Positing a Hard-line view.

Submitted by mariana (United States), May 13, 2007 at 13:05

Many of these immigration problems began with Lyndon Johnson @ 1965, when they amended Immigration laws to allow [encourage] "stream" immigration. Husbands or wives with minor children are one thing, but these chains and streams of immigration [outside the quotas] have been a disaster which has been exacerbated by government sponsorship [financial support].

The 1986 Simpson/Mazzoli "Amnesty" legislation [purportly to "cure" the problem of 2-3 million "illegal aliens," [eliciting 20-30 million more illegals] has clearly exacerbated the situation because it encourages and rewards new illegals who clearly understand that Congress is Hell-bent on devaluing "citizenship" and American Law by rewarding law breakers, and enabling them to "jump the line."

During the same period, the INS lessened qualifications for citizenship, degraded the History, Citizenship and Language proficiency test, and DELEGATED TEST-GIVING TO ETHNIC ORGANIZATIONS [whose prime directive is to GROW their constituency]. I have personally encountered such orgs which passed out the "answers" to the q's to people lacking all of the above skills. Multiple Choice and T&F questions cannot accurately measure literacy or knowledge, when "cheating" encouraged by the proctors, is a built-in component.

At one point, Ca had ballots printed in at least 17 languages. WHY? This is obviously a tacit admission that they're granting citizenship to people who are English illiterate [at the very least; majority coming from Mexico are Spanish illiterate, also]. California has also had serious fraud [illegals being bussed from polling place to polling place in S.Cal], with pernicious results. Why should anyone who hasn't sufficient command of a language to understand the ramifications of political information, be able to vote for OUR government? Any info they get is filtered by their "ethnic leadership" and I believe that ETHNIC LEADERSHIP per se, is UN-AMERICAN. The American Dream was to come here to become American; not to bring the dysfunctional aspects of the "Paradise" you escaped; and absent integration into the mainstream economy [which requires English], the American Dream becomes largely unachievable.

I agree with all of you who feel we need "to grill" APPLICANTS FOR ADMISSION to or CITIZENSHIP into this country. Especially considering the security ramifications we're facing [and the fact that so many visitors overstay visas], perhaps VISITORS should also be REQUIRED to make such affirmations.

First, we have to acknowledge [TEACH OUR CHILDREN AND LEGISLATORS] that our Constitution and Bill of Rights, and our historic "welcoming of immigrants to citizenship," are quite different than those of ALL other countries, and explicitly REQUIRE- A PRIORI, affirmation of a willingness to live under American Law.

If BELIEF IN ISLAM means that "individual rights" have to be suppressed and subjugated to imams, mullahs, ayatollahs or any other "higher authority," those who so believe SHOULD BE INELIGIBLE for American Citizenship, because their FUNDAMENTAL beliefs REQUIRE overturning our society. The extremely offensive street "demonstrations" by illegals is outrageous. This is not Paristan or Londonistan where 10,000 autos can be set alight in a night by rioters.. Round them up and deport them.

Citizenship's "perqs" have commensurate "responsibilities." American Citizens today, are being "oppressed" with the "responsibility" of EXCEEDINGLY HIGH TAXES "required" to support, heal, subsidize, and educate illegals who have no right what-so-ever to be here.

Elected officials on our payroll feel free to insult and ignore us, utterly! Driven by some lunatic "PC" interpretation and non-enforcement of Immigration laws, they live in a Never-Never World of criminalizing political differences, and rancorous personal attacks turning the content of political discourse into a cesspool - attracting only the lowest denominator of our society to run for office. They clearly need to be voted out office here. Perhaps they be happier running for office somewhere like Germany, Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela or in the Middle East.

We're either a country with frontiers and boundaries, a body of laws and rights, heritage, and way of life - or we're not. My great grandparents chose to become Americans, and for me, there's not any other country in the world I'd want us to emulate. mariana

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".