Need a sponsor to come to the U.S.

In my personal life I tend to be very opinionated when it comes to politics and such, but I try to keep it away from my blog for a variety of reasons. So I hope any readers will not be offended by the following small indulgence, along the way to a serious need. (Is that what is referred to as a disclaimer? ;-) )

Life is so interesting. While our country has a serious problem with control over its borders and is dealing with providing health and education services to vast numbers of people in this country having not come through the proper channels (which would technically be a breaking of the law), and while the politicos try to drum up support for allowing these people to stay regardless of proper procedures, one of our teachers is trying desperately to get his family into this country legally. The challenge? For each family member he must have a sponsor who will sign papers stating that they will provide financial support in case of catastrophe. The reason? So they will not become wards of the state and drain our government financially. Which makes me scratch my head in wonderment at the aforementioned politicos.

Why are so many of them endorsing breaking our own country's law in this immigration debate? I know, I know--I've heard the heart-appealing arguments about not wanting to break up families who already have one member here. Wait a moment, what about our teacher? His family is stuck in another country because of our law. Oh and then there's the other argument about needed labor. Well, here's a novel idea about putting to work some folk who aren't doing much right now. Obviously not appropriate in all cases, but certainly for some it could be and it would be job training to provide skills for after release (and I'm sure much more effectively than my feeble attempt to teach short story writing in this environment!). As for the cost of rounding up people who are here without proper paperwork--what if we quit providing government-funded services and put that savings toward finding them and returning them to their proper country. If they want to come back that's fine--just do it the right way. Just go through all the red tape and proverbial hoops, like our teacher is doing. Too hard to do all that? Well, I was always taught that anything worthwhile takes sacrifice.

I'm not trying to be heartless. My great-great-grandparents were all immigrants, as were many peoples' ancestors. Come--just follow the law. And on that note, if there is anyone who can help Mr. Phillips, here is the link to his blog again. He needs one to three people to step up as sponsors for his family to be allowed to come. He gives info on how to reach him, if you can help, or know someone who can. Or contact me and I can pass info on to him.

Thanks for indulging my little rant. Yes, I know it's a complex issue, and no, I'm not without a heart. But I do look at the situation of one family trying to do everything right and how difficult it is for them and then look at the state of this issue in our country and wonder what has happened to the sanity of our leadership. Oh, and yes, I called my Senatorial representative and let him know my thoughts also. ;-)

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...