The White House's False Speeding Ticket Analogy
It is reported that on Friday, White House spokesman Tony Snow compared illegal aliens to speeding drivers, saying:
""If you had a traffic ticket and you paid it, you're not forever a speeder, are you?...So the fact is, you have paid your debt to society,...And we have come up with a way to make sure that the debt to society gets paid. Then you move forward."
Of course you are forever a speeder, just as if you kill someone and serve your prison sentence, you may pay the price and then regain your freedom, but you remain a killer. What else the press secretary left out of that analogy is the presumption that the driver was in possession of a validly issued license to drive. I mean, surely he is not suggesting that if a person is caught speeding, but does not have a driver's license, that that person should pay a fine for speeding and then drive away, still without society's approval to be operating a motor vehicle?
No, that is not how it works. The driver would be fined for speeding, and would face additional penalty for driving without a valid license, and when all of the fines and time served were met the illegal driver would not be allowed to just jump behind the wheel again, but would rather be given the opportunity to demonstrate that said individual understood and could obey the rules of the road, and could safely operate the vehicle. And, only after passing the requisite tests to receive a driver's license would the illegal driver be allowed to, "then ...move forward", or backwards, park, or pass, and otherwise drive on the public roadways.
And just as we have procedures to obtain permission to drive, we have procedures for obtaining permission to be within our national boundaries. And, to fine a person for speeding, or for being here without permission, and to then ignore the rest of the infractions committed and to forgive the absence of attempt or success in following the procedures in place to give the individual the opportunity to behave within the law is not done with speeders, and should not be done with invaders. That would be capitulation to criminal behavior, which is also known as amnesty.
Now, we already know that the Senate can not get their heads around the problem in a satisfactory way, having this week passed a comprehensive amnesty which now goes to arbitration with the other legilative branch, so thank God we have people like James Sensenbrenner in the House of Representatives. He understands the problem. And he is saying that he does not want it to be part of his legacy in Congress that he signed off on another Simpson-Mazzoli type bill which does not solve the problem.
"What's going on now, in calling it a pathway to citizenship or earned legalization, is not honest because it is amnesty,"
And every single issue surrounding the problems instigated by the foreign invasion can be solved without granting the illegals amnesty, or "earned citizenship", or by ignoring their comprehensive list of crimes in the name of political expediancy.
The best policy is to enforce existing laws, and keep high standards for becoming a citizen. A person who broke the law to enter already has one strike against them. They have exhibited the will to scorn our rules. We need more people who honor our laws, not more people who speed past them.
