Congressman James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisc), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee stated on Meet the Press today that a cause of illegal immigration was a working market, and that Congress needed to legislate a fix for this staunch the flow.

Was I sleeping when contemporary conservatives, began to embrace anti-market ideologies, and advocate government policies of legislated market intervention in a public forum?

"The secret is first, secure the border and enforce the employer sanctions law. If we don’t do both of those things, then we will simply get more illegal immigrants coming across the border and taking jobs, because it is always cheaper for an illegal immigrant to be hired than either a citizen or a legal immigrant with a green card and work authorization. The market does work, and no bill that we pass, unless it is done right, will be able to rectify the market so that people who are doing these jobs, including Americans and legal immigrants, will be on the books, will be legal, will be paid and will have their Social Security taxes paid under their own Social Security number and their own name. And that’s what the priorities of the House are."

MSNBC's Meet the Press with Tim Russert, May 28, 2006