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September 29, 2007
Life and times..
I could probably churn out good commentary by doing nothing but reading slacktivist and saying: "what he said". I'll try to keep that sort of thing to a minimum:
Here's the deal: Whatever the technical details of the case, whatever the particulars of the applicable immigration and customs laws, if you confiscate the entire life savings of a minimum-wage dishwasher, you're doing something wrong.
I'll go a step further. As soon as they discovered this guy-- a guy who was able to save US$59,000 as a dishwasher, they should have gotten a judge. That judge should have asked Mr. Zapeta if he wanted US citizenship and was willing to pay back taxes. If the answer to those questions was "yes", the judge should have administered the Citizenship oath right there and then...
If the answers to either of those questions was "no", we need to figure out why- and make the changes necessary to attract and and hold onto people of such outstanding character...
It's not too late, though. Perhaps we can trade Guatemala one for one: Lou Dobbs for Pedro Zapeta. We'd be getting the better end of the deal...
Posted by Andrew at September 29, 2007 12:39 PM