It's Us or Them

Immigration. You know, the illegal kind. Not like the legal kind all of our ancestors did when they lined up at Ellis Island and had their names reconstituted. Back then everyone and anyone could come into our country – and we took them all. Very few questions asked. Everyone was a human being with the potential to add something great to our society. They didn’t get treated well, but the got a chance.

Now the children of those children of immigrants believe that this immigration thing is what’s bringing us down. It’s the cause of our budget deficits, it’s the cause of high medical costs, it’s the cause of the problem with public education, and it’s the number one cause of crime in the streets. It’s the issue that all color of conservative can agree on. Get rid of those damn Hispanic/African/Asian illegals! They’re killing us!

Well if you ask me, and no one ever does, this is not the most serious problem facing the face of White America. Illegal’s account for only about twenty percent of all the uninsured people who go to the emergency rooms in this country. They only account for twenty percent of the people who don’t pay their taxes, and they do jobs that no one else wants to do, and for a wage that no one else will accept. Sure they are a billion or more dollar problem, but they are the great scapegoat of the minute. I guess as a Jew I should be thankful to them for that.

Here’s what’s going on – the right-wing conspiracy is using the easy target of illegal immigration to divert attention from the fact that American industry has become a small group of multi-national conglomerates who are slowly shipping our middle class to India, China and parts unknown. They are creating a world where the chasm between rich and poor is growing wider; more of “us” are uninsured, underpaid, and further and further in debt. That’s our countries dirty little problem.

We live in an atmosphere of unbridled greed where we are trying to squeeze more and more profit out of our businesses. Our corporate boards are now driven by the need to raise their dividends that aren’t paid to us. They pay the money to each other, to other huge corporate stock owners, pension plans, invenstment banks, and venture capitalists. Meanwhile it’s harder for the working man to afford the very things they are pushing us to buy. On top of it, getting rid of the illegal immigrants permanently would get rid of a major source of workers for small business, that would then make it impossible for them to compete with the bigger companies. That means higher prices for us – and more profit for them!

In the end we are closer to the illegals than we are to the people who want us to believe that they’re a problem. I have an idea! Let’s solve both problems: let’s make the illegals citizens, make them pay taxes and make them work for a minimum wage. And let’s tell the corporations and they politicians in their pockets that we don’t want to live in a world of endless corporate profit. It’s the human thing to do.