[anigbrowl]

I'd advise tempering your sense of humor on this topic, since attempts to do more-or-less what you're talking about above tend to culminate in long prison sentences for both operators and customers of such a service, unless it's based in a jurisdiction that doesn't have an extradition treaty with the US. since 'securing the border' is one of those fundamentally unattainable political goals prosecutors tend to throw the book at anyone they find engaged in this kind of activity because it plays well at oversight hearings. If you want to make money by disrupting the immigration system, set up a fake law firm to scam immigrants with paperwork problems - you can run that one for ages because your erstwhile customers are afraid of the police and you won't get too heavy of a sentence if you do get caught since the lives you ruined don't belong to registered voters.

Read a lot of immigration law news and you too can develop a jaundiced attitude! Seriously, it seems like things may be improving somewhat under Loretta Lynch's administration of the DoJ but it's a bit early to tell. http://trac.syr.edu is probably the best resource that doesn't require some sort of professional or academic subscription.

[wildmusings]

> since 'securing the border' is one of those fundamentally unattainable political goals prosecutors tend to throw the book at anyone they find engaged in this kind of activity because it plays well at oversight hearings.

It's not a political ploy. If you try to make an end-run around the law, they're going to go after you to defend the rule of law. The law isn't a computer program that you can find a bug in and circumvent (well, most of the time). The law is purposefully broad and fuzzy, and is interpreted by human judges who will see through your little scheme.

It's not the prosecutor's or the judge's role to pass political judgement on the law. Their job is to uphold the laws that the people's representatives have passed.

[hackuser]

> If you try to make an end-run around the law, they're going to go after you ... It's not the prosecutor's or the judge's role to pass political judgement on the law.

They don't have the resources to prosecute more than a minority of violations, and their choices many times are based on politics.

[wildmusings]

I agree, politics does definitely have a hand, especially at the state level where prosecutors are often elected officials. Judges too. I think that's an abomination to justice, but it's the unfortunate reality.

Even at the federal level, we see the Justice department "deprioritizing" enforcement of drug laws in states that have legalized marijuana. I agree with the outcome in that particular case, but it's definitely pushing the limits of the intended separation of powers.

[brazzledazzle]

>The law isn't a computer program that you can find a bug in and circumvent (well, most of the time).

The biggest exceptions are finance and tax law right? Seems bizarre that they are though.

[wildmusings]

Yeah. It makes sense to some extent because those laws are regulating highly technical fields where legal certainty about details is important. We all benefit when public companies have that certainty.

But so much of the complexity is from politicians abusing the tax code to support their pet social projects, to benefit some company in their constituency, to protect some industry from competition, etc. Then they have to make it even more complex and technical to undo the unintended negative effects of their original abuses. Everyone involved should really be ashamed.

[rdtsc]

Have an acquaintance working in USCIS, so heard all kinds of stories. Their own perspective is interesting as well. They are very pro-US, defending the borders and the law. Yet they at the same time they are very jaded about working in what seems like a beaurocracy full of incompetency and mismanagement.