Adoptive Parents Are Suspected Terrorists

Shortly after we adopted our youngest child almost two years ago, my wife and I discovered that, thanks to the Patriot Act and various other regulations created by Homeland Security, adoptive parents are now suspected terrorists. We were put on a no-obtaining-of-documents list, similar to the no-fly lists we hear about in the news. We were prohibited from directly obtaining official documents for our very own child, even after the adoption was complete. The only workaround was to secure the services of an attorney that could lobby on our behalf to obtain any necessary documents.

Long ago I decided that I would do the utmost I could to live my entire life without ever using the services of a lawyer. So much for that. I compromised on my principles and decided that keeping my son was more important.

Then, after we received the paperwork from the state, we were required to immediately return the paperwork to the state so that they could confirm that the documents were legitimate before they returned them to us. Yes, you read it right. All this screwed up our taxes and tied up thousands of dollars of our own money for quite some time, with some still being tied up.

How interesting that the political party in control of both houses and the white house when the Patriot Act was passed claims to be the "Pro-Family" party. Well, I'd like to thank them again publicly for being so pro-family to us. I already thanked them in private on November 7th.