Reading this article from the Seattle-Post Intelligencer reminded me of the numerous problems that I've personally witnessed and heard about with the US Immigration system. The story discusses a long term US resident of South Korean descent who is being denied US citizenship because of a minor fishing infraction years ago. Apparently he's not moral enough to become a citizen so he is part of a class action lawsuit demanding that his case be reviewed. A friend in NY who is a recent US immigrant (from Brazil) has been going mad as his wife (a French national) has struggled to get her working permit sorted. Locally (for me) a friend of the family was shocked when they discovered that in order to send their college student son to the US for an internship, he would have to pay around $700 for a special visa. When visiting the US back in December, I was horrified at the abusive attitude of the US Immigration staff, both to me as well as to foreign visitors. I was threatened to be sent for a search for no particular reason. Something is seriously off in that entire organization and it doesn't seem to be improving. I can understand their some of their concerns since they blew it on 9/11 but they just don't seem to be able to get their arms around this problem at all. The current policy seems to be "say no to everyone" and employ the administrations favorite tactic of "fear, fear, fear."
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