The article in the Washington post, which focused on allocating money for services to help LEGAL immigrants become citizens, was the target of many bloggers to spew hatred. It was interesting to me, having read so many previous self righteous comments from the “anti illegal immigrant side”, that there would be this outpouring of disgust for a program that would promote citizenship to LEGAL residents. Isn’t that what we all want, integration? The reality is that this issue DOES revolve around an anti Hispanic theme, fear of being “overtaken” by a different culture, fear of losing our “Americanism”. But what is America? As a culture, have we not evolved from so many different immigrant experiences? I believe being American is not about a specific culture, but about an ideal. An ideal of freedom, of individualism. A belief that we can all achieve our dreams if we are willing to work hard. We are the land of opportunity. We are Americans, all connected, by a common goal……freedom.
“This is about getting people who have become [legal] permanent residents to become U.S. citizens . . . so they can become full participants in this society,” said J. Walter Tejada (D), chairman of the Arlington County Board, at a news conference to announce the proposal.
The three-year plan, which was primarily developed by the advocacy groups CASA deMaryland and Tenants and Workers United of Virginia, is modeled on similar initiatives in California and Illinois. It would use a combination of federal, state, county and private sources to fund as many as 25 “Naturalization Support Centers.” The centers would provide a range of services, including educational outreach, test preparation, legal counseling, referrals to English courses and assistance with filling out applications.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/28/AR2008052802973.html
don’t think we need to spend tax dollars on helping legal immigrants learn the culture and laws. That is the job for groups like La Raza and MSF. (that is if they care about the people themselves, rather than using them to have more political power)
Dignidad, the part of your statement in parentheses could be applied to any group including HSM, BVBL. If they care about the people themselves, the people that the WaPo article states are eligible to obtain US citizenship, wouldn’t it be better to spend tax dollars to help them obtain citizenship rather than use them as political pawns?
Wouldn’t it be better to help someone such as Anon’s wife…help her with English/medical translations because she’d be a plus for our society and a plus for the nursing field at a time when we’re experiencing shortages of nurses? While I agree that different organizations, charities, polictically active groups should help too, I’m not adverse to government taking a role.
Ultimately, even most of the immigrants who are here illegally are not going to go away. It’s to our advantage to get people to assimilate. It’s not good to have a large hostile segment of our population…and people will be hostile if they are continually vilified, hounded, singled out as scapegoats. I think some form of ID and a way to pay taxes need to be made available to people who are here. We need to know who they are and it would put the lie to the myth that they don’t pay their share (and take away the need of phony SSs and other IDs.)
Do the Right Thing, I am fine with your idea that if the SSN is NOT attached to someone else, then fine, pay the fines, do whatever is required to get on the pathway. BUT, if someone is charged and convicted of Identity Theft, in my opinion, they should be out of any legislation to citizenship.
Lucky Duck,
Then we agree! Yay! Now we just have to be able to create that path!
Rational thinking….too bad Washington doesn’t do it.
Do The Right Thing: Your comments do nothing helpful. In fact you apparently mock me and my wife for suggesting she took some “easy way out” to get here. In fact, you’ve done nothing but attack me since I’ve came on this board just because I support some aspects of the resolution. Then again, I did not meet my wife on some “overseas dating site” as you seem to imply.
It is clear that you and I can not have any meaningful dialog, when you write things like above and make it sound like my wife took the easy way out because she met and married an American citizen. Somehow, you make it sound like people who come over here and steal people’s identity, should get priority over people like my wife. It took us several years to get her over here, and many visits by me to China (4 visits prior to her coming here, each totalling 2 months – although some of that was work related travel). Not to mention huge expenses I paid in all kinds of fees associated with the immigration process, PRIOR to her coming here. Again, you make a mockery of people like my wife, and I actually think it boarders on some bias you have against Chinese immigrants from the sounds of your posts. And I just really like your last line – “At least those immigrants are contributing to American society by working and paying taxes…even if it IS a false SS number.”
So you are saying my wife is not making a meaningful contribution to society? She has a valid green card and social security number, and if she could qualify as a nurse she’d start work TODAY paying taxes using HER social security number. So how does your last statement which I quoted above be helpful in this discussion. You are implying my wife makes less of a contribution even though she would be working with HER social security number and paying HER taxes.
