politics

so there are these protests happening here (and all over the country, i hear).
kids are walking out of school and marching to protest some anti-illegal-immigration legislation. and the schools are responding by closing down for a couple of days.
i would be a lot more supportive of the marches if the people involved waved american flags, and said good things about the country they (or the immigrants they're marching for) want to live in. but they are shouting "viva mexico!" and waving mexican flags. i really don't understand the logic.
while i'm not clear on exactly what the legislation says (that seems to depend on who you're talking to, and i haven't looked it up yet) personally, i would like to make it easier for people to emigrate legally (start up some work-earned citizenship program, for starters), and at the same time, practically impossible to sneak in (i'm talking massive fences on both sides of the border, with something nasty like hyenas in the middle - who's going to try to sneak through that?!?). then the hardworking, honest people would be able to come live here, as opposed to people who have already shown that they don't respect our laws.
also, i think we need to get tougher on tracking people with temporary visas (students, etc.) - and i'm not too far distant from this issue - my sister got "married" to someone whose visa was about to expire, so that he wouldn't have to leave the country. not that they had any kind of a relationship whatsoever (in fact, the man is gay). so i know that this is a problem. i don't know exactly how this would be done (a high-tech version of martha stewarts anklet, maybe?), but i am sure that several people have rational ideas.
shaggy says we can solve most of the illegal immigration problem by annexing mexico as our 51st state. it has plenty of resources, and with a truly representative state government (with term limits and fixed incomes), could monetarily support its own people quite well. i don't like the idea of us playing nanny, but it would probably be better than the people of mexico being oppressed by gangs and corrupt officials. if only they had the threat of wmd's, we could probably go help them out...
speaking of wmd's (man, i'm off on a political tangent today!!) i am constantly frustrated by being told that "bush lied". i'm not saying he was correct in stating that iraq posed a threat with regard to wmd's, i'm saying that he's not too bright, and repeated what he was told by "intelligence" folk. i admit that i am picky about words/definitions, etc., but it is fairly common knowledge that "to lie" is to knowingly convey untrue or inaccurate information. the key word being "knowingly". seriously, do the people who call him a "liar" think that bush is smart enough to have come up with a convincing enough lie to send america to war? i think not.
i agree that bush probably had personal reasons for wanting to go to war with iraq. i do not, however, agree that these reasons have anything to do with oil. have we taken a single ounce of oil from iraq? not that i've heard of. have we made agreements to purchase any of their oil? again, not that i've heard of. if we were to take any iraqui oil, how would bush benefit personally? i think that he wanted to finish off daddy's war, and jumped at any "evidence" that would let him do so. that he was misguided and misinformed is unfortunate - for all of us.
i wish there wasn't a war. if there had to be one, i wish we could have confined it to the hunting down of terrorist groups (hopefully with the help of local governments). and while i'm dreaming, i'd like a pony.