Thread: No path to legalization for all immigrants SDUT EDITORIAL

San Diego Union Tribune Editorial

The good and the bad / No path to legalization for all immigrants

Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 12:01 a.m.

As Congress formally restarts the immigration debate this week with the introduction of a new comprehensive reform bill, it’s time to make an important distinction. Let’s not confuse hardworking people who come to the United States illegally to work with those who come and commit crimes.

The first group deserves a chance at earned legalization provided they meet a series of conditions that could include paying fines, undergoing background checks and even returning home briefly to be processed for legal re-entry. The second group deserves either swift deportation or – if their crimes are serious enough – a prison cell and three squares a day until their debt to society is paid.

The media has done a terrible job of differentiating between these groups. We’ve glossed over the fact that some illegal immigrants come to the United States to expand their criminal enterprises. Once here, they rob, rape, assault, deal drugs and even kill to advance that goal. And, more times than not, their victims are hardworking, honest immigrants who came here to improve their lives.

One person who understands this dynamic is Assistant Homeland Secretary John Morton, who supervises Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Last week, under Morton’s direction, federal immigration agents arrested 286 foreign nationals with criminal records during a three-day sweep in California. More than a dozen of those arrested will face additional prosecution and could receive up to 20 years in federal prison.

Authorities are characterizing the operation as the largest of its kind. The credit goes to the “fugitive operationsâ€

Let’s not confuse hardworking people who come to the United States illegally to work with those who come and commit crimes.

Let's not confuse LEGAL IMMIGRANTS with ILLEGAL ALIENS.

This is interesting, coming from the S.D.U.T.

Sorry, SDUT, but this pretty editorial does not wash.
An illegal, whatever their motive coming here, has still broken the law of a sovereign nation. And it seems that many of those hard-working immigrants need to keep breaking laws, federal, state and local, to be able to stay here and live the American lifestyle on the backs of taxpayers while shipping their money back home where their loyalty is.
Bullcrap! Right is right (according to our unenforced laws) and wrong is what every one of these interlopers is guilty of, no matter their motives.