Musing of One Watching a Rowing Novice Trying to Find the Oarlocks on a Canoe

In our last posting regarding illegal immigration we forgot to mention one thing, if congress and the president continue down the path they have apparently chosen (amnesty and a special path to citizenship) they will send exactly the wrong message to a billion or so other deserving poor people around the Earth, who would like nothing more than to live and work in the US. Imagine assimilating about another billion people in the next ten years or so. We are being facetious, but it is a possibility.

Thank you Dave Hatcher and Lisa Dillon for your kind comments.

Musing of one wondering what a caveman did when he had a toothache.

Recently we have heard on newscasts and news analyses a good deal of attention paid to illegal immigration. Among other things it seems that the government wants to grant some kind of amnesty and to provide a special path to citizenship. If this is so, then we will repeat an earlier posting, to the effect that this will make our government the only one in recorded history to reward people for breaking its laws.

It seems to us that Congress is ignoring a simple basic precept: If you want to discourage people from taking a particular action, then you establish the strongest practical disencentives that you can device.

It also seems to us that instead of acting as statesmen, and deciding objectively what is best for all of the citizens of the country, Congress is proceeding on the basis of emotion and concession to pressure groups.

Anyway, here is our take on a solution.


SUGGESTION FOR A SOLUTION TO THE ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION PROBLEM

Preface

1. There is a general premise to which we believe most if not all law abidingpeople subscribe: No one should benefit directly or indirectly from a violation of the law.

2. The suggestions which follow are based on this premise.

3. THESE SUGGESTIONS, WHILE STRICT, ARE IN NO WAY PUNITIVE. THEY MERELY PROVIDE FOR PLACING AN INDIVIDUAL WHO BENEFITTED FROM A VIOLATION OF THE LAW IN STATU QUO ANTE. IN OTHER WORDS, THE INDIVIDUAL WOULD RETURN TO THE SAME POSITION HE OR SHE OCCUPIED BEFORE THE VIOLATION OCCURRED. PLEASE REFER TO ATTACHMENT A, REGARDING CHILDREN BORN HERE.

4. It might be noted that these suggestions are not nearly as severe as the immigration and work status of some other countries, e.g. Mexico and Thailand.

5. Congress seems to be acting with unusual timidity on this subject and if it continues to do so, it will probably go down in history as a milquetoast congress.


6. Attachments:

A. Citizenship

B. Voting Laws

C. Public Assistance

D. Guest Worker Program



Attachment A – CITIZENSHIP

Citizenship is not a right except under certain conditions. Otherwise it is a privilege which is not to be taken lightly.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution has apparently been misinterpreted either intentionally or unintentionally to confer citizenship on anyone born in the United States. But according to the Supreme Court’s statement in Elk v. Wilkins:
“This section contemplates two sources of citizenship and two sources only: birth and naturalization… ‘all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.’ The evident meaning of these last words is, not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction, and owing them direct and immediate allegiance”
It seems to us that since the Supreme Court issued this definition regarding the 14th Amendment that even if one is born in the United States at least one of that person’s parents must be a legal U.S. citizen for that child to have citizenship. And since that is a Supreme Court interpretation it seems that the only way it can be overruled would be by another constitutional amendment.
In the light of these facts, Congress should make funds available to every state to review its birth records for some period, perhaps since 1990. The states should reclassify the birth certificate of anyone who does not meet the requirements described above to a category such as resident alien. This category would entitle the person to live and work in the United States, but not to vote or hold public office.
Congress may of course grant citizenship for individuals for exceptionally meritorious service. An illustration would be military service in a combat area. It can also grant citizenship for other reasons and it could do so in the case of illegal immigrants, we suppose. However, should it do so, it would probably go down in history as the “knuckle-under” congress which was too timid to stand up to pressure from groups which had no basis or justification for exerting any pressure.



