Make immigration reform a top priority
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Fatal Funnel Finale
To further discuss immigration reform, we encourage you to attend Tuesday's event, which includes a roundtable discussion, short film and song debut.
WHAT: Fatal Funnel Finale.
WHERE: Leo J. Welder Center for the Performing Arts
WHEN: Tuesday ...
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Fatal Funnel Finale
To further discuss immigration reform, we encourage you to attend Tuesday's event, which includes a roundtable discussion, short film and song debut.
WHAT: Fatal Funnel Finale.
WHERE: Leo J. Welder Center for the Performing Arts
WHEN: Tuesday at 7 p.m.
HOW: Free tickets available now at Welder Center and Victoria Advocate, as well as night of event.
CONTACT: Advocate Public Service Editor Gabe Semenza at 361-580-6519.
President Barack Obama must force immigration reform to the front-burner of U.S. politics.
The divisive problem intertwines with health care and unemployment, two areas the president vows to improve now.
We urge the new administration to the following:
Get tough on employers and enact a fraud-proof worker identification system.
Help to fix Mexico's economy.
Create a guest-worker program that matches the ups and downs of U.S. job demand.
We understand complex problems often require complex solutions. Lawmakers, though, can today take reasonable, common sense strides to address the broken immigration system without neglecting other pressing needs.
While this is a national issue, we in the Crossroads live in the middle of the Fatal Funnel. As national lawmakers remain hot and cold on immigration reform based on political expediency, the issue remains at the top of our list all the time. Crossroads residents live this problem.
The 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act made it illegal for U.S. employers to hire undocumented immigrants. Yet, the law and federal authorities lacked the teeth needed to enforce just that. The country is home to more than twice the number of undocumented immigrants - 12 million today - that were here before the last reform.
Authorities must punish employers who hire illegal workers.
To sort through who can work and who cannot, federal agencies must also require fraud-proof ID cards of everyone who seeks a U.S. job.
After the 1986 law passed, ID fraud boomed as an underground industry - so much so that it threatens the legal immigration system, according to a Government Accountability Office report.
The federal government cannot task employers as identity experts, which it did 25 years ago. Instead, federally crafted biometric ID cards - those that include DNA, retina scans or other sophisticated technologies - should become the new benchmark for legal status verification.
Of course, if Mexico's economy thrived, its workers would have far fewer reasons to sneak across the U.S. border. No border wall will ever stem the tide of work-hungry men and women who yearn for a better life.
The United States can begin to help Mexico's economy by further opening free trade, a proven route to economic development. The economies of both countries remain interdependent, and each stands to gain from increased trade.
Clearly, Mexico authorities must first ensure that its trucks meet U.S. standards. Doing so would spur labor south of the border.
Mexico creates about a half-million jobs a year. Twice that many young people, though, enter the workforce during the same period, and each only earns on average $4.50 a day.
Mexico's economy won't change overnight. Neither will the U.S. demand for low-skilled workers.
Obama must create a guest-worker program that matches Mexican workers with real-time U.S. labor demands. A guest-worker program would help the U.S. economy grow and alleviate the strain on Mexico's welfare purse.
Matching legal, foreign workers to U.S. employers ensures increased tax contributions, and the humane option for immigrants to safely return home and to family.
The U.S. immigration system remains so broken that no three solutions will fully patch the glaring holes. Lawmakers must act now, though, and reverse a 25-year lull in meaningful immigration reform.
This editorial reflects the views of the Victoria Advocate's editorial board.
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Comments
Why make this a “ xenophobic and racist views by those who think apologies from America to the world are appropriate” issue.
It’s not like the VA is suggesting we should be build sidewalks for “those people” attending that Elementary School on Lone Tree RD.
Anyway, who are we to show Mexico how to run an economy. We did in eight years what took Mexico’s PRI nearly 90 years to accomplish.
August 31, 2009 at 8:56 p.m.It is easy for me to support most of the opinion of this editorial.
What I don't understand is how the United States can help Mexico economy? Their biggest contribution to their economy currently is the money sent to them from illegal aliens. Many of our companies have closed and open new factories in Mexico. I just don't see how additional economic contributions to Mexico will create a strong middle class in Mexico. And I believe without a strong middle class illegal immigration will continue. The lower class and middle class must feel they have a viable means to improve their status in Mexico in order to reduce illegal immigration
It is obvious to me that immigration reform will occur rather quickly before the next election cycle. The current elected majority in Washington desires a means to dilute the votes of current citizens that oppose the new direction of our elected Washington officials for a bigger stronger central government.
August 31, 2009 at 8:45 p.m.Catahula...That was probably the best, most powerful argument I've read on this site. You, of course, will be condemned for your xenophobic and racist views by those who think apologies from America to the world are appropriate and those who think that national borders are outdated and patriotism is something too silly to discuss. I agree completely with your outrage over the idea that it is somehow OUR responsibility to "fix" the economy of Mexico. Hell's bells -- have the editors seen what the US government has done to OUR economy and they think we should meddle in the running of a foreign, soverign nation.
August 31, 2009 at 8:31 p.m.Salazaa..."Does anybody outraged here have any idea how much of our tax dollar goes to waste in Israel, Egypt, Iraq, and worldwide?"
Uhhh, all of it?
August 31, 2009 at 8:21 p.m.Does anybody outraged here have any idea how much of our tax dollar goes to waste in Israel, Egypt, Iraq, and worldwide?
Geesh, Mexico is next door and it’s well being directly affects us, especially border states like Texas.
August 31, 2009 at 5:56 p.m.I actually agree with Salazaa, it's time to take a look at the employers.
August 31, 2009 at 7:35 a.m.I don't believe the advocate is suggesting that.......it is an "answer" that has been discussed on this website....the advocates way of including an unbiased selection to this poll.
August 30, 2009 at 10:24 p.m.I am outraged at the Victoria Advocate's suggestion that WE, America, should be fix Mexico's economy. Catahula, you are absolutely right. My tax money should go to fix the AMERICAN economy. Wake up, Advocate!
August 30, 2009 at 8:28 p.m.Like drugs, illegal aliens are the result of a supply and demand equation.
August 30, 2009 at 8:07 p.m.If you buy them, they will come.
It’s long overdue, but time to get tough on employers.
Excellent editorial; kudos to the authors.
August 30, 2009 at 5:29 p.m.Obviously the VicAd is not one to uphold the Constitution of the United States.
Why doesn't VicAd take the pledge just we should be asking all of our politicians
1. I believe in a balanced budget and therefore will vote for a freeze in government spending until that goal is realized.
2. I believe government should not increase the financial burden on its citizenry during difficult economic times therefore I will oppose all tax increases until our economy has rebounded.
3. I believe more than four decades of U.S. dependence on foreign oil is a travesty therefore I will support an energy plan that calls for immediately increasing usage of all domestic resources including nuclear energy, natural gas, and coal as necessary.
4. I believe in the sovereignty and security of our country and therefore will support measures to close our borders except for designated immigration points so we will know who is entering and why and I will vehemently oppose any measure giving another country, the United Nations, or any other entity, power over U.S. citizens.
5. I believe the United States of America is the greatest country on earth and therefore will not apologize for policies or actions which have served to free more and feed more people around the world than any other nation on the planet.
Instead they are asking that law get tough on employers. How about getting tough on media and other organizations that support illegal aliens. Is that not like coyotes? Is this not Anti-American?
Why does the US have to Fix the Mexican economy? Here is one more group of people wanting to spend my tax money on other poeple that are not Americans. You have absolutely no right to advocate such laws. Again that is unAmerican.
August 29, 2009 at 7:30 p.m.