Immigration Reforms

Today on Sunday morning political television, someone said that Latinos who cross the border illegally come from a culture of criminality, and that this is why citizens object to their presence. I think, judging it as leniently as possible, that he meant that someone who is willing to cross the border illegally breaks the law as the first thing he does in the US. But getting to this interpretation of what he said required a few leaps of logic, and I'm not clear why he specified "Latinos" either, because no one can seriously believe that Latinos are responsible for all of the illegal border crossings. I wish I knew the name of the person who said it, but I wasn't actually watching the tv at the time. I was only listening, and I didn't have time to watch the rest of it in an attempt to figure out which one was the bigot.

They were talking about the new House measures designed to stem the tide of undocumented workers. On a personal level, I find the whole thing offensive. As someone else pointed out on the tv this morning, things that are currently being said about Latin American immigrants are the same things that used to be said about Jews and Italians, among others. It's not got anything to do with the groups specifically, but has got everything to do with fear of something new.

On an intellectual level, it's laughable. Undocumented workers are an established and integral part of the US economy. It's funny to watch politicians try to walk the thin line between pandering to socially conservative voters who think that immigrants are stealing the jobs of citizens and/or freeloading rampantly on tax dollars, and trying to keep on the good side of the businesses that really don't want to have to verify the immigration status of their workers.

I think a good solution would be to set up every undocumented worker with a random citizen on friend dates, and see what happens.