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What Apple Computers problem with Mike Daisey has to do with our Immigration conundrum

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

 

I have been a big proponent of Amnesty for our immigrants in the country illegally. My reason has always been, “We knew they were here, we bought products made, harvested, delivered by them. We enjoyed many services they provided us and not once did we take a stand and boycott a company because we were getting a good price because of immigrant labor. We are complicit in this whole problem. Our immigration debacle exists solely because of our demand for good prices and the governments inability to create systems to allow our industries to get the labor they need legally. Because of our participation, no, our creation of this problem, we owe it to the immigrants to create a system where they can stay here legally.

 

A recent interview by two reporters discussing the recent Mike Daisey fiasco makes this point very well. Ira Glass from “This American Life” that broke the false story about Apple Computers, and later retracted it, speaks with Charles Duhigg of the New York Times. 1

 

“Charles Duhigg: … do you feel comfortable knowing that iPhones and iPads and, and other products could be manufactured in less harsh conditions, but that these harsh conditions and perpetuate because of an
economy that you are supporting with your dollars.
Ira Glass: Right. I am the direct beneficiary of those harsh conditions.
Charles Duhigg: You’re not only the direct beneficiary; you are actually one of the reasons why it exists. If you made different choices, if you demanded different conditions, if you demanded that other people enjoy the same work protections that you yourself enjoy, then, then those conditions would be different overseas.”

 

 

We are not only the beneficiaries of illegal labor, But we are the reason it exists in the first place. If we would have demanded the U.S. Government get us the labor we needed to supply us with the labor that affords us this lifestyle, we would not have this problem today.

 

Picking on the immigrant and trying to put all the blame on them for this situation would be the same as putting the blame of poor working conditions in China on the laborers themselves. (had there really been poor working conditions) Amnesty or a Pardon, or whatever you want to call it, is really the only honorable way out of this mess. It’s time to stop picking on the worker and take responsibility for this mess, and fix it before it gets any worse.

 

 

 

1 You can read the whole story here   http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/03/18/apple-and-the-daisey-affair/?hpt=hp_t3

Filed Under: Business, Economy, Employment, Ethics Tagged With: ,

An Argument for Amnesty

May 10, 2012 by 1 Comment

 

Although our laws have changed many times over the years, our attitudes towards immigrants have remained the same, even while admitting we are a “melting pot” country and that immigrants made this country all that it is today.

 

We have always had a need / fear relationship with immigrants. Our history of laws tells this story quite eloquently.

 

During the gold rush, California was awash in asian immigrants who came here looking for opportunity. We needed cheap laborers to build the railroads, do our laundry, cook, work in mines, and any other hard unwanted work. We weren’t too pleased with our immigrant workers, but they served a purpose so we put up with them, until gold became scarce and the competition for work made them more undesirable. We really liked to single out our asian immigrants, imposing more rules and limits on them than any other immigrant community. We even specifically banned Chinese in 1892.

 

Currently we are demonizing the Mexican immigrant, and grouping all other latino immigrants in with them by proxy.  As with the Chinese, we liked them when times were good. They did the hard and dirty work and made our lives much easier, but ever since jobs began to get scarce, we needed to blame someone for what ails us and they look like the easiest target. After we get over demonizing Latinos, I am sure we will find another immigrant base to focus our anger and responsibility on. If history does repeat itself, my money is on the Chinese. They seem to be our favorite.

 

If we look at our immigrant forefathers, when they first came to this country, they were persecuted and made scapegoats for any problem that the citizens of this country did not see fit to take responsibility for themselves. Because of this, every successive wave of immigrants has had to endure this treatment, until finally they became accepted and the focus on them decreased. This was almost always because of a newer group of immigrants who appeared to be more of a threat than the previous one.

 

For the past several years there has raged a large debate as to what to do with the millions of undocumented latino workers living in our country. Politicians have see-sawed over this issue countless times, promising improvements in immigration policy and then restating their positions after considerable party pressure. It’s like they want to do the right thing, but when they feel like they may be eaten by their own, they retreat to the comfort and protection of their party.  This may be very much our fault too.

