Ever since I was a kid Halloween used to be my second favorite day of the year next to Christmas. In one evening I could manage to collect at least a grocery bag full of candy. It was a fun adventure to go through the neighborhood collecting the booty and in the process all of us kids learned something about our neighbors, and perhaps sociology. As I canvassed the streets for candy I swore that when I was an adult I would be generous to the trick-or-treaters so that future generations of kids could have as much joy as I felt on that one crazy night of the year.

For the most part I have upheld my pledge to myself. I never refuse a trick-or-treater and I am conscientious to hand out quality candy — not that cheap crud that is wrapped in orange or black paper. The kids that come to my house get candy bars and M&Ms!

But, the last few years have been different. The number of kids from the local neighborhoods has dwindled to almost zero while the number of kids from outside the area has increased.

Part of the reason for the decreasing number of kids is that is our neighborhood has matured so there are less young kids. Nowadays most kids go to parties or community events so they just don’t do Halloween anymore. The tradition is definitely dying.

For the last several years most of the new kids that knock on the door are minorities. The largest group by far are the Mexican kids. There are also growing numbers of East Indian (Desis) and Asian kids from the growing population of families that come with H-1B visas to work primarily at Intel. It’s a very noticeable trend especially because most of the homeowners in the area are white.

So, where are these kids coming from?

In many cases they arrive in vans that park in inconspicuous places so that the kids can case neighborhoods en masse. The kids are highly organized but nobody seems to know by whom. Many internet blogs and forums throughout the country report this phenomenon. Except for this Boston Globe article there is almost no mention of it in the press. I have yet to find an article in a newspaper that talks about it. See these forums for the gossip: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

Personally I always welcome those minority kids into our neighborhood for Halloween but many neighbors are less accepting and don’t appreciate the trend. I might feel the same way if several hundred hit my house because I would run out of candy. I have no problem with those kids visiting us because they are usually well mannered, they say ”trick-or-treat” and ”thank you”, and they dress in cute costumes. What I like most about these families (illegal or otherwise) is that they participate in a great pagan tradition that is truly American. It's an encouraging sign that they are being assimilated into our culture.

This year there were almost no trick-or-treaters so I turned off the house lights and as a result never got a single ring of the doorbell. I walked outside to see what was going on and noticed the streets were empty. No neighborhood kids and no Mexicans. I got to thinking about what could have possibly happened to them. Their absence must be caused by a new resident on the block — an officer for the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office under Joe Arpaio. He drives his huge black SUV home and parks it in the driveway. It's very conspicuous. My guess is that the sight of that vehicle scared the Mexicans away.

I talked to friends in other neighborhoods and they were still visited by the vans, so it appears the Mexicans are still around but they chose to avoid our neighborhood.

It’s quite irrational for their parents to fear that a sheriff officer would sit outside his house and round up kids who are participating in an American tradition. Unfortunately that’s typical of the polarizing hysteria that special interest groups and the mainstream media have drummed up over Arizona’s tough new immigration law: SB 1070. I’m sure most of you are aware of the protests in San Fransicko today because it’s the first day of the appeal to the 9th Circuit Court, so I won’t harp on that one.

Today is election day — and the one issue people won’t be voting on is whether they will have a job by the time the 2012 elections start. That’s because there are no politicians that support all three of these three simple ways to produce jobs for Americans:

1. Reduce or abolish employment based visa programs such as H-1B.
2. Stop illegal immigration and restrict the legal kind.
3. Enact protectionist legislation to slow down or even stop offshore outsourcing.

Restrictionist policies and protectionism are two dirty words that politicians rarely talk about except when they warn naive voters against the evils of opposing free trade and open borders. Fortunately for the politicians the voters didn't care enough to force the issues to be discussed, so the entire nation buried it's collective heads into the sand.

Oh sure, there has been a lot of talk about immigration lately. Most of the talk has been has focused on superficial aspects of illegal immigration — such as whether we should arrest kids who are buying ice cream cones (or asking for Halloween candy).

Offshore outsourcing has probably received slightly more attention, although the political debates have been few and far between. Most of the time the debates on outsourcing were comic charades, like for instance when Sen. Barbara Boxer assailed Carly Fiorina for supporting outsourcing even though everyone knows that Boxer is a toadie for the Silicon Valley corporations that insource (H-1B) and outsource jobs.

It's worth noting that the only recent attempt at reining in offshoring was stopped in the Senate and yet there was almost nothing said in the public about the defeat of the bill. Despite the so-called fear over outsourcing there wasn't enough public outrage to get the attention of the ruling elite.

So, the bottom line is that Americans are worried about jobs but not enough to do something about it by demanding action on immigration and outsourcing. For the most part the politicians were let completely off the hook by an apathetic and ignorant public.

Regardless of the outcome of the 2010 election we should expect to see more immigration, more guest workers, and more offshoring of our industries as voters show they don't care what politicians do about jobs. Americans got tricked and now the fat cat corporatocrats and the power mad globalists will feast on the treats.