The recent observance of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence last month brought back to mind my wife’s and my trip earlier this year to Philadelphia to celebrate the bar mitzvah of our very dear friends’ grandson. The hotel where we stayed is only one block away from Independence Hall, […]
Immigration
Posted inCommunity & Lifestyle
Immigrants benefit Illinois STEM fields and healthcare industry every day
At a time when public conversations about immigration have become increasingly polarized, it’s worth pausing to remember the many ways immigrants and refugees strengthen Illinois every day. Instead of vilifying our immigrant neighbors, let’s remember that our local communities greatly benefit from immigrant professionals in many of our markets and industries, particularly healthcare systems in […]
Posted inOpinion
Trumped-up charges
Photo by Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times/TNS Brother Trump is the savior come to rescue America, in the opinion of a majority of self-identified Republicans. On the stump he works crowds into a fever with his perorations against immigrants (how he spells “Mexicans”) who are surging across our borders without papers or prospects, taking “our” jobs […]
Posted inOpinion
Wrong in principle
Quick – how big a part of Illinois’ population in recent years has consisted of unauthorized immigrants. Ten percent? Fifteen? Twenty? In 2012, according to the Pew Hispanic Center, it was 3.7 percent. Not exactly a teeming horde, yet President Obama’s recent executive order to prevent the unnecessary deportation of such people – humane in […]
Posted inOpinion
The new border-industrial complex
“Good fences make good neighbors,” goes the old adage. But the neighborly adage definitely did not contemplate the 700-mile, 20-foot-high, drone-patrolled, electronically monitored fence of steel and razor wire that our government has erected across our nation’s border with Mexico, from the tip of Texas to California’s Pacific Coast. This thing is not a fence, […]
Posted inNews
Davis could face Latino heat
The national debate on immigration reform could determine the results of the 2014 U.S. House elections, according to two national Latino groups. One of Springfield’s representatives in Washington, D.C., could be among the lawmakers affected.A poll and election analysis released jointly last week by polling firm Latino Decisions and advocacy group America’s Voice shows 24 […]
Posted inOpinion
Makers
In “Three strikes and you’re in,” I endorsed the idea that what Springfield needs to make its economy perk is the entrepreneurial energy and enterprise that immigrants supply. Turns out that the Small Business Administration commissioned a report on that idea in 2012. Robert W. Fairlie, an economics professor at the University of California at […]
Posted inOpinion
The case for a new open door policy
In “Three strikes and you’re in,” I endorsed the idea that what Springfield needs to make its economy perk is the entrepreneurial energy and enterprise that immigrants supply. Catherine Rampell of the new York Times has more from a 2012 report commissioned by the Small Business Administration. According to Robert W. Fairlie, an economics professor at the University of California, […]
Posted inNews
Illinois leaders campaign for federal immigration reform
Several prominent public figures in Illinois are pushing for passage of a federal immigration reform bill, which President Barack Obama called “the best chance we’ve had in years to fix our broken immigration system.” The Senate could pass the bill by July 4, though it faces an uphill battle in the House of Representatives. For […]
Posted inOpinion
New Beijings
I have often lamented here the continuing decline in the population of Illinois’ rural parts. (See “Devoid of life,” July 14, 2011.) Like a great many readers, I have roots in central Illinois that go deep. My interest in the central question – if the present population cannot support itself on the countryside, how might […]
Posted inOpinion
Three strikes and you’re in
I have no idea what the American Dream means to the 63 persons from 25 nations who were welcomed into the fraternity of the free and the brave in October ceremonies at the Old Capitol. In my version of it, it means being able to order affordable restaurant dishes from south of the border whose […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Immigrant intergration
Coalition to Promote Human Dignity and Diversity, Liberty Brew and View and Lincoln Land Community College present free screenings and discussions of the documentary Welcome to Shelbyville at LLCC on June 23 and Lincoln Library on June 27. Filmed for a year in 2008, the film explores attitudes and adjustments of a small Tennessee town […]
