Straight Talk on Illegal Immigration

With further recent revelations surrounding our governments Domestic Spying program through the NSA, I must begin by reminding you of some very important facts. Number 1, neither the NSA spying program nor the Patriot Act would have been necessary to prevent the attacks of 9/11 (as reported by the bipartisan 9/11 Commission Report). Furthermore Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and all the reasons that we went to War with Iraq have proven to be false and unfounded (including the falsely suspected link between Iraq and al-Qaeda). Finally, we (American citizens) don’t have to choose between security and freedom (that’s the foolish choice that the political Right keeps trying to make us decide on as a reason for Spying on its citizens). No person/country in the history of the planet has ever had either, there was only the illusion.

Now, to the topic at hand…

If you haven’t heard the grand noise surrounding illegal immigration over the last several weeks, then you must’ve been in a coma. I’ll admit that it is a topic that is hard to tackle for several reasons, but is one that must be dealt with. To begin, I’ll just point out a few key terms that deserve to be distinguished:

• Illegal Immigration
• (Border) Security
• Rights
• Laws

To be sure, nothing significant has changed this year or last year with respect to illegal immigrants. Millions enter this country every year from a wide array of demographic, racial and social backgrounds (this is not a Mexican problem as some might think), and this has been going on for decades. So why is illegal immigration a major news issue these days, one might ask?

Well, the answer is simple: illegal immigrants want rights largely on par with US citizens. Many people have pointed out that illegal immigrants do jobs that US citizens don’t do. Some, including Mexican President Vicente Fox, claim that illegal immigrants do jobs that Americans won’t do. And indeed it is true that you often find illegal immigrants working in incredibly dangerous situations where many would not want to. So if and when those illegal immigrants harm themselves at one of these jobs, they want the right to have health care coverage, for example, just like a legal co-worker would. Some go much further and want driver’s licenses and photo ID, etc. Essentially, they want many, if not all, of the rights and privileges of being an American Citizen while maintaining their loyalty to their country of origin.

The United States’ border is also a major issue in this post-9/11 world. And in case you don’t know, when we talk “border security,” we really mean Mexican border security, because apparently no one ever crosses the Canadian border, serial killers included. On the Mexican border, thousands upon thousands of people cross into the United States illegally each year. In fact, at one point I heard that 3,000 people are caught trying to cross the border each day. Largely as a result of crossing the Mexican border, it is estimated that between 12 and 20 million illegal immigrants live in the USA today. Recent proposals to prevent border crossing have included putting up a wall along the border, as well as sending National Guardsmen to enforce the border.

Lastly, there is the issue of Rights vs. Laws. Semantically speaking, Laws give you Rights; therefore you don’t have Rights if those Rights aren’t within the parameters of the Law. For example, you have the Right to health care/leave of absence/financial compensation if you are injured while performing your job (provided you were abiding by company regulations). But you only have that Right if you are lawfully employed by the company you are working for, and such coverage was part of your contract with the company. So the question becomes, if an Illegal Immigrant is injured on a job, do they have such Rights? Sounds like an easy question to answer, but consider that they were working for the company (which benefits the company), and consider that there are Human Rights obligations in existence.

Now I suppose that Laws can also take away some Rights in a myriad of ways, but that’s a different subject for another time.

Here’s what I think…

Unlike the Civil Rights’ marchers of the 50’s and 60’s, I think many of the people marching in the “immigration” parades recently have 1 thing all wrong. If you want the same rights as US Citizens, it’s not a wise idea to “rep your city” (i.e. don’t flaunt your flag from another country). Nothing is more likely to infuriate people on Capitol Hill (as well as the general US population) than “lawbreakers that want our rights while being loyal to their foreign country.” It’s just not wise.

Plus, if your country is so great then why are you trying to work/live here? With respect to Mexico, why is your President Vicente Fox bantering to force the USA to give citizen’s rights to the illegal Mexican immigrants in this country? And how can he do such things when Mexico’s penalties for crossing into Mexico and working/living illegally there are at least as strict as the United States’ policies. Could it be a mixture of money, politics and economics? I think so.

