Thread: Halt Immigration, Legal and Illegal - Mark Krikorian

Halt Immigration, Legal and Illegal - Mark Krikorian

Greater income inequality, more bilingualism and cultural balkanization and ethnic unrest, more Mexican and other foreign government involvement in our internal affairs, more vulnerability to terrorist threats, more poor people leading to progressively bigger government financed by progressively higher taxes causing progressively slower growth in productivity and per capita income.



The New Case Against Immigration
By Jamie Glazov
FrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, July 18, 2008

FP: Mark Krikorian, welcome to Frontpage Interview.

Krikorian: Glad to be here.

FP: What inspired you to write this book?

Krikorian: I've long been concerned that the various critiques of immigration were disjointed, without an overarching structure. There was a grab-bag approach, with conservatives examining, say, the security problems stemming from mass immigration, but not the effects on American blue-collar workers. Likewise liberals were often concerned about the strains on the social safety net, but might reject any concern about assimilation. This book offers a "unified field theory" of immigration limits.

What's more, too much of the debate over immigration has focused on the issue of legal status. It's an important issue, obviously, and has to be the starting point of any effort fix immigration policy. But if legality were the only problem, then just amnestying everyone and admitting an unlimited number of "willing workers," in the president's words, would solve the problem. But, of course, most of the strains created by immigration -- on schools, hospitals, assimilation, national security, what have you -- are unrelated to legal status. Thus getting away from the simplistic "illegal-bad/legal-good" dichotomy is essential.

FP: Are today's immigrants much different from those of a century ago? Are “weâ€

The New Case Against Immigration: Both Legal and Illegal
By By Kelly Lemieux, Special to the Rocky

Thursday, July 31, 2008

* Nonfiction. By Mark Krikorian. Sentinel/Penguin, $25.95. Grade: A

Book in a nutshell: Krikorian, himself a grandson of Armenian immigrants, postulates in his new book that America has a serious problem with immigrants overwhelming our social support systems and evading legal restrictions.

Citing a U.S. population of 300 million with a low birth rate compared to the developing nations sending so many to our shores every year, Krikorian makes a strong case for permanently reducing immigration, both legal and illegal.

The author laments that modern communication technologies like cell phones and e-mail allow immigrants to maintain cultural ties with their homelands that interfere with their assimilation as Americans, both linguistically and patriotically, and might lead to a sense of "transnationalism." The author also makes the expected connection between illegal immigrants and national security threats from terrorists overstaying visas, as was the case with some of the 9/11 hijackers.

In addition, he gives serious consideration to domestic, immigration-based concerns like the Latino Aztlan movement that seeks to return the American Southwest to Mexico.

Best tidbit: With regard to foreign information technology specialists, the author makes a salient point: ". . . high levels of skilled immigration sponsored by the high-tech industry may represent a special threat to America's security . . . The vulnerability created by the nexus of skilled immigration and this advanced technology has already been exploited for purposes of espionage. . . . "

Pros: Even those on the political left will find it hard to fault Krikorian's rock-solid investigation and honest evaluation of both sides of the immigration argument.

Cons: Considering that America is built on immigration, the author's suggestion of virtually closing the borders might hamper future prospects for recruiting the best and the brightest to add to our great diversity.

Final word: Krikorian's investigation is obviously based on patriotism and genuine concern, not xenophobia or bias. His ideas about enhanced assimilation techniques to promote a love of America, especially the dire need for Spanish-speaking immigrants to learn English, make this a provocative and informed read.


www.rockymountainnews.com

We have, in other words, outgrown mass immigration. It was an important phase of our national development, and played an important part in shaping who we are as a nation. But, like other phases we've passed through as a people -- pioneers settling the frontier, for instance -- it's something we need to put behind us.

Amen!