Thread: It's More Important That We Enforce Immigration Laws:Dave G

The Tennessean Nashville News

Written by Dave Gorak:

12:01 AM, Feb. 17, 2011

Because I am not an attorney, I will not attempt to address the legal challenges to Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall's participation in the federal 287(g) program that allows local law enforcement to work with immigration agents in dealing with illegal aliens.

But as a citizen of a country that boasts that it is a nation of laws, I am extremely concerned about its future, which is looking very grim at the moment because certain elements within our society are fighting tooth and nail to prevent enforcement of our immigration laws — laws, please remember, that were created to protect American workers.

Our immigration crisis exists because:

• Pandering politicians elected to represent the interests of their constituents show more concern and compassion for those who have no respect for our immigration laws and sovereignty but demand that the rest of us respect them.

Mainstream media for years have portrayed illegal immigrants as victims of a "broken'' immigration policy. Nearly every day, Americans are subjected to news stories that ignore the media's own ethics and standards for fairness and balance, coverage that leaves readers and viewers with the impression that the only people now entitled to "search for a better life'' in this country are the foreign-born, especially those here illegally.

When was the last time you saw a news story and photos of our unemployed who must compete in a horrendous job market while our federal government continues each month to issue 75,000 work permits to newly arrived foreign workers who, for the most part, bring with them few skills and little education?

• A greedy and immoral business community that whines to anybody willing to listen that it can't exist without cheap foreign labor.

I repeat: If both Congress and the media had been doing their respective jobs; that is, being honest with a public entitled to know all the facts, I'm convinced we wouldn't be dealing with issues like whether illegal immigrants are entitled to in-state tuition and driver's licenses.

And we wouldn't be wondering why a president who sold a lot of people a bill of goods about "hope'' and "change'' and who says jobs for Americans are a "top priority,'' is permitting 7 million illegal immigrants to keep their nonagricultural jobs, while 22 million Americans and legal immigrants cannot find full-time employment.

Strict enforcement of our immigration laws, even during healthy economic times, is an absolute necessity if our immigration policy is to be viewed as credible by the rest of the world.

What does such credibility look like? This question was put to the late Texas congresswoman Barbara Jordan when she chaired President Clinton's immigration reform panel. She replied, "Credibility in immigration policy can be summed up in one sentence: Those who should get in, get in; those who should be kept out, are kept out; and those who should not be here will be required to leave.''

Dave Gorak, a retired Chicago print journalist, is the executive director of the Wisconsin-based Midwest Coalition to Reduce Immigration. MCRI was founded in 1995 as a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization whose primary goal is to educate Americans about the need to reduce immigration to traditional and sustainable levels.

www.tennessean.com

Mr. Dave Gorak...