EvilMonkey

Absolutely not, Teri. Hey if they want to come here and work to make a living I am all for that, always have been. In fact I have a lot of respect for them. To me it doesn't matter if they are immagrants or little green people from the moon, nobody should be above the same laws that we must adhere to. Equal treatment is fine but special treatment is not even remotely fair.

Teri B.

So what law is it that you're concerned about - driving? Identification? Who's to say that in order to get a drivers license they don't have to register and get some sort of immigrant ID number, and I'm certain their drivers' licenses will state unequivocally that they are not citizens. An immigrant doesn't have to have a SS # to get a driver's license. Think about it . . . we have lots of legal immigrants, millions of them, who drive, own property, work, pay employment taxes.

Legal - smegal.

What's the big deal? Why's everyone wigging out about this? It's just another poke at the hot button, with no merit or base.

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Teri B.

That's nonsense. We have MILLIONS of legal immigrants, students, guest workers, etc., in this country who CANNOT VOTE. You're just jumping to wildly exaggerated conclusions.

Proof please.

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EvilMonkey

I am happy to agree to disagree but no merit or base? Having to show a SSN to get a drivers license is a law that Americans are bound to, to make exceptions to anyone else is simply unfair and carries a lot of merit. How anyone can see that as fair is beyond me. This is a flaw in the system overall, if politicians want to make it so they can get licenses then work out an easier way for citizenship, don't circumvent the system for exceptions.

Teri B.

What law? States have different laws (http://www.nilc.org/immspbs/DLs/DL004.htm). My neighbor is from India. She's not a citizen, and she just learned to drive and got her license. She doesn't have a SS#. I'm sure she has some other ID number. She is a "legal" immigrant. What's the point of keeping our underground slave laborers from driving?

They're HERE! They've been coming here and picking our crops and mowing our yards, and doing whatever we ask for whatever we feel like paying them pretty much since we stole this land from the Native Americans. Well, accept for those years when they were trying to keep us from scrounging around their land.

Who the heck do "we" think "we" are? This baffles me.

My grandparents were immigrants, and I'm sure if they could have walked over here to escape dying of starvation in Ireland they would have, but they had to take a boat, so they could be abused and treated like human scum for a couple of generations.

Playground justice prevails.

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EvilMonkey

We are the people who must have a SSN to obtain a drivers license, in 48 states (according to your document). We are the people who pay taxes, no exceptions. Question you should be asking is who are they to be exempt from the same laws.

chambers92

Interesting. So would all legal immigrants get to vote as well?

The reason I ask is because I'm a legal alien/resident with a green card.. Too long to go into why I never became a citizen. I guess I sometimes forget I'm not a citizen because I've lived in this country for many years.

Anyhow, would I be able to vote with this deal if I lived in New York? Something tells me that voting is not included as part of this deal. Because then it opens up a can of worms for all legal residents who live here

Teri B.

Okay, so I didn't read that carefully, cause I was running out the door. But I don't understand who this is going to hurt. If laws DO hurt people, they should be changed, and these laws DO hurt HUMAN BEINGS. When I say who are "WE," I mean who are WE becoming? We used to be a beacon for freedom, liberty, human rights - who are WE now? A bunch of selfish, self-important frauds who CLAIM to care more about the freedom of some people in Iraq, who we've wronged in ways that are beyond OUR comprehension, than those who live on our own continent, in our own country? Our young men and women are dying for Iraqis' "FREEDOM." Yet, after all these years we still treat immigrants like sub-humans who don't deserve the very freedom we take for granted. A driver's license is more than we're willing to allow them?

This immigration debate really sets my hair on fire, cause the basis of it is so inhumane, so elitist. Equal protection means, to me, that all human beings should be afforded the same rights, freedoms, and opportunities, and the moment we stepped away from that ideology, we started to lose our souls.

Where are OUR ideals? And without them, what will WE become. "Rule of law" is only noble if it breeds equality, justice, and decency.

