I also believe it is my responsibility to speak out against bias and prejudice wherever it rears its ugly head in my presence. I will not be silent among my friends or foes and willingly allow the heinous crimes against other human beings that come from silence in the throws of injustice occur without my protest.

The United States is not a small country. It is a collection of many states who still wish to retain some measure of individuality. Every state has different driving laws; try a cross-country drive to experience them. In Muskegon, Michigan they have a left turn, blinking red arrow. I was totally dumbfounded as to the rules for that one.

So long as I have a driver's license and my insurance card and registration for my car, that's enough! That'll find me in any data system.

Yes, we mostly have a national id with our SS card. I guess if some legislature wants to require us to wear it around our necks, that would make ID in the U.S. uniform. I see it as unnecessary.

Again, that is all smoke screen. No jobs equals no illegals with the exception of criminals who will come anyway and fall into the jurisdiction of the exisiting legal system.

Thanks Don for expressing our rights so well. I do feel obligated to express my opinion just as you have and I am actively engaged in political advocacy based on the facts from which I operate. Thank you also for your service to our country and for complimenting my work. I also worked for five years with the 8th Army in Seoul, S. Korea and many of my best friends were career service people with multiple tours where their lives were at risk for my benefit. I was also working in Washington, D.C. and partying with the boys at Quantico preparing for deployment to Viet Nam, many who did not return. My best friend has two children who have each served multiple tours in Iraq and her son who left the air force for the Navy ended up at risk a third time by being sent to Afghanistan - the Navy in Afghanistan. Go figure.

I have very close friends with absolutely opposite opinions, and sometimes we do discontinue our discourse to be certain it doesn't go beyond opinion and into that emotional, ego realm where logic goes out the window and friendships are harmed.

Make sure, before you advocate in favor of or opposition to this law, that you have read the law. Read what it says before you write to your Congressman. End to end. Imagine the various ways that law might be enforced and how it might be used to advance agendas never openly intended by its framers.

Decide whether it is necessary given existing law.

And don't presume that because the feds cannot enforce existing federal law, that state and local law is needed. Local law enforcement already has authority to enforce federal law. It doesn't take a new law if federal law is adequate.

And its intent? Remember that the spirit of the law is often swept under the rug once the letter of the law is enacted.

Why not enforce what laws we have?
Why have more?

Americas days of greatness are over.

The greatest thing we could do is end wars, and be peaceable.

In one of Ann's posts, philosophers indicate that killing is natural to our species. It may be natural, but we were also given a mind that reasons at a higher level than the rest of the animals. That mind was to take us a cut above survival of the fittest to an appreciation for life. We cannot use as an excuse the societies that are not evolved beyond tribal hates and incorporate those hatreds in our own psyche. We must be more; we must start in our own homes and cities and states to find amicable solutions to problems instead of divisive ones. We must encourage knowledge about issues and dispense with the emotional, political ads. They are an insult to an intelligent person, but a balm to those who don't wish to think.

I saw an inflaming ad about the migrant worker issue showing desperate persons climbing a barbed wire fence with the voice over saying, "they are coming to take your jobs." Yee gads, they were invited to take the jobs no one wanted and still don't want.

The problem with the existing laws is that they are laws that govern the actions of employers; enforcing them creates a political storm of opposition and hidden financial inuendo. They have lobbyists up the gazoo. The migrant worker has no one.

My street is the last street of "white" occupants going West off a connector street between the S. American population at one end and the super rich at the other. What a crossroads!

Three Spanish families bought homes on my street since the housing crisis. They are lovely people. My street is slightly upscale from the streets further east, the last section not "gated." One day, it will probably be all Spanish speaking families. I can think of no better and safer place to live in my old age. I am fortunate.

What should we do? If the existing laws are no good the new law is no good--give the country to Mexico?

I don't understand. I don't want to be mean to anyone, but am wondering what we should do.

DK wrote:

Quote:

In one of Ann's posts, philosophers indicate that killing is natural to our species. It may be natural, but we were also given a mind that reasons at a higher level than the rest of the animals. That mind was to take us a cut above survival of the fittest to an appreciation for life. We cannot use as an excuse the societies that are not evolved beyond tribal hates and incorporate those hatreds in our own psyche. We must be more; we must start in our own homes and cities and states to find amicable solutions to problems instead of divisive ones. We must encourage knowledge about issues and dispense with the emotional, political ads. They are an insult to an intelligent person, but a balm to those who don't wish to think.

