Thread: The Border War (Newsweek)

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7305528/site/newsweek/

The Border War
The longstanding debate over U.S. immigration now threatens to turn violent.
By Scott Johnson
Newsweek International

Immigration was supposed to be one of the top issues on the agenda when the leaders of the United States, Canada and Mexico gathered for a summit in the city of Waco, Texas, last week. Conservative TV broadcasters in the United States deliver rants about America's "broken borders" on an almost nightly basis, and hundreds of vigilantes are poised to descend on the arid scrubland of southern Arizona this week to launch a manhunt for some of the thousands of Mexican workers crossing into the United States each day. Yet while U.S. President George W. Bush vowed to redouble efforts to secure congressional approval of a guest-worker program he unveiled more than a year ago, he hedged his bets about its passage. "I will continue to push our Congress to come up with rational, common-sense immigration policy," Bush said in remarks addressed to Mexican President Vicente Fox. But, he added, "you don't have my pledge that Congress will act, because I'm not a member of the legislative branch."

Inaction, however, may no longer be an option. Businesses throughout the United States have grown thoroughly dependent onâ€â€

There are so many things wrong with this guy it hurts.

The story about the three little pigs and the big bad wolf has been around for a long, long time. When you look at the United States, you discover lots, and lots of people telling us we were soooooo lucky. In fact that is not true. I don’t believe Mr. Bush knows that, but historians most certainly do.

And conversely, Mexico has been unlucky. Wrong again, but that is the hot, and pop, belief. In fact, Mexico was the Babylon of the New World for a while. It was racist as you can get, and it squandered billions while it arrived at the place it is now. And where it is now is .. in ruin with a lot of their citizens looking for jobs in the United States. And for them, when you couple their verbal abuse with their efforts to get people into the United States, you have classical, and Mexican abuse. They just don’t care.

Border Patrolmen go to the National Academy for Border Patrol Officers and it is an intensive, difficult process. One to the next and they are assigned as probationary officers and evaluated. Not all of them make it. But to suggest there was a massive increase in Border Patrol officers is ludicrous. The Border Patrol Academy only graduates a couple of dozen.. though now, maybe more.. officers in any period. Nine months I believe. And with 2,000 officers in the Border Patrol, you sure don’t have a lot of people out there catching illegals… you have, in fact, at least half of those officers sleeping every day. But even more important, about one forth of those officers are on the Southern Border, while the rest are manning offices, and working on the other open areas of the United States. My goodness.. we may have some 500 officers on the Southern Border at any given time, and if they are working normal shifts, one third are on duty at any given time. My goodness… Princeton sociology professor Douglas Massey sort of looks like a dribbling idiot to me.
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Change may be impossible as long as the huge gap between wages in the United States and points south persists. "We don't have a choice anymore," says Jorge Osorio Perez, a 38-year-old Mexican who was arrested in the Arizona desert along with 23 other immigrants earlier this month. "We know this is illegal, but it's the only option we have left." Both the United States and Mexico would be well advised to create more options, and soon.

I am not sure that is the case. Mexico does not tax its population. If it did, social programs such as welfare would be enabled which would keep a huge number of Mexicans home. But social responsibility by the Mexican Government …generally… would do a lot to keeping Mexican Citizens home. The Catholic Church, which is essentially the only church allowed by Mexico, sit on their thumb and don’t do a thing. Overflowing their population into the Untied States becomes the solution, and it is a solution that the Catholic Church is actively aiding with half way houses and a great deal more.

We cannot solve Mexico's problems. Mexico has to do that. We didn't make Mexico's problem.. Mexico did, and we cannot. And it cannot be more real to suggest there are a huge number of jobs that could be outsourced to Mexico rather than bring the illegal aliens north.. with fraudulent identifications and all that happens there... and giving them jobs here. If it is cheaper to grow tomatoes in Mexico, why the devil don't we grow them there. If it is cheaper to do shoes there... do them there. But do we need to bring them north and disposess Americans and American Workers?

I don't want anything to do with solving Mexico's problems. I don't think President Fox wants anything to do with solving Mexico's problems. But it should be very, very clear to all of us that if Mr. Fox wanted a solution to the problem of jobs in Mexico, he could very easily create a climate in Mexico that would allow foreign investment. THAT.. would create jobs in Mexico very quickly.

So... why hasn't he done that?