Immigration, In-State tuition, and What We're Doing

I was driving into work Tuesday barely listening to morning talk radio like usual when I heard a story that really got my attention.  Last year a young man graduated from Texas A&M with a degree in bio-chemical engineering at the top of his class.  Instead of being recruited to a large engineering firm or oil company, he was waiting tables at a restaurant in Houston.  He's been unable to get a job because he's an illegal alien from Mexico brought to the U.S. when he was a child by his parents.  I then heard out of my speakers something I thought was even more astonishing.  He had received scholarships and paid in-state tuition while in school. I started thinking about this and at first I thought how crazy it was that this guy went to a superior college as an illegal, paid what I pay, and got some scholarship money on top of it.  I was hot to say the least.

By the end of the story I'd hit traffic going into downtown Austin and I stopped, mad at the traffic and mad about what I had just heard.  I looked over and saw three Hispanic guys in the back of truck obviously headed to work somewhere.  One of them looked over at me, and with a cheerful smile on his face, he waved, shot me a right eyewink, and then took a sip of coffee.  I laughed out loud as realization smashed into me like a train.  This guy in the truck came here to do better.  He may have brought his family from across the border through untold hell, all the time hoping his son could get a college education and maybe become an engineer.  It also made me think about what our founding principals as a country are.  As lady liberty says "give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free."

All of this got me thinking about immigration and the way our government approaches the issue.  President Obama said recently that our borders are as safe as ever and the current administration is committing millions and millions of dollars to stop the flow of illegals into this country. We hear tons about the wild, wild border.  Murder, drug dealers, border war; you name it, if it's bad we hear about it on the border.  But this doesn't represent the millions of people who are already in this country illegally working and living among us.  

Texas Governor Rick Perry was lambasted a couple of weeks ago after he supported in-state tuition for illegals.  It didn't fly well with the right and they let him know it.  I don't think this is a bad idea though.  It promotes education and gives opportunity to people who otherwise wouldn't have it.  They can get an education and start chasing that American Dream.  It shouldn't be without work or sacrifice though.  If someone here illegally wants to go college and be a part of our society then they need to attain citizenship.  That’s a tall order while carrying a full college schedule, but it should be work.  Why not create a program in which illegal aliens can attend college and make it a requirement that they complete citizenship courses as part of the curriculum.  If they choose not to attend the courses then they pay full out of state tuition and have to attend citizenship courses on their own if they want to stay.  We could also stipulate that if they don’t finish the courses they don’t graduate.  My point is that there are options.

Sources indicate that there are between 11 million and 20 million illegal immigrants in this country today.  A lot of them have no desire to return to their countries of origin for whatever reason.  They’re already here.  Lets make it easier on them to obtain citizenship, join the workforce, and start paying taxes.  This would bring millions of tax dollars in that we’re missing out on now and it would keep us true to our basic fundamentals.    

A friend of mine who graduated from Texas A&M and I were talking about all this when he told me another story.  He had recently run into a girl that we mutually went to high school with when she showed up to clean his house.  He knew who she was and he inquired about her life after high school.  She had gone to Stephen F. Austin State University and gotten a degree in finance.  After college she started cleaning houses because she couldn’t get a job.  She told him that she ran an entirely cash business and didn’t pay taxes.  It just seems to me to be a huge waste of an education to allow something like this to happen.  Stop the inward flow of illegals for sure, but lets not forget that people are here because this is the greatest country in the world and they want something better for their families.

The United States government has continually addressed this problem from an enforcement standpoint.  Find illegals, arrest them and send them back to whatever country they came from.  It’s obvious to me at this point that that plan of action hasn’t worked.  Most of these people are yearning to be free.  It’s on us to make sure they can be.   

Wall Street Occupiers and the GOP

It took me a while to locate a topic for this week that I really felt was relevant to this class and what was going on in todays world.  Most the news revolves around the "occupy wall street" movement and what it means and who's right and wrong.  I found an article on the blog site Redstate that peaked my interest.  The article titled "What the GOP must do: Finding common ground with the Occupiers" was written by Erick Erickson and is more of a opinion piece about conservatives and what they need to do to tackle the Wall Street issue.

The article suggests that while many of the "occupiers" are socialist hippies, there are many hard working people around the country who can't find work and think that the deck is just stacked against them.  These people agree with the overall occupation message of having the government solve the economic problems and having the wealthiest one percent of the country pay more in taxes.  The general feeling is that more government will help.

The article also indicates that on the other side of the coin, conservatives and tea party affiliates want smaller government and for the free market to correct itself.  They feel that more government intervention will further hinder the market and reduce the possibility that the economic crisis will end in the foreseeable future.  

The author asserts that the politicians are the ones to blame in the current economic situation because they have made it harder on the middle class to make a living and realize the American Dream.  He says that the rich have been the only people over the years that have been able to afford the rising costs of the government imposed nanny-state causing the overall wealth displacement that we see today.  

The author also lays out what he thinks the GOP needs to do find some common ground with the occupiers. He suggests massive revamping of the tax code, deregulation of small business and companies, and making it easier for people to run a business from home.  The example of a child not being to run a lemonade stand without a business permit in some places was provided.  He basically suggests that we should make it easier for people to enter business and level the playing field which has been drastically stacked in the favor of big business for the past decade.  By doing these things and making the middle class viable and vibrant again, we can all prosper and be successful in America today.  The author suggests that this what the occupiers want, and that is room for a conservative to take this message and create reform.