That same article I quoted from in DK's comment made the point that the human is the only animal that is aware that it is going to die at some point.

I hope the comment didn't lead to misunderstanding. those tribes did not act out of hate so much as necessity, and the hunter's who killed for food also prayed to, and worshiped those same animals for their sacrifice.

It was later, after cities developed, that the hunters became warriors who did not kill animals to eat, but killed other humans for their territory. The hatred started there, I think, when the game grew more scarce, and land was considered necessary for the survival of herds and farms. Hoarding and greed became the norm. We are seeing the culmination today. What it seems to me that we need to do is to look at the situation realistically, each of us, and put the responsibility where it belongs, which is not, to my way of thinking, on the backs of the migrant workers who were led to believe that they could pursue a better way of life here, by the landowners who use them and their need.

Those gated communities are an example of what is happening in this country today. Like Prospero's court in Poe's "Masque of the Red Death," they erroneously think that they can escape the consequences. We are trying to deny our human awareness that we all die eventually.

Ann

I believe the laws regarding the employment of illegal aliens should be enforced against the employers. The employers need to be major fined for not checking for legal work papers. Then they will be forced to hire legally documented workers and to get enough, they will have to pay decent wages and benefits. There will be economic consequences since the price of food will increase and we will be less competitive with imports. However, if the country does not want illegal aliens picking crops, etc., then we will have to cope with the economic consequences.

What many people forget is that we are the employers also: the handyman we employ, the landscaper, the child care worker, the house cleaner, the painter, etc. We are happy to pay less wages, cash under the table; do we ask for legal work papers? We need to be fearful of fines also. It should be cheaper to hire legal workers than pay the fines.

A major ad campaign and arrangment with Guatamala, Mexico and a few other S. American countries needs to make it clear that employers will not hire those who enter the U.S. illegally. Their own countries need to stop them from exiting their borders. The governments need to work together in terms of aid to those countries.

We need to find a way to decrease our drug dependency to help curb the violence at the Mexican borders by decreasing the demand for drugs in the U.S.

A system for legalizing those already in this country already employed in work no one else wants to do should be implemented. Fines (over time) will need to be paid, documents filed, and sponsors (u.s.citizens) who will be responsible for the process need to be matched with the current illegal persons. They need to pay taxes, etc. (which most do anyway).

A new immigration priority system for any person wishing to enter this country needs to be established. All persons wishing to gain citizenship need to have a sponsor already here; preferably a U.S. citizen that guarantees the new immigrant will not become a burden on society.

There's so much more...this is only a beginning. None of my proposals include the inhumane treatment of those who are already here. This is not a police state. I don't want it to become one. The current ICE enforcement is bad enough.

No wonder nothing is being done--it is too difficult.

It truly is a very difficult and complex issue; that is why it makes good fuel for emotional "cures" that only harm innocent people while purportedly "correcting" a multi-faceted problem.

I don't know how much money in aid goes out of this country to others in addition to and in conjunction with United Nations efforts. That whole business needs a good "look see" also. Maybe we are too thin across the world and need to concentrate on helping our nearest neighbors gain some economic progress.

As far as sending money home; that has been the immigrant practice since first coming here. I remember great grampa still sent money to Russia. Families are famililies. At least they aren't drinking it up; they are living frugal to send their money home. They still spend plenty of it here just to eat and sleep. However, as they integrate into communities and have families here, their income stays here. Again, that has always been the immigrant pattern - nothing new. It's just the bias toward the Mexican immigrants that makes it appear new.

Since these immigrants were brought in by crew leaders paid by the U.S. employers to collect them from their villages, they have come in sufficient numbers to be noticeable, especially when their skin is dark and they hang out with each other (imagine that!) speaking their language. They didn't assimilate as easily as some of the lighter skinned immigrants. Those who are light skinned, by the way, do assimilate quicker.

I agree with DK. The problem is not with the worker, but those who hire them.

If the employer can verify that there are no legal Americans that will take the available jobs, then they should be free to hire who they please. To do that and protect themselves, they need government approval.

It seems to me that if there were no jobs available, the problem with illegal migrant workers wouldn't exist.