 

And that is the point isn’t it? Whose fault is it that they are here illegally to begin with? Should we put the blame for this situation on the people who were just working within the constructs of what they were given, or on the people who created the need but ignored the systems required to satisfy that need? And if it is our fault– if the immigrants had no control over a system that is broken beyond belief and has been for years– then how can we blame and punish them? After all, aren’t we the only ones who can create the policies and institutions necessary to ensure everyone who comes into this country is identified, and we have the labor we need?

 

Lets end the blame game and get on with the solution, which leads me to my original proposition: Isn’t amnesty the honorable way out of this mess?

 

These people have been here for many years and we have never boycotted a single company that made a product for us cheaper because they used immigrant labor. Shouldn’t we give them citizenship should they desire it? At the very least we should make it legal for them to be here and decriminalize a population of hardworking people that aren’t criminals to begin with.

 

This is our mess. We need to take responsibility for it, and fix it, without blaming the pawns in our little blame game.

 

 

Filed Under: Economy, Ethics, immigrants, Immigration's effects on citizens, Laws, Politics

Is Mexican a bad word?

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Hate is one of those social crimes that every society is guilty of, but few people want to be openly associated with. Sometimes it lives in shadows behind the scene, sometimes it is coded and boasted about like a badge of honor. Each flavor of hate, from which there are many, has it’s own special language. We all need to be aware when someone wears a mask of civility, but in reality they harbor no good will.

 

I am compiling a list of these terms and phrases along with their meanings and put them together in an ebook. I will also include some suggestions of what to do when you encounter someone using this language in the hopes of guiding our national dialogue into a more constructive direction.

 

Mexican-  This term is used to group all Latino’s into one big group. It’s easier to hate everyone if you just lump them all together. That way it’s not necessary to ask someone if they are from Mexico or any one of the Central or South American countries and then figure out how they feel about each one separately.1 If you Google “immigration” you will find hundreds of articles about there being 11 or 12 million illegal immigrants from Mexico, when really they are only one nation we get immigrants from, and not all of them are undocumented.

 

This is truly unfortunate for the people who are from Mexico, to have their nationality specifically associated with such anger and contempt.  Associating Mexican with illegal alien has become so commonplace that many Mexicans appear surprised and even insulted when the title Mexican is used in their presence. When the nationality of a single race is singled out and associated with condemnation so often that it sounds like the mere mention of the country is an insult, it becomes very difficult to change the dialogue to a more compassionate one, which is what is going to have to happen in order to take the first steps towards any progress in this whole immigration issue.  This needs to be stopped now.

 

 

 

How to combat this-

 

If you are from Mexico, you have every right to be proud of your heritage, just like many Americans who boast of being Italian, or Irish, or Jewish, Polish, Scottish, Welsh, German, French, etc. . . Stand up and take back the name of your country by using it proudly in your speech.  Let the world know that being a Mexican is as good as being from any other country.

 

If you are not from Mexico-  Politely stop them and make it clear what country you are from. Your country is just as good as any other too. Every country has something that their citizens can be proud of. Don’t allow people to lump you together with the ones they think they hate, making it easier to disparage your character, customs or heritage along with somebody else’s.  Letting them know where you come from will make it much tougher for them to do that.

 

A word of caution: Some people may not be aware that they are doing this. When even the news media does this it could have innocently been picked up by people who just don’t know better. Try to educate, not humiliate and infuriate. If they purposely continue to use Mexican when they speak of undocumented immigrants, just walk away and let them swim in the cesspool they fill with hate each and every day.

 

Disagree? Did I forget something? Leave a comment below the post. I will curate the best input from the public and include it in the ebook, as well as give you credit for it.

