Worthless Solution

Building a giant fence that would divide the US from Mexico is absolutely absurd. What is even more ridicilious is that the US government is placing this huge unsightly wall right through people’s property. What this means is that these property owners essentially have hundreds, even thousands of acres that are useless to them because it will sit on the other side of this wall. The reason for this, explains the Department of Homeland Security, is to cut costs. In this day and age is this really what we should be spending hard earned tax dollars on? A wall that our future generations will someday tear down and wonder why we ever built it in the first place. The wall that is being built is not going to stop the flow of illegal immigrants into this country, just slow it down temporarily until they cut holes, dig tunnels, find ways around etc .,etc. Instead of spending millions of dollars on a fence, and the lawsuits of the property owners, why not put that money into repairing the Mexican economy in order to reduce the desire to come to the U.S. These people aren’t coming over here to ruin our country or steal from us, they’re coming to work for a better life and provide for their families. The vast majority of them achieve that by doing the labor that most Americans don’t want to do. They are building our houses, pools, roads, businesses, farming our crops, etc. These are hard working people who want a piece of the American dream and they are not asking us to hand it to them, they are working hard for it. I agree we can’t just open the US, due to safety concerns and laws, but in the year 2008 there has to be a better way than building a wall. We don’t have to build a wall to stop Canadians from coming in so why can’t that be achieved in Mexico. In my opinion the American government doesn’t want Mexico to be as successful as Canada, we need for them to have a struggling economy so that they will come over here and bust they’re ass for next to nothing. They’re struggling country provides us with cheap labor, sad but true. I think if we stopped constructing walls, outsourcing to china and focused on building up Mexico we could eventually gain control of the immigration issue. This is by no means an easy fix that will happen overnight but I certainly don’t think putting up a fence is the answer.
Jason Lundin

Austin Smoking Ban?

The following response is in regards to a fellow colleagues blog concerning the recent developments in the Austin Smoking Ban.
This blog can be viewed at:
http://herdeman79.blogspot.com/2008/03/hey-austin-butt-out-of-smokers-business.html

I have to disagree with you on this topic. Laws like these are difficult decisions to make but in the long run are for the good of our nation’s future. In 50 years it will probably seem ridiculous that this was even up for discussion. By making this ban I think its sending a clear message to the next generation that we are aware of the effects of smoking and trying to minimize the amount of new smokers. It would be ridiculous for us to just keep cruising along fat, dumb, and happy all the while knowing that multi-billion dollar companies are marketing poison to our kids and we are not trying to take steps to stop it. When people are trying to get these laws passed they are not saying to themselves this will be great I am going to really stick it to the business owners, they are saying good another bump in the road for lung cancer emphysema etc. This is just a small step that needs to be taken toward the eventual bankruptcy of the tobacco companies making money off killing people. It took a very longtime for people to have been smoking long enough for us to gather enough information to be certain of the effects of smoking and now that we know, it would be irresponsible not to at attempt to phase it out. It probably won’t happen in my lifetime and who knows how many generations it will take, but when it does happen it will be our generation in the history books they will be crediting for it.