What kind of parents are they?

Today's topic is the influx of illegal aliens we are being forced to deal with, because Obama wants "immigration reform." They keep saying our system is broken. What is broken is not the system, but the lack of enforcement. If we enforce the laws we have, we won't have a problem with immigration.

But my real focus today is on the parents of the thousands of children who are arriving here alone. What kind of parent sends his 8 or 9 year old child across a desert alone? I don't get it. The Obama reason is that they are in danger from drug cartels, gangs, etc., but that's been the case for a long time. What officials who have been brave enough to speak are telling us is that 90% of those they've interviewed have said they came here because it was advertised in their countries that if they could get here unaccompanied, they could stay. In fact, the first thing they do when they cross the border is to look for a border agent. Some families are sending the children ahead, then hoping to make an illegal entrance themselves.

Gilberto Ramos was a teenager from Guatemala who didn't make it. His body was found in the Rio Grande Valley. He was 15 years old when he told his mother he wanted to come. She says she relented and armed him with a rosary for safe passage. Gilberto's older brother lives illegally in Chicago, and he's the one who encouraged Gilberto to come. They found a coyote for $5,400, so I have to wonder just how impoverished this family really is.

And now guess who's paying to send Gilberto's body home? We are. If we can pay to send a dead boy home, why can't we pay to send all these live children back to where they came from?

"Teen made trek to aid ill mom." The Dallas Morning News; July 3, 2014; p. 3A.