where to begin?

This article gives a good sense of some of the absurdities (there are many more) in the U.S. immigration system.

As you may know, I spent my first year and a half after college working for an immigration lawyer. I don't really miss working in that field, though I really value what I learned there and the perspective it gave me on how (horribly) our government operates and treats many people, perspective that has allowed me to write the occasional long ranting blog post about immigration policy in this country.

Here's another one.

In regards to the last line of the NY Times story, it's very warm and fuzzy for immigration officials to say that the couple profiled in the story can re-apply for Lawful Permanent Residence, or LPR, status (aka a "green card," which isn't green, just FYI) based on being the parents of U.S. citizen children. That's nice.

Once the forms are filed, IF they are filed perfectly correctly (and I mean perfectly - I saw applications rejected because of one single typo of the sort that made no substantive difference to the application) and IF the USCIS (formerly INS) doesn't, oh, lose anything or forget to process it within their usual wait times, the parents might become LPRs within a year or two. And then, five years later, they can reapply for citizenship. Which will only take a few years to process. IF everything goes smoothly.

One thing that could keep it from going smoothly is the fact that citizenship applications can be rejected if somone has previously (at any time, ever in their whole life) misrepresented information to the U.S. government in order to obtain immigration benefits (note to the international students I went to college with who voted in the 2000 election because they thought it was funny, and because no one at our local polling station checked their eligibility closely enough - too bad if you ever want to become a U.S. citizen). And while it probably seems to the lay reader of the NY Times story that this particular couple has done nothing wrong, the fact is that their application for citizenship ended in their LPR status being stripped. In other words, they weren't Lawful Permanent Residents in the first place, and if they weren't LPRs then they weren't eligible for citizenship. And by the twisted logic on which the USCIS operates, even though the couple did everything carefully and in good faith, they therefore falsely represented themselves as Permanent Residents.

Yeah, sure, technically they were Permanent Residents... but they shouldn't have been (the gov't would say). And for all of us who would look at that and say "OK, but it would be absurd for the USCIS to deny their applications based on that logic," well, we're right.

Unfortunately nobody asked us. The USCIS would ABSOLUTELY deny applications based on that logic. I repeat, they have very twisted logic. Just look at the apparently upstanding married father of two in the story who not only had his citizenship application denied but is now fighting deportation because of an old domestic violence charge that was legally resolved and wiped from his record. (I guess that falls in the forbidden category of having "committed and been convicted of one or more crimes involving moral turpitude.") How in the world does it make sense to kick him out of the country? Who gains? Certainly not his family, which is suddenly uprooted (or husband- and father-less), or his employer or community. Are we safer? Or do we just enjoy petty harrassment of anyone "unlucky" enough to be born on foreign soil?

Speaking of pettiness, did you know that there nine possible eye colors you could claim to have on the U.S. citizenship application? Nine. Including pink and maroon. How many people do you know who have maroon eyes? And eight possible hair colors (including "bald" and - that critical sector of the population - "sandy"). But only five possible ethnicities (stated oh-so-progressively as "race"). And one of those is "American Indian or Alaskan Native." Excuse me, how many of them aren't U.S. citizens already?

Oh, make that six ethnicities... sort of: there's a separate question next to "Race (select one or more)" that asks if the applicant is Hispanic or Latino. Because being Hispanic/Latino is clearly unrelated (?!?) to race (yeah yeah, of course you can make that argument. Trust me, the way they're using it, it shouldn't be a separate question).

It also asks whether the applicant has ever, among other things, belonged to the Communist party, belonged to a terrorist organization, worked for the Nazi party in Germany between 1933 and 1945, committed a crime for which they were not arrested (because this is clearly the time to own up), or - my personal favorite - persecuted anyone based on race, religion, national origin, or membership in a particular social group or political opinion. Nevermind that we just asked you if you've ever been associated with the Communist Party. Really. We were just curious.

I guess there are a couple reasons that all this bothers me so much that I am giving you copious amounts of probably random-seeming information.

One, jump back and apply these same immigration policies and processes 50 years ago and a whole lot of people I know wouldn't be here. Jump back a hundred or 150 years and almost none of us would be here. And I'm not saying it's necessarily better for the country that we are here, but I like us and I certainly enjoy the privilege that being a third generation caucasian American has given me, so it just feels really hypocritical to support the arbitrary and capricious denial of those privileges and opportunities to others simply on the grounds that they came later.

