Is it that trying to improve reform regarding immigration with work visas in tech is too limited?
It rambles a bit at the beginning and then alludes to hard labor jobs, but doesn't really have any clear organization or discernable purpose.
Plenty of immigrants come to America with little more than a strong work ethic and a dream. They may have been too poor or disadvantaged to have afforded college, let alone an engineering degree, in their native countries. Hell, some of their native countries may not even have such opportunities. If we're restricting our search to highly skilled, highly educated workers, we're discriminating against everyone else who wants to participate in the American Dream.
Lest we assume these people are necessarily undesirable, we should be reminded of the fact that many of our most successful and quintessentially "American" companies were founded by originally unskilled immigrant laborers. Andrew Carnegie is perhaps the most famous example. His family emigrated to the US from Scotland, dirt poor and uneducated. His first job was as a messenger boy. He grew, of course, to become one of America's wealthiest and most productive captains of industry. He didn't have the status "captain of industry" before applying to enter the US. He gained that status in the US, via the opportunities afforded by the US to someone of his work ethic and intelligence. (And even the less-than-Carnegian immigrants of the world fill crucial roles in our economy).
Now, I disagree with the author in that he thinks a focus on engineers is necessarily a zero-sum game: that placing an emphasis on skilled workers precludes unskilled workers. It doesn't have to. I don't think we should throw the baby out with the bathwater on Zuckerberg's argument, just because it's limited in scope. There's probably a lot more help than harm done by the sorts of reforms the group is seeking.
Furthermore, why should the US be encouraging technologists to immigrate here, when fundamentally those immigrants are in the business of putting other people (Americans and immigrants both) out of work? Yes, this is great for Silicon Valley, and probably is good for NYC, but what about for Iowa and Nebraska?
The only folks that might be harmed by this immigration shift are the tech elites here that command sky-high salaries.
Off the top of my head: http://www.hudl.com/ http://www.travefy.com/ http://www.dwolla.com/ http://www.archrival.com/ http://www.votertide.com/ and even less-traditional sites such as http://www.occupytogether.org/
The reality is immigration reform needs to be felt throughout the economy, not simply towards engineers and knowledge workers. It's important for business leaders to stand up for immigration reform, but it would be better if they recognized the issue in a more holistic way. The economy is much larger than what is perceived within the Valley.
Om Malik is one of the few journalists I trust within the bubble of Silicon Valley. Part of the reason this article has a lot of resonances is because he's a dissenting immigrant who understands the values of technology and startups.