Common Sense Missing in Immigration Debate

With the possible exception of abortion, there is no political debate more bereft of common sense, charged with emotion and exempt from factual analysis than that of immigration. One side focuses on "illegal aliens" while the other talks about "undocumented immigrants." The not-so-faint whiff of racism is in the air on both sides. In fact, the issue can largely be resolved with a dying political art, compromise.

Both sides need to stop fussing about ridiculous ideological points and deal with the problem as a practical one. Advocates for non-Americans who have either over-stayed their visas or arrived without one need to admit that there is a problem in not following the rules. Their opponents need to acknowledge that rounding up the 12 million (or whatever the figure is) and sending them back to where they came from is impractical if only because it would be so very expensive. Furthermore, no border can be perfectly sealed -- the Berlin Wall failed to stop everyone.

Here is the basis of the solution; let America find a path to legality for those whose papers are not in order. It need not be a path to citizenship necessarily, but these individuals need to be brought out of the black economy. This will raise American wages, and it will reduce exploitation of non-Americans. If that means that people earning $100,000 have to clean their own homes and raise their own kids, too bad. That deals with the people who are already here.

When it comes to those who will arrive in the future, the first issue is why do people come to America in the first place? Because they think their life will be better. To halt the movement, their home countries will have to improve (in some cases it will take generations). Alternatively, Americans could decide to wreck their country to keep those foreigners out (saving the country by destroying it). The truth is, America has built it so they will come.

Let them. Mikhail Gorbachev observed during the end of the Cold War that historically America had benefited hugely by importing human talent. America must find a system that allows for the importation of talent while continuing to create its own at home. And that system must also be able to remove individuals who arrive and commit acts of violence. And that system must apply equally to all potential immigrants. And that system must prefer citizens (naturalized and native born being treated equally) to non-Americans in employment and taxation.

One can hear the ideologues screaming already. Compromise has become so rare in American politics that it threatens gridlock on all issues. Immigration needs to be resolved soon while it can be resolved at all. One only needs to look at the abortion issue to see how unproductive the inability to compromise is. Most Americans protect their rights with great zeal, but few take their responsibilities seriously. One of those responsibilities is to be reasonable, to prefer solving a problem than winning a bar room argument.

© Copyright 2010 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.

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