The Associated Press reports most Mexicans accept illegal immigration as a fact of life they can't imagine changing:
Mexico's economy, society and political system are built around the assumption that migration and amnesties for undocumented migrants will continue — and that the $20 billion they send home every year will keep coming, and almost certainly grow.
In fact, the government is counting on continued cash from a Mexican-born U.S. population it predicts will rise from 11 million to between 17.9 million and 20.4 million by 2030.
"There have been amnesties and reforms before, and they will continue to occur periodically," said Jesus Cervantes, director of statistics for Mexico's Central Bank.
President Vicente Fox is one of many Mexican who considers the migrants "heroes," because they send money to their impoverished home villages, and in some cases risk death walking into America in pitiless desert sun.
Many families give their babies "American" names, figuring it will help them fit in when they make the inevitable trip north. In one central Mexican village, men on a dusty side road knowingly discuss which Long Island towns are best for day-labor work.
Cervantes avoids using the common metaphor of migration as an escape valve for Mexico's social tensions, but says the country of 105 million people would be in trouble if 11 million migrants returned en masse.
[. . .]
Few in Mexico question the prevailing feeling that Mexicans have an inalienable right to go north, documented or not.
This article highlights my biggest concern about the so-called immigration reform proposals that include legalization of some or all of the 12 million illegal aliens already in this country. It will simply encourage more to illegals to come expecting that eventually they too will be legalized.
That lesson was learned with the adoption of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 ("IRCA"). That "immigration reform" legalized 4 million illegal aliens. IRCA has been a monumental failure. Twenty years later there 12 million illegal aliens to legalize. If some or all of these millions of illegals are now legalized, then we should only expect that twenty years from now we will have to consider granting amnesty to 36 million more new illegal aliens to legalize.
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Comments: 19
Mexico has thousands of miles of seacoast,
Minerals
Oil
Arable farmland
Mexico's elite reap all the benefit. The U.S. is expected to suck up the excess of people and prevent revolution, by releasing the pressure of too much poverty and brutality.
I still say we maybe need to Annex Mexico, before we become Mexico.
Spencer have you sent your legislators a letter? If not please do.
Tell them what you think. I don't care if you agree with me or not, but we can't let this drop off the news/action radar.
Lots of information.
and Yes I am running around the site collecting suggestions. To shape into some kind of document/letter
But in April a Rasmussen poll found Americans are divided on legalization of illegal aliens. 41% favor letting immigrants move towards citizenship by paying a fine, paying back taxes, and learning to speak English. Forty-two percent (42%) are opposed.
Last week on PBS they interviewed some who have been here illegally for years. They remain because crossing is dangerous and uncertain, though they would return if they could, because they are Mexicans at heart and still love their country. Legalizing these people -those who have been here for years- only makes sense, as well as making it easier for others to cross, work and earn the money they desparately need, and then return, knowing that they can come back and repeat that effort, earn that money, and do so without fear of exploitation by coyotes, smugglers, or unprincipled employers. Many who stay here now, burdening our support systems, would probably return to Mexico if given the fair chance to do so and return when they need to. Why not let them?
Building walls, and making laws, to deflect mass movements of people has never worked. The Berlin wall, the Great Wall of China, Hadrian's wall, never worked. The Iron curtain never worked. You have to look behind the physical and see the reasons for any human event, and either make it easier or unnecessary.
I truly believe making it easier for people to cross borders in order to work and attain their dreams will, in the end, make it unnecessary.
Ronald,
I can see that you are a very compassionate human. I suspect you think I , Mimi, Zenith and Yankee are not. I see you live in a state that has virtually no impact from these. . 12 million unauthorized immigrants. When in fact you are talking about our neighbors, we know what the impact is.
Your post is a little confusing. Are you saying this person never went back to Mexico, because he finds crossing the dessert too frightening and difficult.
If you are on this side, you can cross back at one of the towns, located on the border between Texas, NM, AZ, and CA and Mexico.
Ronald, do you find it to be a good situation that 12 million people, plus the employers of those people are all engaged in law breaking. Do you think
this is beneficial to the citizens of a nation who's culture is based on law?
I am still having trouble understanding the huge reluctance of so many to consider, 12 Million illegal immigrants a problem, and instead think any who are opposed, and very concerned are right wing nut case racists.
Well there are the ones who consider being against illegal immigration to be anti-business. At least to them it is just money not morality.
So Ronald, you will not engage in any activity to try to stop all this unauthorized immigration, (such as write your U.S legislators) you will pretend that it is perfectly ok for 12 million people and their employers to live and work in a state of lawlessness, but you will believe that you are more good and more compassionate.
than I.
Worker's program is okay ...
Illegal Aliens and American Medicine
Madeleine Pelner Cosman. Phd, Esq.
The Seen and the Unseen
EMTALA (Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act
Anchor Babies
Contagious Diseases
CRAG - a proposal to prevent medical cataclysm: Close American Borders; Rescind
citizanship of anchor babies; Aiding and abetting illigeal aliens is a crime;
Grant no new amnesties.
Journal of American Physicans and Surgeons
Volumne 10, Number 1 Spring 2005
http://www.jpands.org/vol10no1/cosman.pdf
What is the economic value of that cheap labor to the American economy?
