unemployed person, anywhere in this country, has the audacity to deem any work beneath them and not worthy of their doing is morally abhorrent. But it should not be surprising, given that this attitudinal adjustment is one facet of the legacy of Lyndon Baines Johnson’s horrendous Great Society.

We have spent the last forty years paying able-bodied men to not work, and then we act stunned when these same able-bodied people won’t take jobs when they are available. Again, of anything you subsidize you will get more; after forty years of subsidizing sloth, this is the (lack of) work ethic that results.

We should not be shocked at the gaping hole this scenario creates. I do not entirely blame the illegals for rushing to fill the void; if we are going to insist on being so stupid as to pay our citizens to do nothing, when there is clearly so many things that need to be done, than these illegal immigrants are more than happy to close the gap.

Our Thus Far Approach to Illegal Immigration

I admire their effort, their vigor, and their gumption. What I do not admire is their breaching our borders and breaking our laws to exhibit these fine traits.

... But hand in hand with this is the utilization of the at-rest labor force that is already here. Do not allow welfare to continue to be a lifestyle. Nothing clarifies what work is or is not beneath a person quite like being hungry.

We need to stop subsidizing sloth (and business, by the way, by allowing an endless supply of low-pay and no-benefit labor), and get Americans back to work again.

On today's RealClearPolitics.com, we have Robert Samuelson proffering:

But what would happen if, magically, new illegal immigration stopped and wasn't replaced by guest workers? Well, some employers would raise wages to attract U.S. workers. Facing greater labor costs, some industries would -- like the tomato growers in the 1960s -- find ways to minimize those costs. As to the rest, what's wrong with higher wages for the poorest workers? From 1994 to 2004, the wages of high-school dropouts rose only 2.3percent (after inflation) compared to 11.9 percent for college graduates.

President Bush says his guest worker program would "match willing foreign workers with willing American employers, when no Americans can be found to fill the jobs." But at some higher wage, there would be willing Americans. Indeed, the number of native high-school dropouts with jobs actually declined by 1.3 million from 2000 to 2005, estimates Steven A. Camarota of the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors less immigration. Unemployment remains high for some groups (9.3 percent for African-Americans, 12.7 percent for white teenagers).

We Got the Ball Rolling

Whilst not identical to our scribic excerpt, the sentiment is largely the same; his can be described as just slightly less harsh than ours. He sees unemployed Americans becoming interested in these positions should the compensation increase; we merely think that anyone bereft of a munerable endeavor should be interested in ANY such opportunity, at any rate, period.

Occasions that would be in far greater supply were we to begin again taking our borders, laws and human nature seriously.