...When All is Said and Dunn

Something this simple should not be this hard. For some people, the Census can be as confusing as doing their taxes. Most of us lucked out, we got the short form, basically a simple form, asking very few questions. But some citizens got the dreaded long form which takes on the feel of the Spanish Inquisition. It is a necessary evil and just thank your lucky stars that it only happens every 10 years.

The other morning as I dropped off my kids at school I was listening to one of the local radio shows, Kevin and Bean on KROQ, and they were taking calls from listeners about the Census. As usual there were the always present conspiracy theory proponents who were swearing that they would not send in their forms because of some paranoid fantasies they have about “big brother” prying into their lives.

Then there was the woman who was pulling her hair out because she had gotten the long form and was about to have a brain hemorrhage from trying to figure out how to answer the questions.

In typical early morning radio fashion, Kevin and Bean suggested that she not send in the form at all. They said that they thought there was a fine of $100 for not sending it in, but they wanted to see what would happen and they would take care of her fine if it happened. A $100 fine? I had never heard about that, so I went to the Census website to see if I could verify it. I donned my wetsuit and began to surf the web.

When I got there I was stunned. They have one of the most extensive sites I had ever seen and actually, it seemed a little over the top considering it was only going to be used for a few months. I guess they didn't want to leave any stone unturned and no form unfilled out. As far as my question though, the answer was nowhere to be found. The more I searched, the more frustrated I got, until I finally just gave up. So if anybody knows the answer to my query about the $100 fine, and can back it up, let me know. I'm just curious.

Paranoids and people too dumb to answer 6 to 53 questions aside, why not take the few minutes or an hour depending on the form to fill it out? It is there to help the community that you live in. It benefits everybody and penalizes no one, so why not? Why not indeed.

Could it be that you may want to hide something? But who would want to hide something from the Census people, unless of course you happen to be in this country illegally.

I think the government is missing a prime opportunity here. If you don't send back your Census form they send a Census taker to your home, right? Well, why not combine two jobs and kill two birds with one stone. Let's make the immigration police into Census takers. That way it will give them the opportunity to go door to door and see firsthand who is here legally and who is not.

If the person who didn't fill out their form can't produce a green card, they should take them straight to a deportation center and away they go. No muss, no fuss, no need for messy raids on factories suspected of using illegal labor. Do it one on one. It may be a bit more time consuming but what the hell, somebody has got to go there anyway.

If they don't do something like this we are not going to be getting an accurate count anyway. With so many illegal aliens currently residing here in the San Gabriel Valley we will never get the proper funding for our schools and cities anyway, so why not do something that would truly benefit the community?

Let's get rid of the freeloaders who are sucking up all of the funding and public resources that we have now and will be getting in the future.

If you don't want to be counted as one of us, then why should we continue to subsidize your family's education, health and welfare? We shouldn't is the answer and we shouldn't be expected to. Just because you came into the country illegally and have gone undetected long enough to have a baby, shouldn't mean that we, as a community, should be responsible for feeding you and your child and giving it an education. You can either be counted or pack your bags. Either way is fine with me.

Instead of asking a completely pointless question, like how many rooms in your house are not bathrooms, hallways and bedrooms, why not ask how many of you citizens out there would like your government to do something about the illegal alien problem and maybe it wouldn't seem so Censless after all.