Kama Of Kingstone

"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination."
Tommy Lasorda

Only YOU can convince yourself to do what is right for you right now. The time now is to march to DC!!!
Help IV help you....
GO IV!!!!

Everyone, calm down.

Gautam: We understand that you are not an IV member and you attended a public event and asked the congressman a question and got a dissatisfactory answer to your question.

It was a public event and it was well within your rights to ask your question. Fine.

Here is the issue with your questions and expectation and also with expectation of other members who have been thoroughly dissatisfied on Saturday:

1). Need to temper expectations, lawmakers are not really experts in Immigration law or any law...they set policy...they dont practice law everyday...

Firstly, your question is such that it is beyond congressman's capacity to answer. You asked about the non-immigrant intent tied to the student visa and you said that it doesnt make sense to have that non-immigrant intent on student visas and its prevent you from getting a degree from your school where you are getting/got admission.

You have to realize that these are highly technical issues and no Congressman or Senator....NONE...not even Ted Kennedy, not even John McCain (they have spent good part of this decade coming up with comprehensive bill last year) would understand deeply technical legal issues like "Non Immigrant Intent" in the law and the bills. NOT EVEN JOHN CORNYN who has spend huge time on skilled immigration and whose previous bill actually has stuff to remove the non-immigrant intent from student visa adjudication in consulates. Lawmakers work at policy level and THEIR STAFF works the details. The kind of question you asked was something that you can get answers on from a staff member. And not just any staff member, it has to the the JUDICIARY COUNSEL of the congressman or the Senator. Otherwise, they would not know the different between H1 and F1 and the difference between GC quota (140,000) and H1 Quota (65,000).

Congress passes thousands of bills each year. Each day in session, Congressmen vote on over a dozen bills. For each bill they vote, they get a 5-10 line brief description. So never expect lawmakers to know your issues in that great details.

2). Need to have a polite tone.

This point I am making is not just pertinent to you (Gautam), but to everyone. When you are dealing with a lawmaker so closely involved with a 700-page bill of which 98% is dealing with sparing the lives of 11 million illegals who are living in fear of deportation, prison, raids and separation from their children, you have to be VERY VERY CAREFUL when asking for things like "I am not getting GC therefore, I cant get promotion", "I am making only 80K and with GC I can make 120K", "I cannot go to Ivy league school for next 2 years"... Not that these arent legit issues. They are. But when a person sees questions from the undocumented community, some of them were breaking into tears when asking questions...your questions and your tone has to be very careful. I dont know if anyone stayed thru the end. I and Pratik were there till the end and we talked to Congressman after the crowd dispersed and there were just some reporters, organizers etc at around 7:45 PM. Some questions towards the end,...people were breaking into tears when asking..."my son cannot go to school anywhere next year when he grads from highschool"..."When are the raids going to stop"...etc. These guys are plucked from their homes and workplace and their Kids actually end up on the streets as it recently happened in New Bedford, Massachussetts. Kids were unable to go home (http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/03/07/children_stranded_after_immigration_raid/)beause their parents didnt come from work (http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/03/07/350_are_held_in_immigration_raid/)and there wasnt anyone from social services notified about the parents being picked up by Immigration enforcement.

In the environment, when children possibly become homeless/lost/kidnapped because their parents are in jail suddenly, (read news articles on raids in New Bedford Massachussets (http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/03/07/children_stranded_after_immigration_raid/)), IF YOU DONT HAVE A VERY SOFT AND POLITE TONE and a very compelling story, your point is going to backfire and you will risk looking like RICH SPOILED AND PRIVILEGED KIDS who ALREADY HAVE LEGAL STATUS and ALREADY HAVE PATH TO CITIZENSHIP and are yelling on top of their lungs to speed that up.

Your case is legit, not doubt, but WHEN IN CONTRAST with undocumented, you run the risk of looking like snobs and elitists. That's just how it is. And lawmakers dont exactly get goosebumps when you name-drop words like "Harvard", "Stanford" and "Berkeley" and "U Penn". Its not like they are going to go weak on their knees when you say "I went to harvard and how dare you dont get me a Greencard. I will go back to India/China". It doesnt really make a difference to them. They have people WORKING FOR THEM in their staff who went to Ivy league schools.

And frankly, Gautam, your tone of asking the question was..."what are you doing about this...you dont understand what you are losing , you will lose us to India and China and France"....is THE WRONG TONE. It was nowhere near polite or calm. It was pretty "WTF" attitude like you said we should all use, and IT WONT WORK. If shouting out, yelling, soundbites and rhetoric would have worked, we would have gotten the job done a long time ago.
Merits of the issue and argument is one thing...no matter how strong your point is YOU HAVE TO be POLITE and be FRIENDLY and ask nicely. Otherwise you will really get nothing back from your lawmakers.

Its not like you are going to threaten to vote against them. YOU HAVE NO VOTING power for next 15 years.

any one got approval after submitting recent RFE?

I want to see how you would go about doing it in a 3D program though.

Guys..

If your are with me please respond to this thread

We MUST take the advantage of low VISA usage in this recession and cut the line by tens of thousand

Yes, good idea and something that will benefit the entire I & C community in the long run including EB3. I will support the initiative.

