California Dreaming

California now has a law making it possible for illegal immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses, which clashes somewhat with our compliance with the federal Real ID Act, under which one has to present a birth certificate proving US citizenship, or some other documentation proving legality, in order to obtain a state identification. The license, apparently, will be marked with a “DP” to indicate that it is for driving privileges only, which illegal immigrants claim is discriminatory. I’m not sure why illegal immigrants think that they should not be discriminated against in this manner, but...

Governor Brown said that this “will enable millions of people to get to work safely and legally.” There is the fact that it is still against the law to hire anyone who does not have official permission to be in this country, so this new law may allow them to get to work legally, but it won’t allow them to actually work legally. Perhaps it should be pointed out that Governor Brown is older than I am and may be suffering from dementia.

Supporters of the law say that "unauthorized immigrants are already driving, and that this law will encourage them to be trained, tested and obtain insurance." The logic of this thinking rather escapes me. People are robbing banks rather frequently, too, so perhaps we should pass a law making bank robbing legal so that bank robbers could be “trained, tested and obtain insurance” as well.

Yes, I realize the simile is not entirely valid and that very few insurance companies would issue bank robbing insurance, but I’m engaging in some artistic literary license here. Some might call it bullshit, actually, but I feel sorry for them.

The governor also said that this will “send a message to Washington that immigration reform is long overdue.” I have no idea why the governor thinks that, and I suspect that it will mostly send a message to the rest of the country that California is nuts.

But then, the rest of the country already knew that.