According to the AP, “Virtual fence on Mexican border deemed insufficient.”

The government is scrapping a $20 million prototype of its highly touted “virtual fence” on the Arizona-Mexico border because the system is failing to adequately alert border patrol agents to illegal crossings, officials said.

Why is it such a failure?

Maybe the dramatization below is more accurate than the government wants to admit:

A bill fixing Ryan Allen’s situation has passed the Tennessee House and Senate unanimously.

A letter to the CA:

I am 52, have five college degrees and two professional designations. Tonight at midnight, according to the state of Tennessee, when I drive I will become a criminal. If I can’t drive, then I also can’t work — my only choice will be to break the law.

I have spent about a third of my adult life in the United States. My wife is American-born, and I have three children who are all American citizens. In the past I have held a green card (which I surrendered when I went back to Canada to work), have worked on an H1-B visa as a university professor, and for the last two years have worked on a temporary employment authorization based on my application for a new green card. I am now in the limbo of “Adjustment of Status” whereby I am legally entitled to remain in the U.S., can apply for one-year renewals of employment authorization but cannot travel outside the country without permission and cannot receive a “real” driver’s license in Tennessee. Now I am not even able to receive a “certificate for driving” that is stamped “For driving purposes only, not valid for identification.”

In the infinite wisdom of the Tennessee legislature, I and hundreds like me, whose proof of legal status must be renewed on a regular basis, are often caught in the Catch-22 of not having documents that show an expiration date more than 365 days distant. Since my employment authorization is renewed on a yearly basis, and I don’t receive my card until after the date it becomes effective, I will never be able to receive a driver’s license on this basis until my immigration status is finalized.

In the past, as a law-abiding, legitimate spouse of a citizen I would have received my green card or permanent residence status within months. Today, however, I am one of the thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of aspiring American citizens who are playing by all the rules but who may never be on a “path to citizenship.”

Over a year ago I became one of the many immigration applicants whose paperwork gets placed on a pile of applications for completion of an FBI name check. Apparently, if on a computer search you are so unlucky that your name, or one like it, is identified as appearing in one of the millions of paper records maintained by the FBI you will not be cleared until some FBI agent somewhere takes the time to check the pertinent file by hand.

In today’s climate you clearly don’t have to be an illegal immigrant to be made to feel like an unwelcome immigrant. Bureaucratic inaction, inane lawmaking and political posturing and pandering won’t make America safer, but it will make many future Americans very uncomfortable, and may even threaten our ability to support ourselves and our families.

Allan Ryan
Collierville

First, I was not aware of the 365 day rule. I would say that any immigrant with a legal status should be able to get a driver’s license valid for as long as the visa or temporary status is valid. That would seem like a fairly simple fix to the situation, and one that rewards law-abiding residents rather than encouraging illegal activity.

Second, I think we need to focus on speeding up the legal immigration process for that same reason — so that legal visitors and immigrant workers won’t continue to be burdened and hassled by an inept bureaucracy while illegal immigrants basically get a free pass. We need to reduce and remove the application backlogs without sacrificing safety measures.

I would say, however, that while I sympathize with Mr. Ryan’s situation, he is presenting something of a false dichotomy. Unless he has absolutely no other means of transportation, no friends, family members or coworkers who can give him a lift, no access to cabs or buses, or no ability to travel without operating a personal vehicle, he doesn’t actually need to “become a criminal.”

Being in an unfortunate situation is not license to break the law, no matter how compassionate we might feel by looking the other way. That’s true of undocumented driving, just as it’s true of undocumented working and illegal immigration in general. Instead of temporary compassion, lawlessness and half-measures, we need smart reform, pragmatic policy and respect for both the law and the people it serves and protects.

Greg Siskind (my former boss, btw) seems to argue that generic amnesty is always justified because it allowed a single recipient in the ’80s to stay in the country and later develop a popular product.

He mentions the case of Philippe Kahn, who appears to have entered the country under false pretenses (with a tourist visa), began working in this country illegally, lost his job because of his immigration status but remained in this country illegally for another FOUR YEARS, then was covered under a blanket amnesty, after which time he went on “to achieve greatness,” inventing the camera phone.

Not factored into Siskind’s equation is how other blanket amnesty recipients may have subsequently contributed in a negative way, or if the specific achievement he cites would have been developed by the same individual while living in another country. Siskind also doesn’t consider the effects of a more targeted, individualized amnesty (rather than blanket amnesty), or the possibility of a private relief bill based on merit or national interest.

For Siskind, the end justifies the means, except he only mentions the ends that seem favorable to his argument, while ignoring everything else.

Would Siskind argue in favor an amnesty covering all criminal activity if he could later point to one former inmate who went on “to achieve greatness” afterwards? I doubt it.

It would be hard for him to deny that the main reason Siskind favors amnesty for illegal immigration is that it would serve his financial interest. Illegal immigrants do not need his legal services, but amnesty applicants do. And that’s the bottom line.

I think we should liberalize our laws in order to allow more immigrants and relatives to visit, work and live in this country legally. But blanket amnesties are a signal that we don’t take our laws seriously and we don’t respect our own sovereignty.