Well, this is a clear sign of "You are not Needed here, get the heck out of our country". May be we should heed to this msg and move out.

I wasted My money, Time, Took a Few shots at the Doctor, declined a good Permanent Offer for all this. What a Waste...


This is a sad sad news

UPDATE ON JULY VISA AVAILABILITY

The sudden backlog reduction efforts by Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices during the past month have resulted in the use of almost 60,000 Employment numbers. As a result of this unexpected action it has been necessary to make immediate adjustments to several previously announced cut-off dates. All Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices have been notified of the following:

Effective Monday July 2, 2007 there will be no further authorizations inresponse to requests for Employment-based preference cases. All numbers available to these categories under the FY-2007 annual numerical limitation

have been made available. Employment preference numbers will once again be available to these chargeability areas beginning October 1, 2007, under the FY-2008 annual numerical limitation.

Department of State Publication 9514
CA/VO: July 2, 2007

Bump /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

I am trying to immigrate to this country. I feel that I have my own responsibility to make this country a better place. From my own experience, I know that the namecheck is the most ridiculous process, needs immediate fix:
1. What is the legal base? No legal base makes it become such a black hole.
2. No time frame, they can use �case by case�, �national security� as excuses to randomly delay your cases.
3. It�s a lottery, we can only pray, some people get it cleared in one month, some more than 3 yrs.
4. Case by case? We�ve got a lottery program. Where is the justice, the fairness? How should those affected people plan their living and become a productive citizen?
5. National security? You should not give those �terrorist suspects� more that 3 yrs of freedom! Should it be done earlier before they enter this country?
6. The 911 terrorist attacks did not directly affect most people, but name checking makes many people very anxious. They are amplifying the effect of the terrorist attacks and that is what the terrorist wants. What is the efficiency of this measure?
7. No transparency, nobody knows how they do it.
8. Not responsive, you cannot get any meaningful response except those excuses.
9. You are guilty first, you do not have any chance to provide any assistance to them, and they won�t request any either.


retrohatao willgetgc2005 wam4wam & stirGC,

Thank You for your input. This is very helpful to highlight the name check problem. The problem description and proposed solution by retrohatao are very good. However, just allow me to share a bigger picture. There is no difference between any issue is being categorized by someone to be a sub-issue or if an issue is categorized as main issue. What is important is that the issue is being addressed ....

willgetgc2005, just so that you know, I am also stuck in name check since June-04 and my 485 is pending since Oct-03. Just like you, this issue directly affects me. No doubt this is a very important issue. As berkeleybee mentioned, this is being addressed and communicated to the lawmakers and CA team did an excellent job in making the presentation to the lawmakers.

Even though name check delay issue directly affects people like you and me, know that this is not the only important issue. The point is, many people only care about getting to the next stage of GC process. If someone's labor is stuck, that group thinks that labor certification clearance should be the top priority. If someone's 140 got rejected, then that issue should be the only issue on IV's agenda. If someone is not able to apply for 485, then that person wants to make that as the top priority. If someone is a PHD, then that person wants the top agenda should be to get GC to the guy who has PHD and the argument presented to us is - don't you get it, I am a "PHD". The other day there was a group of people including techworker_tn1, helpful_leo etc who wanted to form their own group for PHDs. And now, if someone's name check is delayed, then we say that everybody will have to go through it sometime in the later stage, so this issue should be on the fore-front of the list of issues.

I am slightly perplexed by the behavior of some members who seems to indicate that we are in some sort of race with one another. And these members seem to send out a message that says - if their issue is not listed as top priority goal then all other issues that IV is working to resolve or all the work being done by IV is worthless. I am slightly disturbed to read posts like the one from wam4wam which says that he/she hopes that bill is not passed till his/her name check is cleared.

This is a sincere request to everybody. If all that we think about is 'what's in it for me', then we cannot find commonality among ourselves. And thus no progress is possible. Know that with this thought process, nothing will happen.

IV is an organization made by people like you and me. If everybody's objective is to get to the next stage of green card process, know that we are not behaving like matured and "educated" class that we all claim to belong. Just reaching the next stage of the process is something like looking for instant gratification which actually doesn't help the cause or the complete green card process.

Most humbly, I would like to request you to post your experiences with how many people you have communicated about the efforts of IV? How many people you have convinced to join IV? What is the success rate? Were you able to persuade the people to contribute for this cause? Those things will help more than anything else. If IV is bigger and stronger, we can together address each and every issue. Ask yourself, how is it possible to continue to include more agendas and not come up with more helping hands and more resources and expect to succeed?

If you do not see a favorable post or see a post that doesn't contain something that you want to hear, please do not infer that nobody cares or as if no one is doing anything. That post may just express somebody's opinion. I must mention that everybody wants their agenda to be pushed to the top. If there is some sort of a debate from others in the forum, I see that group of people starts backing off and starts posting messages to communicate as if this forum or IV is not doing what it should; Or some people start posting messageas hoping that bill will not pass if their agenda is not addressed.....and on and on. Please let me share that this doesn't help anybody.

retrohato, Would you like to take the lead on making name check to the forefront and address it in every possible manner? IV needs sincere people like you who can spend time to do each task. We have very good ideas on how to approach this issue and find a solution to this issue. If you could please take the lead on this issue, know that name check is top priority of IV. I would request you to please call us at anytime convenient for you and express that you would like to work on this issue. We need people who are ready to take ownership of issues and are ready to deliver. Would you like to join this effort actively?

