Immigration
In the great classic movie, “The Sound of Music,” there is the wonderful song, “Maria” or "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?" which is sung by the nuns in the convent where Maria was living and studying as a young girl. She was a great irritation to them. This song and especially one refrain, could be a meaningful analogy on the situation of illegal immigration in our country. It’s a tough problem and can’t, won’t be solved by angry shouting, shooting, and demagoguery. We must work together strongly, calmly, and sanely.
In “Maria” one verse of refrain is:
“Many a thing you know you'd like to tell her
Many a thing she ought to understand
But how do you make her stay
And listen to all you say
How do you keep a wave upon the sand”
You can almost sing those words as you read them!
On immigration we could perhaps rephrase the words like this:
"Many a thing you know we’d like to tell them
Many a thing they ought to understand
And they ought to listen to everything we say
But how do we make them all go away?
How do you keep a wave upon the sand"
Yes, this is a complex problem, perhaps it can’t be solved, just like the problem the nuns had with Maria. Although her story did have a happy ending. Is it possible for our immigration story to have a happy ending? Well, yes, certainly it is, but it won’t be easy for a lot of us.
If a situation is impossible or darn near impossible, the first sensible step is to accept that fact. It’s not ordinary and will require extraordinary effort. The 11 or 12 million are here. During Hurricane Katrina, when we had to evacuate the city of New Orleans, there were about 500,000 or so people, most honest American citizens, with no place to live. And we had a very difficult time finding a place for these folks to live in safety, dignity and with respect.
Just 500 thousand, we really need to look at that 12 million number, and accept it as a “Maria” problem. We’ve tried walls, jails, bullets, and deportation; maybe we ought to try something different (to paraphrase President Reagan, “There I go again!”)
We’ve talked about amnesty, and just the mention of that word sends rage through some of us. We’ve talked about various worker programs, with complicated controls and requirements. No sensible illegal who wants to stay here in an active job will come forward to volunteer all sorts of information to the authorities, and then more than likely get deported, breaking up a family or worse.
I realize that many great minds have already tried to solve this problem, including our duly elected representatives. The latest effort is of course the new law in Arizona, aimed at being able to find out just who is legal and who is illegal when stopped for some other offense. (That’s pretty close, the law has already been modified in its brief life.)
However, if we think about it, haven’t most of the efforts and thinking and agreements been aimed at “controlling” the incoming flow of immigrants, controlling the tide, keeping the wave upon the sand?
“Acceptance” is a different way of looking at situations. It doesn’t mean “taking it.” It means acknowledging the situation realistically and then setting realistic goals on mitigating and improving the situation so that the result is “win-win” for everybody.
Sound hard to believe? Well it can work. First we must get the right folks with the right attitudes back together again, and work from a different point of view. We must think differently, we must do something different, and expect a different result. It may not be perfect, but it just might be workable and acceptable to the majority of our American voting citizens.
So, it’s not up to me, if you elect me as your representative, I want to do just that - - represent you, the majority, I will listen to you.
However, as you might expect and hope, I do have a personal plan, it’s just an idea.
Here’s a brief introduction to my plan. Remember, this is truly a complex issue.
If we take a breath and honestly look at this challenge, we just might realize and agree that the issue of immigration is inextricably tied to three other powerful issues:
1. our social and family structure,
2. our tax structure,
3. and our so-called drug wars.
Addressing those three and taking action therein might help far more than trying to regulate immigration as a sole issue.
Let’s look at the first two issues together. Perhaps we ought to make the tax system more realistic, and more in line with the current needs of our country. Right now we give many extra deductions and exemptions for large families. Immigrants (and some “regular” folks) often have large families. Let’s change the IRS codes to allow a maximum of four deductions, one for each adult, and two for children. That’s it, the rest you take care of yourselves.
That’s the first step. Will that affect some of us citizens, yes it will. But the question can be proposed why should folks who have small, “standard families” pay extra taxes to support folks who get tax breaks for large families. Why do we, collectively, have that responsibility? Well, many would say we don’t and we shouldn’t continue this policy.