In my opinion this article is aimed at conservatives who are dismayed or upset about the occupation movement and what they stand for.  Most conservatives feel that its just a ploy by group of useless hippy communists who don't want to work and want the government to take care of them.  There may be some of those in the group, but I think a lot of occupier sympathizers are just what the author described them as; middle class, out of work folks who don't want anything free, but want a fair shot.  I think that this sentiment is something we can all identify with, even conservatives who have a lot of money.

Overall I thought the article was pretty good and I agreed with most of what the author had to say.  I think that limited government intervention and stimulus of the middle class is ultimately going to bring us out of this economic crisis.  I think there's middle ground to be found between the occupiers and the right, and I think that the sooner they find it, the sooner these problems can be resolved.  But I think I agree most with the authors point of leveling the playing field for small business owners and middle class Americans.  For to long big businesses have been the only entities capable of affording to stay ahead of government regulation and the tax code while small business owners were forced to close their doors because they couldn't afford to implement the required regulations.  It's unnecessary for it to be this way to save the least.  Allow people to operate businesses, make it easier for them, and watch them prosper.  We do that and we'll be able to return to an era economic stability and growth that will ultimately help us all.

Electoral Reform: The New Bright Idea

I read an opinion peace in The Washington Post toady about electoral reform and the way certain states intend to address this age-old issue.  George F. Will, opinion writer for The Post addresses new Pennsylvania legislation, the current law in Maine and Nebraska, and a new compact between several states in his article titled Electoral College reform and tilting the presidential balance.

Maine and Nebraska have current laws on the books that do not award all of the states electoral votes to the presidential popular vote winner.  Instead, they employ a system in which the state awards one vote to the popular vote winner in each congressional district, with the remaining two electoral votes going to the overall popular vote winner in the state.  Pennsylvania is poised to do the same with the legislature there working on legislation that their governor has promised to sign.  These laws would split the states votes and lend some legitimacy to third party candidates who right now have none.  A third party candidate might win some percentage of the overall vote but never win any electoral votes.  These laws would change all that.

Will states that an even worse idea is being kicked around by 8 other states including California and the District of Columbia.  They are in favor of forming a compact that says they will award all of the states electoral votes to whomever wins the overall popular vote nation wide.   Will states that California would have gone to George W. Bush in 2004 even though 1.2 million more people in California voted for John Kerry.  Will goes on to say that proponents of the compact are for straight popular vote elections, which we already have, within the states.  The winner of the popular vote takes the electoral votes.

Will takes the stance that the framers of the Constitution wished for moderate, consensual governance with regional and other diversities, and they shaped the Electoral College system to reflect this want.  The framers didn't foresee different political parties, but the electoral vote does hold to the values of federalism that they favored. 

I think that the author aimed this article at every eligible voter.  In the 2000 election, George W. Bush won the electoral vote, while Al Gore won the popular vote.  The election itself was hotly contested and brought the issue of electoral votes and the Electoral College to the forefront of the American political scene.  Before this, blue states were going to be blue and red states were going to be red.  A lot of people felt their vote didn't count because they lived in a Democratic or Republican state.  By popular vote alone, this would not be the case.  Every vote would actually count.   

It's an issue that affects all of us as voters and Americans.  Do we abandon the way that America has run elections for decades; or do we stay with the traditions and laws that have governed elections since the inception of our country?

I've found it really hard to make up my mind on the issue.  I see both sides.  The electoral vote served its purpose in the past with its structure and format.  On the other hand, it almost makes more sense at this day in age to go with the popular vote.  Does the Electoral College really serve the Constitutional concept of majority rule?  

I'm not sure to be honest, but I keep coming back to the same thought.  America was founded on a set of dreams, and those dreams brought forth a country that was designed by men who acted on the best set of principals and knowledge that they had.  We hold the structure of the Constitution, the values, and the concepts of America in the highest regard, which we should.  I don't think changing it now would serve our history or us in a positive way.  

No matter what, this issue is not going to go away and our state legislators are going to be the ones who ultimately decide how our electoral votes are distributed.  Only by deciding and taking a stance one way or the other will we cause the change that we as Americans have the right to effect.  

Gun rights? Maybe, maybe not.

Today I read an article in the Washington Post about the Supreme Court and the Second Amendment and how a ruling from 2008 hasn't been the cure all for gun owners.  In District of Columbia v. Heller the high court ruled that the Second Amendment applied to ownership of a gun outside of military service.  A couple of years later they ruled in McDonald v. Chicago that the rules previously passed applied not only to federal law, but state and local law as well.  These rulings were thought by many to allow gun possession outside the home; however, now the rulings are seen as ambiguous.

These rulings have been applied to many cases and many people convicted of gun crimes throughout the country have filed suit to have their convictions overturned.  The article indicated that just after the rulings, most people thought the decisions would clear the way to oppose state gun legislation that was restrictive.

This has not been the case.  The lower courts have continuously ruled that the Heller decision was limited and narrow in its scope, stating that the decision and the Second Amendment do not impact states rights to legislate gun ownership and violence.

I suppose I have just never really paid attention to laws impacting gun ownership in other states.  In Texas, it’s relatively easy to own a gun and to carry one in your car for that matter.  You don’t need a permit and you don’t have to pay taxes or register firearms when they change hands.  In other areas of the country you can be arrested for having a legal, registered handgun in your car.  How are you supposed to get it home after you buy it?

This topic affects us all.  It’s interesting to me after looking at the article how the lower courts rule and how the law is interpreted. It shows me too that we should all also be a little more familiar with others states laws.  You, me, them; we could be driving through a state with more stringent gun laws than we’re used to and find ourselves in a legal bind and pleading ignorance.  The article is linked here:  

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supremecourt

Check it out.  It could affect you one day.