Some of you may have read about the effects of the toughest “immigration” law in the USA, here in Alabama. I put the word “immigration” in quotation marks because the carrying out of the law has been far from related to immigration at times. Let me give you some instances.
One of our daughters and my wife and I were talking. This past week she had to go renew here car’s auto tag. Unfortunately, it took over three hours. Why did it take over three hours? Well, the new verification requirements in the “immigration” law were not only unfunded, but they were also not thought through. There is no way to verify your citizenship online. So, the law knocked license tag (and any other license) renewals right off the Internet. All those good Alabama natives (I mean children of immigrants, since most are not Native Americans) are now having to queue up for what was previously a five minute stroll through the Internet. But, it gets worse. While our daughter was there, she watched someone who is a part-time resident of Alabama (and has one car here and one car there) get to the front of the line. That person showed their Texas driver’s license and was turned down. Why? Because if you are not from Alabama, you must show proof of citizenship, even if you have a license from a state that only gives licenses to legal residents. Alabama no longer accepts, or gives faith, to outsider documents. Another lady got to the front of the line only to be told that because “her” vehicle was jointly owned with her husband, he had to be there too, with his verification (or provide notarized copies).
In another instance, she was at a store to buy some alcohol. One of the people in front of her was an immigrant–from their accent–but had obviously been here for many years because their English was excellent. The clerk at the counter asked for ID, then asked slowly and loudly for “American” ID. The person started to put their ID forward when the clerk repeated the same demand. The ID the person had was an Alabama driver’s license. Oh, the next person in line? He was white, so she looked at him, glanced at his ID, and said nothing while selling him the alcohol. Fortunately the “immigrant” had been here enough years that he new about being an American and promptly went to the manager to complain.
I recently had to do a bit of paperwork at a county office. I have an Alabama driver’s license, for which I had to prove I was an USA citizen. In spite of that, the county refused to accept the state’s own driver’s license as sufficient proof and I was forced to bring in a copy of my naturalization papers FROM FORTY YEARS AGO. I had to do a bit of paperwork for the State of Utah, and faced the same thing.
From a newspaper online live chat, let me quote one more instance out of many that I could quote:
Reader Hammer had this to say: Joey, I totally agree with the meanness. I tried to renew my library card at my library in Shelby County and was turned away because I did not have my birth certificate?!! How much is all this “verification” costing businesses and all forms of Alabama government?
I must wonder what renewing a library card has to do with protecting us from “illegal” aliens. The Tea Party types have kept insisting that their immigration emphases have nothing to do with xenophobia. Yet, look at how the law is being implemented here, both by governmental authorities and by private parties, such as that liquor store. Alabama has become a frightening and painful state in which to live if you were born overseas, like I was. Our daughters, who were born in the USA, but have lived overseas during our missionary time, are sickened by what they are seeing here. Sadly, it has given me the opportunity to review with them the history of Alabama, the marches of Rev. Martin Luther King, and the awful heritage of the South that still lives on, hidden beneath many fine words. They are seeing in practice what they only previously read about in history books.
Father Bless!
I am not in favor of a National I.D. Card as I hold the 10th Amendment to be important, the issue is that some states give their identification/D.L. to anybody- citizen or not. This causes chaos for other states as they cannot tell if the identification proffered is legitimate.
My son had this problem with New Mexico- the state that he has lived and worked in for the last two years. He is a cowboy on a large ranch (103 sections), cowboys with ranch jobs traditionally get a place to live, utilities paid, a vehicle to drive and beef in their freezer, in addition to their salary.
When my son went to get his NM drivers license he was turned away because he didn’t have a utility bill. He had everything else he needed from Colorado but no utility bill to prove he lived in the state. He had bank statements from NM, his birth certificate and his Colorado DL but to get a NM DL he had to go to another nearby town and use their office because they understood his situation. There is no conformity or consistency even within a particular state!
As to bigots they are everywhere and that is unfortunate. But something has to be done to sort out the mess, personally I just get tired of having to justify my very existence in the country that I was born in and, yep, I am a “tea party type” and an Orthodox Christian and pretty darn Libertarian too.
Fr. Ernesto,
Your posts are always welcome and I love reading them, but it is becoming so disheartening, living here. I feel like our existence as a democracy is now extinct, but we’re too stupid and strung out on Jersey Shore and Fox News to know any better.
