You may be wondering where old National Lampoon writers can find work today. After all, they seem far too hostile and crass to be employed by such contemporary venues of non-inappropriate humor as The Onion.
Fortunately, there remain jobs open to men of their personalities, such as writing Israel's immigration regulations. From The Guardian:
Israel to stop issuing birth certificates to babies born to foreigners
Israel says it is not obliged to issue documentation and wants to stop foreigners using birth certificates to stay in country
Israel is to stop issuing birth certificates to babies born to foreigners – a move targeted at migrants but will also encompass diplomats and other international workers. The absence of official documentation is likely to cause major problems when applying for passports and other identity papers.
The plan was disclosed in state papers filed to the high court on Monday in response to a challenge to an existing policy of refusing to include the father's name in foreigners' birth certificates. As part of this policy, Israel also insists that only the mother's family name may be documented as the baby's last name.
The Israeli government says it has no legal obligation to issue official birth certificates to foreigners, and intends to stop doing so to prevent foreigners using such documentation to claim the right to stay in the country. Instead, foreigners will be given hospital-issued birth notices, which are currently hand-written in Hebrew.
A reader explains:
Israel is no longer issuing birth certificates for ... "illegal infiltrators" as they call them in Hebrew. Even further, they are not listing the names of the purported fathers without DNA proof of fatherhood (at the alien woman's expense!).
Thus, the wetback women, gentile servant girls and prostitutes who are imported to service the Israelis cannot use a bit of Jewish sperm to get impregnated and then stay in Israel as mothers of a half-Israeli (but not Jewish, since the mother isn't Jewish) child.
As a lawyer, I really like the "handwritten" part. Sure, the hospital may have to give SOME kind of evidence under international law, but it doesn't have to RECORD the evidence in any sort of Israeli-maintained eternal electronic database as they do for Jews. If a mother cannot provide proof that SHE is an Israeli citizen then all she gets is a handwritten birth note.
So the Israelis do the bare minimum to meet international law, yet any effort to USE the "certificate" (in Israel or elsewhere) can be immediately challenged:
"Ma'am, all you have shown me is a piece of paper. I can't even read the handwriting. You say it was written by some hospital clerk in Tel Aviv, but they have no record of ever writing it. Unless you can come up with something better, or get this note authenticated by the appropriate Israeli authorities, I am afraid I am going to have to deny you benefits and deny a passport to this child you have with you."
Or this:
"Ma'am, you say you want to sue Mr. Moses Moskowitz for child support? You will need some proof that he is the father. Do you have a birth certificate? No? Just this little scribbled piece of paper that you say the hospital gave you? That's it? No DNA test results? Ma'am, you cannot sue anyone based on nothing more than illegible scribbles and an illegible signature on a piece of paper!"
Now compare this to the State of California. In California, any woman giving birth can apply for money, name whoever she wants as the father (California requires she give a name), and the state will add her to the welfare rolls.
The state then mails an official notice to a man matching the name she gave, thereby notifying him that he has two months to challenge her statements in court.
If he doesn't respond in the two months, he is legally deemed the father and to have voluntarily waived his right to challenge paternity.
[He did have Two ... Whole ... Months, after all!]
California then steps in to collect money directly from him to offset the cash they give the mother.