Liberal Calvinball
Holy crap. I swear I never thought I would be saying something like this right out loud (I might have to turn in my fellow traveler card to the Vast Left Wing Conspiracy), but some things just aren't right. One is the current initiative in my fair Commonwealth, known unfairly by its detractors as Taxachusetts, to let the children of illegal immigrants attend state colleges at in-state resident tuition levels.
State Attorney General (and likely Democratic candidate for Governator) Tom Reilly is pushing this plan as part of his campaign bid. And now our Lieutenant Governer, Republican Kerry Healy, is getting crap for saying something about it.
Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit. Not in a million years. That's my tax money. That I pay because I live here legally.
Now, I'm not a close-the-borders kind of guy. Immigration is what made this country great (that plus strategic genocide, but I'm not, really not in favor of repeating that part of our history), and I like it a lot when the best and brightest - or the most desperate and resourceful - from around the world come to our shores in search of a piece o' whatever makes them happy. And maybe our immigration policies need a bunch of work to make it easier for people to be documented and cleared to enter, and maybe the slugs at the Department of Homeland Security who are responsible for visas and such could stop trying to make life as hard as possible for all supplicants at their grubby Formica altars. I agree. We need to get on that.
But in the meantime, we need to do something about the people here illegally. Yes, I know our economy could grind to a halt if we sent everyone home en masse. But guess what? The answer to that conundrum is not to decide the rules are meaningless. By "do something," I mean 'figuring out how to more efficiently police our borders,' 'how to more efficiently screen guest workers such as seasonal produce pickers,' 'how to streamline the visa process,' and so on. "Something" is not giving away tuition breaks to the chidren of illegals. Do that, and the difference between legal and illegal immigration becomes less and less meaningful. If you get a drivers' license (such as California proposes) and in-state tuition, why ever go to the goons at DHS to plead your case?
I get where the impulse comes from. The kids, it's likely, aren't generally here of their own volition; they haven't broken immigration laws independently of the authority of their parents. This is America, after all, and people deserve a shot. If they're bright, we can use them. Now that they're here, sure, it would be nice if they got smart and educated, and stayed in the Bay State as hardworking, aboveboard and upright legal aliens. That's a nice idea.
But until the day they get their visa or their green card, it's also bullshit.
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J,
J,
This is a VERY sore subject for me, as you well know.
Any policy that favors illegal immigrants over permanent residents and citizens, naturalized or otherwise, is total bullshit. This policy is a slap in the face to every immigrant who had to travel, kowtow, and pay through the nose (in money orders only, if you please) for years jumping through the administrative hoops to become a permanent resident.
What I just cannot grasp is what his campaign gains from this stance. After all, illegals don't vote (as far as we know, since asking for ID at polling places apparently violates their human rights), while many of his purported constituency are paying top dollar for their kids at competetive MA colleges already. I'm not sure they're interested in this message of "Hey, they deserve it because they have it hard".
If things are that dire for you, ruck up and enlist. When you're out you'll be a citizen. With GI Bill $$, you can cobble the rest together from grants, scholarships, and loans like the rest of us have to.
Aren't eligible for federal aid? That's because you're not a citizen. Go home, re-cock, apply for a student visa like the rest of the planet has to, and take it from there.
Uh, bravo, on the lot.
Uh, bravo, on the lot.
And, if you ever had one, your VLWC card expired before I ever knew you. Good on you for not having replaced it with a VRWC card, but what makes sense is what makes sense, and that's seldom delineated by positioning on an imaginary horizontal line.
This silly-ass tuition policy, like so many before it (both tuition-related and other) is all about the apologism. It's only when people quit choking on their reflexive apologistic tendencies that they're able to do anything to actually FIX the problem.
Think of it as a modern-day version of "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain..."
Sleight of hand, that's all this crap is.