Posted by
Dana Andjus on Wednesday, July 05, 2006 3:41:13 PM
Hi! This is my first attempt at blogging. I retired recently and have the time now that I never had before. I worked 36 years for the same insurance company right out of college--the University of Michigan. I've grew up in Ohio, lived in Illinois, California(15 years) and for the last 16 years Massachusetts. For business, I have spent significant time in Indiana, Arizona, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. I married my dream girl in 1968 and have 3 sons ages 25-37. I am a Christian, a common man and want to express some views here with more than common sense. I want to look at things with uncommon sense.
Let me start today with immigration, particularly the illegal kind. I don't hear anyone who has a problem with legal immigration. Those newcomers add a lot of skill to our workforce and we have a chance to investigate their records. I think we should increase the number of legal immigrants allowed each year.
But most of us, probably 80% plus, would like to see our borders and ports more secure. That is the #1 problem. Politicians had a chance to unite us. With 80%+ in favor of enforcement of our borders and ports and enforcement against employers taking advantage of undocumented workers they should have started with enforcement not a comprehensive plan. We want to prevent terrorists, drugs, weapons, other contraband, and yes, hardworking Mexican immigrants from coming here illegally. Then after 2 years of enforcement, if they are doing their job of securing the border and prosecuting employers who are hiring undocumented workers and those workers who use forged documents, we can come up with a plan to legalize the residency of those 12,000,000 here illegally. America will always be just. There are many different ideas of how to be fair to these people, after we are fair to our citizens and taxpayers and those waiting legally to come here. All ideas should be heard and discussed. There is no emergency. Closing the borders is the key item.I would prefer some sort of legal residency short of full citizenship. There should be no reward of citizenship for breaking the law. But they will get protection from employers taking advantage of them, they will be able to live a full life in the greatest country ever developed on earth, their children born here will be citizens, they will pay taxes and participate in programs like Social Security, in state tuition, etc . They should not be able to bring others in, except as allowed under current programs and under a reasonable total limit. English fluency should be required and i would be OK with a path to citizenship for honorable military service. I'm sure there are a lot of really good ideas.
When a politician accuses someone of wanting to divide us, remember in a situation like this they had a chance to unite us and chose to try to further their own political agendas. Teddy Kennedy is just as guilty as George Bush in this case. Maybe they know that they aren't actually going to enforce the borders so they want a comprehensive plan before we realize what they are doing. They just think we don't care and will go along. At any rate, I think they are uniting us. This McCain-Kennedy Immigration Plan, the corruption we have seen, and their statements that they are above the law regarding perfectly legal searches of their offices tells me that we need better representation in Washington. I'm sure a lot of you are united with me. Don't be fooled by their rhetoric, enforcement first unites us.