Thread: Courage needed on population growth

Courage needed on population

Froma Harrop

"Population Explosion" was a call to arms for American environmentalists 40 years ago, amid fears that baby boomers would have big families. That didn't happen, but hyper-population-growth is occurring now due to large-scale immigration.

California has just projected a population of 60 million by mid-century, up 5 million from its forecast of only three years ago. We're talking about a 75 percent leap between 2000 and 2050 - by any measure, a population explosion.

That's the truth, but one that has sent many environmental leaders into hiding. Most of California's population growth will come from immigrants and their relatively high birthrates, but the Sierra Club refuses to touch the matter. Once a tiger on U.S. population growth, it has retreated behind calls for a global approach that, it contends, will reduce the demands to immigrate to the United States.

Problem. Despite great strides in reducing birthrates in many poor countries - Mexico is one of the success stories - the world's population is still expected to jump to 9 billion from 6 billion by 2050. Mass immigration to the United States, if anything, eases the pressure on other governments to promote family planning.

Not a few Sierra Club members have challenged the group's spineless response to a spiraling American population. Prominent among them is Dick Lamm, the former Democratic governor of Colorado.

"I can't believe my friends who are still jerking their knees out of the '60s," says the always outspoken Lamm. "It's really important to be sensitive, but I can't understand the fact that we are not talking about issues that are fundamental to America's future."

Overpopulation isn't the only environmental threat, Lamm concedes, "But if you pass every item on the Sierra Club's agenda, yet you have a billion Americans at the end of the century, it's a Pyrrhic victory (a gain offset by staggering losses)."

The prospect of 25 million more Californians in a mere 40 years - and the added cars, shopping malls, sprawling developments and lost species that implies - alarms a splinter group called Sierrans for U.S. Population Stabilization (www.susps.org).

"With that kind of overpopulation, California is going to be importing virtually all the resources needed to sustain ourselves," warns the faction's co-chairman, Dick Schneider.

A consultant on citizens' growth-control ballot measures, Schneider says that California cities and towns will be pretty much on their own. Some may try to set zoning that balances their goals for open space, quality of life and projections for growth. That will require fighting off the real-estate developers who often dominate local governments and accepting a loss of state money.

Demographers say that the population boom could be slowed if Californians refuse to build the roads and other infrastructure needed to accommodate the surge. The resulting congestion would stall the economy - attracting fewer people and prompting more Californians to relocate. This emigration, already well underway, would export California's population pressures to Arizona, Colorado, Oregon, Washington and other Western states.

This is what passes for population policy in the United States: Make people so miserable that they leave.

There have been glimmers of liberal courage. In 1996, President Clinton's Council on Sustainable Development called for a halt in population growth, citing mass immigration as a main driver. While noting the delicacy of the issue, the group forthrightly recommended, "Priority attention should be given to implement and enforce national policies on illegal and legal immigration."

Population concerns took a back seat during the recent struggle over immigration reform. But because the bill would have vastly accelerated the numbers of legal entrants, its defeat ended up serving the cause.

It really is time for a national population policy - an honest one.

Froma Harrop is a Providence Journal columnist. Contact her by writing to fharrop@projo.com.




http://www.heraldnet.com/article/200707 ... /707290312

People who say we can't raise this issue for PC reasons are saying in effect, that times and circumstances never change, and laws cannot be revisited. We saw, on a thread here, how some foreigners believe that there is some sort of right to come here in our Constitution. Others don't even recognize that we are a sovereign nation - they think we're opportunistic johnny-come-latelies who are simply trying to hog America for ourselves, and who have no prior rights or different standing from them. We will not get any sympathy from the envious - our nation seems almost empty by some standards, and pressure on them to leave for greener pastures will only have more and more knocking on our door (or busting it down).

Back in the 1960s, the founder of the Hare Krishna movement came here and travelled in America. He made the remark that he thought America should open its borders to India and allow their poor to come here and occupy all the empty land he saw. He was talking about our farms, ranches, open space, parks, national forrests, etc.

Many of the foreign people who will oppose this are motivated by simple envy, and there will be no reasoning with them.

Many of the foreign people who will oppose this are motivated by simple envy, and there will be no reasoning with them.

...this is a salient point. We have let PC and an extreme liberal attitude take over our discussions, legislation and even our thought processes. Certain things are really non-refuatable: national sovereignity, our right to control our borders, the need and commitment to enforce our laws, the glare of the population explosion, and illegal is illegal. Yet we allow dissenting and nefarious opponents freeze us into non-action. That has allowed the current crisis on our country and will untimately contribute to our destruction if we continue on this path.

What I am thinking is that there needs to be some sort of national discussion and awakening in our citizens concerning what it means to be an American and what America really is all about. Our borders were open during times when there was a perceived need for more working population, not because we renounced the sovereign right to control 'naturalization' (Article I. Section .

So, how does the Preamble (We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.) jibe with the Reconquista and Mexica movements, illegal immigration, work visa fraud and abuse, the shipping of sensitive data overseas along with our jobs, becoming utterly dependent upon imports for everything (staples and labor) to the point where we become vulnerable to public health disasters, and I could go on and on.

It seems clear to me that it is in the best interests of America to beef up locally making and doing things, while for years now it has been simply cheaper to buy from abroad. We were always a capable and energetic people, and will be again once HR stops shunning citizens.