Broken Immigration Laws
But Is That Any Excuse?
By Daniel Muniz

The author needs to study the history of immigration, laws and policies before he simply states that obeying the laws allows one to stay in the country legally. There is an abundance of complicating time frames, schedules, issues and policies that come into effect for those involved in immigration. One can be here legally and then due to complications through paperwork or what not, can become temporarily illegal.

Others do leave their country, as they have in the past, to the American dream of a better life. Is it easy? Is it legal? Maybe not always, but I believe the author should have at least considered the facts of history and reality of our nation before writing this piece.

The above comment is an observation from my harsh criticisms of illegal aliens. And this reader brings up some very good points about the complicated path to citizenship.

The first thing I have to say is that becoming a “legal” immigrant is indeed very difficult. As with any federal bureaucracy, the process is riddled with inane rules, mindless paperwork, and stupid procedures that have no basis in reality. But then again, bureaucrats seem to excel at making things as difficult as possible.

As for my own personal knowledge of the immigration process, I have seen a really good example firsthand.

Years ago I used to work at a very large mortgage bank that had plenty of contract employees from India who were part of the Y2K transition team. There was one particular contractor that I had become good friends with and he and I would often enjoy quite a few beers together after work.

The managers of the Information Technology division that I worked in were really impressed with him. Finding COBOL programmers was tough because it wasn’t taught in universities anymore. And the ones who were familiar with the language weren’t interested because of the emerging opportunities arising from the newly burgeoning Internet. But this contractor was different because he always enjoyed learning new things. In fact, he often ran circles around some of the software developers who had been with the company for years.

As a result, my employer wanted to hire him as an employee so they decided to sponsor his visa application. Even though it was a very large corporation, it was the first time that the company had ever done that since they always preferred to work with third party contracting firms. Overall, this was really a best case scenario where an immigrant had the backing and full cooperation of big corporation.

But it was also a very tedious if not excruciating process. My friend would often show me his paperwork and he was very frustrated at the bureaucratic mess and the numerous delays that ensued. Now if he was in the best situation an immigrant could hope for, I could only imagine the nightmare conditions that people in less fortunate circumstances had to endure. But after a long protracted effort, my friend finally got his legal papers squared away. He married a woman from India and brought her to America where they are now raising a family and all of it was done legally.

The whole point is that, right or wrong, this is the system that is already in place. Of course the process is broken and it is imperative for politicians to fix it although the harsh reality is that bureaucracies are inherently difficult to modernize.

But even with a broken system that is still no excuse to not follow the rules.

Here is a good example to illustrate my point. Credit and the credit reporting process is one big awful mess. Until Congress began applying pressure, credit bureaus were very secretive about what kind of credit behavior impacted your credit rating. In fact, they wouldn’t even tell you what your credit score was and they forbade creditors from revealing it to you. Today, there is now so much more openness about which factors influence your credit rating and the credit bureaus now make suggestions on what you can do to improve your credit score.

Right or wrong, using credit scores is the system that is already in place. Yes, it is convoluted and some things don’t even make sense (like paying off debt too early hurts your credit). But if you want to have an outstanding credit score (which means saving a fortune by having lower interest rates), then you have to learn how the system works and play by its rules. People with bad credit can complain all they want but that in no way changes the rules.

Legal immigration is not any different. There are lots of things in life that seem unfair because the system is broken and whatever improvements that are implemented are glacial at best.

Even so, there is not any other way to work around the system. If someone wants to have good credit, then he or she has to play by the rules. And if someone wants to become a legal resident alien or a naturalized citizen, then he or she also has to play by the rules. Again, illegal aliens can complain all they want but all the whining in the world isn’t going to alter the fact that they are still not obeying the law. But more importantly, they are in no way exempt from following the law just because it is complicated and arduous.

The harsh reality is that we are a nation of laws and just like any other country, they have to be respected.

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