Again, I find your comments vile and disgusting – both these and others you’ve made to me in the past on other threads. I’m done dialoging with you – which is what I should have done the in the last thread when you made some other negative remarks toward me. That time you claimed you mixed me up with someone else in some disgusting statement you made to me, which I was sure you didn’t. This time you no longer have that defense.
And LuckyDuck – I appreciate your reply to Do The Right Thing in defense of “mail order brides”. Not that my wife really qualifies as that, but apparently in Do the Right Thing’s eyes she maybe does (or even if she doesn’t, I highly resent the remarks DTRT made and find them rather offensive and hateful). Maybe more because of other remarks DTRT has made in response to posts by me in the past.
DTRT – and if in your later post you really meant it when you said ” want to clarify that I do not hate anyone who is an online overseas bride/mail order bride or anything like that” – then you wouldn’t have made the comment: “At least those immigrants are contributing to American society by working and paying taxes…even if it IS a false SS number” when comparing illegal immigrants to Chinese women emigrating to the USA after meeting an American citizen. I will say this, all of my wife’s friends who come here have intentions of being gainfully employed – so they aren’t looking for a “free ticket” to just come here and sit around all day.
However you paint it, that last comment was pretty out of line and it seems you backpedaled a little after making it – but I think you let your true feelings show with the orginal comment. You can’t have it both ways, which is what you now seem to be trying to do. Somehow, I still get that you suggest that these Chinese women are less valuable to our society than the illegal immigrants who come here and steal social security numbers – as if those people are working and large percentages of these Chinese women have no desire to work!
And, from your comments it seems to me in your eyes illegal immigrants are somehow better than Chinese women who marry and come here legally. Again, I will argue with you that no one could possibly come here without a lot of proof of a legitimate relationship, no matter what the press or whatever has you believe. The US Consulate in Guanzhou (which handles all these VISAs for anyone in China) is extremely strict, and I know legitimate couples who’ve been turned down because they didn’t have enough proof of a real relationship (not enough time spent together in China, or various other factors pointing to marriage fraud). In fact, they look at your bank accounts for suspicious transactions – did you know that both me and my wife and her family had to show all our bank account history for the prior 3 years – to show that no money had been transferred to her family as some sort of “gift” to them for her coming here, or money transferred to me for agreeing to bring her here and marry her? I’ll bet you didn’t. You are showing how uninformed/misinformed you are about the whole thing. There is certainly attempts at marriage fraud, but again I will tell you the US Consulate is very strict on that and the interview my wife had to go through when she was finally granted her VISA – did you know it lasted 1 hour long and was conducted in English? I’ll bet you didn’t! Even though ours was a fairly easy case considering the number of visits and the length of the visits, plus the total length of our relationship in years before she came here – it was still required a lot of documentation, interviews, etc. Again, I bet you didn’t know that. Your posts kind of illustrate just a few “sound bytes” you’ve picked up about some websites – which I don’t say don’t exist, but I think again no way could someone who’s never met the other person, be able to come here – nor could they come here if they just met the person for a week or so, and the relationship was a year old or less.
And if you really want to educate yourself on how complicated it is to come here on a fiancee visa like my wife did – go see http://www.candleforlove.com which is a forum (not for people to meet) but for people currently working on those visas and what they have to pull together in the way of documentation and other proof to come here. If you read some of the threads on that forum (which I haven’t in a long time since we are mostly through this process) – you will see it is no easy process, which you seem to think it is. If you were to educate yourself on this, you’d no there’s no way someone can meet someone on the internet, and come over here without ever having met in person, or even after having met only one time briefly for a week or so in person.
Your comments do nothing but belittle the many Chinese women who have come over here legitimately – and in fact have had to go through a rigorous process to prove they aren’t trying to commit marriage fraud. Maybe 6 or more years ago the US Consulate in Guangzhou was less strict, but in recent years they’ve become very strict and do much investigation on each case. And I can only speak to how it was there when my wife went through the process and her final interview (which I could not be present for – I had to wait OUTSIDE the consulate) – back in October 2005. I’m sure it is just as strict now, and perhaps more strict.