Attachment B – Voting Laws

The present loose procedures for registering to vote need drastic revision. People should be allowed to register to vote in federal elections only by presenting a valid verifiable birth certificate. Voting is a privilege available only to U.S. citizens.

Congress should provide funds for each state to arrange for everyone who first registered on or after January 1st, 2000 to re-register in accordance with the above and should require states to verify birth certificates. States should be required to verify a birth certificate wherever there is reasonable suspicion that the person registering has not met all citizenship requirements.

U.S. citizens are supposed to know how to read, write and speak English. Therefore, ballots for federal elections should be printed only in English.


Attachment C - Public Assistance
Direct public assistance should be available only to U.S. citizens except for in life-threatening medical emergencies.
All applications for direct public assistance should be accepted only if accompanied by a true copy of a valid birth certificate. Fraudulent applications should subject the applicant to significant fines and/or prison terms.


Attachment D – Guest Worker Program
Congress should establish a guest worker program for workers in agriculture, hospitality, construction and perhaps other areas. This program would be separate from other permits permitting people to work in the United States.
Congress should establish a policy to cover the number of workers allowed and the duration of permits allowed for each worker as well as rules for accompanying family members. Detailed implementation of this policy should be left to the Executive Branch.


J.D. Eiland December 2010

Musing of One Watching an Elephant and a Donkey Try to Communicate, with a Chicken Acting as an Interpreter and a Turkey Providing Refreshments

In these days of apparently unmanageable national debts, apparently unmanageable annual deficits, demonstrations for and against budget proposals, etc. it seems appropriate to call attention to the ancient Law of the Unrecognized Obvious. (Is that an oxymoron?)

Basically the law states that in the final analysis, the total price of anything sold- tangible or intangible- is made up entirely of compensation paid to individuals.

Think about it.

Musing of One Wondering Why Octavian Changed His Name After Becoming Head of the Roman Empire

We watched some Republican congressmen talking on TV about repealing the health care bill. In each case, it appeared their plan was to have various committee heads come up with pieces of the bill. Sounds like another committee designing a camel. It will probably result in another 2,500-page monstrosity, and although all the little monsters will be different it will still be a monstrosity. The only question is: will the camel have one hump or two?
As to our health plan we submitted to some congressmen (see posting of Oct. 20th, 2010), we have still had no acknowledgement from any congressman, not even so much as a "Ah, yes, boo, go to hell or what have you." It makes us think that the congressional NIH factor is bigger than the all outdoors.
So we are going to try a different approach to get somebody's attention. We recognise that our plan is radical, but the situation demands drastic measures. We'll see what happens.
On another note, we have seen on TV a gaggle of congressmen talking about the need to reduce expenditures and pontificating about the pain everybody will have to endure. Conspicuous by its absence was any reference to inflicting such pain on congressmen and others on the governmental payroll. So, what else is new?

Musing of One Wondering if Diogenes Ever Succeeded

Like everyone else we were horrified at the massacre in Tuscon a week ago. A day or so after ,one of the networks presented a program that seemed to us to be a disguised anti-gun message. This moved us to do some research on murder rates. We read summaries of gun laws in 7 states, along with data on murder rates, and did not find any correlation between the two. Some states with permissive laws had low murder rates; others had high murder rates. The same was true for those with restrictive gun laws.
Data such as these moved us to conclude that the problem is societal not modal (for example, recall the Tylenol incident during the Reagan presidency. In that case, a mentally incompetent individual poisoned numerous bottles of Tylenol on store shelves, leading to many deaths and the advent of tamper-proof closures). Some of the factors we considered were population density, ethnic and racial groupings and poverty rates. We have no data to draw any conculsions other than the one that the problem is modal, not societal.
We also wonder why there is such a large proportion of the population with mental disabilities.
One does recall that some years ago there was philosophy that stated "If it feels good, do it."

Musing of One Watching a Guy Who Fell Out of an Antique Biplame at the Top of a Loop, Landed on the Side of a Haystack, Slid All the Way Through It...