Your post on usury–how many of us are dealing with that? How much could our country recover by a modified year of jubilee–where say we only pay what we owe from then on. What the banks got in interest before is all they’re going to get? What would happen if all our mortgages reflected only the value of our home, not the inflated value they drove it to. What if our student loans were forgiven?
What if we cared about each other? What a novel thought.
Anyway, thanks for your writings, as painful as they often are to read and contemplate.
Rebecca–
I can understand where you are coming from, but then I ask how is forgiving the student loans for example “fair” to the students who studied hard and got scholarships or worked 2 jobs while going to school to pay for it. Do they get their tuition back? My daughter who busted her butt working and going to school so she wouldn’t have any debt gets a little upset at the folks who got big student loans, majored in football and sororities and now want their student loans forgiven. That is why she has not gone full time for her Masters but is doing it one class at a time as she has the money saved–doesn’t want a load of debt.
It is almost as if people who were responsibly living within their means and figuring out ways not to go into debt are ignored in your equation. I have a very old little house because I could not afford a big, new house. By this reasoning, I should have bought a bigger house for more-Would I like to pay less interest on my house–well, of course–but I would not have the house if someone had not lent me the money–and I signed the note–
And I think it is a bit unfair to suggest that folks who don’t necessarily agree with you are folks who don’t care about others. (You didn’t say that exactly, but the inference is there.) I don’t have a tv or cable so that I CAN send a check to IOCC or another charity. I drive an old, cheap car that gets good gas mileage and shop sales and thrift stores for the same reason–so I have something to share with folks who have less than I do–(and I am a disabled senior and not making a million a year or even 50 thousand.).
I agree that the system is screwed up–but think that some of it isn’t racist necessarily–my brother who was born on Okinawa to parents both US citizens and my father military had to jump through hoops to get the star that means I am a genuine American when he renewed his DL.
As far as political candidates, it is my theory that we should put every eligible citizen’s name in a hat and pick–citizen legislators not professional politicians–probably do as well as we do now or even better. (A firm pox on all their houses from me…..)
If we all would share with our neighbor…..well that is another post…..
Alix
Alix–I too busted my hump in college and paid for it with a mixture of scholarships and loans, did not major in sororities or football. I have put off graduate degrees and will likely never go because it is cost prohibitive for me to do so. I drive an old car, long ago paid off and live within my means. My house costs less than my rent did, it’s that small. And I am not making it. I didn’t say anything about folks not agreeing with me not caring for others. Nor did I even come close to implying it.
So what if it’s not fair to erase debts or restructure them. We’re no longer talking about fair here, dear. We’re talking about the survival of our economy, our democracy and any shred of community we may still have. Tuition costs are driven up by the schools and banks that benefit from the fees and interests on the loans. Our houses were inflated in value to get more money from us in interest and in fees. The banks charge us fees and interest for using money already ours. Our health insurance companies wiggle out of every single opportunity to part with our hard-earned cash. Forget “fair.” We’re well beyond that, no? The game is rigged. Time to rig it the other way. Or do you prefer greed to justice? You’ve got yours and you did it all on your own. Congrats. So far the economy has not eaten you alive. But it has eaten up any other people who did nothing more than have the temerity to get cancer with bad insurance, get older and expensive in a company looking to downsize, or whatever else is going on that we have no control over. If you think you have control over how your life has gone, your family’s life has gone and how your life will go, I have some lovely bridges to sell you in the Gobi desert.
The year of jubilee is Scriptural. What better way to eliminate the fun for the banksters who have preyed upon our country’s poor, undereducated, unsophisticated and elderly. Make our student loans reset to the amount we borrowed, so the banks can’t capitalize on the interest anymore. Make our mortgages reset to amount the house is worth. End usury.
If we as Christians are going to yip and holler in this country about “family values” and “faith” and all that crap, let’s put it somewhere else, somewhere other than just abortion and homosexual marriage.
Perhaps I read something into your statement that you did not mean. I am sorry for that. I do not think that I have things under control–far from it–and I look at my children and they have it less in control that I do. Things have changed so much since I was a girl and I do not understand a lot of it. I also look at what my girls tell me from their places of employment–that their generation and younger doesn’t always give a good days work and seem to take any opportunity to slack off. That wasn’t the USA I was raised in. My girls all have a good work ethic and don’t get it when their contemporaries don’t. Now which came first the chicken or the egg, I don’t know–but somehow the spiral down has to stop. The only way I can help make it stop is light my little candle–which is do the best I can, live frugally, and give to those less fortunate and pray–a lot!
