It's been nearly four months since the U.S. began accepting from employers H-1B visa petitions for IT and other professionals for temporary jobs starting in fiscal 2010, which begins Oct. 1. The weak economy continues to dampen demand of the visa most popular among employers seeking IT workers.

Since the U.S. began accepting fiscal 2010 visa petitions on April 1, the U.S. has hit about two-thirds of the annual cap on general H-1B visas. At last count, as of July 10, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services had received 44,900 H-1B visa petitions toward the congressionally mandated annual cap of 65,000.

While use of the visa in the private sector at companies like Microsoft is well-known and hotly debated, less is known about school districts' use of the program. In fact, at least 40 Washington school districts have applied for H-1B visas to employ teachers and staff over the past five years.

When Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, told a U.S. Senate committee recently that tech workers are a "privileged elite" whose wages are protected by the H-1B cap, it's clear he hadn't talked to New Jersey's IT chief.

Adel Ebeid, New Jersey's CTO, said he has seen hourly wage rates for IT contractors decline, a falloff he attributes to H-1B visa workers employed by IT contracting firms. The visa workers "are willing to settle for an hourly rate that would not be tolerated by other folks." And Ebeid's view that the availability of the visas "is driving down wages," is reflected, he said, in the state's quarterly analysis of wage rates.

"Italy's conservative prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has sought to deflect criticism of Italy's harsh immigration policies by stressing potential migrants are welcome in his country. In an interview posted to the US television network CNN's website on Monday, he said immigrants who qualified to come to Italy should be allowed to work and create a better life for themselves and their families.

"We welcome those (immigrants) who have the right to come here. This is what the United States and all normal countries do," Berlusconi told CNN.

"We are absolutely open to those who come to our country with the wish to integrate and to work... we keep an open door to all who are eligible to come to work in Italy or request asylum," Berlusconi said."

"Margaret Heintz sputtered in frustration.

"There's nothing we can do," the Marshalltown, Iowa, woman said to her daughter, Mona Kilborn, when they talked about their shared point of aggravation -- illegal immigrants.

"Mom, you can do something," Kilborn said. "You can write your congressman. I'll even get you the address."

So in September 2007, the 90-year-old Heintz put pen to paper for her first letter to a politician. Two weeks later, she died at the hands of an illegal immigrant.

"Ironic, isn't it?" Kilborn said. "This one issue, it's changed our lives forever....""

"One of President Obama's highest policy priorities is making America energy independent. The president has correctly observed that our reliance on others for essential energy needs is both a source of weakness and an impediment to the development of new technologies that would also strengthen our economy and help the environment.

In much the same way that we have avoided investing in domestic energy sources and new technologies, we have developed an unhealthy reliance on foreign workers to fill our science and technology needs. As technology has become increasingly important to our economy, U.S. companies have spent millions of dollars lobbying for increased access to foreign workers, rather than investing in American workers to fill jobs...."

"Around this time each year, thousands of foreign students graduate with science and engineering degrees from U.S. universities. Many are eager to stay in America and contribute to the U.S. economy.

So does the United States welcome them with open arms? No, the government tells thousands of them to hit the road — and take their sought-after skills and brainpower to countries and companies that compete with the USA.

Talk about a self-defeating immigration policy...."

In between establishing new national policies on healthcare, education, financial regulation and energy, the Obama Administration said last week that it is getting ready to tackle immigration, too. Part of this involves deciding whether to allow up to 85,000 foreign technical workers to enter the country under the H1-B visa program at a time when hundreds of thousands of American engineers and programmers are losing their jobs.

The yearly scramble by employers for temporary visas for foreign scientists and technology engineers started on Wednesday, with immigration authorities expecting fewer new petitions this year because of the recession and because of new restrictions on financial companies that received emergency federal aid.

For five business days beginning Wednesday, Citizenship and Immigration Services will accept petitions for the temporary visas known as H-1B for the 2010 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. In recent years, visa limits were reached in the first days of the application period.

Microsoft Corp has filed substantially fewer applications for specialty visas for next year as the weak economy depletes its need for workers, a top company official said on Wednesday.