The Real Story Behind The DREAM Act
[Editor’s Note: Stace Medellin is a hard core blogger of DosCentavos.net and will be a regular NewsTaco contributor.]
On December 1 — shortly after San Antonio DREAMers were arrested at her offices there — DREAMers in Houston at the Mickey Leland Federal Building found that Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s staff high-tailed it out, avoiding the meeting with local DREAM Activists and Texas DREAM hunger strikers who simply wanted to ask the Senator to support the DREAM Act.
The hunger strikers did leave the Senator a note.
One positive outcome of all of this hunger striking and luchando is that this blog, and I am sure others, have enjoyed increased traffic due to the recent DREAM Actions around Texas we have been blogging, the “balanced” approach that the mainstream media usually gives the issue of the DREAM Act has given many of us a sick feeling, especially when talk on the other side turns into the usual “secure the border first” and “backdoor amnesty” talk.
The bottom line: The DREAM Act has nothing to do with “border sercurity” and “amnesty” and more to do with helping children and young adults brought here as babies by their parents and who have only known the United States of America as home. It’s about bringing young adults into a more secure status that will allow them to flourish in a country that has already invested much in them, especially in education.
These aren’t temporary residents, or “workers” who toil in the fields, who deserve an opportunity to stay, too, but a small section of the immigrant community that for all intents and purposes is culturally, economically, and one might say with all the actions going on, politically connected to the United States of America. And damn it, America deserves a return on that investment.
That said, it was refreshing to see an op-ed in the San Antonio Express-Newscalling out Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison for waffling on the DREAM Act and for putting politics over principle.
Hutchison’s stance at the time was what once was known as a “moderate” position. And it was the position of a leader. She treaded lightly, but she stuck her neck out. These days a moderate Republican may as well be a “pinko Commie.”
And Hutchison is fast losing her place in Texas history as someone who was once thought of, at the very least, as an elected official willing to talk about legislation, rather than just be another set of initials after the Republican “NO” rubber stamp, as she is talking now.
The Houston Chronicle’s Lisa Falkenberg laid out yesterday’s occurrences at the Mickey Leland Federal Building quite well. Readers have an opportunity to read about how these students were treated by Senator Hutchison’s staff.
As they approached the tall building with dark reflective windows, an officer with the Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Protective Service blocked their path.
To a federal building that is supposed to serve the taxpayers? And to visit a staff that had already clocked out?
This has indeed been an interesting week, and the actions in San Antonio and Houston have put this cause on TVs, newspapers and beyond the new media.
Some argue that these type of actions only anger the other side, but we’re at a point in time when action is required. These students are standing up for themselves because of the inaction. And those of us who support them should back them up–no questions asked.