We need to fix our laws, figure this out, not shut them out and build some Berlin-style wall of shame.

A border is just an imaginary line - human beings are more important than that, I still dare to hope anyway.

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Teri B.

The Real Immigration Debate - Have WE Lost Our Souls?



By Teri B.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

Yeah, "home of the free" - that's us. But the definition of "free" has become kind of skewed.

Did some people wake up two years ago thinking 14 to 20 million people snuck over the border while they were asleep? This has been going on for 30 years, and suddenly everyone's all aflutter about it with all these drastic ideas, bogus statistics, and "us and them" mentality. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT?!? Deport 14 to 20 million people? Not only would it be an exodus of Biblical proportions, which would show the entire world just what a "Christian" nation we are, but it would be impossible to achieve, and our economy would collapse. "Mr. Gorbachev, put up that wall."

They've been here for a pretty long time, and no one's had to give up their SUVs or IPODs. These people are arguing for something that they wouldn't want if they could get it. Haven't we already seen enough of the "unintended" consequences and suffering caused by our actions!?! At this point, these folks love America so much they're willing to risk their lives to get here and join our military and die for our country for a chance to be a citizen. So, why don't we just create a bunch of angry young men, starving, disillusioned, and disenfranchised RIGHT BELOW US! Isn't that a wonderful recruiting ground for terrorists!

People make up nonsense about illegal immigrants committing crimes, steeling identities, taking jobs, it's all just outright lies when you look at reputable sources (see below). They are far more law biding and hard working than your average U.S. citizen, and they're the ones being exploited. We've created our own slave class who are too frighted of having their family deported back to poverty and hopelessness to complain about mistreatment, yet some of us have to arrogance to spit on them to boot. Who among us wouldn't walk over some imaginary line to escape abject poverty and put food in their children's mouths? How dare we begrudge them that. Since when do our lazy butts, who've never done a thing to earn the freedom we inherited, think we have a right to own freedom. I thought this was AMERICA! Our founding fathers would be ASHAMED OF US!

If we cared half as much about our neighbors to the South WHO ARE CONNECTED TO US as we do about the freedom of Iraqis or making sweet trade deals for cheep labor that benefit China, this wouldn't even be an issue. Canada's border is much more porous than our Southern border (and that's where terrorists would sneak in) but they don't need to come down here and work for crap wages when they have a thriving economy at home.

2/3 of Americans believe we should legalize these workers, and move forward. So, luckily it's only the other "courageous" 1/3 we all have to be ashamed of. (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/25/us...5088&partner=r)

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02830t.pdf
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...5/ai_n17175023
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniont...07/06/07/1714/ http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060612/howl
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/200...s-immigration/
The border we SHOULD be worried about: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIP...14/acd.01.html

Video: The heroic and the horrific:
http://www.cnn.com/video/partners/cl...rder.drown.cnn
http://www.cnn.com/video/partners/cl....911.calls.cnn

Article from The Birmingham News
http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnew...340.xml&coll=2

And some words from a truly wise and courageous man, Mark Twain:
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/06/hbc-90000262

In depth information on all the issues rising from illegal immigration: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=5310549

More on our history of racism against immigrants:
http://www.msu.edu/course/mc/112/192...oniaspage.html
http://www.msu.edu/course/mc/112/192...annespage.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Irish_racism
http://harpers.org/archive/2007/06/hbc-90000262

Sen. Lindsey Graham

http://teristyrades.blogspot.com/200...e-we-lost.html

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bigbrowndog

Wouldn't we rather that they HAVE driver's licenses?

They have to do some study and testing,
and it generates some income.

And they have to get citizenship to vote, I think.

I should think we'd want to get them on track to becoming legal
citizens--they get the voter app and they see they have to become
citizens in order to vote.

Half the country born here doesn't vote and everytime
I post an article about voter fraud it sinks like a stone
and I am told it is a non-issue SOOOO PLEEEASE!

Do not even pretend that the right to vote is so special--
half the people born here do not even give a crap and half the
people coming here won't either--so get real.