...And Set It on Fire by Friction of His Pants.


Semi-fantasy #1:

The board of directors of a large corporation finished its review of a proposal for production of the goozlemawhatchit, a new product. It exhaustively studied the market analysis, the facility requirements, profit and loss projections etc. Having done so, the board decided to approve the project and duly notified the CEO of that decision. The CEO hired a plant manager who in turn hired a controller, a director of human resources, and director of industrial engineering and they began work. Before the workforce requirement had been determined the board sent a letter to the CEO specifying the skills and pay grades of the people to be hired. The director of industrial resources began struggling with this since it did not conform to general labor practices in the area. While he was doing so, the board sent another letter to the CEO specifying the types of accounting systems and banking arrangements that were to be used. This resulted in confusing the controller, who nevertheless began to try to comply with the letter. While he was so engaged the board sent another letter to the CEO specifying the size of the new facility, its layout and the manufacturing flow. The industrial engineers climbed up the wall trying to figure this one out.
As a result of all this, the whole project became enmeshed in a tangle of conflicting requirements and solutions. The project fell behind schedule by about a year. Meanwhile, a competitor began producing a similar product and garnered about 2/3 of the market.
In the light of all this, the board finally decided to cancel the project with a substantial loss to the company. Because of this the plant manager was summarily fired, the CEO lost his annual bonus and two directors decided not to stand for re-election.
The foregoing is the fantasy part.
Reality - Congress does the same thing with much of its legislation, an outstanding example being the health care law. Instead of acting as the policy-making board of directors which it is supposed to be, Congress has become mesmerized with the details of upper- and middle-management, for which it is not qualified and which should be properly left to the executive department.
Sic transit gloria mundi.

The Musing of One Thinking About the Guy Who Tried to Sell Santa Claus Batteries for Rudolf's Nose

Fantasy #2
The Dream Act passed and people began to come out the shadows to claim their share. One guy joined the military, served two years in Hawaii, got his citizenship papers and began to organize his compatriots into a solid voting block. He succeeded to such an extent that the block was able to force passage of an open borders act.

Within a few months after the act was passed some one billion people from around the world flooded into the United States. The financial strain was so great that the economy collapsed resulting in a depression worse than the Great Depression. It was so bad that the military took all its equipment and went to Canada, where in conjunction with Canadian military it set up a defence line along the U.S. and Canadian border.

Things were so bad in the United states that people started heading south to find a better life. Mexico, whose population was down to 50 million because of out migration, tried valiantly to seal its borders but failed.

With all the new arrivals things got just as bad in Mexico and the masses continued to migrate south eventually arriving in Argentina, Chile, parts of Brazil, and the Falkland Islands.

Meanwhile a false rumor arose that Australia had enacted an open borders act another couple of billion people of Oriental decent headed to Australia which was unable to resist the on slot.

All this weight at the bottom of the world caused an imbalance so that the Earth tilted one half a degree from its normal inclination. The result was drastic climate changes aroused the world. Mexican resorts began to order ice skates. skies, and snow shoes in the hope of attracting more vacationers. Central California became the Ski capitol of the world, the Riviera found its self encased in ice two feet thick, and all the snow melted off Mount Fuji.

This prompted a group of environmentalists, who had blamed the US and George Bush for global warming, to head for the now and feeble united nations to ask for establishment of an office to monitor global cooling, ignoring the fact that Scandinavia has an average temperature of 95 degrees.

Eventually everybody realized the whole thing was a pipe drain and returned to their native lands, where upon the Earth turned to its normal angle of inclination. The climate changed again, and everybody resumed their practice of debating who was responsible for what.


Yes Virginia there is a Santa Claus but during the great upheaval it got so warm at the north pole that he moved his entire operation to the South pole, where he had proceeded to review his navigational charts and adjust Rudolf's nose. Whether he is still there or has returned to the North pole is unknown at this time.