 

 

1 According to DHS Estimated Illegal Immigrant Population for Top Twenty Countries of Origin

and Top Twenty States of Residence in 2009:

 

2009 %

All countries …….. 10,750,000    100

Mexico …………….   6,650,000      62

El Salvador ……….     530,000       5

Guatemala ……….     480,000        4

Honduras. . . . . . .     320,000        3

Philippines ………..    270,000        2

India ………….. ..        200,000        2

Korea ………….  ..      200,000        2

Ecuador ……………    170,000        2

Brazil …………..  …    150,000         1

China …………………..120,000         1

Other ………. …..     1,650,000       15

Filed Under: Ethics, Hate, immigrants

Arizona in the spotlight

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The Ariziona Republic, an Arizona news outlet purporting to be, “Arizona’s Homepage” recently published a news article about Immigration waning as a voter issue. This leads me to believe that as far as immigration is concerned, Arizona still has a long way to go to catch up with the rest of America.

 

According to all the news articles I read each day, I have a hard tim believing Americans have suddenly dropped the immigration issue as this article tries to convey. This really sounds like the fanciful dreaming of a wounded and severely damaged anti-immigrant platform.

 

Americans are very capable of keeping more than one topic on their minds at the same time, and I am sure that Immigration is right up there with Jobs and the Economy as one of the top 3 topics Americans are most involved with right now. With the Occupy movement recently grabbing the public attention we see their activism loosely aimed at all aspects of the economy and jobs, with particular attention given to Job creation, taxation, and wealth distribution. And with all the politicians having meetings to discuss immigration and their associated press releases, along with the Mercedez Benz fiasco, I would argue that the immigration movement has actually picked up steam in recent weeks.

 

Arizona, It’s obvious your Senators and Sheriffs like to grab headlines and carry the hard line against illegal immigrants, but what you should really be doing instead of all this political posturing, is listening more and talking less. Then you may just understand what the devil is going on in this country. Immigration issues cannot be swept under the carpet any longer. There will be a steady flow of press releases in the future, and maybe even a few more politicians and sheriffs will lose their jobs before this is over.

 

Arizona Republic, nice try pretending this issue doesn’t resonate with America. Immigration is at the core of who we are and there are a lot of people on both sides of the fence who can’t seem to agree on what to do about the PRESENT state of things. Give it up Arizona Republic. Hard lines and radical views are what got us into this mess, and will only keep us chained to this tragic situation indefinitely.

 

And by the way, how can you credit the byline to Daniel González(?) for writing this article when at the bottom of the article it states, “Republic reporter Dan Nowicki contributed to this article.” On face value it appears that you are attempting to look fair and impartial by using an hispanic name for the byline, while carrying a radical viewpoint.

Can the true message of this article get any more convoluted?

 

 

http://bit.ly/rt8QMT

Filed Under: Economy, Employment, Hate, Immigration's effects on citizens, Laws, Politics

Mitt Romney, the GOP, and America

May 10, 2012 by 1 Comment

I posted a blog entry on September 18th titled, “We Need A Hero,” and I thought I spotted one the other day. Newt Gingrich, you came forward and spoke your mind. You stood a moral ground and said you were “prepared to take heat” for it.

 

Well you got the heat.

 

Michelle Bachman and MItt Romney both took out their matches and tried to light fires under you so you would no longer be a threat to their nomination bids. Michelle Bachman called you, “The most liberal G.O.P. Candidate on immigration reform.” Which I guess was supposed to be an insult. Mitt Romney tried to put words in your mouth, overstating your position in an effort to make you vulnerable to an attack from your own party. We clearly see what he is made of.

 

Now we see you wavering a bit, stating you are not for amnesty, and 25 years should be the cut-off point for anyone who came here illegally to apply for a “Red Card” which would let them live here, but not as citizens. Excuse me, but 25 years ago was 1986, and anyone who was in the United States in 1986 was offered Amnesty back then. A  25 year cut-off really makes no sense.

 

Mr. Gingrich, you don’t need to back down. There is nothing morally wrong in what you said, and you know it– that’s why you said it.

 

What I am sure every American in this country believes to be true is that have all the politicians we need. What America needs right now is a Hero. We need someone to stand up for what is right, more than for what is popular.

 

At first this would seemingly fly in the face of what Politics is all about, but I beg to differ.  Our greatest statesmen stood on principle when it would have been easier to echo the popular view. Those who did and said what was popular at the moment, will not be remembered long, nor celebrated for their contribution to mediocrity, or immorality.

 

Help us take back that which we seem to lose more of every year–our National Pride. We have screwed up the world economy, we were embarrassingly wrong about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, we don’t know how to get out of Afghanistan, we keep people imprisoned indefinitely without charges at Guantanamo Bay, and we got busted shipping guns to Mexico. (Like we really needed that one.) Every time we go to sleep at night we wonder what new controversy we may find ourselves in the middle of tomorrow.

 

When you spoke up for a Nation that did not believe in breaking up families– I began to see amber waves of grain again. When you spoke up for a nation that values friends and neighbors instead of creating a cultural and social war zone; I caught a glimpse of a “brotherhood from sea to shining sea.” When you said you would take the heat for trying to give us back some National Pride, I clearly saw someone “Who more than self their country loved. And mercy more than life!” .

 

America does not shed her grace on the lazy, or the timid, or the selfish. America needs a great leader now as much as any other time in our history. We are losing world confidence in our financial solvency. Our reputation as a bully to smaller countries goes unchecked despite our best intentions. And our inability to rise above ourselves and get out of our own way when it comes to welcoming “the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free” is tragic. If these words mean nothing any more then they should be stricken from the monument, or forever be the yardstick by which our failure as a great and free country is measured.

 

Mr. Gingrich, I understand that you fear your own party is turning on you, as your opponents would like you to believe. I understand the fear you must be feeling when even your advisors tell you that your position on immigration could lose you the nomination.

 

That is real heat. But fear not; you are not alone. Your opponents feel it too or they would not have shot back with whatever foley was at their command. Don’t listen to the voice in the back of your mind telling you to step away from a position that is morally right.

 

Ten years from now and after, when we look back on this battle, as we have done each time we have fought to defend a moral idea against a false but popular position, you can be sure that you are in the company of other great men in our nation’s history.

 

It takes the heat of a mighty furnace to forge mere rock into steel, and a relentless battering to shape that steel into a sword. You are in a place right now where you can be that sword, a shining example of what is good about this country, and your political competition, which is made of softer, more malleable materials, will be reduced to ashes and relegated to the dustbin of history.

 

So Mr. Gingrich, when you are up late at night, and the day’s events play over and over again in your head, and you end the day with that one all-powerful question: How will the future see Newt Gingrich?” There really is an easier way to ask that question that should make the answer perfectly clear, “Are you a Lincoln or are you a Douglas?”

 

Mike J Quinn

 

Citizen,

The United States of America

 

Filed Under: Ethics, Immigration's effects on citizens, Politicians, Politics

American Children are NOT Anchors.

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

  • Anchor Babies  American Children

    12/12/11

    Mike J. Quinn- Author

    southoftheborderbook.com/wordpress

     

    To Fox News and Bob Dane, spokesman for F.A.I.R.

     

    There are few terms that engender more anger than racial ones. When spoken aloud, they fan the flames of the already bitter, disparage the character of whom they are directed towards, and enrage those who listen and do not approve. When spoken to one’s self, they are like cancer to the soul. When adults say them about children, it is  utterly without honor or defense.

     

    Bigots are people with a chronic personality disorder. They do not like something about a class of people that is different from them. Like alcoholics, they seek out each other’s company so they can feel normal while indulging themselves in their particular brand of self-destructive behavior.  They rationalize that if other people feel the same way, then they must be right.

     

    People who use the term Anchor Babies are no different. The term serves a distorted purpose for those who use it, and a dictionary was going to add credibility to the term by adding it to their list of new phrases. Unfortunately the widespread use of the term this past year hinted at it’s legitimacy, but when inspected more closely, a dark morality emerges.

     

    When using this term, people are de-humanizing young, innocent children and categorizing them as an undesirable object, much in the same way other races have been subjected to. With Anchor Babies, it is children we are picking on. How insensitive can we as human beings become? Much more, I’m afraid.

     

    The term came about when ignorant and hateful people tried to claim that parents of children born in the United States are using their children to gain access to citizenship for them and the rest of their family. The problem is there is not a single fact to back that assumption up, but there are hundreds of thousands of parents who have been deported while their children stayed behind. And it gets worse.

