So my US cousins...as many of you know Bjam and I are here as guests in your country and patiently waiting for over 3 years to go through green card process. (Oh my god the legal immigration system is so broken and overwhelmed!!)
It gets extremely boring watching reforms that would bring some sanity to the processes that support legal immigration get sidelined and subsumed under the never ending debate and coverage about the illegal immigration problem and the debate about protecting our borders which gets hijacked for the political purposes of all sides of the debate.
In the meantime here is some amusing entertainment to divert our attention. Enjoy!
To me this is like the large pink elephant in the room.
Immigration isn't the problem. You don't see anybody talking about building a fence on the border with Canada. The immigration debate is really an umbrella to what the real problem is, the pink elephant(s).
English immigrants, why no problem dear sirs..we trust you will fill out the forms correctly and patiently wait through the process. You are no threat and don't seem to be abusing the system in any way.
Mexican immigrants....AHHHHH, Oh my god, there are so many of them swarming across the border in droves and infiltrating our economy and driving our work markets down and the ones that do file visitor status just abuse our welfare system! WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT <b>IMMIGRATION!</b>
Canadian immigrants, (My mother became an american citizen between the age of 6-12) ah..how long will you be staying? Anything to declare? If you get around to it, maybe you can fill out he proper paper work. You know, just out of convenience for your U.S. employer..eh, when you get around to it.
General Middle Eastern Immigrants, (My fathers side of the family is 4 generations in from Lebanese immigrants) GTFO! No way! This is a fundamentally wrong system that potentially compromises our homeland security. WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT <b>IMMIGRATION!</b>
Big ole pink elephant right there in the middle of the room... lets just talk about general immigration overhaul that will cover all residents here from other countries. This from the country who dragged Africans out of their own country here as slaves, got the Chinese over here to build our railroads, and tried to kick out the original inhabitants in the first place. So now it's time to put in more hoops to jump through? Sign in or get out. Thats the policy they are pushing now.
Hoblit wrote:...got the Chinese over here to build our railroads...
...and the Irish, too. Welcome to America, we're color blind when we're taking advantage of you! Age, color, creed, we'll suck y'all dry, and then throw your corpses over the side with the rest of the trash.
Yeah this is touchy to say the least. At the risk of offending anyone or everyone, I'll play devil's advocate for a minute. I think the big thing that has a lot of folks up in arms isn't so much the "Migraphobia" thing or the "They're taxing our welfare system / taking our jobs thing". It's the whole "ILLEGAL" thing and that the government is considering a blanket "CITIZENSHIP" thing for anyone now considered to be illegal while folks who honestly try and go through the red tape and follow the guidelines as Stuey and Bjam are, wait for things to get better with no end in sight. That stinks of both parties wanting to tap into 12 million unregistered voters, plain and simple. As close as Presidential elections have been lately, the party that does that could tip the scales in their favor. Illegal means you're breaking the fucking law. If you're breaking the law now, BEFORE you become a citizen, why should a reasonable person not expect someone to break the law after they've been given citizen status? I think it's a fair concern. Should the process be simplified? Well yeah, so should my fucking taxes dammit. Red tape sucks. Yet year in and year out I manage to find a way to fill out the forms, take my deductions, and pay what I should. But I'm not griping about being given a free pass for not doing any of those things. And I would be pissed at the guy who did.
Protesting about letting illegal aliens being given citizenship is as tasteful to me as people who gripe about prisoner rights. Is there something wrong in the line of thinking that once you break the law you kind of forfit your rights to a reasonable extent? I said reasonable so don't jump down my throat about human rights. I'm talking about cable TV, and smoking, and the food isn't good type gripes. Uh.......listen. You broke the law. You're being punished. Your High School guidance counselor should have told you it wouldn't be like Club Med if you weren't smart enough to figure that out on your own. So sit down, shut up, eat your bologna and enjoy watching Oprah.
And here's where I tell you that I'm 3rd generation boat riding Irish. My grandparents had a shtty time of it. My parents, mildly better. But they persevered and now I get to enjoy the fruits of their efforts by paying my taxes and bitching about the stupid shit my government does. And I don't write angry letters to the editor about how Notre Dame should change their fucking mascot because it doesn't bother me. I think that's whiny bullshit, and I'm not looking for a free pass or a handout. My wife. Hell she's half Hawaiian, half Japanese. Talk to her about how the US annexed her island while her father was treated to a concentration camp in WW2. There's a conversation you want to engage in.
Happy news! We got accepted into the next stage of the green card process (which we've been in for 3.5 years... hm). We just need them to let people like us get greencards again or something like that(there's some finickety thing about the quote being filled or some such).
And hopefully before my brother ages out of being a dependent and loses his 'place in the line'.
(The letter stueym/my dad wrote to our congressman (the best thing to do is to write to your congressman!) is here if you feel like reading some legal gobbledeegook where I'm referred to as a "bright young adult" entering my "most exciting phase of my life" but I have a "dark cloud of uncertainty and high debt over my head". Oh dear! )
And then Bush brought up immigration in the state of the union. Hopefully Congress/Senate will pass something actually useful.
MintyHandy wrote:I'm all for allowing anyone to enter the country legally. Unless they speak pirate or use a bad fake accent all the time, or kick my dog.
illegals from the far east will love your dog, in a variety of delectable ways.
CNN is having some competition where you can video a question, send it in, and then if you get chosen, they fly you to South Carolina and you ask your question in a debate. Super cool!
Enjoy!
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