I need some help with two questions. So I am asking for it. Please read the following story.
- Can you explain to me why the illegal immigrants this story is about are not responsible for creating this mess?
- Perhaps I am being too harsh, but why is The Washington Times, supposedly a Conservative newspaper, peddling this tearjerking nonsense?
Dysfunctional immigration enforcement system tears apart family
In the end, their flights almost overlapped: The 11-year-old boy on his way to the U.S., granted a one-year parole to escape violence in his home of El Salvador, arrived in Dallas just a week after his uncle, Elvin Marroquin Diaz, whose testimony helped earn the boy his parole, was deported back to El Salvador.
Now, just a few weeks later, it’s the boy’s father, Elmer Marroquin Quintanilla, who faces deportation this Thursday after federal immigration officials decided that despite having a family here, including two U.S. citizen children — the 11-year-old boy Alexis and 15-year-old Sylvia, who was raped on her own journey north from El Salvador — he still meets President Obama’s new priorities for being kicked out of the country.
It’s the latest twist in the case of the Marroquin family, which has seen major ups and downs, years where Alexis and Sylvia didn’t see their parents at all, several joyful reunions in the U.S. and now the possibility that two men in the family would be kicked out and shipped home within weeks of each other.
“Why would you separate a family that we just spent almost two years fighting hard and finally got permission to unite? That makes no sense whatsoever,” said Ralph Isenberg, founder of the Isenberg Center for Immigration Empowerment in Dallas, a help center that has taken on the family’s case.
Mr. Isenberg, who provided the information about the cases over the course of dozens of conversations stretching back more than a year, said he was making a last-ditch plea with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to stay Mr. Marroquin Quintanilla’s deportation, which is scheduled for Thursday.
ICE has already paid for a ticket on a commercial airline to send Mr. Marroquin Quintanilla back to El Salvador on Avianca Flight 441 Thursday afternoon, nonstop from Dallas to Sal Salvador.
The agency says the man is a target for deportation because of his checkered history. He was first caught sneaking into the U.S. in 2005 and issued a notice to appear before an immigration judge — though he was released to await that hearing. Five months later, he didn’t show up for the hearing, and a judge ordered him kicked out in absentia, ICE said. (continued here)
This is also an easy way to write a post.
😉
Citizen Tom 
Tom, I read your post about the 20-20 hindsight being cheaply indulged by the media when they grill conservative 2016 candidates for Prez. I’m going to cheat a little, and submit here the comment I thought of while reading THAT article, but you’ll see how I connect the two in a moment.
Near the end of that article, you said:
When I read that, I thought “Hold on. It’s the Middle East itselfthat is by far the primary cause for the Middle East descending into chaos — not G.W.Bush.” Just like here where you’re saying that the immigrants themselves are primarily responsible for their plight, not America.” I would also add that if a country is to be blamed at all, the immigrants’ country of origin should bear the brunt of the criticism, not America.
Regards,
– Jeff
Jeff
That’s an interesting observation. Thank you.
I don’t know who deserves the most blame for most problems, but I am irked when politicians think their job is blaming somebody else. Hence this post and that other one on illegal immigrants. Nevertheless, because I think each of us is our own worst enemy, I tend to agree with your observations.
Why is each of us our own worst enemy? We really don’t have much control. We don’t choose the conditions of our birth, and we have little control over what happens to us. The only thing most of us can control is our own attitude. Yet even if we approach life with good attitude, we may not be materially successful. At best, we will be trying to do the right thing. So we will be better off than we might have been otherwise. That’s particularly true of our spiritual condition.
That said, if most people are their own worst enemy, then it tends to follow that the people of the Middle East, illegal immigrants, the poor, fat people, smokers, drug addicts, criminals and so forth mostly have no one except themselves to blame. However, that does not relieve those WHO HAVE LEARNED THE IMPORTANCE OF HAVING A GOOD ATTITUDE of their obligation to help the people of the Middle East, illegal immigrants, the poor, fat people, smokers, drug addicts, criminals and so forth. It just means government has a small role, and the reason for that should be obvious. We have tried repeatedly, but no one can point to a government program that has successfully improved the attitude of the people of the Middle East, illegal immigrants, the poor, fat people, smokers, drug addicts, criminals and so forth. Such programs may start of with all the best intentions, but every single one of them has eventually degenerated into nothing more than a corrupt scheme for buying votes.
So what is our obligation to the people of the Middle East, illegal immigrants, the poor, fat people, smokers, drug addicts, criminals and so forth? The Parable of the Good Samaritan states it better than I can.
@Citizen Tom, who wrote:
I wasn’t addressing that question, I was replying to a specific comment. “I cain’t do everthin’ all at once’t, ya know.”
But to this question, which is essentially “what’s wrong with out voters?”: It seems to me that there are several factors:
• A steady decline in US education, as a result of the combination of federal interference and teachers’ unions. Public sector unions, with government employees on both sides of the table, represent themselves rather than taxpayers. And teachers’ unions certainly do not represent the interests of the students, and are threatened by quality improvement initiatives … or at least, good ones.
