Thread: Someone Who Hops the Fence Has Broken the Law

This was in today's newspaper in the opinion section.


http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinio ... 2903.story

Someone who hops the fence has broken the law

January 22, 2011
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I recently read a letter on the subject of illegal immigration that brought a tear to my eye. The writer is no doubt a caring and warm-hearted individual, but that wasn't what tugged at my heartstrings. Rather, I was moved by the author's failure to understand one of the most serious problems facing our country.

The writer starts off from a solid premise, "The United States must have guarded borders and enforceable immigration laws," but immediately demonstrates that he misses the entire point when he adds "that is not the case, and so we must find some way to grant amnesty to those honest, non-criminal people who squeezed through the loopholes."

A person who enters this country in a manner that does not conform to U.S. immigration laws is committing a criminal act, prima facie. The fact that he/she might otherwise be an honest person is irrelevant. This is no more squeezing through a loophole than someone who breaks into and squats in your home while you're away on vacation.

In the immigration analogy, this person is to be referred to by some politically correct, "sanitized" term (e.g., uninvited house guest) who must be fed, educated and given medical care — at your expense — until such time as he/she might decide to leave.

The writer concludes, "we should provide a way for them to earn legal status when their residency is already a status quo." A legal U.S. immigrant, Albert Einstein, defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Our feckless politicians act as though they're smarter than he was because they continue to "reward" illegal immigrants as soon as they've hopped the fence.

Our federal deficit is huge and continues to balloon, and there are many states and municipalities that are functionally bankrupt. At the local level, we continue to cut services that are funded by taxes collected from legal U.S. residents while providing free, public education for the offspring of illegal immigrants.

We need more effective tools to close our porous borders, even as we admit that previous successes in this area have been illusive. More importantly, we need to remove the unintended incentives that attract illegal immigrants to this land. While this will surely not be easy, it has to begin without further delay. The price of continuing inaction will be far too great.

Mike Friedrich is a resident of Plantation.

Copyright © 2011, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Very good letter,and spot on California just declared (another) fiscal emergency,and yet NOBODY talks about the real reason that the state Is bankrupt... ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION