Random Immigration Thoughts

There's a new immigration bill which looks like it might get through. And though many of its supporters seem well intentioned, and many of us have wanted something to get done, I have trouble supporting a bill that confers rights but only hopes for enforcement of all the new rules. Haven't we already done the amnesty thing and it didn't work? Oh well…

Here's a few of my immigration concerns:

• Don't give new legal rights, of any sort, to aliens who have broken the law. Once rights are given, it's almost impossible in our court system to take them away. Also beware of interest groups and politicians who are grooming new voting blocks.
  
• Secure the borders first. Legal immigrants who come in the front door are (and always will be) welcome, so don't punish the ones with integrity and reward the unethical.
  
• Don't create more bureaucracy or more laws to enforce. We have too much government and too many laws we don't enforce already.
• It's un-American to create a permanent underclass just so we can buy things cheap. Didn't we fight a Civil War over similar issues?
• This is largely a Mexican problem. I like Mexico itself but the corrupt, Napoleonic cartel that runs that country is the reason we're in this situation. Can you say "regime change?"
• The emphasis needs to be on assimilation to the American culture. The country is a democratic, capitalist nation of citizen landowners. We have a Judeo-Christian foundation (largely Protestant) that has written its laws and defined its struggles in the English language. Everyone is welcome to join us. No one is welcome to undo us.