     

    According to a recent study done by the Applied Research Center there are over five thousand examples of American citizen children being put in foster care after deporting their parents. Now I ask you, is there anything more de-humanizing than to distribute children like so much junk left behind after someone has suddenly left the country?

     

    Luckily few of us ever have to experience the tragedy of separating a child from their parents first-hand. We all benefit from the perspective of distance. The lack of pictures and sound makes it all seem like it never really happened, while reducing the children to mere statistics on a piece of paper to be filed under Miscellaneous. The hate-mongers meanwhile are free to pick on children all they like.

     

    Our legal system seems to be able to clean up a mess just as quickly as it’s made,and once you deport the parents, the children don’t speak up for themselves, so few people will ever hear about it.

     

    These children are not anchors, and they are not furniture or cars or used clothing —they are children— American children. They are citizens of this country and because of their age they need to be treated with more care than an adult. They don’t understand how things work or what their options are, or even how to take care of their own basic necessities. These innocent children rely on adults to do that for them, and we are sadly letting them down in the most egregious way possible. Sure we are taking care of their immediate physical needs, and so it may appear on the outside that we are taking great care of them, but can we see inside their hearts and minds to measure and catalogue the emotional damage we have inflicted upon them when we crushed their worlds and cast them into a new and completely foreign one? Have we as a nation lost the ability to empathize with children? Have we completely forgotten that to a child, a family unit is their world?

     

    Many people will tell you that their whole lives changed when their parents got divorced, and they only left one parent behind– and even then there was visitation. Can you then imagine what it would have been like to have nothing of your old life to cling to for comfort and security when all the world stopped making sense?

     

    So remember, Bob Dane, and Fox News Inc. the next time you go to use this phrase, or hear someone else say it, that these are not things, they are children– American children, who got their citizenship the same way you and I did. Let us not emotionally devastate them, especially in the name of Law or Country, for there can never be a right way– or an American way– to abuse a child.

     

    We should stop this behavior immediately on the grounds of it being cruel and inhumane punishment. We need to figure out a less harmful way to do things.  If we think ourselves to be a great nation, then we should damn well be able to do much better than this.

     

     

     

    For the entire report by the Applied Research center see  http://bit.ly/vdPhQr

Filed Under: Hate, Immigration's effects on citizens

A letter to Newt Gingrich

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Hey Newt,

 

I hear you are starting to lag in the polls now. Apparently standing on principal worked better than standing on popular belief. You broke from the herd when you declared there  needs to be a more humane way to deal with the immigrants in this country. Ratings skyrocketed. You had no competition. Then, as pressure mounted, and you knew it would, you caved. You back tracked on your stance, without really negating what you previously had said, which only a seasoned politician can do, but it fooled no one.

 

Now that you are towing the party line, you look like all the other Republican candidates and you are losing your distinction as a man who believes in something, and will fight for it; which is after all is said and done, is what we are really looking for. We need someone to lead this country out of the funk it is in, not to follow popular yet inefficient philosophies like everybody else.

 

Mr. Gingrich you are either a man who stands for something because you believe it to be right, or you are a man who stands for whatever everyone else stands for– irregardless of right or wrong. It is very easy to tell the difference. The moment anyone opens their mouth, it is immediately obvious which.

 

Well, good luck with that.

Filed Under: Politicians, Politics, Republicans

We need a hero

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

 

As a nation, we have seen very little that inspires us to rise above our circumstance. Instead we are bombarded with the failures and foibles of a political system gone mad. Congress has really let us down. Greed has put us in a terrible state of affairs, and now that we need the governments guidance and assistance, they seem to be more determined to blame someone else and whip up a big fervor over what needs to be done. In the mean time, nothing is getting fixed. Instead of getting us out of a recession, they seem determined to keep us in one. What else could Congress do to keep us from shoring up our stressed out economy–

 

Keep bickering about the debt ceiling, stimulus packages, immigration policy and border issues.

 

Yep. That’ll do it. Not only will they not be stimulating the economy with much needed jobs and low cost services needed to keep inflation at bay, but if they argue and blame the other guy long enough, they won’t have to do anything else at all—the elections will be over and all the campaign promises will soon be forgotten or overshadowed by some new and more important issue.  There should be a new show on TV: Dancing with the Czars.

