Illegal Immigration in the United States

Want it to stop? Time Magazine, in their September 20, 2004 edition, have prepared a special investigation entitled: Who Left the Door Open?

Click here for the article.

The movie Clear and Present Danger (Paramount Pictures, 1994) has a moment where Cortez, a security agent for a Columbian drug lord is having a conversation with National Security Advisor James Cutter; and in this conversation, Cortez boldly proposes a plan to his American Counterpart: I will give you regular quotas for arrests so that you will look good in the press, restructure the drug trade and make it less bloody, make it more civilized and you (Cutter and the American administration) and I (Cortez) will both have our victories. We've seen the movie and we know what happens. Far fetched?

When you walk into airplane terminals to travel in America by plane, you must endure more security as a law-abiding citizen than an illegal immigrant must in trying to cross the border into the United States. Do you feel more secure that your plane will not be taken down by terrorists? How about all of the terrorists that enter without inspection? Is the United States doing anything about stopping illegal immigration? Where they can be seen, you bet they are. How about out in the desert in Arizona and New Mexico? 

"They are here to earn a living and to send money back to their families."

"They are hungry and hope to share in the American Dream."

"They are humble people, with no hope. America is a land of hope."

"They will do the jobs that no one else will do."

I've heard these statements many times before. I've also heard that without illegal, cheap labor, America's economy would be in dire straights. If we pay real wages to laborers, prices for food will skyrocket. If we take this simple argument, then we destroy our security by letting anyone in just in the belief that they are looking for low-paying jobs? 

The INS makes a great show about interdiction in Pomona, California and Calexico, California. I've seen it: at the fence separating Mexicali, Mexico and Calexico, California, every few hundred yards an INS border patrol vehicle sits in vigilance. I've stayed with family in Calexico, and at night, you do hear people running through the yards at night. That was unnerving. I've seen immigrants jumping the fences and making holes in the fences and rushing across. Why do they do this? 

They do it because many times they come from poor countries that offer no jobs, no education, no hope. They will be destitute if they stay home. Often times they travel to the north to find family that moved north long ago. They are hungry, tired, and full of that which their respective lands deny them - they come here to quench their thirst.

The sad truth is that they will end up huddled in a house that is full of people in the very same plight. I've meet and spoken to people that lived that life and now are legal citizens. They tell me of the cramped conditions, little food, awful conditions that none of us would ever be able to endure unless we were in the same situation today.

We can go on to argue about their human rights, we could argue with the INS about their treatment of these people, and we can complain about the transporters of these human souls. We can we not simply solve the problem. You can't have it both ways. Either you allow illegal immigration and remain silent or you don't allow it and you put a stop to it. How? Enforce the laws on the books.

If an employer hires an illegal immigrant, that employer could be fined up to $10,000. Multiple hiring would send that employer to jail. These fines were written in the 1986 immigration bill and again into the 1996 bill. Since the employer could easily be fooled by fake documents, a hotline was set up so that the employer could call a federal number to verify the legality of the individual. Simple. Done. The mechanism is in place, now all that is left is for the law to be enforced. Not so simple when the INS tried to do as such and was stopped because congress in the local communities fought back and slapped the INS. Now nothing is being done. No workplace arrests, no fines being issued. Employers clearly see the light: Why worry when congress is doing nothing. Let's get the cheap labor and let's keep it coming.

Stop the sham of wasting our money on Border Patrol agents if you aren't going to fine the businesses that hire the illegals in the first place. Hiring additional Border Patrol agents only puts on a good show to fool the populace into believing that congress is doing something. Regular arrests, agents at the border, green trucks driving around and yet they simply don't do the most basic thing: fine the perpetrators of the illegal immigration movement - AMERICAN BUSINESS.

In Clear and Present Danger, National Security Advisor James Cutter accepts Cortez's offer to restructure the drug trade and in doing so, he is going along with this criminal to help his administration get re-elected. Just like the freaking movie, life imitates art and in this case, we are the losers - again. 

Read the article from Time Magazine entitled: "Who Left the Door Open?"

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