Immigration Reform

With the unrest in Syrbia and the economic difficulties of both Greece and Puerto Rico, there is a sudden surge in immigration throughout the developed world.  While the bulk of these are coming from the Middle East, the people of Puerto Rico are leaving their island and coming to the United States in larger numbers.  This has once again brought immigration back into the spotlight.  While Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States, it is not a state and as such, its people should be treated the same as any other people entering this country.

Our current immigration system is broken and it has been for years.  It simply does not work and it's long past time to revise it.  "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," are the famous lines from the poem, "The New Colossus" which is engraved on a plaque and is part of the Statue of Liberty.  As a nation, we should live by these words.  Living by these words must be done in such a way to be fair to the immigrants and fair to the Americans who welcome them.  I suggest the following:

Anyone who desires to come to America for a better life must do it legally.  They should visit their local American Embassy and fill out an application.  That application will then be reviewed, mostly for past criminal activity.  If there is a history of violent crime, the application is denied.  We do not need the criminals of other countries coming here to commit their crimes.  Those are not the tired, poor, huddled masses.

This background check should be completed within two weeks.  It does not take any longer than that to run a background check and extending that period only makes illegal entry easier than legal.  Run the background check immediately and be done with it.

Once the background check is complete and assuming no violent crime has been found, the application will be approved.  Approval means a visa to live and work in the United States.  The person then has 30 days to find a place to live and register with their local government with their American address.  Once they have done this, they will be able to apply for a Social Security number and a driver's license.  

Within the first six months the person must report to the local government that they have found employment or are attending school on a full-time basis.  They must report every six months to update their information and if they move, they must immediately notify their local government office.

In order to make this fair to the American people, no public benefits will be available to anyone who has not paid taxes for a minimum of ten years.  In the event of a child born in the United States, benefits are not available until their parents have paid taxes for ten years.  This includes welfare, medical, food stamps and all other public benefits.  If the person has not been working in this country and paying taxes, they are not eligible for benefits. 

Lastly, before any public benefits are paid to any immigrant, they must be granted citizenship.  If they do not choose to become a citizen of this country, they are not eligible to receive benefits from this country.  

This is the simple plan of immigration reform that I propose.  It would be equitable for all involved, it involves a path to citizenship and it eliminates the need for illegally entering this country.  

How To Be A Great President

Since the days of Harry Truman, presidential administrations have been ranked by their approval, expressed as a percentage.  Looking at the approval rating of all presidents from that time forward as they left office, only two were higher than 60%.  As far as greatness goes, these two men can truly be said to have been great presidents.

Ronald Reagan left office with the highest approval rating to that date, at 63%.  During the eight years he was in office, the cold war ended, tax cuts for individuals increased, nuclear arms were reduced worldwide, the war in Afghanistan ended (that didn't last very long), the first female Supreme Court Justice was appointed, the Air Traffic Controllers who went on strike were fired (they would have cost the tax payers $700 million had they received their outrageous demands), a successful rescue mission was launched in Grenada and the Strategic Defense Initiative was implemented.

When Reagan left office, the country was prosperous and at peace.  The Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 950.68 on the day Reagan took office.  When he left, it was at 2,235.36.  

While Reagan's 63% approval rating certainly sounds impressive, and it especially is when compared with the 34% that both Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush had when they left office, or the pitiful 24% that disgraced Richard Nixon's administration.  But impressive as 63% is, it was not to remain the highest.  That title is currently held by William J. Clinton who left office with a 66% approval rating.  Highlights of the Clinton years included an impressive 115 months of economic expansion, 22 months of job creation, the highest home ownership in American history, the lowest unemployment rate to date, the lowest crime rate in 26 years, the smallest welfare rolls in 32 years, the lowest poverty rate in 20 years, the first female Attorney General and the first female Secretary of State and the conversion of the deficit to a surplus.

When Clinton left office, the country was again prosperous and at peace.  He took office with the Dow Jones Industrial Average at 3,241.95 and left when it was a staggering 10,578.24.  

These two men have one very important fact in common, and it is this commonality that made them great.  Reagan was a Republican, but the House was controlled by the Democrats.  The Republicans held a slim control of the Senate, which they lost in 1987.

Clinton is a Democrat and his first two years saw him with a Democratically lead House and Senate.  That reversed in year three when the Republicans took control of both houses and that control remained until the end of Clinton's presidency.

What each of these men had to do was work with the opposition.  No president runs this country on his own.  They all have to have the backing of the other elected officials in order to be successful and the truly great know that in order for this country to excel, no one political party can ever have its way to the detriment of the other party.  There has to be a negotiation where each party gets some of what it wants but neither party gets it all.  When we have this balance, when we work together, we are truly the United States of America and our history shows that when this happens, we can achieve greatness.

