By Bill Woodruff ?
The problem of illegal immigration is certainly a very complex one, but as with many issues today, it is further complicated by muddled thinking.
The scope of this problem is staggering ? the number of illegal immigrants in this country is more than the entire populations of Bahrain, Belize, Estonia, Fiji, French Guiana, Guyana, Iceland, Jamaica and Slovenia combined. Imagine all those countries vacant.
I constantly hear the argument that they are just here to find work. I have sympathy for people who live in poverty under a corrupt government and will do anything to escape, but a bleeding heart leaves no blood for the brain. That is the sad truth here ? what part of illegal alien isn”t clear?
Illegal immigration is a slap in the face to all those immigrants, Hispanic or otherwise who have obeyed the law. There are many people who wish to legally immigrate to the U.S. who are stuck on a waiting list. Put this in a different context. How would you feel and react if you had been patiently standing in line at the bank for 10 minutes when someone walked in the door and went right up to the teller and demanded service ahead of everyone else? I think you would hear a lot of grumbling from most people in line and possibly a few who would do something, such as complain to the bank manager and take their business elsewhere or get violent.
Without repercussions for illegal activity there is no justice system. It is clearly against the law to enter this country without going through customs. It makes no sense whatsoever to give detainees a free bus ride home where they will just turn around and re-enter the U.S. illegally again. Amnesty for those who do not respect a just law is a huge mistake. “Compassion to an offender who has grossly violated the laws, is, in effect, a cruelty to the peaceable subject who has observed them.” ? Junuis.
With all the absurd legal defenses used in court these days, it is no surprise that compassion and reason are distorted. Should we argue that a burglar be sent home without punishment because he was broke or came from an abusive home?
I suggest that instead of a free bus ride home, we set up mobile work camps all the way across the border and put detainees to work building a fence at room and board payscale for several months and then sell them a bus ticket home. Even if that is not enough of a deterrent for return visits, at least it will help seal our border at a lower cost. Why would a terrorist bother to go through TSA inspections when he can walk right in?
In a Utopian world, it would be ideal to not have national borders and let everyone be free to go anywhere they want in the world unhindered, but until then we need to have respect for borders and enforce existing laws.
We cannot afford to rescue the world”s exploding population. We are consuming the world”s finite resources much faster than any other country. This is unsustainable and in that respect, we are already the most overpopulated country in history. That would unfortunately suggest that we should also curtail illegal immigration.
Politically, we have been the light of the world since the American Revolution, but in the long run people in other countries are going to have to follow that lead and learn to cure the ills in their countries and stop overloading our country”s resources. We are already bankrupt, although still in denial. It is time for the lights to come on in the rest of the world before ours gets extinguished.
Bill Woodruff is a longtime Lake County resident and former business owner.