I am well aware that Jubilee is scriptural, but we are a secular nation. Perhaps that is what is wrong–but I do not see that nations with a national religion are doing so well either. As far as yipping and hollering, I don’t necessarily agree that the folks who are the most vocal are the most Christian. (Just my POV–I prefer less hollering and more praying and good works like caring for the sick, the poor, the widowed and the orphaned without waiting for government to do it.)
I think that it is too simple to just say–end the interest–reset everything. Perhaps a first step is to eliminate the lobbying and the giving to campaigns that all these folks seem to be spending so much money on–THEN you look at their legitimate cost of doing business (not persuading lawmakers to pass legislation in their favor or folks who have their hand in the till some kind of way) and set interest rates–or fees for borrowing or whatever you want to call it based on their legitimate expenses. Simplify the tax code which even IRS employees don’t always understand. Stop sending money abroad (except for humanitarian efforts and send troops to make sure the supplies and money get to those who need it not the bank accounts of the despots). and maybe–just maybe attempt to stop policing the entire world ourselves.
Maybe, it is time to put the money in the mattress and end the banks totally!! (tongue firmly planted in cheek) Maybe the barter system is better. You give me some stuff from your garden and I will come and take your BP or monitor your blood sugar or whatever. I think a lot of folks are doing just those kinds of things under the radar. and God bless ’em.
I don’t know all the answers–in fact, I probably don’t know ANY of them. I try to trust God and do the best I can and give the next guy a loaf of bread when I have two–or even half of the one I have.
I agree with much of what you just said here, if not most of it.
And I have come as close to putting my money in a mattress as I can. I won’t go near the big banks with a 10-foot pole. I no longer accumulate new debts…at least I try.
I guess that’s all we can do. Keep trying…
Please forgive me, Alix. That respond came off harsher than I had intended.
I notice you said you are a disabled senior. May I ask, in your life as a worker, did you have a pension? Are you making ends meet with Medicaid and/or Social Security?
I do not have a pension. I have worked for 15 years in an industry that is struggling. I had a pension once, but not long after I was vested, my company decided it was too expensive to uphold that end of the contract they made with me for my employment. My 401K is not worth what it was, and I have had to borrow from it to make ends meet. My employers ceased contributing to that too, and I haven’t been able to either since they cut my wages a few years ago. If you include the increase in gas costs, the decrease in my benefits, the increase in my health insurance costs, I make far less than when I started at my current employer 11 years ago. I work extra contract/freelance work when I can find it, but that’s not steady and hard to find.
I do not, though, make the suggestions I made from a position of bitterness, or from a place of “if I can’t have it, neither can you.” I believe we need to seriously rethink what we value as a culture and how we communicate that value to our children. I believe we need to make sure that government acts in the best interest of all its citizenry.
We have to do better.
I was a nurse–and I do have a small annuity–I also do a little work in a local theatre to make ends meet as I cannot work as a nurse anymore. I pay partly for health insurance and my former employer pays part–and I also pay for medicare part b. Health care costs are prohibitive, I agree. The medicine which keeps me out of a wheelchair and in a minimal amount of pain (3-4/10 vs 7-8/10) costs a lot even with my drug coverage. Don’t even talk to me about the gas prices–or the increase inf ood prices…..
I agree that we need to rethink what is important.
Alix
I will remember you in my prayers. Be well.
As usually happens with something like this another more fundamental law kicks in; the “law of unintended consequence”.. It would be humorus if it was not also tragic.
Peace…
Actually, my whole post was to point out the “law of unintended consequences.” It is the USA citizen in Alabama who is paying an unintended high price for the new laws. There has been lost production, angry citizens, police departments that are now feeling overwhelmed, etc. Everybody wanted to fix the system but nobody wanted to count the cost.
Actually when I went to renew my DL here in Florida, I had to produce birth certificate, proof of residency and SS card. They have done it well, I think. A couple of months before I was due to renew, I got a card saying what I needed. They have hired more people and introduced more locations to renew a DL. It was quite a short and painless process though I did need to get a certified copy of my birth certificate. So it can be done—
Because Florida has a very high percentage of aliens who have become citizens, they have had to make sure that their system of verification does not discriminate against naturalized citizens. Alabama has legally approved an adversarial system that assumes that if you are not very clearly a citizen of the USA, then we must suspect that you are breaking the law. That includes anyone who is not a “citizen” of Alabama, which is why the Texan “citizen” was told that their ID was not good enough.