Who Is Cowtown Pattie?

My photo
I was Lillie Langtry in another life, and might have a crush on Calamity Jane.

Tuesday, November 28, 2006

English - It's Not Just For Farmers Anymore

*UPDATE

Those of us fortunate enough to live within listening range of the local public radio station often get to hear the commentary of a very wonderful writer - Tom Dodge. As usual, his perspective on this topic is too good not to share with readers of Texas Trifles. As I mentioned in an email to another blogging friend, Bill at Prairie Point, as you listen to Tom, you get lulled by his homespun folksy voice, then WHAM, you realize this man is better'n Confucius.

You can read Tom Dodge's morning commentary here.

No matter where you stand on the question of border protection between the U.S. and Mexico, or the issue of illegal immigrants living in America, you can't ignore the facts. By some estimates, over 5,000 people cross illegally into the United States on any given day. Yes, a day.

You may have recently read about a suburb of Dallas and its city council's efforts to be proactive in regards to the problem of illegal immigration. Starting with Resolution No. 2006-130, RESOLUTION DECLARING ENGLISH AS THE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE OF THE CITY OF FARMERS BRANCH, the city of Farmers Branch is hoping the federal boys will be taking notes.

In addition, the council has passed Ordinance 2892, AN ORDINANCE AMENDING CHAPTER 26, BUSINESSES, ARTICLE IV APARTMENT COMPLEX RENTAL, MANDATING A CITIZENSHIP CERTIFICATION REQUIREMENT PURSUANT TO 24 CFR 5 ET SEQ.; PROVIDING FOR ENFORCEMENT; PROVIDING A PENALTY; PROVIDING A SEVERABILITY CLAUSE; PROVIDING AN EFFECTIVE DATE; AND DECLARING AN EMERGENCY.

The penalty for not following the letter of the ordinance is a $500 a day fine for every day the violation exists. As you can imagine, there are some very unhappy landlords in Farmers Branch, and of course, the 10,000-plus Hispanic residents are more than just "upset".

Don't let the bucolical name fool you; while once known for the wild mustang grapes that grew along its creek banks, modern-day Farmers Branch is now more noted for its corridor of manufacturing plants, including over fifty Fortune 500 companies. The Dallas bedroom community may have kick-started the maelstrom, but now another city has signed up to do battle, Hazelton, Pennsylvania. Hazleton, however, has taken it a step further adding language that provides punishment to employers who hire illegals. In the wings are fifty more like-minded communities who may enact their own illegal immigration ordinances.

Of course, now this means that LULAC will be busily filing massive lawsuits that will snarl up our courts and cost millions of taxpayers dollars - that would be you and me paying this tab in case you were wondering. Funny, last time I looked, the "C" in LULAC stood for "citizen". Isn't the issue more about NON-citizens?

Regardless of how you personally view the issues, or which camp you choose to champion, you cannot argue that America is afire over the question of illegal immigration. Though he was not specifically addressing an immigration problem, Thomas Jefferson's quote below says it all:

If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it.

(Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Lewis, Jr., May 9, 1798)

And speaking of our third president, I believe I shall do some history homework regarding the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798.

I wouldn't want to be tried for Sedition for writing a blog...

3 comments:

GUYK said...

Just be sure you are registered as a democrat and no one will dare try you for sedition..they would have to go after too many BIG NAME democrats if they did...

The illegal immigration problem is indeed growing by the day and neither the democrats nor republicans want to do anything about it. Both are in the hip pockets of big business who needs the labor.

Bill said...

"you cannot argue that America is afire over the question of illegal immigration."

Actually I am not convinced that it is much of an issue to most Americans.

As far as FB is concerned this seems more like an issue of changing neighborhood demographics. In the 60's when blacks moved into white neighborhoods, they got all riled up about "states rights." Whenever there is movement in the line of demarcation that seperates one ethnic group from another, it produces conflict.

Anonymous said...

Some of the people in the affluent suburb in which I work have fired off several letters to the editor (to me, naturally) about the issue. Despite being hundreds of miles from a border crossing and having such a high cost of living that it already keeps "riff-raff" out.

While there is no gray area between "legal" and "illegal," so many forget that we're all people. There has got to be a better way to handle people who are just trying to make their lives better.

- Texas T-bone