or
Join Now!
|
|
Home/Government/Politics
|
| Forum |
Ask A Question |
Question Board |
FAQs |
Search |
Return to Question Board
| Question Details |
Asked By |
Asked On |
| My e-mail to President Bush |
ETWolverine |
05/22/07 |
Mr. President,
I realize that you most likely will never see this message. However, I felt it was my duty to log my concerns with your immigration policies.
First, I believe that I should tell you a bit about myself so that you understand my perspective on immigration. I am a 38-year-old banker working for a mid-sized bank in New York. I am the son and grandson of immigrants from Poland, survivors of the Holocaust. My parents were born in German DP camps after the war and are naturalized citizens. (My mother still keeps her green card as a keepsake due to her pride at having come to this country.)
My grandparents worked very hard to become successful in this country. My father’s parents were candy-shop owners (after years of running pushcarts to scrape together the funds needed to buy the shop) and my mother’s parents were tailors. They came to this country with literally nothing in their pockets, and managed to become productive members of society. They managed to put their children through college, and all of them became professionals. My father is an attorney and a stock broker for a major Wall Street firm (coincidentally, he was once the youngest attorney to be admitted to argue before the Supreme Court, a record that has since been broken but that my father is still proud of to this day), and my mother manages real estate. My family made good on the American dream within a generation, and I am very thankful for the opportunities that the United States afforded my family. Thanks to the opportunities that this country affords us, I became the first member of my family born in this country, and with the support of my family I graduated Brooklyn College with a BA in economics. I married a girl from your own home state of Texas (Houston, to be precise) and we have two wonderful children, a home in New Jersey, and a solid middle-class income. My sister is a teacher living in Brooklyn, and my brother is an MD, a graduate of SUNY Downstate Medical School. I truly believe that my family is a text-book success story for immigration within the USA.
As you can see, Mr. President, I am hardly an opponent of immigration. I value immigration as an important source for “new blood” and new ideas into the pool of American resources. I try to keep in mind that some of the greatest acheivements of our great country have come from immigrants: Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, perhaps the two greatests scientists of their times, were both immigrants. Eli Weisel is an immigrant. And there have been many others as well… too many to name in such a letter. Immigration is important to our national identity and an important tool for remaining at the top of the economic and technological food chain.
However, your recently announced immigration bill concerns me greatly.
Mr. President, part of the reason that my family was so successful in this country was the fact that we became part of American culture. Another important factor is that we didn’t demand support from the government for what was really our own responsibility to provide to ourselves. And finally, and perhaps most important, is the fact that we caqme here legally after waiting on the appropriate lists and doing the appropriate paperwork. We did not sneak into the United States, we came here legally.
Mr. President, these are important factors to consider, and none of them are addressed in your bill.
While I do not necessarily support making English our national language (though it would be nice to see), I also don’t believe that accomodating other languages in government business supports the idea of joining American culture. Language is one of the most important factors in any culture, and not giving immigrants a reason to learn English by forcing them to conduct government business in English is a barrier to cultural acclimation. It sets immigrant apart from the rest of society, which in turn hurts American society as a whole. (Not to mention the economic costs of providing government assistance in multiple languages.) Your bill does not address this point at all.
Secondly, your bill has not appropriately addressed the costs of illegal immigration. The vast majority of illegal immigrants are low-skilled labor. The Heritage Foundation did a study in which they found that the average cost of a low-skilled labor family to the US Government is roughly $22,000 after taxes. Mr. President, with 11 million illegal immigrants in this country, the government is spending roughly $242 Billion per year on supporting low-skilled laborers from other countries. That equates to $2.4 trillion over a 10 year period. When we consider that your proposed national budget for 2008 is only $2.3 trillion, the cost of illegal immigration is one of great concern. This is potentially the biggest disaster to our economy since the Great Depression. We can barely afford to support our own low-skilled workers and their families. We do not need to be importing poverty from other countries to support. Instead of low-skilled laborer’s, we should be encouraging the immigration of high-skill employees and innovators… the likes of Eli Weisel, Nikola Tesla and Albert Einstein… people who will push this country forward economically, socially and culturally, not those who will hold us back.
Thirdly, your bill grants amnesty to an entire sub-class of law-breakers. I know that you object to the use of the word “amnesty” in reference to this bill, but that is exactly what this bill is: an amnesty bill. Mr. President, the American Heritage Dictionary defines amnesty as "A general pardon granted by a government, especially for political offenses." It is difficult for me to see how this bill is anything but amnesty. It grants a general pardon to a specific group of people for the illegal political offense of entering this country illegally. This is potentially a very big mistake, Mr. President. It makes US citizenship cheap. My grandparents worked very hard to become citizens, and they hold that citizenship dear because it was something worth working for. But your bill makes it cheap. It makes coming to this country illegally a method of gaining relatively quick citizenship.
Mr. President, one of your predecessors, President Carter, made the mistake of legalizing illegal immigration. The result was the Mariel Boatlift, a huge rise in crime, particularly drug crime and violent crime, and influx of convicted murderers and rapists to the United States, and a financial and economic burden that we are still paying to this day. I beg you to reconsider your current course of action. Legalizing 11 million illegal aliens in one felt swoop is an economic, social and criminal burden that this country cannot bear without serious and irreversible consequences.
I have supported you with regard to the War on Terror and the War in Iraq (which I consider to be one and the same), the USA Patriot Act, your tax relief plans, and your handling of judicial appointments, as well as on most other issues. But on this issue, Mr. President, I must log my strong disagreement.
I know that you have the good of this country at heart, and I know that your compassion for your fellow man is what drives you to support this bill. I respect your motivation. But this is not good for America or the American people. I urge you to reconsider this immigration bill.
With greatest respect from your constituent and supporter,
Elliot (my full name)
Edison, New Jersey
God Bless the President of the United States of America
------------
What do you think? Did I catch the high points? |
|
| |
|
Your Options |
Additional Options are only visible when you login! !
|
|
|
|