Actually, to Censored’s comment: “Wouldn’t it be better to help someone such as Anon’s wife…help her with English/medical translations because she’d be a plus for our society and a plus for the nursing field at a time when we’re experiencing shortages of nurses. While I agree that different organizations, charities, polictically active groups should help too, I’m not adverse to government taking a role.”
Actually BEACON has a pretty good program in Manassas for people wanting to become nurse’s aids and helping them learn English medical terminology which started up back in February. Although their requirements are strict, and I thought my wife’s English was getting pretty good. She had done very well in the intermediate/advanced ESOL class offered by Prince William County Adult School – her teacher said she was her best student. However, she still did not quite score high enough on a test BEACON administered to get in the program this year. However, they claim to have a free advanced English class starting up shortly (I guess in the fall) that she can take, and then hopefully next year get into that program.
I really think actually there is enough of this already – either available free or for a small fee – about $125/semester – such as Prince William County’s Adult ESOL program which is quite good too. My wife had attended that for the past 2 years now and her English progressed well. Although as can be seen, BEACON still think it falls slightly short (only about 30 points on this test they give her that requires a score of around 500 to get into their medical terminology program).
As I said, she has a very uphill climb to get to be a registered nurse here (or even a nurse’s aid) even though she was a senior nurse in China.
I guess my point is, I’m not sure I agree with taxpayer dollars funding this. Again, I can see a huge bill for taxpayers coming from USCIS once amnesty is voted in. It may not come right away, but it will come in 6 months to a year. I just know how USCIS works, and they will just fall to pieces under this increased load of an estimated 12 million amnesty applicants! Our taxpayer dollars are stretched far enough, funding amnesty PLUS some other programs for helping immigrants assimilate – I’m afraid we can’t fund everything – something’s got to give. That’s why I’m sort of against the government getting involved in funding that sort of thing – as I’m willing to bet that a huge bill will be forthcoming from USCIS once amnesty gets enacted. Anyone who thinks USCIS will pick up that load for free is sadly mistaken. USCIS just doubled their fees a year ago, and that STILL hasn’t helped them handle their current load.
Anon, sometimes people fail to realize what a challenge it is to learn a language when there is another alphabet involved as well as different words. Often a person will appear to be totally proficient in a language because he/she speaks it well. Writing/reading it can be a real challenge though. I once was in an art class where the many of the students petitioned the instructor to give the exam orally because what we native speakers/readers could read in an hour would take them four or five hours because of the difference in alphabets.
It sounded to me from the article that more than language classes would be involved…that an attempt would be made to get people who were eligible to move on to citizenship. Perhaps the help needed involved filing the proper paperwork.
Censored bybvbl: OK, I see what you mean about more than just English classes. True, filing the paperwork is no easy task, and lots of forms ask for duplicate information. I’m sort of surprised someone hasn’t come up with software to help do it – like what is done for filing taxes. At least it could keep track of some information that you wouldn’t have to fill out over and over again on a bunch of different forms. One thing they kept asking for were the names and addresses of all my wife’s family – that is her parents, and her two brothers and sister. It was a pain to have to keep writing this out and would have been nice if they didn’t ask the same information on about 5 different forms. Anyway, definitely agree that there is a need for people to get help filling out immigration paperwork, I’m just not sure government funding is the way to go about that.
I am trying to understand why it would be acceptable to steal an SSN if 1) You need it and 2) you don’t plan to ruin someone else’s credit with it. NO ONE is entitled to my SSN for any purpose other than that which it was intended for, and I don’t give it out freely for that reason. It is never OK to use someone else’s identity, I don’t care what the purpose is, it is stealing, plain and simple. I can’t believe that so many here seem to be endorsing this as a harmless, “victimless” crime, and the potential damage to a person is often incalculable.
It wasn’t all that long ago that someone (I believe it was kgotthard, but forgive me if I am mistaken) said that Greg L. should be arrested because of his blog and his views. As near I can tell, Greg has not broken any laws, but you would want him arrested anyway just because you perceive that he represents an extreme view that you do not agree with, and I recall that several people joined in a chorus of agreement on that. (and no, I don’t belong to HSM, don’t really like the bvbl blog all that much, etc., etc., so please don’t lump me in with the “minions.”)
