Immigration issue continues to impact emotions in Arizona

I have been trying to watch videos and keep track of what John McCain is saying, Mayor Gordon, and many others. I know my own family is impacted. My daughter Ronda has many Spanish friends, speaks Spanish, and is very concerned about racial profiling if people are expected to show papers verifying they are legally entitled to be here.
Living on the west side for 20 years, I worked with many Mexican people at Revlon for my four years there, I interacted with them socially and they were my neighbors in the apartments where I lived. I played pool about seven years in a bar where two masters played as well as many other great pool players, including a number of Mexican players. I even went to illegal cockfights a time or two which I thought were bizarre and strange, but I wanted to see what the fuss was all about. It seems the betting was the thing. I understand why the Mexican people who are already here are going to be doubly impacted by this issue because many have formed ties to illegals. In fact that is something an illegal is going to try to do for protection if possible. I have seen Mexicans who were native Americans being impacted adversely by the constant flow of immigrants, but they were apt to be more tolerant, thinking back to when their own ancestors may have come across the border seeking refuge for the first time.
I read a book recently by a writer I like Villasenor called Crazy Loco Love who talks about his father being brought to the border by his mother, a Yaqui Indian, nearly starving, her people killed, walking. He also talks about how badly he was treated in the school where he went in the US as a 'wetback' even though his father worked hard, acquired property, and eventually became a wealthy man. I do not believe in calling anybody names like 'wetback'. Such cruelty to refugees is not acceptable. But would we call closing our country to immigrants from such countries as Ireland, Germany and England, cruel? There came a time when immigrants from countries that had to come here by boat were successfully limited in numbers.
I do not believe in treating anyone badly who is coming from another country to seek refuge. I believe in civility to everyone. I know that it is going to be very painful for a lot of reasons if the US decides to try harder to secure their borders, which is what lawmakers in Arizona feel must be done. They say they are trying to do what the Federal government has failed to do by not securing the borders. They are going to try to enforce immigration laws that have not been enforced in years.
Everyone has gotten used to the laws not being enforced, so such a new law is bound to cause pain as well as doubt as to the necessity. It is already causing a gamut of upset reactions!
But if 3,000 to 8,000 illegals, an estimate I just read, cross into a country DAILY for years, it is going to tax any country's ability to cope with the flow. The border is going to be extremely difficult to secure, but without a strong determined INTENT to stop the flow, nothing will work too well.
I have been interested to see how the democrats are responding, because the democrats have traditionally addressed the issues of minorities as they did with civil rights. They may think first of the suffering of the refugees and are being quick to accuse the republicans of prejudice and racism. Our Mexican legal citizens will tend to sympathize with people they identify with for many reasons.
The US has been a big brother to immigrants for years now, and I believe that it can be the big brother still by pressuring Mexico to take more responsibility for the population that emanates from within their borders. If the US secures the borders that alone will put the onus on Mexico to do a better job of taking care of their own citizens. Yes, securing the border would be an awful crunch to the poor of Mexico, those most apt to try to cross the border. People are going to be afraid. Any adjustment is horrendous especially after so many years of tolerating the flow because it was perceived as to much trouble to stop, so allowing the poor of Mexico almost to think of the US as their country where they could come and be received and treated better than in their own country. They just had to take the risks of crossing the border, which have not been too great or so many would not have successfully crossed.
Nothing is going to happen with great speed. That would be impossible. We are going to have to proceed slowly to implement any significant changes.
There was a time when refugees poured into our country from many places, Ireland, England, Germany, etc. And a time came when this flow was limited, because it was perceived that the US could no longer absorb that many immigrants. But the flow was a lot easier to control than our borders to Mexico have been. The challenge of securing the border to Mexico has never been met. No president up to date has been determined enough to do it and probably won't until the people in the border states have had enough and start demanding it! For a long time people close to the border have felt their rights, their property, their very lives were being altered for the worse with illegals coming through in such numbers.
The people who are impacted by this flow in our state have started to make their protests felt by passing a tougher immigration law. People in other states need to be willing to understand how illegal immigration impacts this state and all the other border states. What impacts those states eventually affects the rest of the country. So this is an issue that should concern everyone. We all need to inform ourselves of more facts which I think will cut down on the violence of the rhetoric!
For twenty years I walked among the Mexican people in our country and they made me welcome in their neighborhood. I loved many of these people but what affected me affected them, the violence, the overcrowding, the drug wars. There is always a feeling of things being out of control with illegals. No one is responsible. Mexico is not responsible.
We are absorbing all these people as refugees, but if this goes on for years, and people expect it to stop, no, it will not stop unless the US stops it.
Mexico is bleeding people into our country and we cannot get at the causes because it is their country. We cannot do anything about the flow of people from that end because it is not our country.
Pressure can be put on Mexico, more now than when our country was too undeveloped to do this. We are selling short our ability to make sense out of this situation. We have not faced the fact that we simply cannot keep absorbing the overflow. That's what the border states are saying. I know that's what Arizona is saying. The state of California is BANKRUPT and people are just ignoring that fact like it will just go away because there are a lot of rich people down there. Arizona is deep in the hole. The budget cuts are hurting. Let's keep looking at the facts and go from there.