I wrote this over a year ago but I wanted to post it because it is something dear to me! It is long but please bear with it! Thanks!

"Ever since I was a little girl I have struggled with the mantra that the citizens of the United States has put forth. Capture the American Dream! Pull yourself up by your bootstraps! Be a success! I guess I have never followed those steps. All these mantras only talk about "me". What if you can't? What do you do when you have no bootstraps because you can't afford them? Aren't we as a nation supposed to be a "we" not a "me"? What happened to the others? What about those who cannot help themselves? Do we leave them behind in our quest for the American Dream; the sad result of survival of the fittest? When did we begin to believe that we were so much more deserving to be here than those who are not? It makes me really sad. The inscription on our Statue of Liberty says "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door." That inscription stirs a picture of compassion and heart in me. When did this beautiful picture become "Give me your smart, your most successful, those who can afford to get in. I lift my lamp only for those who will pay for its oil." But really isn't that what it has become about? I know that we don't have thousands of people trying to get here from India because it is not close but there are many poor and if they could, we would probably only accept those who could afford it. It would be the smart kid who has all that we desire in order to put him to good use, not the poor little girl who has to roll cigarettes for the rest of her life to pay for a debt her and her family could never pay back. We might feel sorry for her but then we would go on with our lives and praise the smart kid who has put our country ahead of others in technology, medicine, etc!
Lately, with all of the immigration reform, I have heard many people in our "great nation" ranting about Mexican immigrants, how they are here illegally, they should be kicked out and I even read something today which broke my heart and made me REALLY angry: a mother in Phoenix wrote on a blog post on My Fox 10 website, "I think we just need to send all of them home and if we catch them we need to put them on a chain gang and let them break rocks into gravel and pay them, but keep the money and tell them after they earn enough then we will pay their way home. And if we catch them again it's a felony and they get sentenced and deported again." I'm sorry but in this message I hear that she thinks only "Americans" should be free. I mean, really, a CHAIN GANG! Come on! Why do we think it's a good idea to do this to another human being? It’s so dehumanizing! How can we say that we would not do the same thing in their position! Would we not do anything for our family? For our children? How far away are we from being in their position? I know I'm close! Most of us, we live paycheck to paycheck, praying that something doesn't go wrong that would break our family. Is that not just the same struggle they are living through? Instead, we worry that "these people" are taking money from us that is "rightfully ours". WHAT ABOUT THOSE WHO ARE NEXT TO US SUFFERING? Please! Think about them! Most of the people who are crying out "No Amnesty" are those that backed our President to go to war in Iraq. They cried "Weapons of Mass Destruction!" Then "Free the People!" And finally "We must finish what we started or it will come home to us!" Now if they are going to cry that for the Iraqi's, why can't they cry "Freedom for our Neighbors!"? If are going to cry that for Iraq then why can't we say it on our homefront? What about our neighbors who are suffering? What has happened? Why are we so selfish? I say "we" because I fall into this all too often! This selfishness has attached itself to our hearts and leeches off us everyday, causing it to grow!!!!! Lord, please help us! I just don't understand!