Yet another government program designed to chip away at liberty in this nation.

I just can't seem to get off this immigration issue. No, that's not it. I just can't seem to get off this illegal immigration issue. The whole thing is so ridiculous that I predict that it will never happen. What essentially amounts to amnesty for 8-12 million illegally residing immigrants in this nation is simply not acceptable to anyone. Ninety-percent (90!) of Americans feel that there are too many illegal immigrants in this country. About three-fourths think that legal immigration should be reduced. If you choose to only poll legally residing citizens of Spanish descent, these numbers decrease only slightly. They don't like this situation any better than anyone else. I do not feel that the American people will accept the legalization of all of these federal criminals.

Notice (I'm sure you have) that I do not use terms like "guest workers" (found in the headlines of today's newspaper) and "undocumented immigrants". These are euphemisms designed to hide the facts. These people broke the law. Fortunately, this particular fact is not able to be questioned by anyone. They have, to a one, all committed a federal crime. The term itself has become diluted by all of the un-Constitutional laws creating federal crime, but the basic idea is the same: These people have committed a crime or crimes against the United States. This is an easy crime to spot too, since lack of citizenship is simple to establish. So they are all guilty of a crime. The only thing defenders of these illegals can do then is to advocate amnesty. Advocates claim it is in the best interests of this country to help these law breakers sidestep the system of naturalization. If it indeed is in the best interests of this nation then perhaps they have a point. Let's see...

Amnesty advocates claim that illegal aliens boost our economy. I believe the argument is something like this; illegal immigrants work for less money, which drives down the prices for products and services. This promotes spending which increases the money moving through our economy, which improves the state of our economy in general. I have to hand it to them, these facts are absolutely correct. But, in true politico-talking head message spinning style, an image is presented that does not actually reflect reality. Illegal immigration boosts this aspect of our economy, but the economy is not that simple. Illegal immigration costs too.

All money that an illegal alien sends back to Mexico is money that is not spent in America that ordinarily would be. It is no secret that these people send money back to their impoverished relatives in Mexico. This helps to slow our economy down. It is understandable that they would do this. I would do the same. The fault is not with the illegal aliens, it is with our lack of enforcement of our own laws. We make it far too easy for them to break them and then grant legal status later anyway.

Statistically, illegal immigrants have more children than American citizens. This requires above average hospitalization and other health costs. The minimum wage pay they are making is not paying for this. Our tax dollars are paying for it. Granted, they pay taxes too from their minimum wage jobs, but the contributions they make are far less than the actual amount of services they receive. Healthcare isn't the only expense either. The extra expenses for education are enormous. In many areas the money spent on educating the children of illegal aliens equals the amount spent on citizens. Living in Texas, I have a perspective that some in this nation may not. For example, when my family moved to the DFW area, I was sent to my district's elementary school. My teacher spent most of the time speaking in Spanish and I understood nothing. I was one of 3 English speaking students in the classroom. Basically, that teacher's entire salary and costs of education were spent on what were almost certainly the children of illegally residing immigrants, and 2 children of American citizens (my family immediately removed me from this system and I went to school somewhere else) were denied proper education. And this was 1981 when the number of illegal immigrants in this nation topped off at somewhere around 2-3 million. Now its 8-12 million.

The idea of cheaper products and services is one that is hard for Americans to get around. We like low prices -that's the heart of capitalism. The competition to provide these cheap prices is what has fueled this mass illegal migration. Here's the problem -the reason that people from Mexico will work for such a small amount of money is because the economy in Mexico is so bad that our minimum wage seems like an awful lot of money. In the 80s, when illegal immigration was considerably less (although it must be noted that even at that time the citizens of this country were infuriated by our federal government's lack of border enforcement), jobs like janitorial services and other manual labor jobs actually paid enough money to provide for basic living expenses. These jobs all pay about half as much now when inflation is factored in. That ends another common myth: Americans will do the work. Americans were janitors and field workers before this mass immigration problem. They just require a living wage to do it. Employers no longer have the requirement to pay a living wage; they use the federally mandated minimum wage as a marker. If American citizens won't work for it, they find someone else who will.

As previously stated, the amnesty idea was tried already. Reagan did it in the 80s for the then approximately 3 million illegal aliens. This infuriated most Americans, but we grudgingly accepted it because we were assured as a nation that our borders would be enforced. They told us mass illegal immigration would not be a problem in the future. They told us that if we allowed the administration to grant amnesty to these people, this problem would be addressed and the issue would never come up again. Now, not even 20 years later, its worse than ever. Reagan granted the amnesty, and as a result, the previous number of 3 million has ballooned to 8-12 million. Wages continue to drop. Jobs increasingly go to foreigners illegally residing in this nation while American citizens can't find jobs that pay enough to cover basic living expenses.

Once again, we are asked as a nation to accept what is basically an amnesty program. Once again we are told that we have to accept the reality of the presence of these illegal aliens and grant them some sort of legal status. Once again we are told that if we accept this, the problem of border security will be addressed. Will we once again accept this? In 20 years, when illegal immigration shoots up another 3 or 4 hundred percent will we accept it again? At which point do we make our government listen to us?

We do not have to accept their presence. We do not have to allow legislation to pass that continues to drive down the wages of American jobs. We can demand that these laws are actually enforced for a change. Our country's immigration policy is out of control. More importantly, the overwhelming majority of American citizens feel that it is out of control. When we allow our government to act in a manner that is in opposition to the will of the people (not to mention the law), we accept that our nation is not ruled by consent of the governed, but in spite of them. America is dying a slow death due to this and other instances of our government disregarding the will of the people and the laws of the land. But like the Romans, pre-occupied with entertainment and frivolity, the American public no longer has any desire to fight. In many cases, they don't even know why they should fight. Everyone in America should study Roman history. The common saying goes "Rome wasn't built in a day". It wasn't. It also didn't fall in a day. It took a long time. America is replaying that fall, one day at a time.