The constant pressing question in the immigrant community is: when will we have immigration reform?  The answer, unfortunately remains the same:  not this election year.

While the poor state of the economy is still a major election issue, the immigration issue, legal or illegal, has emerged, perhaps unsurprisingly, as one of the hottest button issues of our times.  In fact,  the slightest association with even the "good" immigration, the creation of an EB-5 Regional Investment Center that would lend foreign investor money to U.S. businesses to expand and create jobs for U.S. citizens and Lawful Permanent Residents, has been deemed by one Congressional legislative assistant as "too hot a voter issue to touch" in this close election atmosphere. 

There's an old expression that sometimes we can't see the forest for the trees and that holds true with this immigration debate. Yes, there are a huge amount of illegal immigration issues that need to be addressed, and addressed well beyond the mere throwing of funds and resources at border control that our President has pledged to do. But it's the real forest, the picture of what America does and should look like so that we may remain economically sound and globally competitive that must be considered, rather than the thorny, fear-inspired anti-immigrant bushes and trees in our diverse forest.  To see the forest, rationality must return whenever the word "immigration" comes up in a conversation. As the Hazelton and Arizona legislation have clearly demonstrated, Americans are clearly lacking in these attributes.  Tempers need to cool and common sense needs to be substituted for anger and hate. Only then we will have a chance at an immigration reform bill that meets the needs of an America in the year 2010 and going forward.