I find it amusing that people do not realize we are being played by both parties.
A targeted legalization program for STEM-degree holders and enrollees in the military is one of the sections the president has listed in his "blueprint" for immigration reform in the White House blog.
Obama goes live and speaks in the SOTU address, NOT of the DREAM act, but of agreeing to let STEM-degree holders and those who want to enroll in the military be granted some form of legal status. The very next day the Republicans introduce the very precise legislation that covers these two. Are you telling me that they wrote it the night after the SOTU?? Everything is negotiable and everything we see in TV is just for show.
Obama got the heads up from somebody in Congress, and then went out and said his little speech with the full knowledge that he has promised that he would sign and pass the DA in his first term, and he has nothing to show for it. So if this passes, he will go out and bullshit people about how he was "able" to sign something to help "young, talented people". Not young, talented people who've grown up in this country necessarily, but still "young, talented people". The DA is about EDUCATION and ROOTS in this country. The DREAM Act is for those who are already American in principle, but not on paper. The U.S. grants 400,000 student visas a year, so somebody who gets a STEM degree and has no ties to this country, would be given a fast-track to residency regardless if they only arrived in the last three years. This program gives those that hold a STEM degree residency so that they can become Americans over time. It's a change in status for those that already have F1 status.
That is not a modified Dream Act by any definition. The DA is an idea that was conceived and created with Republicans in Congress, and I think the DA as we have known it has actually run its course. The Dems blew the chance they had to pass it when we had support for CIR in congress in 2007. Passing the DA doesn't preclude any other forms of legalization from passing; whenever that may be, so this is just political pandering by both parties.
If this passes and helps whomever, great, just don't call it what is not; this is no DREAM act.