Two, this is just one of many ways that our government, with OUR tax dollars, carelessly or purposely - yes, purposely; see the war in Iraq and the U.S. correctional system, for starters - really messes with peoples' lives. Often ruins them, in fact. And so much of it happens simply because no one questions it, because we have so much faith that our government wouldn't do such things, that the system is benevolent and makes sense and has everyone's best interests at heart.* But I've seen so much, especially over the past seven years, that convinces me that that's a fallacy that each of us is paying for, literally (Happy Tax Day!) and figuratively.

That bothers me. It should bother you. And we should all DO something about it, like get much better informed, and call our congresspeople, and VOTE goddamnit. Don't wait to care until the system reaches out and screws over you or someone you love. Not just because that approach has been effectively repudiated, but because right now is when we have the power and, therefore (in my book, anyway), the responsibility to make change. Because if you are not part of the solution, you ARE part of the problem.

Does this shit keep anyone else up at night, or is it just me?

*And I'm happy to have a conversation anytime about my theory that this faith is actually THE defining characteristic of what separates the "developed" parts of the world from the rest, no matter what Jeff Sachs or the World Bank or the MDGs say.

impressive

This was a "secret" until now??

I'm sorry, but no wonder the apocalypse is coming. We're just plain stupid sometimes.

let it be known

Verizon. A big company, right? Corporate, efficient, full of technological resources. Or so one would hope.

One would be wrong.

Let me give you a completely hypothetical scenario: Imagine three roommates sharing a house. Verizon bill, for telephone and internet service, is in the name of one of them. Said roommate decides to move out. Does Verizon let him simply transfer the bill into another roommate's name? Oh, no no no...

Verizon's TOTALLY LOGICAL system is as follows:

1) Roommate #1 must cancel the account, paying something like an $80 termination fee

2) Roommate #2 must call Verizon to start a new account

3) Roommate #2 does this before the cancellation date, in hopes that service doesn't have to be disrupted. She is told that Verizon can't do anything until the previous account is actually terminated.

4) She calls back the day after the termination date. Verizon tells her that the account must actually "clear out of the system" (as if it were an outgoing tenant... except people don't get grace periods, only computerized sets of numbers do) before a new account can be entered for the same address.

5) Roommate #2 calls AGAIN a few days later, and spends 25 minutes on hold before she remembers that she has something better to do, like watch water boil.

6) Roommate #2 calls yet again, and speaks with Pleasant Customer Service Man who tries valiantly (it seems) to get her a better deal than the HIDEOUSLY OUTRAGEOUSLY EXPENSIVE one that Verizon offers for high-speed internet without phone service.

7) Pleasant Customer Service Man pleasantly reactivates the account, and pleasantly reports that we will have internet access again on September 21st.

I called on September 11.

Except originally I called on August 31st.

This, my friends, is a F*@%ing bad system. Not only can they not just roll over the account, but I have to wait three weeks and pay significant extra money in order to get a service that I already had. But there are about four telecommunications companies in this country and the very few other options are no better.

Gotta love the U.S.A.

you knew we're screwed when

We're definitely on the wrong path in this country when retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is described by a generally respected news organization as "liberal."

Centrist, maybe. Not-as-crazy-as-Thomas-or-Alito, sure. But liberal she is not.

I really hate it when the mainstream media suggest that anyone to the left of Dick Cheney might as well go back to their naked pot-smoking hippie gay communes.

It's all a matter of perception and semantics, I guess. I mean, you know how I feel about some of the supposed "liberals" out there. But do we have to lump everyone into overgeneralized categories all the time? Sure it comes in handy now and then (just kidding! well, kind of), but, for example, just because I don't think Hillary Clinton is liberal doesn't mean I think she's Ann Coulter's best friend.

(though does anyone else think that Hillary looks a little too much like Harriet Miers if Harriet went through detox and had a facelift? Just curious...)

And just because Sandra Day O'Connor hasn't used her free time in retirement to start to start vacationing with Pat Robertson doesn't mean she's liberal.

Maybe (but don't hold me to this) it's not conservatives that are ruining this country (except for a few particular conservatives, but that's a conversation for another time). Maybe it's actually our intense need to categorize and label everything and everyone and make a really messy world fit into neat little boxes so that we can sleep well at night.

Well, that and mainstream denial that that's what we're doing. But that's another conversation, too.

which one of these is not like the other?

Apparently the Pope, long known for wanting to take the Catholic Church back to its glory days, has decided to relax restrictions on the celebration of mass in Latin.

OK. I'm not Catholic (in case you didn't know) and I never gave this much thought, but what thought I ever have given it tended toward "if people want to, why not?" It doesn't seem like the world's most learnable or fun language. If they're really that motivated, my (completely ignorant) opinion on the matter is that it's not hurting anyone, so go ahead.

