Reply #1: The right-wing clowns view deaths at sea as politically powerful.

[Judi Lynn]

Whereas the visa alottment, operating as it was intended, would allow them to come across in an orderly, safe manner, the withholding of the alottment, which forces them to take matters into their own hands to take advantage of the promise of instant legal status, instant work visa, instant social security, US-taxpayer-funded Section 8 Housing, Food Stamps, Welfare, free medical treatment, financial assistance for education, etc. through the Cuban Adjustment Act, makes the risk seem worthwhile.

Imagine how many more Latin Americans and Caribbean citizens would make their own heroic efforts if those incentives were dangled in front of them. We would have been inundated long, long ago.

The deaths by sea of people from other countries never get publicized, nor the deaths of people coming across the desert and the Rio Grand, and the canals in California, yet they mount annually, to the costs of HUNDREDS of lives. Those deaths are not politically important, however, as the people's deaths can't be used to fuel hatred of their own governments.

No other country of ANY size is offered anywhere near a yearly opportunity to allow 20,000 of their citizens to move to the U.S., and no other country's citizens get to enter freely, no hassle whatsoever, no agents running them down and beating them before deportation, with the astonishing array benefits available to ONLY CUBANS.