On the issue of Border security, I think EVERY one of the proposals I’ve heard is completely mindless. You can’t put up a fence that runs the length of the Mexico-USA border (I think it’s roughly 2,000 miles long), and there’s no better way to further fuel animosity between neighbors than by doing so (just ask Israel and Palestine or East and West Berlin, Germany). Another proposal I heard consisted of putting up a fence along portions of the border, which is silly for the aforementioned reasons and because people will just find places where there is no fence and try to cross there. Then there’s the big issue of money, time and manpower that it would take to put up a fence of that magnitude. Now if the government is willing to contract out a company for Billions of dollars to get the job done like they did Halliburton in Iraq, then maybe they should go for it; but only if the same care is taken at the much longer Canadian Border too. I mean, this is about security, right??? And if not, then please shut that noise up.

So, I don’t think that illegal immigration would be much of a problem if the Laws, which are already on the books, were being enforced. Employers who surreptitiously hire Illegal Immigrants should be jailed, then there would be no place for the Illegal Immigrants to work, then Illegal Immigrants would have much less of a reason for crossing the border. The problem is that companies, as well as the government, benefit from Illegal Immigration financially. I have never believed that Illegal Immigrants do jobs that American’s aren’t willing to do; Illegal Immigrants can just be paid slavery wages to do jobs that would require an employer to pay a citizen much more. And in a capitalistic, selfish society like the United States of America, of course many of these Billion-dollar-a-year companies will employ cheaper labor, even if it’s illegal.

Also, there may be those instances where Americans wouldn’t perform a job because the wage for that job is unrighteously low considering the work load. Imagine working in the hot Arizona sun all day, risking serious injury but working for an hourly rate near minimum wage (which is $5.75 an hour and hasn’t been raised in 10 years) while the heads of the company spend their “hard day at work” making thousands of dollars an hour for breathing while swinging their golf club at the city’s local clubhouse. In the richest country in the world, Americans shouldn’t have to do any job of that ilk at a wage that they can’t survive on.

It can’t be overlooked that there are legal ways of obtaining citizenship in this country (albeit sometimes unfairly distributed in my opinion). You can migrate here, work and pay taxes for a specific number of years, then pass your naturalization tests. You can come over on a work-Visa or College Fellowship, “fall in love,” and marry an American citizen. Heck, you can even come over here for a space of time, get pregnant and have a child (which would then be an American citizen), and that process would open certain doors that may make it easier for you to become a citizen. Whatever the method, there are legal ways to do it (including a random citizenship lottery), and it is unfair that many people have attempted those legal routes and been denied, but those who are clearly illegal want to “step in front of the line.”

• Yes, illegal immigration is a problem.
• No, I don’t think it will be fixed anytime soon.
• Yes, it is being used as a political tool by both the Left and Right in this election year.
• No, there is not an easy solution to the problem.
• Yes, the USA should enforce the already existing Laws.
• No, those Laws can’t be truly enforced without first enforcing the Borders.
• Yes, Physicians should treat illegal immigrants that have been injured (as a part of the Hippocratic Oath).
• No, I don’t think Illegal Immigrants should be given Health Benefits…but maybe.
• Yes, employers of Illegal Immigrants should be prosecuted.
• No, amnesty is not the answer to the problem.
• Yes, President Bush’s proposal IS amnesty.
• No, sending 6,000 unarmed (internationally strained) National Guards to help enforce the border is not a benefit AT ALL!!!
• Yes, sending 6,000 unarmed (internationally strained) National Guards to help enforce the border is about the dumbest thing I’ve heard come out of this debate.
• No, deportation of millions of Illegal Immigrants is not plausible.
• Yes, I’m confused about the notion of giving Illegal Immigrants photo ID’s and Driver’s Licenses…isn’t that backwards on both sides of the argument?

And NO, Illegal Immigrants should not be given the same rights and privileges as American citizens, no matter if they’re working in this country. Otherwise, what would be the value of being an American citizen, and what about the millions upon millions of poor, disadvantaged and disenfranchised citizens and immigrants that already live in this country? Isn’t it the duty of the United States’ government to take care of them first?

I know that there are many angles that I haven’t addressed or touched on. This topic is too big to be contained in just one posting. That being said, here are the things that I think would help the problem:
1. Enforce the borders and secure the ports (which seems to be a no-brainer to me after 9/11, especially since the President keeps claiming we’re safer now than we were then).
2. Enforce the existing laws and prosecute employers that employ illegal immigrants.
3. Raise the minimum wage to a living wage for people 18 and older.

And I’ll leave you with this thought:

Laws are what make countries manageable, and Borders are what define a country. If Laws and Borders aren’t enforced, then what do you have? Seriously, consider that.

-Maelstrom