Paying For The Past On Immigration

America has long been seen as "The land of opportunity," and not without reason. The country has been built around immigrants down through the decades. The problem is, we got sloppy. Particularly along our southern border with Mexico, we really didn't do a hell of a lot to keep the border secure. By secure, I'm not meaning that we should have been fearful that General Santa Anna's son, grandson or great grandson might march a Mexican army across the border and try to once again take the Alamo (Hey, we don't have John Wayne anymore to stop them!), but we let the border go so unchecked that literally millions of people from "south of the border, down Mexico way" entered the U.S. without ever having proper immigration papers or guest visas issued. In many cases, according to what we hear, our government has no idea where most of these people are. Now, in 2007, the issue has become as hot as a habanero chili pepper.

To some extent, we're also worried about "terrorists" coming over our southern border, since it has been so poorly monitored. That makes me wonder if, in fact, we've been looking for Osama bin Laden and company in the wrong place for the last six years. Instead of them being in a cave in Pakistan or Afghanistan, maybe all the while they've been picking lettuce and spinach right here in the "good ole U.S. of A." Hell, maybe that's why are food isn't safe anymore!

Anyway, it does seem that some of the politicians are seriously interested in making the border much more secure. Since Bush and Putin seem to have kissed and made up, maybe the President could hire Putin to secure our "south side." After all, Putin, as a former Communist and KGB man certainly has experience in building walls, albeit to really keep people in, rather than out.

One thing Americans are going to have to realize is, this is all going to be expensive. Back in the 1980s, I traveled through Germany, going from then West Germany into East Germany. The amount of security, especially on the Communist side, was just incredible. Towers all along the border, giving heavily armed guards a great vantage point to keep Germans from the West from breaking into East Germany (Well, that's what they said! After all, I'm sure it was the dream of every [West] German to own one of those East German cars that broke down every 15 to 20 miles.) Well, border security is expensive, but we're going to have to do it. I still don't know how we're going to locate the estimated 12 to 20 million people illegally in this country, and that is a whole different issue, and another expensive proposition.