Liberty for all

The immigration reform debate rages on and since the conservative pundits and bigoted politicians have refused to desist, so have I. The negative backlash I received in response to last week's column was saddening but only convinced me more of the need for alternative voices in defense of the American way. \nIn one personal letter I received, I was asked if I really meant that I wanted the dirty, poor and uneducated of world to be welcomed into our country. Indeed, sir, I do, with the wide-open arms of liberty and humanity. Isn't that what the country was founded for, to be a refuge for the downtrodden of the world?\n It sounds like there are a lot of my fellow Americans who need to be reminded of their roots.\nAside from the tiny minority of American Indians, no one in this country can claim to be anything but an immigrant. All of our ancestors emigrated from the vast expanses of the globe with the same impetus; to build a better life than could be obtained in their countries of origin. Our bustling economy and our proud culture has emerged from a great teeming mass of immigrant tenacity. Now that we are comfortable as a great economic presence and military power (however unpopular), is it time to close the borders and seriously restrict the cultural flow our country was built on? Absolutely not. \nIt is now time, more than ever, that we need the influx of cultures, languages, goals and experiences, to keep our collective culture fresh and globalized. To insulate ourselves from the reality of suffering found in much of the world is to choose the kind of ignorance and apathy our forefathers fled to America to escape. When I hear the ultra-right-wing rhetoric, claiming the preservation of American values by advocating the restriction immigration, I look to the Statue of Liberty.\n"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore; send these, the homeless, the tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door."\nThat is the sentiment this country was built on. Give us your poorest, least educated and most needy, and we will pick them up and assimilate them into this great cultural melting pot of minds and potentials. In light of our history, the American way the xenophobes in this country are claiming to defend, is not the American way this country was built on. Our way is not the way of exclusion. It is a way of welcome.\nOur immigration policy needs to be reformed, but instead of a policy that makes it harder to get here, I advocate the development of incentive programs to make it more appealing to immigrate legally. Develop greater cultural infrastructure to make assimilation easier. Help people get on their feet with health care, career counseling and language lessons. Perpetuate the American dream by building healthy, happy American workers because in the end, it will make our country the strong place for which America's forbearers hoped.