At what point would you object to the illegal activity of an illegal immigrant? When it affects you personally? How much are you willing to excuse? In the name of intellectual honesty, can’t you just concede that some activities are simply WRONG? I am appalled at the legal and moral relativism that I see here so often.
I also am very sad to see how some of you have jumped on anon’s case about his Chinese wife, and your sickening insinuations about “mail-order brides.” So quick to make assumptions and fling vile stereotypes. Isn’t that just what you accuse the “other” blog of doing? I’m not sure you can go much lower than that.
Emma: thanks for making the point (in the last paragraph of your post) that I’ve been trying to make in my last few posts. And actually, your entire post makes a lot of very good points about this whole discussion of stealing social security numbers. It gets back to what I said that in one of my posts that I really have trouble believing it is a “victimless crime”. The taxpayers will have to pay in some way actually, for the social security administration to unravel the mess created by those social security numbers that are “unassigned”. And again, I suspect people using unassigned numbers, are probably making sure their payroll shows a huge number of dependents so they pay next to no income taxes. If I were going to steal a social security number – why wouldn’t I also make sure my income tax withholding was as low as possible, since I’m not going to file an income tax return anyway!
I’m getting off the point I wanted to make, but mainly I wanted to thank you for saying what you did – as I was beginning to wonder if I was the only one on this blog who found some of the remarks about Chinese “mail-order brides” rather offensive.
You’re quite welcome. I’m sorry to see such blatant bigotry go unchallenged here. The silence is deafening.
Emma – it’s the same the other thread (that I know you just posted your views there) that people either have blinders on or are somehow making apologies for all the hateful terminology being thrown about in a cavalier attitude! Sort of a sad commentary on things, but it is what it is! I feel you, I, and 2 or 3 other posters seem to be the only ones offended by some of what is being said in this thread, that other thread (as well as other threads in the past) and if we are the only ones on this blog being offended by those things ,that in and of itself is rather scary! It is at least refreshing to me to find that there’s a few of us who find some of these posts (especially in that other thread) fairly distasteful.
Censored, I just don’t think this is something tax dollars should go for. This is something groups like La Raza & MSF need to do because these are the people they claim to be advocating for.
You are right that there is a large segment of the population that is hostile. There is a tremendous false sense of victimization. As their children come of age, I’m afraid the hostility will increase. This doesn’t mean we should cave to a misinformed population. For this reason I wish the media, especially Spanish language media, would be honest and publicize the concept of taking responsibility for one’s own behavior. There are some people who do villify, but I think most people just want the American culture and laws to be respected.
You made a very good point Dignidad – about the “tremendous false sense of victimization”. I blame a lot of that on the groups like La Raza & MSF who help stir up the pot and say a lot of false things that help stir up fear and hatred in the people who they are advocating for. I find it shameful that they use these tactics to promote their agenda. I agree that instead of pouring more incendiary rhetoric on the fire, they ought to use their money to help these people assimilate and find a path to citizenship. Instead they seem to do more to drive a wedge between them and American citizens and legal American residents.
Also what you say about “taking responsibility for one’s own behavior” is quite correct. Perhaps if more of the newer Hispanic immigrants (both illegal and legal) were encouraged to take a hard look at how they behave in the neighborhoods they live in, and take some pride in where they live, there wouldn’t be all the problems and some people who live near them in this neighborhoods wouldn’t be quite so angry! There’s far too many instances of them no respecting the neighborhoods they live in, and turning them into undesirable places to live. They seem to not even be interested in trying to live in harmony with their neighbors – not caring if they blast loud music at all hours of the night, toss trash and broken bottles all over the place, and disobey other social norms. Some people say they need to be educated in these things – fine – then why doesn’t La Raza and other groups help them to learn that this is unacceptable behavior, and a very large part of what is fueling a lot of the anger.
Emma, you have misread my comment. My point was that people who come here on a site advertising for mates DO NOT STEAL or USE other’s SSN’s. I was defending people who come here for any reason and do not use other’s identity as I am assuming that they have entered legally.