Does that value offset the costs enumerated above?
It it does, then I'd say keep the status quo.
If it doesn't... build that fence on the Mexican border.
You state your case well, but there are still issues to be dealt with.
We,as a nation, have allowed illegals to cross our borders for decades. Why didn't anybody notice this was happening until now ? How did 8 to 12 million people just cross our borders and establish a working lifestyle here without drawing attention to themselves ?
If we, the public, were serious about dealing with this issue and not just using as a form of national entertainment until we got bored with it, we would be searching out the causes the led to 8 to 12 million people just showing up in our country and deciding that they could stay.
Reverse the roles for a second. If any one of us wanted to sneak into another country to live and work, what would be the parameters that we would base not only the decision to stay in that country on, but to encourage others to follw us there as well ?
You know and I know that constant would be the overall feeling that the people who lived in the country we were trying into sneak into didn't really care if we snuck in.
That's the situation that has existed in the United States for the better part of twenty years. As a whole, nobody here really cared that these illegals were pouring across our borders. Who is to blame for that ?
If we are going to deal with this problem, and not just entertain ourselves with it, these questions must be answered.
Stories about ellected officals having to remove their names from lists of nominations because they were found to be employing illegals have been popping up for years, and the backlash from we the people has been zero.
Many voices demand that companies that hire illegals be fined. Do those same voices endorse the companies doing the hiring to raise the price of their products to cover the cost of hiring legal workers ?
There are many questions no one seems to want to answer, yet these questions are part of the problem. Just how serious are we about actually solving this issue ?
Why should we show mercy to them when none is shown by them?
Asa former Immigration Inspector in El Paso, Texas, I can assure you that thousands of illegals return home every Christmans and Easter. How do I know this? Because apprehensions of illegals always spiked immediately after the two biggest Christian/Family holidays in Mexico. The proof we had to refuse entry to these returning illegals? Old check stubs from U.S. employers, utility bills in their names to a U.S. address, drivers' licenses, and all sorts of other documents indicating these individuals had already been in the U.S. and had simply gone "home for the holidays". Not to mention that once they were caught red handed, they would attest under oath, "Yeah, I've been working in Denver for the past 5 years. This is the first time I've been caught." A wall might not work on it's own, but it would help, along with the deployment of some National Guard to assist the Border Patrol. Check out my article "Let's Talk Immigration" to see more on my opinion on the subject.
" As a whole, nobody here really cared that these illegals were pouring across our borders"- In California we did care. Illegal immigration is not a "new" topic here- this has been raging for a number of years, finally boiling over with national headlines.
(it is a NATIONAL border and NATIONAL LAW issue ok, folks)
No improvement in reducing the numbers of new illegal (unauthorized now the pc term)
But if ya'll out there in the land of your few sweet immigrants need to feel this impact, it is entirely possible that some kind of internet site could be set up directing them to your freindly waiting arms.
might work, might work, might work, our schools are bursting, our health services are closing, there is no housing, there have not been enough jobs for several years now, ok, it might work, it might work,
We just need a rumor to send them to Main and other states,
Thanks for the great article, seeing the incredible numbers of the illegal immigration has really done it for me. After seeing the blatant display of total disregard for the laws of this country. The illegal aliens demonstrating with the crowd of Latin Americans has told me how the illegals really see this country. No Fear. They truly believe nothing will be done to put a stop to their ability to come here and get all that goes with being an American. For our own president to say that they do the work that Americans won't do is an outright lie. The unemployment level for Americans are so high I really doubt that we would turn down any job
Thanks for the border state point of view, it allows me to ask my next question:
" Why didn't the rest of the country show concern or interest when border states had an illegal problems big enough to require laws to be passed twenty years ago ? "
( I do believe residents of border states know the answer to this question all to well. )
Their schools are not overflowing, their county hospitals are not closing,
They don't have a few million people living in garages and other make shift housing. They don't have a few dozen men standing around on corners all over their towns waiting to be hired, they don't have people standing on corners selling fruit and/or trinkets/clothes, what ever.
That was a Federal Law, name is Simpson-Mazzoli, and signed by Regan.
1986 Immigration Reform Law.
You're offended by people selling "trinkets/clothes, what ever.?" You think unemployed men standing aroung on street corners are unsightly? Just what kind of world did you think you lived in?
Here in Maine unemployment is a fact of life, and always has been. I grew up in a trailer camp in Pennsylvania and saw my steel-worker father work part time jobs every time he was laid off or on strike. He ended his working life working two jobs. I've worked as many as three at a time here in Maine to make ends meet. Maybe my empathy for illegal immigrants is more a case of identiy than you can muster. I've been there, and I didn't have to cross any border for the priviledge.
All I'm saying is that documenting these people legally may just do away with the exploitation they suffer from and free them to pursue life in this country more openly, and to bargin for better jobs and a better life. Maybe then they won't be forced into garages and miserably living conditions. Treat people like human beings and just maybe they'll surprise you by behaving like human being.
As for the legal aspect, I agree that the law is a bulwark against aberrant behavior. However, the Undergroung Railroad was illegal in it's day as well. Ask yourself now whether you would have obeyed it or not.