Thread: Freds Right, We Were Betrayed

http://fredoneverything.net/FOE_Frame_Column.htm

Brutality In Mexico

The Horror. The Horror.



April 19, 2006

Bobbling about on the web, like flotsam in some drear tidal pool, is a piece purporting to show that Mexico mistreats immigrants in all manner of ways offensive to the North American soul. Most curious. I am one of those immigrants, and still waiting to be mistreated.

The specific charges:

“In brief, the Mexican Constitution states that:
Immigrants and foreign visitors are banned from public political discourse.
Immigrants and foreigners are denied certain basic property rights.
Immigrants are denied equal employment rights.
Immigrants and naturalized citizens will never be treated as real Mexican citizens.
Immigrants and naturalized citizens are not to be trusted in public service.
Immigrants and naturalized citizens may never become members of the clergy.
Private citizens may make citizens arrests of lawbreakers (i.e., illegal immigrants) and hand them to the authorities.
Immigrants may be expelled from Mexico for any reason and without due process."

Most of this is true. Much of it is trying too hard. If it is intended to suggest that Mexico behaves badly toward legal immigrants, it is silly. Many hundreds of thousands of American citizens live here and like it. After all, if they didn’t, they could leave. Further, I think the law entirely reasonable—provided that you realize that the Mexican government exists for the benefit of Mexicans, not gringos.

Bear in mind that the United States is far more powerful than Mexico, and far richer, and that America and Americans are by nature meddlesome. At the national level the US tries to impose democracy, change “regimes,” and dictate social policy in all sorts of countries. At the level of the individual, Americans, certainly those in Mexico, try to pass leash laws, make horses wear diapers, regulate smoking, and set closing hours for bars. Neither the US nor most of its people grasp that some things are simply not their business.

Protecting Mexico from such intrusiveness is a concern of the government here.

Politics? No, you may not engage in politics. I am not sure why Americans think they should be permitted to, but I know why Mexicans think that they should not. In the Yankee enclaves, they would take over and run things as they wanted, not as Mexicans want. They would want rules, regulations, correct attitudes, laws, laws, laws. They would want to instruct Mexico. There would be encampments of activists demonstrating in Chiapas. (When the US has solved its own ethnic problems, then perhaps it might make polite suggestions to others. Day after tomorrow, you think?) And a naturalized American is just an American with a different piece of paper in his pocket: Same attitudes, culture, and lack of respect for other countries.

The Mexican approach is, “You are free to live here, but we will make our own laws, thank you.” Which makes perfect sense to me. I came here in large part to escape the micromanagement of everything by the damned government up north.

“Basic property rights”? These are what a particular country says they are, not what the United States thinks they ought to be. Things are a tad complex here for historical reasons—the ejidos, land reform for the indigenes and so on. The practical fact is that if they could, Americans and American corporations would buy up, for example, all the best beachfront land. They don’t, because Mexico won’t let them, which is exactly the right policy. (There are complex trusts that let foreigners pretty much own land near the beaches, and many do this.) The fact is that countless gringos own homes in Mexico with no problem. I do, for example.

From the website of Adriana Perez Flores,* my attorney in Mexico: “Until recently, foreigners could not buy land in Mexico unless the title was placed in a Trust (Fideicomiso). Now a foreigner can purchase a home or vacant lot in his own name, except for property located within 50 kilometers of the coast, or national border. A home in Puerto Vallarta or Nuevo Laredo would still need to be purchased in the name of a trust.”

Employment “rights”? Why do Americans think they have a right to work in Mexico? As in most countries you need to get a work permit, and here they tend not to be issued if you are going to take work away from a Mexican. Perversely, Mexico does not believe that it exists to employ gringos. Gosh.

If you want to live here, it’s easy. You get a tourist visa for 90 days when you land (try that in the US), and with no hassle you can then get FM-3 residence status (try that in the US), provided you can demonstrate in income of $1000 a month. (You are welcome, but Mexico isn’t going to support you. Why should it?) Driver’s licenses are easy. You can bring your car and belongings, and no, the police aren’t going to give you a hard time. The government hassles you far here less than does the government up north. But also no, you are not going into politics and, if you do something adequately undesirable, you will be chucked unceremoniously out. And why not?

“Due process”? You aren't a citizen. (Read the Patriot Act, by the way.) Behave or go away. Mexico is much less a police state, much less watched, tapped, bugged, cross-referenced, data-based, regulated, intimidated, regimented and politically corrected than the US, which is a major reason why people come here.

Now, Americans will say, “But Fred, all these Mexicans come into the US and get welfare, school for their kids, driver’s licenses and medical care, and don’t pay taxes, and who knows what all. It isn’t fair.”

To which I respond: “All true. But why is it Mexico’s fault? You practically invite them. Mexico has no obligation to keep its citizens in, though the United States has the right to keep them out. If you folks up north choose to let in poor Mexicans, don’t be surprised when you have poor Mexicans.”

