A Grand Cheer for the Grand Canyon State

Everyone's probably heard about it; Arizona has enacted one of the strictest immigration laws ever. So many people are quick to criticize it, but I see nothing wrong with it. I've been hearing and reading a lot about how it will incite racism and violence and it will destroy families and that America is the country of immigrants and it's the right thing to do to let them in the country. Yeah, no.

A law alone can not and will not cause racism. It is up to the individual officers in the state of Arizona to decide if they will be racist or not. It just happens to be that the state of Arizona shares a border with Mexico. Who else would be illegally entering the country through that state? Seriously, we racially profile terrorists, yet it's a crime to racially profile illegal immigrants in a state that is adjacent to the country that is the home of the largest number of illegal immigrants to this country?

I absolutely support the Arizona government for passing this. For years the federal government has had border patrols(they wouldn't racially profile, would they??) and built useless fences, yet has not solved the problem of illegal immigration. Who knows if they ever will pass legislation that will actually do something? Thank you Arizona, if not for solving illegal immigration, for at least putting it in people's minds that something actually needs to be done about it. I would probably support a federal-level bill dealing with immigration, but only if it made a difference. If it ended up nullifying the Arizona law, but left the whole issue unsolved, I would consider it a failure.

However, I am just against illegal immigration. If the system were to be tweaked so that more people could become citizens without loosening the requirements, that would be great. As many people say, America is the country of immigrants, and we shouldn't stop that. We just need to become the country of legitimate immigrants. My advice for anyone considering entering illegally is this: if you break our laws to come here, why should we take you seriously as a candidate for citizenship? You have obviously shown that you don't support our system.

So for now, go Arizona! I think that this law will help in your state, even if it pushes the illegals to other states. Hopefully you have sent a message loud enough to travel the 2000 miles to Washington, where they will respond with a national law closing opportunities for illegal immigrants, but opening up many more for individuals wishing to become citizens.