The curious thing is that "The decision comes after months of debate. Some cardinals, bishops and Jewish leaders have opposed any change, voicing complaints about everything from the text of the old Mass to concerns that the move will lead to further changes to the reforms approved by 1962-65 Second Vatican Council." (Yahoo News)

Does any part of that sentence jump out at you as a bit odd?

I mean, I would say there is truth in the stereotype about us being a particularly opinionated people, but frankly this suggests that some people have way too much time on their hands. Um, guys?* Don't you think there are some major theological, or, say, geopolitical issues of our own that we could be devoting this energy to?

*because yes, I'm sure the "leaders" implied here are men

is it so much to ask?

Call me crazy. Maybe I'm alone here. Maybe my concept of public, paid-admission musical performances is just different than most people's. Maybe I'm a freak.

But when I go to a concert, I want, really more than anything, to HEAR THE PERFORMER.

Not the people "whispering" - with full engagement of their vocal cords - behind me the *entire freaking time* (I'm thinking specifically of the Mason Jennings concert a few months ago - not that I hold grudges - but this seems to happen to me just about every single concert I go to).

And not, by any stretch of the imagination, the woman who feels like getting involved in the impromptu kora-guitar-more kora-singing jam session by hijacking it with an Aretha Franklin-soul-diva song about pajamas.

PAJAMAS.

We came to hear this amazingly gifted man, who traveled halfway around the world and then through the backroads of western MA, play his beautiful kora. OK, it turned into a jam session. And yeah, the woman had a pretty nice voice. Which I'd be fine putting up with sitting (preferably strong drink in hand) at a local dive bar's amateur open mic night, where presumably I would have paid far less for admission and had far lower expectations for my evening of musical enjoyment. NOT HERE.

Is it so much to ask?

what's YOUR favorite acronym?

Because my life really is quite wonderful and I don't have anything major to get upset about, I get to notice and be driven up the wall by little stupid things.

(Reality check: when you're biggest frustration is something like the restaurant giving you regular Coke instead of Diet, or a baseball game running late and delaying your favorite TV show, you are living a DAMN GOOD LIFE. So count your blessings and don't yell at your waitress.)

A little stupid thing that keeps popping up to drive me nuts these days is the process you have to go through to sign up for secure services online, such as bill payments, insurance accounts, etc. Specifically, the "security questions" you have to choose and then enter your own answer to so that if someone else were to try to log into your account, they'd be caught red-handed by the fact that they don't know that your first car was a 1973 Dodge Dart or that your first pet was a goldfish named Fartface.

(Note: neither of these applies to me, so don't go trying to log into my insurance website. But I do know someone who once owned a goldfish named Fartface. And it will TOTALLY shock you to learn that my friend was an 8-year-old boy at the time.)

The unique thing about these particular questions is that their answers don't change. This kind of question seems rare. Instead, I keep seeing questions like "what's your favorite song?" and "what was the name of your best friend in high school?".

Like, hello, do you remember high school? The whole point of being a teenage girl is that your best friend changes according to which way the wind is blowing and who will pass notes for you to the cute boy she sits next to in Spanish class.

And does ANYONE have one favorite song that has always been and will always be their favorite song? I can generally narrow it down to the same few, at least until my mood changes or someone comes out with a new CD or I go to another music festival. But one constant favorite? You've got to be kidding me.

My favorite ridiculous question thus far is one option on the Cigna health insurance website where I had to create an account this morning: "What's your favorite acronym?"

Acronym? ACRONYM? Who the hell has a favorite acronym?? Granted, if you held a gun to my head and asked me this question, I could think of a few I enjoy. LASER, for example. Which apparently in some circles stands for "Lots of Applied Scientists Eat Regularly" (I am not kidding). And of course, if you start looking, you can find quite a few to chuckle over.

But seriously, who (besides perhaps our friends at the AcronymFinder blog) actually spends enough time thinking about acronyms to have a favorite that distinguishes them from the general population? Who feels so passionately about their least favorite vegetable that their hatred will still burn bright enough to help them log onto their bank account a couple years from now?

Even the "name of your first pet" question is tough for me. The first major pet was Rascal the dog, but he came only after we'd buried countless goldfish and a guinea pig. The first goldfish, the one I won at the McLean County Fair by successfully tossing a ping-pong ball into it's cup, definitely had a name, a name that was undoubtedly glorious enough to make those few hours he lived after we brought him home from the fair feel bright and loving. But not a name memorable enough that I have any recollection of it now.

So my point, if indeed I have one, is that this is dumb. Ask me a questions whose answer won't be different a week or a year from now. Ask me my mother's maiden name, or whether I've ever gone skydiving. Ask me if I think George W. Bush should be impeached. EASY questions.