 

I personally have had enough.

 

We need a hero. NOW.

 

Fixing the border could stimulate the economy with jobs. Lots of jobs. Not only for the people getting paid to fix it, but for the suppliers of the materials and technologies, as well as for all the staff needed to monitor the border and it’s technologies, as well as the services they all need to live, work and play, like: food, clothing, housing, transportation. . .  and that’s just the border itself.

 

What about immigration?

 

Fixing our outdated laws and inefficient permit processes would provide jobs.

 

We have millions of people living and working here illegally, and we can’t track them, verify their identities, or provide them with the basic human rights we so staunchly demand for ourselves because according to our records— they don’t really exist. Nobody knows exactly how many people are here illegally. There’s a lot of guessing going on and the figures always change depending on what side of the equation you’re on.

 

The laws that keep our immigrant workforce from registering into a system that can count them, verify their identity, and provide for them can easily be amended. We just need a plan. It will also take a valiant effort to ensure the plan gets done. Databases will need to be created and connected to one another. More offices with which to register for visas and permits on a more timely and cost-effective basis will need to be built and staffed. Social security, DMV, Tax offices and many more departments will need to increase their staffs to support the sudden increase in participants and collect the fees they have not been collecting. Every non US national I have ever spoken to has told me they would gladly pay for chance to live and work here legally and without fear of prosecution.

 

All of these systems will create jobs and add revenue to our economy as well as increase our national security.

Sounds to me like fixing these two problems would go a long way to repairing the top two problems our society endures today: Lack of Jobs and an unstable economy. What we have is a potential to create a win-win situation where we will create jobs, increase state and federal funds and verify the identities of millions of people who are here illegally and in many instances are living under fabricated identities.

 

The immigrant will benefit by being able to provide for their families and live free of fear of prosecution and deportation. Just like us, for every week they don’t work, their family suffers. Unlike us, they don’t get unemployment or welfare.

 

We all win when we all begin to think about what is best for everyone instead of just what is best for ourselves, or by sticking to an invalid idea that to fix the problem we created is somehow an amnesty for a criminal society.

 

Illegal aliens are here; let’s do something about it and begin to live a better life because we dared to break free from a debilitating value system, and worked for the betterment of all involved.

 

So, which one of our presidential hopefuls will be our hero?

 

Filed Under: Economy, Employment, Laws

Hate and Immigration in the United States

May 10, 2012 by Leave a Comment

So, another day, and another immigration story. Today many families are leaving Alabama for Arkansas or back to Mexico due to a strict immigration bill being signed into law there. As usual, below in the comments was another story. Reading about a hundred of the almost three thousand comments I am struck by a couple of things:

1)  An overwhelming majority of comments are sympathetic to the law and approve the direction it is going in.

2)  The comments also reflect the voice of hate, and overwhelmingly drown out the few rational arguments crying out for the repair of a broken system.

3)  They are overwhelmingly selfish and self-righteous.

4)  Few of them even consider themselves to have ever come from the same situation, and the few who do acknowledge the similarities in their heritage but use “Might is Right” as their justification.

 

So, why are the overwhelming majority of these posters hateful and bigoted?

Where is the rational voice of a compassionate nation struggling with a difficult issue?

Where is America, the country that fights for other countries rights to be governed by it’s people (all it’s people) and be governed by a democratic process?

 

It appears that either the majority actually is speaking and America is not the righteous defender of the people of the free world, or there is a silent majority sitting on the sidelines.

 

But why would that be?

 

Don’t they realize that these comments are what lots of people the world over look towards to find how the people view something? If there is a majority sitting this debate out, then they are in fact being spoken for as far as the world see it, whether they like it or not.

 

Bombs are pretty loud, and they spoke for us in Iraq, when we overthrew an unstable dictator who killed all voices of opposition and supposedly harbored weapons of mass destruction. A large vocal majority approved that at the time.  Are these the same voices in the comments below the story today?

Granted, posting a comment in opposition of the majority in these arguments is often as profitable as spitting into the wind, but that doesn’t explain why the voice of reason isn’t the majority.