• An increasing willingness on the part of the establishment media to distort, falsify, and (most frequently) simply omit crucial information in order to produce a Left-favoring result. I have nominally conservative friends who get their news from establishment media and have thus very distorted views of politics, the US, and the world. This is in spite of their natural inclinations.
• An ever-increasing proportion of the populace now dependent upon government handouts, a pattern that has resulted in families with seven generations who have never worked. These programs range from raw wealth-transfer schemes that have simply displaced charities from doing their jobs (leaving many non-profits now pursuing social activism instead) to poorly managed benefit funds like Social Security and pensions. A vote against the Establishment is seen to threaten this.
• A tendency to shift the debate from “progressive versus conservative” to “establishment versus rogue” with all the establishment protection (including media favoritism) that this entails. Current congressional leaders, while nominally Republican, are clearly Establishment party operatives.
• A general apathy toward and ignorance of government by most people, again circling back to the lack of education on civic issues including our founding documents, principles and virtues. Any number of YouTube videos bear sad testimony to this.
Despite all of this, national elections remain close. If we can fix some core issues, I think that the American people will do the right thing.
This notion is behind the idea of a Convention of the States, i.e., a “Convention for Proposing Amendments” as the Constitution calls it. This would, done correctly, reset certain principles back to a the Constitution founders’ concepts and allow the people to regain control.
I expect such a change to be fraught with risk … but perhaps not as much as our current direction. And if successful, this reset of power back to the states and to the people will lead to steady rise of America in the world, which will be good for its people and for the people of all countries.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
WOW! That was quick! Are you sure cain’t do everthin’ all at once’t?
😀
Since you posted your comment, I will comment there.
Tom, In this post and your last post you posed two wise management questions. What and Why.
I have expressed my opinion to Tilbet on the Who, what, when, where, and why questions every manager in Management 101 is taught in school below. Apparently this thought process is not a prerequisite course for Congress 101.
Tilbet, You asked
What ideas do you have to allow both freedom of religion to be Muslim while at the same time protecting and securing the secular base of legal equality and individual rights in law?
I think both can be maintained only by getting all religious privilege out of the public domain and keeping it strictly secular.
Because you asked, I will tell you what I would do.
Freeze all immigration until the immigration problem is fixed by Congress.
It is that simple. We have a problem.
What is the problem? Uncontrolled immigration.
Where? In the USA,
Who should fix the problem? Congress, the body that is responsible for immigration
When should they fix? Now.
Why? Because Americans are at risk from terrorist violence, drugs, and the cost burden to Americans.
How should they fix it? This is what Congress is being paid to figure out.
After we fix this problem Tilbet, I will tell you what to do about religion and law equality problems in the USA. We have to set priorities. Our first priority is not to allow terrorists the ability to come and go anywhere they want in the USA to kill us. Why is this our first priority? Because when you are dead, nothing else matters.
Is my advice you asked for wise or foolish? You decide..
Regards and goodwill blogging.
For my readers: Tildeb asked is question here=> https://citizentom.com/2015/05/14/what-do-we-do-about-the-muslims-the-hispanics-the-asians-and-so-forth/#comment-63185
So what do I make of your proposal? It properly addresses what needs to be done, but it fails to consider why what needs to be done is not being done.
Given its track record, Congress could very well pass legislation to do exactly what you suggest. Then it would not fund the program. That is effectively what Congress is doing right now.
Meanwhile, while Congress tries to deceive us, President Barack Hussein Obama would also practice deception, much as he is doing already. Instead of deporting illegal immigrants, Obama would find excuses (which he labels prosecutorial discretion) to allow and even help more illegal immigrants enter our country.
So why is Congress and our President engaging in such behavior? Why are we picking such people to lead our nation? Is the fault truly with Congress and the President, or are we at fault for choosing such awful leadership. Should we be asking how we fix Congress and the President, or should we each be considering how we fix ourselves?
So I have a question for you. Why have we chosen such people to lead us?
You have posed two different problems which I would identify as control problems.
The first is Congress arguing like children over controlling a piece of candy. (Voters)
The second is parents (voters) being slackers in their responsibilities to control their children (Legislators)
For the sake of brevity, I will only give you my opinion on the first problem because you asked and the nothing can happen about the second problem until the next elections..
When a responsible parent sees his children fighting over a piece of candy, the first thing he or she must do is take control.
Who is the parent? The President of the USA.
What tools of control does he have? Existing Laws that have been given to him.
Where are these laws? War power act of 1973.
When should he enact his powers? Now, he has nothing to lose. He is a lame duck.
How? First, take the candy away from Congress and make them do what they were elected to do. Example, freeze immigration (because of the threat of an enemy (terrorists) and stop the engagement of all our troops from active warfare unless they approve a declaration of war.
Why? If he does these two things, it will force Congress to make decisions on these two problems that they keep avoiding in hopes of keeping their candy in the next elections.
Wise or foolish. You decide.
Regards and goodwill blogging.
Current law enacted by Congress handles immigration reasonably well. It certainly prevents the current crisis. Except that it didn’t.
Current law is being ignored by President Obama. Immigration law has been long superseded by whim, by practice, and ultimately by unconstitutional executive branch regulations. They’re not even executive orders, and they are now being implemented in defiance of explicit court order.
