Joe Arpaio where are you?

I think it's high time we had a blog to create some thought, if not downright controversy. Hope you'll all read this thoughtfully and come up with opinions of your own. Please remember to be considerate of others and tolerant of their views. You and I may not share the same view...but you do have the right to be wrong.

Arizona has held sway in the headlines this week. At contention here is immigration, privacy concerns, safety, taxes, healthcare and the always polarizing issue of racial tensions. If you've been living under a blanket this week, Arizona has passed into law a bill which not only allows, but requires Arizona police officers to ascertain the legality of any person's presence within the boundaries of Arizona. Prior to this enactment, police officers there, as in other states were not even allowed to ask a person if they were in the country illegally.

There is no doubting the impact of illegal aliens on our existence. Taxes, unemployment, the health care system, and even crime rate are all impacted in some manner. Drug trafficking and violent crime stats are exploding along the Mexician / US Border. Just to what extent these issues are affected are hotly debated. So we have the question of "What to do?" How about those individuals who have been living in the country for years, if not decades as honorable decent people? Is it the same to be an illegal immigrant from Great Britian, as it would be if you're from Mexico? How about Canadians? Remember the Mariel Boatlift of 1980? As many as 125,000 Cubans fled Castro's Cuba for Florida. That number pales by comparison to the millions upon millions of people streaming across the border into Texas, Arizona and California. But even at 125,000 people, there was no denying the dramatic change upon South Florida's economy, culture and even crime rate. The vast majority of those refugees from Cuba were honest hardworking, salt of the earth people who created opportunities for themselves and others. Some of them are among my very best friends who carry my greatest confidence. They made a positive impact on the area. But with them came a few criminals with a culture of crime Florida was not prepared for. Is this mass exodus from Mexico and all of Central America even comparable to the Mariel event? How about the mass exodous of Northern Europe into the US in the 1800's?

As he looked back over the events of his life, the wise Solomon remarked in Ecclesiastes Chapter 3, "There is a time for all things and every purpose under Heaven..." Another wise man who's opinion I greatly value (my Dad) once told me..."Spend your time building bridges instead of fences. But if you find it necessary to build a fence, and you will, build it horse high, pig tight, and bull strong." Somewhere in this collective wisdom I think lies the answer...Pretending there is not a problem is not the answer. We know we have a problem....I'm just not sure we know exactly what the problem is, let alone what the answer may be. Has our world passed the point of open borders? Have we already passed the window of opportunity? Why is no one trying to flee the US?

Personally, I'd rather share a border with Cuba and Mexico than either California or Washington D.C. There is no doubt the ratio of crooks to honest folks is better in Mexico and Cuba than those other two places. To be up front with you, we elect crooks and then hire them lobbyists to help them make crooked ,biased, ill informed decisions.....but I digress.

Well, tell me what you think....we'll wash this pig and then I'll get back to my standard blogging. Every once in a while, I just want to hear what you think.

Please remember to keep it civil...

Don and Company