 

Where is the logical debate about the issues without the racial name calling and hate mongering that we as a nation are now viewed as being. This is making us look quite hypocritical.

 

We will fight and spend billions of dollars to defend another nations rights to live free and self-govern, yet we are denying a minority their rights as human beings ourselves. Remember the Kurds of Iraq, who were being killed by their nations leader because they were viewed as a worthless minority? We established a safe haven for them in their country, but we are refusing a discriminated minority safe haven in our own back yard.

 

Such hypocrisy does not make it easy for us to justify making other countries abide by our morals of  right and wrong, when we ourselves cannot live by them. This does not sit well with the world community.

 

How would you feel if another country saw what we were doing to our latin population and invaded us to protect them and create a safe haven for them? Yep, we’d shout and protest and disrupt them as much as possible, not trusting anything they said and counting the minutes until they went home.

 

Sound familiar?

 

We need to wake up and realize we are not the world’s morality protectors and underdog defenders that we think we are.

 

Those who live in glass houses should not carry around a pocket full of rocks.

 

Then what would we do? Stop forcing others to live like we ourselves wished we lived, or will the silent and strong stand up and try to take back which the loud and the oppressive are taking from us every day we do not defend what is right.

 

This is exactly what Edmund Burke once said, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

 

So America, the voice of hate is the loudest today. There are more racial slurs and hateful innuendos in the comments below the immigration stories than anything else. Is this the voice of the majority? Is this who you want the world to see us as being?

 

We need to debate this issue in order to come up with logical and workable solutions to our problems that we as a country can live by. But we need to keep the hate out, or  it will consume us.

 

The whole world is free to look at the comments below the news articles to see what the people themselves think of  any article. This is what they’re reading.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/05/us/immigration-one-family/index.html

Is this representative of you? If it isn’t and you do nothing, then it for all intents and purposes, it really is.

 

 

Filed Under: Hate, Immigration's effects on citizens

The United States Immigration Debacle, Part 5: The Conclusion

May 10, 2012 by 1 Comment

Part 5 of 5

 

There is plenty more to be said about the role that immigrants who entered our country without inspection have played in our society, but the main points I hope I established in this series are:

 

Immigrants have been here forever.

We asked the immigrants to come.

The immigration system does not meet our labor needs.

Waiting 25 years to come here is not realistic.

 

We never boycotted a company that gave us a good price and used immigrant labor.

Sending them all home now would make our broken visa system worse.

None of this is their fault.

They are not going to take over our country.

 

 

Once you stand back and take a look at the larger picture, it becomes clear that the immigration debacle is our own creation and the players in this game are only reacting in logical free market ways to work with the dysfunctional system that has not kept up with our growing labor needs.

 

Undocumented Immigrants are here, they have always been here, and they are very much a part of the intricate fabric that is the United States of America. Immigrants are not going to take over America and make it some other country as the most paranoid of us would like you to believe. Right wing extremists have been saying this since the 1700’s. and it still hasn’t happened. We are what we are because of who we are, and it is for this very reason that we have been so successful.

 

Immigrants have been coming here from every country on the planet in search of their American Dream. Whenever we have fallen and gone back on our promise of a better life to any particular immigrant population, we seem to eventually get over it and accept them into our society, but invariably at the cost of a new group of immigrant, who then become the new focus of our phobias and problems.

 

We are a nation of people who are always looking for a better price for a product or service. Brand loyalty comes in a distant second to our loyalty of the dollar, and whenever times get tough and the dollars get thin, our aggression to any perceived threat to our economic sustenance gets bolder. Immigrants, have always shouldered the brunt of our misguided anger through our well meaning, but highly ineffective immigration policies. What we tend to forget is that immigration is a function of our economy, not the cause of it.

 

We need to focus our energies on with the process of rebuilding our economy and stop vilifying on the people who came here to help. To send them all home now would add to inflation, shrink our economy and hamstring the very engines we need running smoothly to get us out of this recession.

So what do you think America?

 

 

Filed Under: Economy, Employment, Immigration's effects on citizens, Laws, The US Immigration Debacle
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