President Obama and Immigration

Dear Friends,

President Obama's approach to immigration seems to me to be schizophrenic.  He has continued to deport more people than any prior President, and he continues to seek support from Republicans for his efforts to defend our borders and keep the "others" out.  At the same time he seems he really cares for individuals, e.g. the Dream Act.  As with most things today, I do not know what President Obama really feels about any issue.  He continues to do things that the Republicans should like and to do things that show complete disdain for his political base.

His latest request to Congress for $3.7 billion to address the huge increase in minors illegally entering the country demonstrates President Obama's lack of a rational approach to the immigration problem.  There are apparently 52,000 minors currently being detained and processed (for the most part to be sent home) and President Obama wants $3.7 billion to address this crisis.  I did the math and that is over $70,000 per minor.  Of course his proposal includes all kinds of border protection expenditures.  I suppose he included those to get Republican support.  He should have known that if he proposed it, the Republicans will be against it.  When will he learn. The Republicans are not against spending money to keep the "others" out or to deport them, but they do not want to let President Obama do it.

There is apparently nothing in President Obama's proposal to address the reason why so many minors are being sent unaccompanied by their parents on an incredibly dangerous 1,000+ mile journey to the United States.  These parents love their children just as all parents do, so the only reason they are subjecting their children to such danger is that it is the lesser of two evils since the conditions and environment in which the children are living is even more dangerous and in which there is not future for the children.

So both the Republicans and President Obama seem willing to let the children risk their lives to get here so long as we either stop them before they cross the border preferably with some kind of armed intervention or send them right back as soon as they get here.  If we spent a fraction of what the Republicans and President Obama are willing to spend on wars, the military and closing our borders on humanitarian aid and other efforts to make living conditions better for these families, we would not have the crisis that we have today.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal