Tis the season in which citizens are urged to feel compassion toward foreign job thieves who broke into America and then got themselves into trouble.

It's not enough that we are forced to pay billions yearly in healthcare and other costs for illegal aliens: we are guilt-tripped by the press that we should be happy to redistribute our hard-earned dollars toward foreign invaders, and particularly around Christmas.

In southern Mexifornia, the tab is still accumulating from recent fires (see the previous Wildfire Costs Include Expensive Healthcare for Illegal Mexicans).

(One study put the 2006 cost of illegal alien medical care in San Diego County at $155 million.)

The San Diego Union Tribune featured the story of Maria Guadalupe Beltran, a Mexican who was caught in the October fire and later died [Mother of 4 burned near Tecate dies of injuries, November 11, 2007)]

In a December 8 article in the North County Times, Families of burned illegal immigrants grieve while medical bills and questions mount, one subhead was "A family without Christmas," where the misery was sensitively detailed.

More interesting was the material included and omitted from the section "Who will pay?"

Mercado said his wife had health insurance, provided through her U.S.-born children, to cover her medical costs. Dr. Thomas McAfee, UCSD's physician-in-chief, said he was unaware of Beltran's case, but said that the hospital had been able to get emergency Medi-Cal coverage for some of the patients. [...]

McAfee said that during previous fires the average cost of care per burn victim was about $90,000. However, he cautioned that costs can vary widely depending on the care that is needed. [...]

In California, hospitals spent more than $1 billion in 2005 on health care for illegal immigrants that was not reimbursed by federal or state programs, according to federal government estimates. Meanwhile, the state received $66 million in federal money in 2005. The county received about $1.4 million.

We know who pays — not the illegal aliens themselves, not the enemy Mexican government that pushes its poor peasants out the door, but the overburdened American citizen.

It's all taxpayer money, whether it's strained through Washington or Sacramexico. Celebrate the season of American generosity—whether you want to contribute or not.

Of course, if America had a real border, the Beltran-Mercado family would all be happily alive in the beloved homeland of Mexico. No Feliz Navidad for them.