No compromise on border security
By D.A. King, Marietta Daily Journal, July 12, 2006
http://www.mdjonline.com/articles/2006/07/12/270/10224481.prt
At all costs, secure your perimeter.
This very basic and logical concept is a “no-brainer” fundamental that has been taught to every military recruit since cave men began to organize the defense of their families and shelters.
Much is now being made of a possible “compromise” on “immigration” in the Congress of these United States. On one side, we see those who are pushing to grant a “pathway to citizenship” [amnesty] to the millions of illegal aliens who, along with powerful and privileged employers and bankers, seem to be immune to existing U.S. laws.
In the other corner, the more pro-American members of that body are taking the position that securing American borders is essential to our existence as a sovereign nation.
On securing our borders, there can be no compromise.
With great respect and admiration for Senator Johnny Isakson and his tireless work, doing so should not be a “trigger” to repeating the mistakes of the “one-time” amnesty [pathway to citizenship] of 1986 and should not be a bargaining chip in what has become a very dangerous political game.
There, I said it.
Senator Isakson has correctly publicly recognized that regardless of what the Bush - Kennedy-McCain coalition keeps telling us, it is in fact possible for a nation that put men on the moon to secure its own borders.
We should start with the southern 1950-mile long border. Constructing an easily patrolled barrier on the Mexico- U.S. border will not be a problem for a nation that fifty years ago built and still maintains more than 46,000 miles of interstate highways.
Such a basic deterrent to illegal immigration has been in place in San Diego for years and has proven to be very effective.
Let’s decide how to return the twenty million or so illegals to their home countries next year. Let’s begin to punish criminal employers - using existing laws - beyond the three who were fined in 2004 and watch the effects of equal application of the law.
Many pundits are now telling all who will listen that the Republican party will be toast if it does not pass some kind of “immigration reform” bill this year. Nonsense.
The GOP will be toast if it continues to allow existing immigration and employment law to be ignored and people from all over the world to walk into the U.S. while the huge majority of Americans wonder who to vote for if the Republicans will not secure America in a war on terror.
The GOP will lose its base of support if it continues to regard illegal aliens as “guest workers” and passes legislation that contains little publicized provisions that allow them to apply for American citizenship when their guest status expires, as does the senate bill.
Another Republican, my own Congressman, Tom Price [Roswell], proposed a bill in the House last September that requires the Secretary of Homeland Security to prevent all illegal border crossings into the United States - using whatever means necessary. Called the “Secure the Outside Perimeter (STOP) Act of 2005”, the Price bill is now part of the House version of “immigration reform”.
We will leave the fact that securing the homeland seems to an obvious duty of the head of the Department of Homeland Security for another day.
The House bill has become known as an enforcement only bill. It should be called “enforcement finally”…using the hopeful assumption that it actually would be enforced if passed into law.
Congressman Price should be commended for his plain language approach and we should all be grateful that the majority of our Cobb County congressional representatives voted “YES” on the House legislation.
As John O’Sullivan writes in National Review, the absurdity of the argument that voters want “something” done about illegal immigration should not go unchallenged. What most voters want is border security –now- and an end to rewarding lawbreakers, both employers and aliens.
We should all be asking ourselves why the President has sided with the majority of Democrats on illegal immigration and border security and how that strategy is going to somehow save the Republican party.
As someone who studies illegal immigration and is proudly not a member of any political party, I ask myself that one every day.
Maybe one must spend more time in Washington D.C. to understand this very odd situation.
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