Just so that everybody know, Immigration Voice could include 'World Peace' as one of the agenda items. But just including something as Goal doesn't mean that it can be achieved. To achieve anything that is listed as goals or to meaningfully add anything to the goals we need more serious people and more resources. If you are interested to actively contribute, please call us and we will connect you to the larger group of people to team-up the work for this issue. It is ok if you are not able to participate actively. It would help if you could please encourage others to take up the responsibility. Just because people are not agreeing with you, posting negative or discouraging messages will not help anybody.

America is a great nation. That is why we want to stay here and want our GC sooner. JFK once said that 'Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country'. One of the reasons why America is Great is because of the people of this great nation delivered what JFK said. We all could learn from this and before making any claim to being part of the American fabric or before claiming to be from "educated" class, maybe we need to stop behaving in way that only sends out the message 'what's in it for me'.

I think we should use this opportunity to lobby Congress to pass Legislation to help legal immigration that are least controversial.

1. We should be able to file 485 independent of priority dates.
2. Exempt dependents from VISA cap.

In my opinion pursuing a lawsuit may not help us much.
We should raise money to pursue lobbying instead of the lawsuit.

IV should use this opportunity to reienforc the lobbying efforts and fund raising effors.

For my part, I will contribute individually and willing to particpate in any fund raising efforts in my area (North West Boston area).

sent the message ..
I will be asking 6 more friends to do the same.

ok made thread, lets do this...

And are the polls done for this battle?

Total BS!

How can you even suggest that the immigration related raids to be the same as ethnic cleansing.

Admins, please close this thread!

I would like to bring to the notice of your readers, editorial committee and leaders of
the Indian community of a systematic way that (legally) the US Government is practicing
legal ethnic cleansing of Indians and Chinese and other H-1B visa holders.
...............
............
..............God Bless America....God Save America from 'some' of its own people.

Thanks.

Sent a message to the editor.
Maybe we should let other news sites know about CNN's defaulting if they do not make corrections even after many requests!

If USCIS could interpret the law to their advantage we can use our resources
to fight their interpretation and force them to change their policy.

I also think we can even file a law suite in relation to "incorrect" interpretation
by USCIS.

That is because the quota system does not apply as well in the 4th quarter of each year. Thats the explanation previously given. EB India has to hope for the end of each fiscal year for some magic to happen.
EB ROW, please be patient it will be all yours after Oct. 2007 for the next 9 months.:)
Those EB India stuck in 485.................it is either now or next year summer. If you don't see yours by Sep't, unless you have a PD pre go into hibernation and wake up in June or July 2008, you might find better luck at that time.

Hi,

What makes you decide on the pre-2003 PD. why should they be out of hibernation yet. As fas as I have seen May EB3 india was May 2001, we all know what happened since then. There are still a lot of cases in labor backlog with pre-2002 cases that have not yet been cleared, june/july there were thousands of cases approved for people uptil 2005. so what will happen, will in october the dates go to - "say 01AUG03", is this what you are expecting ....

I am totally mystified by your pre2003 assumption and would love to get some more info on how that date was derived.

Sorry to hear about your situation... I seriously hope and pray that your RFE is for a small issue like birth certificate or marriage document..

Good luck and keep us posted on the matter.

God Bless.

PD Aug 2006
I 140 Filed in June 2007. Pending @ TSC
I 485 Filed on 10th Aug 2007
FP Notice received.

I'd love to do a 3d character battle--it's been a while since I've done any character work--I'm in. Definately a four week deadline, at LEAST.

well I've realized now that I can't get this thing done in time, so here's my not-so-final-but-as-final-as-it-gets images... :)


(as seen through a surv. camera)
http://www.avalon-rev.dk/junk/station2F.jpg


(as rendered through Max)
http://www.avalon-rev.dk/junk/station2FS.jpg


I really wanted to add more to 'em... :(


oh, well, consider them my finals :)


wireframe: www.avalon-rev.dk/junk/wireframe.gif

Looks like
April 2008 - 01 oct 2001
April 2009 - 01 Nov 2001
April 2010 - 01 Dec 2001

and so on...

We will def get our GC this century if we are lucky

the date is July 8th 2008 and NOT 2007 as you mentioned. July 8th 2008 is when USCIS submitted the list to the State Department regarding the demand for visa numbers. please do not confuse this with July visa bulletin developments of last year.

This part is self-explanatory. It seems that USCIS made a list of all the applicants to Jul 08, 2007 by setting PD to Jun 01, 2006.

Documentarily Qualified might possibly imply:
.. Medically OK
.. FP and Name Check OK
.. Everything in application is consistent (e.g. DOB, Name, Kids, Spouse)
.. Requires No RFE
.. Requires no interview
.. Just requires GC (Visa) Number

My 2 cents input