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| AP Photo/Alex Brandon |
During the Jimmy Carter administration and the simultaneous economic disaster America was enduring, Bruce Springsteen’s contemporary Bill Chinnock released an album called Badlands. The most popular song from the album, “Something for Everybody” was a commentary on the desperate economic straits many citizens were enduring.
One verse says:
“Unemployment sent me to welfare, welfare demanded some proof
I was so drunk I couldn’t even remember my name
I tried, but there ain’t no use.”
The chorus of the song tweaks an age-old saying about the riches of America:
“There’s Something for Everybody
There’s something for young and old
The streets are filled with money
The sidewalks paved in gold.”
The old phrase “the streets are paved in gold” is so tightly woven into the history of United States immigration, particularly during the 19th century and early 20th century, that an Ellis Island museum exhibit that opened in 2018 was actually called “Streets Paved in Gold.”
It is a mythical term of course, but is indicative of the expectation of a better life in America. Many immigrants of the day were willing to endure tremendous hardship, including unpleasant, unhealthy and sometimes deadly passage aboard overcrowded, poorly ventilated ships in hopes of a new and better chance at success. They didn’t believe the streets were literally paved in gold, but rather, they understood a golden opportunity awaited them.
Fast forward to 2021 and once again America is seeing a large influx of immigrants, this time primarily from Central America. It would be safe to assume many of those immigrants are also hoping for a better life. The big difference this time around is that thanks to the Biden Administration, the streets may literally be paved with gold for those who’ve chosen to enter the United States illegally.
The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal reported last week that the Biden Administration Justice Department agreed to pay $450,000 per person and up to $1 million per family to illegal immigrants who had been separated from their families. That is $450,000 American dollars. For the average American that is almost nine years of work. Biden’s Justice Department officials apparently believe handing the equivalent of nine years payout to people whose first act on American soil was to willfully disregard U.S. law is a reasonable response. --->READ MORE HERE
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| AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills, Pool |
Members of Congress who die in office customarily have a year’s salary, currently $174,000, as a payout to their survivors.Families of U.S. service members who die on active duty get a $100,000 death gratuity.
Japanese Americans, forced out of their homes and into internment camps for more than two years during World War II, collected $20,000 payments four decades later. That’s worth about $46,000 in today’s dollars.
Lawmakers and legal experts are looking at those kinds of payments as the Biden administration considers cutting $450,000 checks — nearly 10 times the inflation-adjusted rate paid to the internees — to compensate illegal immigrants who say they suffered emotional trauma from family separations as a result of President Trump’s zero-tolerance border policy.
One legal expert characterized $450,000 checks as “quite generous” compared with other payouts that courts have authorized, but figuring out the proper comparison is fraught with complications.
Sen. James Lankford, Oklahoma Republican, said during a Senate committee meeting this month that Americans are outraged by the thought that illegal immigrants would get more than four times the amount that goes to families of troops killed on duty. --->READ MORE HEREFollow link below to a related story:
+++++Analysis: Biden’s ‘Build Back Better Act’ Gives $800M in Cash Payments to Illegal Aliens Released into U.S.+++++
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