Knee Deep in the Middle of the Rio Grande

One issue that I have avoided discussing on this blog is that of illegal immigration. Quite frankly I just don't know what to think about this issue. Everything is turned upside down. I look at every side of this issue and have come to the conclusion that the entire debate disgusts me. Everything is right and everything is wrong. I usually hate those that stand in the "whishy-washy" middle but that's exactly where I find myself today. The radical extremes, which are driving this issue, are so far apart and so wacky, that there is no other place to be for any rational thinking person.

It makes me sick to hear Patrick Buchanan's claim that there is some great Mexican plan to take back the American southwest. That's just plain stupid. Somehow he expects us to believe that the Mexican government, who isn't competent enough to pick up the garbage off the streets in their capital, has come up with a grand scheme to win back Texas.

Every bit as ridiculous is Rep. Luis Gutierrez, who seems to be advocating that illegal immigrants have unfettered access to our legal and social welfare state without regard to our economy and national security. At the height of Gutierrez's idiocy was his fight for clemency for the imprisoned members FALN, the Puerto Rican terrorist group who staged over 130 bombings in the hopes to gain Puerto Rican independence.

With extremists in the mold of Gutierrez and Buchanan leading the debate for and against illegal immigration I have no hope that the problem will be resolved anytime soon. What we need is someone sensible enough and with a large enough following to frame the debate in the following manner:

• Keeping an open boarder that allows people to cross unchecked is a national security issue that must end.
• Since it is a national security issue to allow illegal immigrants to come into this country, it seems obvious that we have to find out who is already here. So we need to find some way to account for those people.
• The illegal immigrants are not creating the jobs they are filling, the employers are. If they weren't being hired no one would be coming over. It is imperative that the laws we have on the books against hiring illegals are enforced.
• There is a demand and a need for unskilled laborers in our workplace. As more baby boomers retire and as the average size of the American family gets smaller we simply do not have the workforce to fill all our jobs.

These are the talking points that need to be accepted before we can expect a satisfactory resolution to our national dilemma. Building a fence along the boarder and using the race card as a reason not to enforce our laws serves no one except those that are playing on the extremes of the political spectrum.