Most tourists to the U.S. come from countries with visa waiver programs. They don't need to have a visa before they come to visit - their passport is good enough.
Most tourist to the US who can afford to come to the USA normally come from countries with visa waiver programs, yes.
Exactly! But for many countries (most countries) a visa is required and getting a visa to come to visit or travel to the USA is very difficult. That's the whole reason why we have so many illegal border crossers. It's not because they are too lazy to apply for a visa. They already know their chances of getting a visa is almost 0.
I dont mean to turn this into an immigration thread but I can guarantee you that this gay marriage issue is supported by many groups who are also for an open border policy.
I was listening to a local am radio talk station and they had on an opponent to gay marriage who went through sites such as MySpace browsing profiles of alterntive lifestyle users in other nations (mostly 3rd world where visas are reuired to enter the usa) such as Thailand, Mexico, Malaysia and he commented on how many of them had sticker like political messages with rainbow colors "Legalize Gay Marriage" and messages in text referring to the "unfair" anti-gay marriage policy in the United States. Ironically, in their own country gay marriage was not only illegal but the lifestyle itself was not even tolerated. In the Favorite Places section of their profiles were listed American cities such as NYC, San Francisco and Los Angeles and in their goals section were "live in the United States".
If you live in Thailand, your chances of getting a VISA to come to the USA is almost zero. If you live in Vietnam it's a well known fact that those who apply for a visa to come to the USA have less than a 5% chance of being accepted.
It's bad enough to see that there are Americans in this country who are fighting to legalise gay marriage merely for the sake of gay marriage. However, we should not forget about other consequences of this when it comes to immigration, fiance visas and marriage visas.
Those outside the country already know these consequences and it's why they are involved in the activism of gay marriage in America.
We should also understand the motives of those people as well.