Highest Corporate Taxes in the World

The United States is once again number one but not in an area where it is a matter of pride.  Thanks to a recent move in Japan to lower their corporate tax rate, the United States is now the highest corporate tax rate in the world.  This, of course, has many people screaming about the need to lower these taxes.  And I mostly agree.


I say I mostly agree because I think that before we just lower the tax rate, the corporations need to do their fair share.  Many industries in this country have been making record profits.  These industries include financial institutions, insurance companies and oil companies.  If they make record profits on our (the consumers) money, then they should certainly pay their fair share in taxes.  Many are now arguing that they are paying more than their fair share.


I would suggest that we revise the tax rate but only for those companies that meet two criteria.  The first is that if they are a company that is headquartered in the United States, no part of their operation can be outsourced to a foreign country.  They can certainly have offices in other countries but their IT department for America must remain here.  Their Human Resources for America must remain here.  Their Customer Service for America must remain here.  If any part of their operation services American consumers, it must be done on American soil.  This would also apply to any company that is not headquartered here but has operations here.  Any service provided to Americans must be provided here.


Why should we lower taxes on a corporation that is sending jobs overseas?  We need to get Americans working and rewarding companies that take jobs away from Americans is not something this country should allow.


Second, no one in the company can make more than twenty times what the lowest person in the company earns.  This amount includes their entire compensation package; salary, overtime, bonuses, benefits, pension payments, stock options and any other part of their compensation.


Tax breaks would certainly help the corporations make more money, which would allow their stock to rise and allow them to hire more people but the truth is, many companies already spend far too much of their earnings on executive salaries.  The gap between the rich and the poor in this country is growing wider and the middle class is continually being pushed downward.  That trend needs to stop.  There is no reason why our government should reward a company that pays its workers under $50,000 a year and then pays $15 million to an executive.  


We, the American people who buy the products and services of these corporations are ultimately the ones who pay these taxes.  It's our money.  I, for one, do not want my money going to companies that send jobs overseas or pay exorbitant salaries to a small group of individuals.  

Los Angeles Unified School District

The Los Angeles Unified School District is always stating that they need more money. This is probably true, since they serve over 600,000 students annually, and with only about 37,000 teachers. Every school teacher I know has had to use their own money to buy things for their classroom. These things include chalk, erasers, notebooks and the like, but also often include books for their students.

Something is obviously wrong with our society when teachers (already fairly low paid) have to use their own money to buy school supplies. One of the problems here in Los Angeles is that Proposition 13 was passed many years ago. This legislation was good in that it reduced the value of houses in the state, but bad in what it has done to our schools.

Back in the 40s and 50s, many people moved to Los Angeles because they liked the year-round nice weather, and the job market was expanding. Many of these people had been stationed here during the war and wanted to stay. Houses were soon built on a large scale and suburban areas were particularly attractive, as the cost of housing was much lower than in the city proper.

Los Angeles grew and as it grew, housing values increased. This was a problem because salaries did not increase accordingly, and property taxes are based on the value of the house. A family living in a two bedroom house that cost $40,000 with the father earning $20,000 annually was doing well, but when that house increased in value to $100,000 the tax bill became so high that the family could not pay. Houses were being seized by the state in lieu of payment. Proposition 13 ended this.

With Proposition 13 your tax rate is based on what you paid for the house. That amount is allowed to increase by a very small percentage annually, but when a spike in housing value happens, it does not change your tax rate. This is all well and good, but the writers of Prop 13 went too far. It also includes houses that are given from a parent to a child or a grandchild.

These houses are often sold without the sale being declared, so the parent receives money from their child and the child continues paying taxes at the parents' rate. Property taxes are where the money comes from to fund the school districts. When these amounts are being decreased, the money to schools decreases.

We certainly need to look at Prop 13 again, not to abolish it, but to improve it. Areas where our schools suffer need to be addressed. Added to this, we need to get the parents of school children more involved in schools. We should enact tuition for all students in our district. $100 per student per year is a small amount to pay, but this amount would generate $68,000,000 in additional money for our schools.

Added to this, every parent should be required to work at their child's school for five hours per month. Five hours is a very small amount of time, and no parent can claim they cannot do this. They can forego five hours of television per month to put in their time at their childs' school.

For parents with more than one child, it was their choice to have children. Children are not free, and parents need to take more responsibility for their children. This is one way of accomplishing that.