[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by Daniel_LaFleur

While I agree that giving teenagers access to Sience and Technology is a good thing, there is a right way of doing things and a wrong way. I personally believe legislation such as DREAM is the wrong way.

I do not recall seeing in this thread the words "freeloader" , "Jobstealer" , or any other insult (nor would I use those phrases when talking about immagrants, illegal or not). Please refrain from strawman arguments and please do not try and polarize the issues here, these are very serious issues and should be discussed as such.

This wasn't targeted at anyone in particular in this thread. I have heard such terms being used to describe illegal immigrants before, and the idea was that one's opinion of this can be completely independent of whether or not you thought that particular way of illegal immigrants. So, technically it's not a strawman, I guess, as the argument is not supported by people stating those statements, but I apologize for any implication that anyone in this thread holds that opinion or uses such statements.

My issue with DREAM and other legislation of its type is that it rewards bad behavior ... in this case abandoning children and breaking up families. Many of these childeren are abandon because the parents believe that they cannot provide for their childeren as well as the welfare system of the US can, so they abandon their childeren here ... knowing that they will be fed, medically treated, educated, allowed to hold jobs, and now ... thanks to DREAM ... have a chance at becoming a citizen of the US ... and all the parents have to do is illegally enter this country and abandon their child.

If the bill offered any form of reward to the parents, I would agree that this would be an issue with the legislation. I just can't see myself telling some child with awful parents that abandoned them "Oh, sorry, you can't be a scientist or engineer, we need to teach your parents a lesson."

Independent of the argument, how often does this or will this happen? This is a purely hypothetical situation (to me, if you have evidence that this happens frequently I'll stand corrected), and might not be a common occurrence at all.

The US government is a poor mother and a poor father, and promoting the distruction of the family unit is even worse ... and that is what DREAM and the other associated legislation does, whether it intends to or not.

Personally, I can't imagine any sane family unit would chuck their children over the border because of the DREAM act potentially making their lives slightly less hellish. Especially considering how unlikely a child with no parental guidance would have the required strong moral character.