Immigration is the hot topic of late, but it seems that the one thing about immigration reform that no one seems to want to answer is, "why does it matter?" If you ask most people this question, or if you manage to hear someone talk about it in the media you're likely to hear any number of responses ranging from, "we need keep those terrorists out of our country," to "they're taking away all of our American jobs." Generally I have discussed illegal immigration and haven't bothered to mention any reasons beyond the simple fact that what they're doing is illegal and for that alone they should be dealt with accordingly. I'm not sure if everyone actually realizes why it's illegal, or why it should be illegal, and why we should deal with those who have entered the country illegally and then subsequently tighten border security.

I'm not going to spend time getting into the history of immigration because I'm sure that most people remember their high school history lessons which explain how everyone in some way or another (by land bridge or by sea) immigrated to the Americas. The 13 Colonies were built on immigration, the United States grew through immigration, and the country became an industrial powerhouse thanks to immigration. Consequently it would make sense that we as a nation should be embracing immigrants, no matter how they got here, not sending them away. This is actually one of the worst things we could do.

America has long been known as a "melting pot" when it comes to immigration. This metaphor refers to the fact that people from all around the world come to the United States, and when they enter our society they learn our way of life, our language, and essentially conform to our society's way of life, as well as adding their own distinctiveness to our own. Essentially in the melting pot paradigm we are the Borg, assimilating those who wish to come into our country. As illegal immigration increases at an alarming rate and as we choose to not teach them the "American Way," we have turned the country into the "tossed salad" model for immigration. In this everyone retains their own identity instead of mixing with the country as a whole. Creating sub-groups of American society, classes that don't just deal with income but also with race, country of origin, and thought processes.

So what's the big deal anyway? Do we really need to be the Borg; can't people just hold onto their own way of life and not mix with American society? Well there's a problem with the comparison between us and the Borg, and that's that people can choose to enter into our collective, we're not forcing them to come to our country, they're seeking it out for a better life. Why do we need them to conform then? Well it's actually fairly simple. Those that enter the United States come from a variety of backgrounds, socially, economically, and governmentally. Thomas Jefferson addressed this issue at the formation of the U.S. and stated that if uncontrolled immigration were allowed to happen. He stated simply that, "They will infuse into [our government] their spirit, warp or bias its direction, and render it a heterogeneous, incoherent, distracted mass." So basically what Jefferson is saying is that if immigrants do not nationalize they will change our system of legislation and government to match that which they know of and brought from their former countries all of which have an inferior form of government. No offense to those not in the United States, but I do believe that we have created the best governmental system in history, and as Jefferson said if we allow those who come from elsewhere to infuse themselves into our country without correctly teaching about what has made the country the way it is, and without naturalizing we're going to see them create great cultural rifts throughout the country, some of which are already beginning to occur.

We also see immigrants coming into the country with vastly different points of view on certain major issues which cannot be compromised on. For instance, the majority of Mexicans believe that the southern United States is rightfully theirs, and they should have free passage into it, and it should ultimately become part of Mexico again. There are even groups planning such things. This is quite substantial, and is not exactly something to be trifled with. I'm not suggesting that we begin to worry that Mexico is going to attack, but they're coming into the country illegally with a fundamentally flawed mindset of whose country it really is. Along with that people are attempting to give driving, welfare, and voting rights to illegal immigrants. We are going down the exact road that Thomas Jefferson warned us about. Then again, these days we haven't been much listening to the founding fathers so it would figure.

On top of all of this though, we have lost a part of American society that use to be necessary. There will always be the poor, even Jesus agreed to this, and it use to be that poor Americans did the so called "unfavorable" jobs. Now illegal immigrants do these jobs, and we give the poor Americans free money. I've heard many a person say, "well if we were to deport all the illegals who would take care of all the jobs they do?" Well, who took care of them before the illegals came into the country? Guess what, it was Americans. I know that people don't like doing certain jobs and that's fine, but when there are millions on welfare, and millions of illegal immigrants doing jobs, I think that both of those problems could be quite easily remedied don't you? Of course, we're Americans, we're lazy...yeah we are, perhaps it's time we start working on that eh?