Replacing the law with new law will not solve this — any law that would pass the current Congress and be signed by Obama would be one that fig-leaf’s his actions, and any part of it he found inconvenient he would ignore as he does now.
Constitutional scholars on the left and right agree, amazingly, that Obama’s lawless behavior has created the greatest challenge to the American governance system ever. I’ve been listening to Constitutional law debates. It seems that to find someone who is so base, so corrupt, so evil as to actually support Obama’s actions, you’d have to locate a compromised personal buddy of the Obama administration and appoint her Attorney General.
Forcing Congress to “freeze immigration” does nothing. They no longer have a role in that arena.
Forcing Congress to stop the engagement of our troops does nothing. They no longer have a role in that arena.
Congress has abdicated the power of the purse. Republican congressional leaders announced this in November, as soon as the ballot results were in … that they had no intention of pursuing their campaign promises.
Congress has abdicated many other powers since, most recently the Senate’s power to approve treaties. Now it can only impotently watch, since their Constitutional “two-thirds must approve” has been turned into “two-thirds are needed to even complain.”
And the obvious solution, impeachment, scares them to death. It threatens voter disapproval … and thus their cushy jobs, and will never happen. And there is no intervening election between now and Obama’s planned departure.
As an aside, DeHavelle Amendment T, Term Limits, solves one aspect of this completely: No member of Congress nor the President may be re-elected to office except after a three-year intervening interval. (It’s effectively four years, as elections are a few months before inauguration day.)
No one in office will be campaigning or wasting time fundraising. And their attractiveness as the target of pay-for-play campaign support will be much reduced. I’m not worried about lack of experience; Lincoln had only been a one-term Congressman prior to becoming president, and that used to be standard practice. These days legislative aides and outside groups write the bills anyway.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Thanks for your info and comment. You appear to be a powerhouse of knowledge on numerous subjects. It is commendable.
After reading your comments, it is apparent that Obama does not want to solve the immigration problem. Since he will be gone in another year, goodbye and good riddance. I will pray that another Boston Bomber incident does not happen in the interim because if it does, it is entirely on him in my opinion.
Kieth since you are not a prayer guy, I will pray for you will someday realize that there has to be a God looking over our nation. I say that because we are probably the most foolish nation in the world, yet we somehow have not yet wound up to dissolve as did the Roman Empire n, Notice I said yet.
Regards and goodwill blogging
I sincerely appreciate your sentiment, scatterwisdom, and I thank you.
I don’t drink, as I am immune to alcohol. I am evidently not susceptible to religious belief, either. But this evening is a bit rough, and one or the other of those would have been useful. For the nonce, your kind thought is pleasant.
A better day tomorrow.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Is our president supposed to be our Congress’ parent? I doubt the Founders thought that. George Washington was suppose to be the first among equals. Moreover, when he presided over the Constitutional Convention, I don’t believe he said much. He maintained order, but he understood that legislative bodies have a job to do.
In his comment, Keith did an excellent job explaining that Obama is unsuitable to lead, and Congress refuses to do its job. So I come back to that question. Why have we chosen such people to lead us?
I am a little surprised you took a pass on it, but I note that Keith took a pass on it as well.
Self-examination is not a pleasant process. I know I don’t enjoy it; I angrily rebel against it. So God has to cause me a lot of pain before I will admit my mistakes — my sins. Hence, even when the sin belongs to someone else, we would rather not mention it. Instead, we prefer to speak of a more distant them, those rascals in Congress, that narcissistic president of ours.
Just the same, I noticed this post is getting a few hits. => https://citizentom.com/2008/10/21/has-your-vote-been-bought/
I hope that’s a good thing.
Hello, Tom. What an ungodly mess.
The only reason the illegal immigrants this story is about, are not responsible for creating this mess is this: Our Regime – I decline to call Obama, or his administration legitimate- has not only refused to enforce the federal immigration laws, but previous administrations have grossly neglected those laws, and never properly secured our borders. (I ought to inform you that I was born in Arizona, long before the invasion.)
Even when I was a young adult, in 1972, the border crossing between Nogales AZ, and Nogales Mexico was lax. A formal entrance with a building, and several border officials, some cursory inspections of items being brought into the U.S. being done, and a secondary entrance, a mere open gate through a chain link fence with one border agent.
This was long before elaborate tunnels with lighting systems, large enough to drive a truck through, were discovered; I vaguely recall one such tunnel in the news, which surfaced within the confines of a house on the U.S. side.
As to the second question, I’m glad you used the term “supposedly” in reference to The Washington Times; they’ve become as liberal as other publications, and the MSM.
The Regime undermines our immigration laws and encourages illegal immigration. I fear there are too many people making money off it, and they can too easily bribe our corrupt politicians.
Is The Washington Times a Liberal publication? Well, on this issue I don’t think they can be trusted, but they are generally not anywhere near as Liberal as The Washington Post.
Instead of the expression MSM, I refer to the large media outlets as the corporation mass media. I suppose some CEOs are honest, maybe even most of them. However, it seems to me that for a lot of them the news is just another way of manipulating public opinion so they can make more money.