Note that the immigration problem is entirely of America’s making. Laws, decisions in the courts, amnesties, interpretation of the Constitution, and policy all encourage illegal immigration. What the US does is to say to impoverished and desperate people, “See this river? Don’t cross it. If you do, we’ll give you all sorts of privileges, and jobs, and a chance to advance in life and give your kids a good future. Now, don’t cross it, you hear?”

Keeping immigrants out would once have been easy, but you didn’t do it. You could have fined employers a thousand dollars a day for hiring illegals, half of it to go to whoever turned the employer in; denied them all services, and deported them instantly. Today, taking things away from people who have lives in the States and kids in the schools would be brutal. (You are going to forcibly deport millions of people? That will be pretty.) And of course they soon come to have the votes to make deportation impossible. But it wouldn’t have been in the beginning. Don’t blame Mexico for having an immigration policy more sensible than yours.

I think you are missing the point of the posting of Mexico's immigration laws. We are not criticizing Mexico's laws. We love his laws and wish to model our immigration laws after his. Some of the ones we want to copy are being in the U.S. is a felony punishable by a fine and 2 years in jail. If a U.S. citizen marries a Mexican citizen just so the Mexican citizen can enter the country, well that's punishable by a fine and 10 years in jail. You know, things like that.

As you say, some people should just learn when its none of their business. President Fox wants the citizens that he throws away to be welcomed with open arms by Americans. He encourages them to jump the border and come here illegally and work at low paying jobs and send the money back home so he can take a percentage of it off the top to pay for his lavish lifestyle. On the other hand, he crys foul if we want to add a U.S. surcharge to any money going to Mexico. No, he wants to be the only pimp here.

Time to take off the rose colored glasses in regard to El Presidente. He and his elite rich class live like kings and then he has millions of peasants that live like pigs. He taxes the poor and does not tax the rich.

In case you were unaware, El Presidente Fox has threatened individual states and persons in this country with lawsuits because of the way they have chosen to handle illegal immigration. If anybody dares utter the word deportation or detainment he has something to say. Just the other day he threatened to sue the state of Georgia because they will no longer provide free social services for illegal immigrants. Any measure we suggest to curtail the stampede of illegal immigrants into this country gets a response from him.

His meddlesome comments of how we do business is an indication of his arrogance and complete disregard for sovreignty.

You have found Mexico to your liking. That's great. You are obviously there legally and have become a productive member of society. Mexico should be nice because most of the people that personify poverty are no longer there, they're over here.

I think you would see a different picture if you went there with no money, no skill and no education like the the majority of the illegal immigrants that come here.

Ok, first off, I did not right that article. It was written by a guy named Fred Reed who lives in mexico. I live in so.cal. I don't always agree with Fred but I think he has a unique look at some things. Illegal immigration is just one.
To that end, there are only 2 points I agree with him on:

1. We could have taken seriouse action to keep them out...but we did not(Thanks to the jacobites in washington) now we have an enormous problem instead of a relativly small one. We should NEVER have even considered amnesty in the 80's in the first place.

2. By way of in-action and not having our gov. do anything about the illegal problem, the U.S. in, effect, did practicaly invite them.

I do think it is possible to deport them all. I also think a wall is better than nothing. I am all for LEGAL immigration in smaller numbers. I am not for anything about being illegal in this once great nation.

Originally Posted by barth49

“All true. But why is it Mexico’s fault? You practically invite them. Mexico has no obligation to keep its citizens in, though the United States has the right to keep them out. If you folks up north choose to let in poor Mexicans, don’t be surprised when you have poor Mexicans.”

Note that the immigration problem is entirely of America’s making. Laws, decisions in the courts, amnesties, interpretation of the Constitution, and policy all encourage illegal immigration. What the US does is to say to impoverished and desperate people, “See this river? Don’t cross it. If you do, we’ll give you all sorts of privileges, and jobs, and a chance to advance in life and give your kids a good future. Now, don’t cross it, you hear?”

Your friend Fred hit the nail on the head. The runaway illegal invasion is the fault of the conspiratorial policies of our fearless leaders. Our fault lay in believing their lies and promises. But NO MORE !

We won't be able to undo all the damage, but we can undo some. And we WILL guarantee that this idiotic system gets changed, politician by politician. We were blind, and now we see. We were silent, but will be silent NO MORE !

It is so simple, you don't have to deport illegals, all you have to do is dry up the jobs, dry up the entitlements, dry up the automatic citizenship for droping babies here, stop making things easy with the accomadation of their language. I got so mad today, made a call to my bank and got the automatic voice mail, first question out of the box was "do you want to speak in english if so press 1, can you believe that, not do you want to speak in spanish but do you want to speak in English like english is the second language now!I bought a new tv the other day first language on the box was spanish, english was second, can you see it coming folks? If we stop all these things I promise you 90 percent will go home and we won't have to send them on planes, how redundant that is to think we have to send them home by plane!

If we stop all these things I promise you 90 percent will go home

Agreed! No one is saying deport all of them in a day.