Until mid-September, before the news media launched its daily assault on the American public with stories about the economic downturn, immigration consistently ranked as the first or second most important issue facing citizens of many states, particularly those in the West and Southwest.

A late August survey by Mason-Dixon Polling and Research of 2,400 likely voters in Utah, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas and Wyoming found that 53% wanted the estimated 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S. to be offered the chance to apply for legal status.

Barack Obama and John McCain both support the proposal to accommodate illegal workers in America. In 2006, Senator Obama voted for the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act – co-sponsored by John McCain and Ted Kennedy – which proposed to both give illegal immigrants a chance at citizenship and to boost security at the U.S.-Mexico border. Although the bill was passed in the Senate, it was defeated by Congress.

In spite of each candidate’s support for this legislation, of the 4,000+ people who voted upon McCain and Obama’s respective immigration agendas on the Minekey Election 2008 microsite, an overwhelming majority of 83% approved of Obama position, whereas only 33% gave a thumbs-up for McCain. Why? Primarily because the Obama plan emphasizes giving priority to those immigrants who have applied legally for citizenship, whereas McCain’s plan proposes offering VISAs (with conditions) to all those working in the country illegally.

Says one user in support of Obama’s plan, “the whole immigration and naturalization process should very well be revamped, from the ground floor, up. Kick out illegals, but streamline legalization.” Says another, “I agree with protecting our borders but I don’t agree that we should accept amnesty. Your intentions are good when giving everyone opportunity but if they broke the law that wouldn’t be fair for the legal immigrants who worked to get here by honesty & clean record.”

Visit the Minekey Election 2008 Microsite, and discover how people from all over the world are voting on each of the Presidential candidates’ policies.

Minekey Extends its Discussion Community on Leading Social Networks to its Website to Reach Broader Audience

SUNNYVALE, CA – Sep 8, 2008 – Minekey, the Leading Discussion Community on Facebook, today launched its destination website to extend its reach to a broader audience. Minekey’s discussion network now spans across its own website and the five leading social networks – Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, Hi5 and Orkut.

To date, over 1.8 million users have participated in discussions on the Minekey network and have expressed over one million opinions, cast 40 million votes and written over seven million comments. Minekey is rated as the most addictive application on Facebook by many users and is among the top 100 social applications in activity and engagement. Minekey ranks among the top five applications in Politics, top 10 in Chat and top three applications with a high percentage of women users.

“Social networks are not very effective at connecting people outside their immediate social circles”, says Delip Andra Minekey’s Founder & CEO. “Minekey expands the social universe by helping users connect with people from all over the world through conversations”.

One great example of how Minekey makes this kind of social connection possible is the story of Samantha Sten, an ardent user from Sweden, and Antonis Konstantoudakis, another passionate user from Greece, who met on Minekey, and will soon get married. Antonis says “Minekey encourages discussion about a wide variety of subjects, while remaining surprisingly fun. Minekey makes the whole world closer, and much smaller. The experience has changed my life.” Says Samantha, “I’ve made more friends and intellectual companions in a few weeks of using Minekey than I had all the time I used Facebook without it. On Minekey, I met the love of my life, and so have many others.”

About Minekey, Inc

Minekey is the leading discussion network that connects real people through real conversations. People from all over the world hang out on Minekey and discuss stuff that matters to them such as relationships, social and political issues, religion, pop culture and more. Minekey’s proprietary technology provides recommendations on relevant topics, conversations and people with similar interests. Founded by Delip Andra in 2005 and funded by NEA IndoUS Ventures, Minekey is headquartered in Silicon Valley and has R&D offices at Delhi and IIT Kharagpur in India. For more information visit: www.minekey.com.

Next week, Minekey will be participating at TechCrunch50, the premiere event for launching new technology start-ups, and networking with the industry’s most influential VCs, entrepreneurs and media.

If you are attending the event, be sure to visit us at booth #19 in the exhibit hall. We will be running some exciting contests focusing on TC50 and the forthcoming launch of the Minekey website.

Sign-up now as a Preview user of the Minekey website!

Minekey continues to get media coverage from the very successful Lunch 2.0 it hosted back in early September. San Jose Mercury News has just featured Minekey’s Lunch 2.0 on Video. Check it out:

Check out Bambi Francisco’s interview with Minekey CEO Delip Andra, aired on Vator.tv.

Delip offers a great overview of how the Minekey Recommendations Widget personalizes the reading experience of blogs and websites.