LuckyDuck – actually I think Emma was responding to DTRT on that point although you might have gotten caught a bit in the crossfire. Anyway, I agree with what you say in your latest post contrasting the theft of SSN’s versus “Chinese mail order brides” not engaging in this behavior. However, I personally find this whole Chinese mail order bride discussion rather distasteful – which I’ve already kind of gone to great lengths to debunk a lot of the misinformation and commentary that was in some posts that I found personally rather objectionable. I’m done trying to change anyone’s minds on that.
Anyway, personally I have a problem with the idea that theft of SSN’s is in some cases a “victimless crime” if the SSN’s don’t match up with anyone. It is still going to be a cost to taxpayers at some point to unravel the entire mess – as someday someone is going to have to figure out what to do with that bucket of money sitting there for all those “unused” SSN’s. You know there’s going to be a bill attached to it – nothing in life is free! And I’ve pointed out my suspicions that people who do that also (if they were smart) would intentionally claim a lot of deductions on their W-4 forms and make sure they pay little if no income taxes. Not that I’d steal a social security number, but if I did that’s what I’d do – as I’d have no reason to file an income tax return obviously – since I couldn’t be tracked down! So why would I want to have any income taxes taken out of my paycheck?
Anon,
DTRT apparently clarified their statement regarding mail order brides. They were trying to draw a comparison, although somewhat clumsily initially, that there is a sense of disgust and anger over those who come here to work, while no one mentions the “mail order brides” as an offensive way to gain citizenship. Once again, internet communication is very difficult to communicate nuances and offenses are easily taken because there is a “delay” between sender and reciever.
The reality is that we have jobs for people, people willing to fill those jobs, how do we reconcile this need? How do we ensure that people who are here, if they intend on making the United States their home, become truly “invested”, and I don’t mean financially invested. I will continue to make this point, there are plenty of reasons why neighborhoods struggle, and scapegoating any ethnic group is never an effective way to deal with those problems. Anon, what would you do if the problems you were having were not with hispanics in your community, but Asians, or Pakistani’s?
I had written a long post in response but it got lost. Let’s just say I’m disappointed we’ve taken steps backward here. It is somewhat shameful to suggest that I’d not have the same problem (or be as angry) if Asians or Pakistani’s lived next to me and trashed my neighborhood and stole from my house.
Also I respectfully disagree about the mail order brides. I thought I gave ample evidence of how a true mail order bride ( if I understand the definition right) could not gain entry to the USA. And in me and my wife’s case, you don’t know how hard it was to get her Visa approved, even though we had a genuine long term (many year) relationship with lots of evidence. Did you know we had to get police reports from every town she ever lived in? Some of those police dept’s are very uncooperative in this regard. Did you know she went through an FBI Name Check that because her name was a common one, took more than a year? And the implication that “mail order brides” come here and make no contribution to American society is shameful. I don’t know of ANY Chinese women who come here and expect to sit around all day. Most Chinese people are very hard workers, and I think most Chinese women who come here want to work when they come here. But DTRT posts made it clear it was just the opposite. My other point is, due illegal aliens go through any of these checks? No. And they are already here, so what’s the point if amnesty is granted of any of this being done. It won’t be. Will they have to themselves go and get police reports from any town they’ve lived in from the country they came from? I doubt it. Will they have to wait a year or more for the FBI Name Check to complete? I doubt it. And I know of some people getting stuck in what’s called ‘Name Check Hell’ because their name is so common the FBI can’t make a decision as to whether they are a criminal or not. It seemed to be on the verge of happening to my wife and I finally got Congressman Wolf’s office to give them a bit of a push to move the case along. Anyway, I hate it when people speak from ignorance, and the posts about mail order brides were filled with misinformation and just ignorance about what it truly takes to come here on a fiancee or marriage type of VISA (it really makes no difference if you got married overseas – you still face almost the same hurdles – there’s some debate as to whether it is easier to come here if you are already married or not – but we chose the fiancee visa route and I wanted to get married over here with my family and friends, although unfortunately that meant my wife’s family and friends could not participate obviously).
