[Marxism] CSM: Tide of illegal immigrants now being reversed

[Mike Friedman]

While I agree that this report is questionable, in the name of rigor I
question how you responded to it. Most of your commentary was spent
discrediting the source of the poll and the media that carried it. All
well and good, but we need *substantive* refutation of the analysis
presented, not a one-paragraph blow-off. Your blog piece doesn't even
explain the title you give it, which is an important point. This approach
is counterproductive in that it is exactly what the other side does... and
when they do it, we see it as an insult to our intelligence.

--------------------
from my blog at http://glocalcircus.blogspot.com/

Media Misses Distinction Between Correlation and Causation...

The New York Times reported on a new study by the Center for
Immigration Studies saying that 1.3 million "illegal" immigrants have
left the United States in the past year. The group attributes the drop
to tough new enforcement measures.

Unfortunately, readers don't find out that the group is a "policy
advocacy group that favors reduced immigration and opposes legislation
to give legal status to illegal immigrants" until the 7th paragraph.
CIS is in fact a far right, anti-immigrant group that opposes almost
all immigration, legal or otherwise.

CIS director Mark Krikorian once said that "immigrant communities ...
serve as the sea, as Mao might have put it, within which the
terrorists swim as fish" and that "immigration is incompatible with
modern society." According to the Progressive Research Associates, CIS
was "founded in 1985 as a think tank to support the more activist work
of the anti-immigrant Federation for American Immigration Reform
(FAIR)." Through their academic and non-fanatical style they, in
contrast to FAIR, have successfully insinuated themselves into the
think tank world.

Independent analysts and immigrant rights activists, surprise
surprise,  attribute the drop in undocumented immigration to the
contracting economy. Other analysts have also questioned CIS'
methodology and say that the 1.3 million number is way too high. CIS
measured the "likely illegal population" which it defines as
less-educated, foreign-born Hispanics age 18 to 40. CIS seems so
enthralled with cowboy theatrics that changing "push and pull" factors
like, you know, the global economy, don't get much credit.

And The Times appears to be too concerned about potential charges of
"liberal bias" to accurately report who these groups are. The Times
and many newspapers have a troubled history with citing industry
sources--or worse, publishing their op eds--and not revealing them as
such. (If anyone can find an article on that, send it my way. I can't
remember where I was reading about that...)

And of course, representatives of La Migra were quick to endorse CIS'
fuzzy math: "It reinforces what we always thought, that comprehensive
enforcement is a critical part of the reduction," said Kelly A.
Nantel, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.


On Fri, Aug 1, 2008 at 5:17 PM, Mike Friedman <mikedf at amnh.org> wrote:
> Tide of illegal immigrants now being reversed
> Border crackdown and tough economic times in the US are seen as reasons.
> By Gail Russell Chaddock
> Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
>
> from the July 31, 2008 edition
>
> Washington - Some 1.3 million illegal immigrants have left the United
> States since Congress failed to pass comprehensive immigration reform in
> the summer of 2007. If the trend continues, according to a new study, the
> nation's illegal population will drop by half in the next five years.
>