There are many good reasons to suspect that the life blood of politics is money. That fact is not new or something unknown by others. And I am certain that what I have suddenly realized has been common knowledge for others for a very long time. What I suspect is that there are certain political issues that do not get solved in Congress because their debate is a great source of money. They are the hot ticket issues that generate great passion and thus great contributions. They are brought up and argued and then they are allowed to fade unsolved because they produce great waves of contributions to politics.
My hunch would be that Immigration Reform is one of these. It is not a complicated nor difficult problem to solve. Even President George W. Bush was able to come up with a good plan. But it is an issue that has great passion in it and thus swells the bank accounts of parties on both sides.
It is an issue that should be easily compromised. There are some very clear givens. There is no way we are going to send all of them home. There is no way politically that a bill will get pass that just grants "amnesty" to all of them. So it would seem to me that the reform would include something about better border regulation; a process by which all who are here who want to become legal come forward and confess that they have violated the law. There will then need to be some kind of punishment. A Fine of some size. The punishment is one of those places where compromise is needed to find a good balance. There would need to be avenues for all who are here illegally to become legal, either citizenship or work papers. Again the steps for citizenship or legal work status can be brokered. Those who have criminal records would be subject to deportation. There are lots of little pieces that would need to be included but that is where good political "horse trading" would be wonderful.
Neglect of this issue continues to make it worse. But solving it would probably deprive the body politics of a great cash cow. But it is certainly true that the measure passed in Arizona to deal with it appears to me to be a great violation of our American rights under the Bill of Rights.
2 comments:
Don't you think the increase in border problems with illegals is a direct result of how easy it is for them to actually get into the US and find a job. Employers are eager to hire them at a reduced hourly wage and not have to pay SS/SDI or taxes on them. Under the table employment of this sort has cost US workers jobs increasingly over the past couple decades. This, along with outsourcing of our commodities industries and customer service is at an untenable level.
Border control is absolutely one of the issues needed to be solved. The employment issue is very much a part of this, but the problem needs to be addressed, and I am merely wondering why our politicans do not have the passion to solve it.
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