COMING OUT OF THE CLOSET
Good Fences Make Good Neighbors
I suppose after this post I will most certainly join the ranks of the heartless and cruel. Nonetheless, I must be honest. I cannot hide the truth any longer. I must admit I am a member that notorious group that is perfectly willing to deport Marilu Lopez back to her home country of Guatemala.
Out of the shadows
When Lopez was arrested last May, it was the first time she had seen the inside of a prison. Lopez is one of about 170 Prince William inmates facing immigration charges, a population that has shot up by approximately 460 percent since jail officials began cooperating with ICE.
“Some of the people would normally have been bondable, but now that they have a detainer, they’re waiting for a court date, they’re going to be here,” said outgoing Superintendent Charles “Skip” Land, who will step down at the end of 2007.
“Farm-outs,” inmates who are held at neighboring facilities for an average of $50 a day, have increased threefold from a year ago, and lately have been fluctuating between 180 and 200. (from here)
It would appear that Prince William County’s new “immigration laws” are already having an effect. Naturally, the liberal news media is upset with this success. So to humanize the “victims”, they have gone looking for the most sympathetic victim they can find. As told this morning in the Potomac News (here and here), Marilu Lopez has a sad story. After fourteen years and five children, she got caught. Because Lopez is suspected of abusing one of her children, she was arrested. Is she guilty of child abuse? I do not know about the child abuse, but she is guilty of sneaking into the United States and using “free” public services.
Why do I want to see Lopez go back to Guatemala? Am I mean? Do I hate Marilu Lopez? Of course not. I just don’t want to live in a country like Guatemala. Lopez came here to escape Guatemala. Unfortunately, when she came here, she brought a little bit of Guatemala with her. In fact, whenever an illegal immigrant escapes their home country and sneaks into the United States, they bring a portion of their home country’s problems with them.
Consider.
- Is Lopez married? No. She had her children with two different boyfriends.
- What does Lopez do to support herself and her five children? She works at low wage jobs.
- Does Lopez speak English? Apparently not very well. After fourteen years in this country, Lopez still needed to speak Spanish when she was interviewed at the Prince William Adult Detention Center?
Of course none of Lopez’s problems are unique to illegal immigrants, and, undoubtedly, illegal immigrants bring some virtues as well as problems with them. Nonetheless, on the whole, these people are poorly educated and ripe for exploitation by the less scrupulous amongst us. Unrestrained, the continued influx of illegal immigrants into this country is causing our nation to fracture along economic and ethnic lines. For the sake of our own children, we cannot allow this fracturing to continue.
Our Christian heritage teaches us to care for the needy, but it does not require us to destroy ourselves in the process. To receive our aid, the Marilu Lopez’s of the world do not have to immigrate to the United States. It is the U.S. employers of illegal immigrants who have that requirement.
To put a stop to illegal immigration, we need to demand that domestic employers hire only U.S. citizens.
OTHER VIEWS
JK at NOVA’s Traditional American Blog also would be happy to see Lopez return to Guatemala (here).
I used to oppose the border fence, especially during the 2000 Gore/Bubble recession, as it would have made it harder for mexicans to go home, but it is hard to argue with results. Eh? Our political opponenets are pretty much reduced to callign us nasty names.
Your reasoning is faulty, but you do manage to stumble over the correct answer. Illegals are subject to deportation because they are illegal; they broke the law. Not because she is poor, or unmarried with children, or uses ESL.
We are a nation of laws and can manage immigration using the law any way we as a nation see fit.
The fact that you or anyone else objects to her station in life is meaningless.
hoobie — I don’t object to Marilu Lopez “station in life”. I did not use such a term.
My concern is the stability of the society my children will inherit. When we allow greedy employers to import hordes cheap laborers just for the sake of their immediate personal profits, we endanger our ability to govern ourselves. Hordes of unskilled, poorly educated laborers cannot make a democratic capitalist society function properly. Even though they may be willing, poorly educated people do not know what they are suppose to do.
Democracy is a participatory process. Yet even now too many Americans do not engage themselves in the process of running our society. Many of these people are just too lazy, but most I suspect do not know their responsibilities.
Our schools do a lousy job. In particular, our schools do a lousy job of teaching civics. When our schools already stink, why burden them with millions of the third world’s poor? How does it further the national interest to waste money on unnecessary ESOL programs?
You asked us to consider that Marilu Lopez is an unmarried mother working low wage jobs. That is her station in life. And, if you ask her, she probably is thankful for that compared to her prior situation in Guatemala. Is that a reason to let her stay? No. There are a lot of poor Americans who are unmarried with children who do not speak English well. These are not valid reasons for removing someone from American society. Breaking the law is. That is all that needs to be said.
Now, I agree with you regarding cheap labor, and it’s not just illegals. I’m sure you are familiar with the H1-B visa. It’s just one step up from being undocumented; in both cases the worker is at the mercy of his employer and each can be abused. H1-B visas hurt American workers by driving down wages to third world levels.
hoobie — “Breaking the law is. That is all that needs to be said.” If that is all that needs to be said, then why are our immigration laws not being enforced?
The reason our immigration laws are not being enforced is that the employers responsible for breaking these laws are highly motivated. Money.
If we need a law to keep people from doing something, then when we make that law, we have to have a good reason, and we must understand that reason. Otherwise, because we will have insufficient motivation, that law will not be properly enforced.
Why you dont complaint then when you live in a house that most likely was built by illegal immigrants funny ha !! they build our houses and then we kick them out of the country for having a broken light.