You raise some interesting points, SDAITech1, but I think your essay suffers from being shoehorned too relentlessly into your anti-immigrant philosophy.

First, let me making something very clear. I'm not anti-immigration. I'm anti-illegal immigration. My mother's an immigrant and many relatives on both sides of my family I can trace to their legal immigration to the United States from various countries. All had to apply, wait and follow the law.

People seem to have a difficult concept with "immigration" simply by avoiding the "illegal" aspect.

The most sterling example of this is the PC term "undocumented worker" over "illegal alien". Conjuring up the image of some poor hardworking chap whose lost his papers rather than illegally entered our country.

Second point. Your suggestion about raising the minimum wage seems valid, but many illegal aliens are paid cash at the end of a job. If one thinks one will discourage employers from hiring illegals to do labor by making it equally expensive to hire illegals as citizens, I think it will not make as big a dent as you think it will.

The wall works. San Diego saw a reduction in crossing and easier apprehension where the wall was built. Arizona crossing increased proportionately. The wall needs to be built all across the southern border. It will pay for itself many times over as both reducing US unemployment, fixing the perpetual burden on our economy and healthcare system and as a security feature in an increasingly anti-American world.

I'm reminded of a particular line of Reagan's vision of the Shining City on the Hill from his farewell address:

I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it, and see it still.

I couldn't agree more.

We need city walls. With balance. A nation made up primarily of Mexicans is not in the US best interest because it is imbalanced. Just because its easier to cross illegally from Mexico than other nations, doesn't mean that the US should simply look the other way.

The US destiny is to be peopled by people from ALL nations. This creates balance. I want to see Turks, Egyptians, Russians, Chinese, Italians, Afghanis, Japanese, Libyans, Swedes, Pakistanis, Nigerians and every nation equally represented in the US population - not just Mexico.

Legal immigration allows us to balance the flow of influx to keep diversity equal. Is it fair to legal immigrants to arrive to the promised land and find everything written in Spanish for illegal immigrants?

I think not. It's an injustice that has already gone on far too long.

America's destiny demands we tighten our borders and promote legal immigration from ALL nations and not pander to those who break our laws, simply because it is politically convenient to do so.