|
|
|
|
SUBSCRIBE The leading Copyright |
What Happens To A DREAM Denied: Is There A Way To Get More H-1B Numbers?by Gary Endelman
The United States Senate turned its back on the future this past week when it fell 8 votes short of invoking cloture to halt debate on the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, colloquially known to the cognoscenti as DREAM. Dick Durbin of Illinois, its chief sponsor and No.2 Senate Democrat, moved heaven and earth to get those precious last few votes to no avail; corporate backers of high tech visas were rumored to be holding back from a full-throated endorsement. A bitter Durbin warned that advocates of more skilled worker slots would have a hard time convincing him of their cause in the days to come and pro-DREAM backers erupted in fury with press releases of bitter disappointment. Once all this sound and fury dies down, perhaps the larger question still hangs in the air: What, if anything, does the downfall of DREAM have to do with employment-based immigration. Stated simply, where do we go from here to get more H-1B numbers? The status of illegitimacy has expressed through the ages society's condemnation of irresponsible liaisons beyond the bonds of marriage. But visiting this condemnation on the head of an infant is illogical and unjust. Moreover, imposing disabilities on the illegitimate child is contrary to the basic concept of our system that legal burdens should bear some relationship to individual responsibility or wrongdoing. Obviously, no child is responsible for his birth and penalizing the illegitimate child is an ineffectual -- as well as an unjust -- way of deterring the parent.At first glance, it may be a stretch to link such good intentions and high rhetoric with the mundane world of the H-1B cap. Certainly, Senator Durbin would not see any connection, nor would his colleagues Senator Charles Grassley ( R-Iowa) and Bernie Sanders ( Socialist-Vermont). That is why they just persuaded the US Senate to tack on an additional $3500 tax disguised as a penalty fee for any US employer who had the temerity to file an H-1B petition. They are not alone. Many pro and anti-immigration advocates feel precisely the same way. It is one thing to rush the barricades for undocumented high school students, whose ability to prick our consciences and pluck our heartstrings is open and obvious to all; it is quite another to don sackcloth and ashes for the captains of industry or the avatars of corporate profit who want more H-1Bs to pump up the bottom line. Indeed, if there is one thing that the Left and the Right agree on, it is the belief that the global economy really does not matter when it comes to US immigration policy or that, if it does, the top priority should be to punish employers who want us to be part of it. Not surprisingly, Pat Buchanan is Dick Durbin's soul mate when it comes to shutting the door to the engineer from Mumbai or the geophysicist from Oslo; however much they may part company on DREAM, both men have never met an H-1B they did not dislike. Most immigration advocates are pro-immigrant but not pro-immigration. They care a great deal about how US immigration affects the poor and the dispossessed fleeing persecution and oppression, be it political, religious or economic, but precious little about whether, or how, these same policies make America wealthier, more powerful and better able to occupy and retain the competitive high ground. Indeed, from this perspective, which is precisely the one that Senator Durbin finds most congenial, employment-based immigration is devoid of any moral integrity. It is something to be grudgingly accepted, not positively encouraged, a problem to be controlled, rather than an asset to be maximized. Many of DREAM's most ardent supporters, as well as its most vehement detractors, find common ground in their shared desire to build high Fortress America. To some extent, perhaps to a very large extent, the pro-H1B alliance has itself to blame for the widespread public misperception that most Americans have no interest in expanding the H-1B cap. After all, is that what many on our side believe in their heart of hearts behind closed doors when we think no one is listening ?Indeed, when they have to speak the language of national interest, pro-immigration forces do so, but hesitantly, with manifest reluctance and with body language that suggests their heart is not really in it. Indeed, one gets the distinct feeling that the ideological purity of a visa is in directly inverse proportion to its ability to strengthen the American economy and promote national self-interest. Regardless of what the issue is, the pro-immigration side almost never offers any concession as a trade off for what they want; theirs is the politics of gain without pain, of victory without compromise, a pure and bloodless triumph not tainted by any pragmatic baggage. The end result is partisan advantage divorced from any real or sustained sense of national advancement. We win but what about America? The H-1B cap debate is a case in point. We want more H numbers but are willing to give up absolutely nothing to get them. In fact, anyone who suggests we should is thought to have gone over to the Dark Side. Such apostasy is simply not to be tolerated. Better not to have them! Let's wait for the Democrats to win the White House, not realizing that the hostility to employment immigration will then hold sway at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue. Can there be a way to hold fast to the light, serve the national interest and uphold the consistency of compassion as an organizing principle of our national immigration strategy? There is a hidden bonus that may surprise us. The very willingness to accept that which we find distasteful will go further than any press release or public proclamation to demonstrate our concern for the economy in which we all live and work, the same economy whose health underwrites our children's future. These modest proposals for a new H-1B approach are a place to start, perhaps even a way to make the DREAM come alive again, if they unite national self-interest with compassion as the path for the future:
© Copyright 2007 by Gary Endelman. All rights reserved.
About The Author |
Add to del.icio.us