What's the deal with Immigration Reform???

With “anti-immigrant” laws and reforms making the news around the country, I marvel at the online comments posted in response to the articles. What a sad state of affairs this country is in! The sheer amount of ignorance among the population is nothing less than frightening. While I share some of the sentiments: “People wanting to come live in this country should try to do so via the legal route, as I did!” Nothing is ever just cut and dry, and someone managed to veer public opinion from worrying about terrorists to worrying about illegal immigrants at large.

First off, while the majority of illegal immigrants in this country do come from Mexico and Central America, people should remember that a lot of Illegal’s also come from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East (!). Quite frankly, I am more scared of the Russian Mob that seems to be popping up everywhere, and the potentially jihad minded extremist Muslim, than I am of the usually hard working, illiterate Hispanic. Granted, the number of people crossing into Arizona is staggering, and certainly something needs to be done to discourage the illegal passage into the country, but these new laws are NOT the way.

A large part of the LEGAL population there is of Hispanic origin...not visitors. Will they need to walk around with their passports just in case a over-zealous police officer decides to check their immigration status? I think not! I definitely understand the need for control…my husbands remodeling business has suffered tremendously, in part due to the economy, and people parading as contractors without licenses, insurance, etc. underbidding legitimate businesses. It’s a huge problem!

The flip side of the coin is that most American’s feel they’re too good to toil the earth, clean houses, or do any other kind of hard labor for pennies. You may say: “I don’t care if I have to pay more for my apples!” But when the time comes, and the price of agriculture related products quadruples, you will be the first to complain and ask the Government to “fix” it! Folks, you can’t have it both ways!!!

And people who quote nebulous statistics stating that illegal immigrants don’t pay taxes and deplete the country of its resources are just plain ill informed. Most illegal immigrants have some form of tax id, (even if it’s a fake social security card) and do pay taxes! Few will ever file for a tax refund, so they are actually contributing more than their share to the tax coffer. And give me proof that “they” use more services than (Legal) Americans. A better solution might be to grant special status to the migrant workers who help assure I can afford to buy produce, and impose fines (and find a way to enforce this) to other businesses hiring illegal immigrants, to discourage the practice. When jobs are harder to come by as an illegal, the flow will lessen. Also shorten the wait time (10 years in some cases) to gain legal status, and find other ways to encourage people to follow the legal processes (like make it affordable). Bottom line, the bad guys that Arizona is trying to keep out, will always find a way!