Mourning the death of a DREAM

I got a sort of perverse pleasure out of reading the intro to SF Chron’s coverage of the most recent death of the DREAM Act, right down to the fact that the young people at issue are respectfully referred to as “undocumented,” rather than “illegal aliens”:

The Senate killed help Wednesday for the single most sympathetic group of illegal immigrants – those who were brought to the country as children and now wish to go to college or join the military – and seemed to dash the hopes of Silicon Valley technology companies and California farmers for more immigrant workers they say they desperately need.

You really don’t need to read the rest of the article to know what the writer’s biases are, do you?  Interestingly, the one thing the article doesn’t mention is that, when it comes to college education, the bill offers greater rights to illegal aliens than it does to Americans.  If I were to set off for Michigan now, I’d have to pay full, out-of-state tuition.  However, a kid who slipped across the border would get in-state tuition.  I hardly think the taxpayers should be responsible for that, do you?

As an aside, I do believe that youngsters who volunteer to serve in our military should get a pathway to citizenship, because I see that as giving to, not taking from, our country.  For a long historical perspective, Rome gave its soldiers, often from conquered territories, citizenship.  It worked well for a long time, and helped integrate outlying areas into the Roman empire.