Next step would be doing something about the documentation and the social services. There is a great deal of debate in our country by our own citizens about having a “national ID card” or national identification system. It’s almost an unsolvable issue. Of course, truth is, we really already have it; it’s just that many folks would like to deny it or not accept it. So, let’s allow them to have it their way. Let’s make a national ID system voluntary for American citizens. We already have many ID methods in place, for example, state issued driver’s licenses, military ID cards, police ID badges, student ID cards, nursing and doctor ID cards, and of course U.S. Passports, as well as passports from other countries and visas.
Exactly! Those passports from other countries, couldn’t those be a clue as to how to solve this problem? We could stop trying to “identify” people we stop, who often have fake social security numbers, and invalid or no driver’s license.
One important aspect of solving this problem will be using the latest technology to the fullest.
We could require all persons in the U.S. to have some form of ID, except of course those citizens who don’t want anything to do with this. Then if a person is here with a passport from another country, all of their work is not funneled into our tax and social security system, but rather documented and credited to the home country. Likewise, if social services are needed, whether in an emergency or otherwise, then the billing would go to the home country. This would help make the other nations aware of just how many of their citizens are working or living here, and make that home country at least partly responsible for that citizen of theirs!
Will we get those bills paid? Who knows, but it would be doing something different, and it would help let our authorities know who is here. And if they should not be here, it will be somewhat simplified to deal with that person. If they have no passport, or no ID of any kind, then regular legal channels could be activated. And then perhaps honest, law-abiding American citizens would be relieved.
And what about our free-choice citizens who “opt out” of this national ID system? Well, more than likely there will be unintended benefits from such a system, and the volunteers may slowly join the program. Implementation for citizens could be a very simple check box on a driver’s license or other form of identification, which could be titled,”U.S. Citizen?” Yes or No. Let’s keep it simple!
Now then, I did mention the so-called drug wars. Ostensibly we are “waging the drug wars” because of the social and moral decadence caused by illegal drug use. Yes there is surely a terrible cost. By now almost every adult person in our country has had a friend or family loved one affected by drugs.
However, it is quite apparent and very well documented, that the cost of the “war” and the resultant incarceration and family trauma is far worse than the social cost of the actual drug use. Therefore, we as a society maybe ought to consider a complete change of attitude. I would support legislation totally legalizing all form of drugs. All. It is not the drug which ought to be illegal, rather the actions of the user. This policy would be exactly identical to tobacco and alcohol. Drinking is not illegal, but driving and drinking definitely is. Then we would could focus our national will on reducing drug use, increasing treatment programs and education. Billions upon billions could be saved by changing our attitudes and our policy!
So many so-called “conservatives” want less and smaller government. Well, the current drug war policy is certainly extremely government intrusive! A new policy would allow us to totally eliminate the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) which really can’t enforce anything about drugs, just conduct raids and arrest people. If we want “the government out of our personal lives” let’s start here. We the People (the Government) ought not be involved if a person sits at home and enjoys a moment of supposed bliss. But that person better not start driving, flying, or working in such state.
Let’s summarize. If the tax and socioeconomic benefits automatically bestowed upon illegal immigrants were changed and stopped, but in a manner which would still allow those persons to live and work here - not amnesty, just honesty - then we could begin to get long term relief. Further, if the horrible affects of the long lasting drug wars were ended, and the high price associated with illegal drugs was eliminated, perhaps a calmness over the whole situation might begin to take place. If there were no enormous financial benefit to smuggling illegal drugs into our country, we can only wonder to what degree the illegal tide might ebb, along with reduced criminal behavior.
Changing the tax and social structure as described above ought to have the result of keeping the illegal persons ultimately tied to their home country. That is where their health care, educational funding, and retirement funds would come from, not from our treasury!
Ending the drug wars almost certainly will have great social benefit to our entire society.
Finally, a different way of looking at “immigration reform” is that we must change three other issues:
1. Change our social and family economic structure,
2. Change our tax structure,
3. End our so-called drug wars.
If you got this far, Thanks for reading all the way through! It is complicated, but most of our efforts so far have not worked. Let do something different!