Anyway, I still see attempts to make me appear that I hate all Hispanics, or to try and put me in a neat little box as someone who labels one group unfairly. I thought we had moved far past that. Too many posters on this board like to do that to people they disagree with, and it is shameful. I know I even said in some of my posts that initially, 5-7 years ago Hispanic FAMILIES moved here and they were fine – they were law abiding, didn’t trash the neighborhood, didn’t blast music at all hours of the day and night without any feeling for those living next to them, etc. Then came this OTHER element maybe 3 years ago who were quite different. This subelement are people who care less about people they live near to, and care less about their neighborhood and trash it. And I believe a large percentage of this subelement are probably illegal aliens. Are they all? No. And are all illegal aliens bad? No. Anyway, I’m repeating myself as I said this plenty of times before, but then you come out with the statement implying I might feel differently if some other ethnicity than Hispanics came in and trashed the neighborhood. I think that is very unfair, and I feel we’ve taken two steps backward in this dialog. I thought we had moved far beyond that.
There is a subset of posters here that keep trying to “put me in a neat little box” by trying to imply I’m racist, or I hate all Hispanics, or something like that. It is a very unfair thing to do – and it is done by these posters to anyone who they feel is “pro-resolution”. They are the ones that need to be ashamed of themselves. They jump to conclusions, and then other people on here applaud them for doing so. And then this blog tries to make it sound like it ‘rises above’ the other blog. Not when it slings about misinformation and hatred on subjects like “mail order brides” – which again I say a true “mail order bride” if I understand the definition of one on this blog – would not gain entry to the USA. I thought I made my points clear on that, but then I see again it is implied that mail order brides are less deserving than other people in coming here. Again, if the definition of a mail order bride is what I think it is, then they would not be able to come here. If it is some more broader definition – well I won’t even touch that one.
Well, I’ve rehashed this enough, but I rather resent the implication that I’d somehow feel differently, or label people differently, if I had another ethnicity than Hispanics living next to me and overcrowding the house, trashing the neighborhood, blasting music at all hours of the day and night (it’s 5:30 AM in the morning and music has been playing since 4 AM or so). It’s a very unfair statement to make, and again I think we’ve taken a giant step backward in where I thought we were, in this entire debate. It’s too bad, but it is what it is.
And, as a proud American citizen, I resented when all I said was I thought border security was important – a reply that told me I had learned nothing from 9/11! I think any American citizen would be rightfully angered at a suggestion like that. How would you like to be told such a thing. Every American citizen was personally affected by 9/11 – so for a poster to make such a statement, to someone who just said that border security was an important step to be taken before we could think of amnesty, was a truly shameful thing to say. Everyone tried to say it was not a personal attack, but it was addressed at me specifically and I think most American citizens would be rightfully idignant when if someone told them they had learned nothing from 9/11. Actually, I wouldn’t have my present job if it weren’t for 9/11 – the system I was work on was about to be completely decommissioned, but in the wake of 9/11 it was decided to completely modernize and enhance it – and that’s the job I was hired to do in November 2002. So for that poster who doesn’t know me, to make a statement like that – when I wouldn’t be in this job if it weren’t for 9/11 – is really something. It just shows the poster’s ignorance, jumping to conclusions – which I see happening far too often on this blog, usually when that jumping to conclusions leads to a personal attack. And the same thing happened with the whole “mail order bride” thing. But the gall of someone to say to another US Citizen that they have learned nothing from 9/11! I don’t think you can say there is a US Citizen that has NOT learned SOMETHING from 9/11. So it matters not that what I do for a living, I would have a different job if it weren’t for 9/11.
So the fact that it would anger any proud American citizen to tell them they had learned nothing from 9/11 – THAT IS what astounded me from that post, and again I said nothing that should have warranted such a hateful comment. Wouldn’t it anger you if someone told you that? Some of the posters here are filled with more hate than they try to accuse me (wrongfully) of having. They need to take a good long look at themselves in the mirror, when they sling about terms like racism and other similar buzzwords – just because they happen to disagree with people’s point of views. That subset of posters on here (a very vocal subset) seem to be set on lumping all those they don’t agree with into one cohesive group. They are gulity of the same thing they accuse me of doing, labeling the Hisapnics as one cohesive group! Yet they refuse to recognize that, and constantly accuse me of doing it, when in fact I’ve gone to great lengths I do not do that. It is really quite hypocritical of them, but they refuse to see it because they have their blinders on. It is a sad commentary about the state of things on this board, and every time I think the discussion moves past it, we take two steps backward.