Thread: Who Needs a Fence? Viva Mexico, USA!

Who Needs a Fence? Viva Mexico, USA!
By Lyla Ward
Sunday, March 25, 2007

When I'm not trying to think of a graceful way out of Iraq, or how to get China to buy more of the excellent low-fat products we make in this country, I ponder the problem of illegal immigration. With all due respect to those worthy legislators who have pushed for the 700-mile fence along the 2,000-mile border, or guest-worker programs or out-and-out amnesty, what are the real chances of any of these steps doing the trick and solving that thorny dilemma? My pondering has led me to believe: zilch, zero, ningun. So why don't we just end the rhetoric, put Lou Dobbs out of his misery, pool the fence money and the increased-Border-Patrol-uniform money, and (110th Congress take note) buy Mexico?

I know, I know, it's not on Craigslist, but everything has its price, and we have some world-class mergers-and-acquisitionists in this country. Plus it's been a long time since we bought a next-door neighbor -- 204 years to be exact -- and though there have been rumors that after Katrina some in the Bush administration tried to get France to take it back, on the whole Louisiana has proved to be a pretty good investment.

As for the price, it wouldn't be as expensive as you might think. We bought Louisiana -- 51,840 square miles -- for about $940,000 in 1803. (I'm pro-rating here, because of course the entire purchase was much larger.) That works out to about $18 and change per square mile. Mexico is about 761,000 square miles, and the value of the dollar today is about 45 times what it was in 1803. So we should be able to pick it up for about $616 million.

Cheap, when you consider it's costing us about $177 million a day for the war in Iraq, and when we're through, we won't even own the country. Add to that the obvious advantage to both the United States and the people of Mexico if this deal were to go through and Mexico were to become the 51st state. Probably most of the 12 to 20 million undocumented workers would want to head home right away. This would mean a good piece of change for Greyhound, because with only 52 seats on each bus, it would involve anywhere from 230,769 to 384,615 trips.

Once back in the now-state of Mexico, those workers who made less than minimum wage with no benefits in the United States would be assured of $5.15 an hour, if they found jobs. "If," because at this point Mexico would no longer be considered a cheap labor market and its jobs would have been exported to China or Qatar, and its workers would have to suck it up like other Americans.

Still, once they were legal, they would be entitled to unemployment insurance or even welfare until they could be retrained for the corporate job market, which would undoubtedly begin to surge as corporations, without seeming unpatriotic, could move their headquarters to a politically correct paradise. Given the choice, it's hard to picture a CEO picking Princeton, N.J., over Guadalajara.

Even if we were to throw in a few mink pelts and some amber fields of grain to sweeten the pot (no offense intended), we would still be ahead of the game. Illegal immigrants supposedly cost the government upwards of $61 billion a year, and an estimated $311 billion in uncollected taxes. Once Mexico was a state of the union, some say, its own oil and gas revenues could pay for the acquisition.

No doubt President Felipe Calder?n might raise some objections, because as a U.S. senator (assuming he was elected) he would not have as much influence over U.S. foreign policy as he has now. But he's a smart guy, and once he saw the health benefits package and the travel opportunities, he'd probably jump at the chance to be an official part of the U.S. government.

What it boils down to is this: If everyone in the country -- we're a nation of 300 million, after all -- shelled out just $2.05 each, we could buy Mexico without raising taxes. We wouldn't have to bring our National Guard troops back from Iraq to guard the borders, and with more people able to retire to Acapulco without losing their Medicare benefits, Florida would be less likely to sink from overpopulation.

The choice is ours. We can continue to have our lowest-paying jobs filled by foreigners, or we can reserve them for our own people, our newest citizens. Write your congressman today. Viva Mexico, USA!


lylaward@sbcglobal.net

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... nt/outlook

Maybe we should think like Israel. I like this fence, I mean wall.

See wall'


The great wall of Israel
Nov 24, 2002 – By Yoav Appel, Associated Press

Yoav Appel, at The Associated Press, has reported that Israel has begun construction of its new electronic security fence along the entire West Bank:

Israeli bulldozers flattened ground Sunday for an electronic fence that is planned to eventually run the entire length of the West Bank - a disputed project aimed at protecting Israelis from Palestinian suicide bombers. Those backing the barrier say it does not, in any way, stake out a final border between the Israelis and Palestinians.


Ben-Eliezer, who visited the construction site at Salem Junction on Sunday, said the fence isn’t intended to be a political barrier. ‘It has one and only one clear aim - to defend the lives of Israeli citizens,’ Ben-Eliezer said. ‘Every extra day that passes without the fence being built could cost us more victims.’ At a meeting of Sharon’s Cabinet Sunday, several ministers raised objections. Work on the fence, which is to be part of a system of defensive measures to stop or curb suicide bombers from launching attacks against Israelis from Palestinian areas, will go ahead for now, but the smaller security Cabinet was expected to take up the issue Wednesday.

Sharon, an ardent supporter of Israeli settlement expansion for decades, opposes the barrier for ideological reasons. He reluctantly gave his approval this month. Of the nearly 70 suicide bombings in Israel over the past 20 months, all have been launched from the West Bank, which has no barrier separating it from Israel. Groups that have carried out many of the bombings, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, are strongest in the Gaza Strip. But no suicide bombers have come from Gaza, which is fenced in. Ben-Eliezer said the fence eventually will stretch 215 miles, which is the full length of the ‘Green Line’ - the Israeli border before Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war.
.

Yaron said the cost would be close to $2 million per mile. Separately, Israel already is building a fence and trenches around the borders of east Jerusalem to control the flow of Palestinians into the city from the West Bank. Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, while Palestinians seek the eastern sector for a future capital. Bush, who is expected to address how to advance Mideast peace this week, has not announced whether provisional Palestinian statehood is an idea he intends to push. In Washington, a Bush administration official said Sunday on condition of anonymity that the president was still considering whether to do so.

Media reports have said he may propose offering the Palestinians a state with limitations on the approximately 40 percent of West Bank and two-thirds of the Gaza Strip already under full or partial Palestinian autonomy as a result of the 1990s Israel-PLO interim accords. Cabinet Secretary Gideon Saar said Sharon briefed the Cabinet about his meeting last week at the White House, telling ministers he had told Bush that a Palestinian state can only come once Palestinian violence stops, serious reforms are implemented and general elections are held.


. http://www.securityinnovator.com/index. ... ctionID=27

Ever heard the term....buyer remorse?