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I know you're not addressing me, but I don't want to invade Mexico. That being said Mexico, like Afghanistan, has a responsibility to police its territory so its territory doesn't become a path for every caravan from every G-dforsaken country to get to the U.S. The U.S. has a very real humanitarian crisis on its borders and not of its making. Mexico allowed thousands of people to come through that it knew could not legally enter the U.S. The U.S. has a right to repel caravans, as much as any other invading force. Just as Afghanistan had a responsibility not to become a base for Al Qaeda.
1. I'm breaking my own rule responding to this.
2. My post was in response to another poster's proposal to annex a large part of Mexico. First, that would be illegal under any international law that I'm even vaguely familiar with.
3. Second, were we to annex a large part of Mexico that wouldn't eliminate the border issues, just move them.
1. I'm breaking my own rule responding to this.
2. My post was in response to another poster's proposal to annex a large part of Mexico. First, that would be illegal under any international law that I'm even vaguely familiar with.
3. Second, were we to annex a large part of Mexico that wouldn't eliminate the border issues, just move them.
That's what my post was about.
All not bad points. Maybe time that "rule" be forgotten? I lost my temper on one very bad day. Also, and I don't remember the timing of our disagreement, I had a TIA on October 31, 2017 and really wasn't myself until around February 2018.
I’m biased. The milieu in which I was raised and in which much of my career unfolded, consists in large measure of people who were raised to be multi-lingual, who have strong international ties, who have scientific or business collaborations spanning the continents, who might own property in various countries, who invest heavily in stock markets in various countries. National borders are more a matter of culture: cuisine, accents, music, quirky rules/mores/trends such as stretches of speed-unlimited highways in Germany, 11pm dinners in Spain, the gun-culture in America, clothing-optional beaches on the Baltic coast, driving on the left in former British colonies, and so forth. Borders are just a place where you show your passport and practice chatting-up the security officer in his/her native language.
I must confess difficulty in making distinction between a lily-white person of English ancestry, who claims descent from the Mayflower, and whose forefathers have been in what became the United States for 15 generations… and a brown person from Pakistan, who’s a devout Muslim and who speaks only Urdu, with the utmost difficulty saying “thank you” and “hello” in English, who arrived in the US illegally 6 months ago, and now drives a taxi-cab. When riding in said cab, I want an aggressive driver who weaves through traffic and who gets me to the airport on time. I don’t care about his/her legal-status, religion, ethnicity,… whether that person wants Sharia law, or Roman law, or English common law, or vapid anarchy.
There’s a trans-national kinship that I feel, with say a professor at TU-Berlin, one at the Technion in Israel, one in Melbourne (Australia), or in Cambridge (UK). These are “my people”. My immediate geographic neighbors are not “my people”. Yes, we speak the same language (one of them), we’re almost all of the same race, we fill our cars at the same gas-stations, and grumble about the same heavy snowfall on our roads. But the thought-process is shocking different. If a Somali or Bolivian or Vietnamese villager were to be dropped into the house next door, I’d likely have more in common with said villager, than with my neighbor… because neither the villager nor I much care about football, or American celebrities, or Thanksgiving or Halloween… but maybe that villager and I both like spicy food.
If tomorrow there were an Angela Merkel-style “welcoming” of 100 million immigrants from Syria, Iraq, North Korea, Nigeria, Libya, Guatemala, Bolivia, Cambodia and Yemen, I would welcome it. Why? Here in the Midwest, we have too many cattle and not enough people. We have empty houses and emptying towns. We need the people. Second, I very much welcome a punctuation of the monotony and monotonicity of local life. I’d love to see a mosque here and there, instead of the ceaseless carpet of churches. I want to hear other languages, besides the stilted, garbled, untutored “English” spoken by the locals.
And while I don’t condone breaking laws by illegally crossing borders, I regard this as minor and forgivable crime, like speeding or spraying graffiti or cheating on a drivers’ license exam.
I’m biased. The milieu in which I was raised and in which much of my career unfolded, consists in large measure of people who were raised to be multi-lingual, who have strong international ties, who have scientific or business collaborations spanning the continents, who might own property in various countries, who invest heavily in stock markets in various countries. National borders are more a matter of culture: cuisine, accents, music, quirky rules/mores/trends such as stretches of speed-unlimited highways in Germany, 11pm dinners in Spain, the gun-culture in America, clothing-optional beaches on the Baltic coast, driving on the left in former British colonies, and so forth. Borders are just a place where you show your passport and practice chatting-up the security officer in his/her native language.
I must confess difficulty in making distinction between a lily-white person of English ancestry, who claims descent from the Mayflower, and whose forefathers have been in what became the United States for 15 generations… and a brown person from Pakistan, who’s a devout Muslim and who speaks only Urdu, with the utmost difficulty saying “thank you” and “hello” in English, who arrived in the US illegally 6 months ago, and now drives a taxi-cab. When riding in said cab, I want an aggressive driver who weaves through traffic and who gets me to the airport on time. I don’t care about his/her legal-status, religion, ethnicity,… whether that person wants Sharia law, or Roman law, or English common law, or vapid anarchy.
There’s a trans-national kinship that I feel, with say a professor at TU-Berlin, one at the Technion in Israel, one in Melbourne (Australia), or in Cambridge (UK). These are “my people”. My immediate geographic neighbors are not “my people”. Yes, we speak the same language (one of them), we’re almost all of the same race, we fill our cars at the same gas-stations, and grumble about the same heavy snowfall on our roads. But the thought-process is shocking different. If a Somali or Bolivian or Vietnamese villager were to be dropped into the house next door, I’d likely have more in common with said villager, than with my neighbor… because neither the villager nor I much care about football, or American celebrities, or Thanksgiving or Halloween… but maybe that villager and I both like spicy food.
If tomorrow there were an Angela Merkel-style “welcoming” of 100 million immigrants from Syria, Iraq, North Korea, Nigeria, Libya, Guatemala, Bolivia, Cambodia and Yemen, I would welcome it. Why? Here in the Midwest, we have too many cattle and not enough people. We have empty houses and emptying towns. We need the people. Second, I very much welcome a punctuation of the monotony and monotonicity of local life. I’d love to see a mosque here and there, instead of the ceaseless carpet of churches. I want to hear other languages, besides the stilted, garbled, untutored “English” spoken by the locals.
And while I don’t condone breaking laws by illegally crossing borders, I regard this as minor and forgivable crime, like speeding or spraying graffiti or cheating on a drivers’ license exam.
We need more immigrants, not fewer.
I wouldn't go near as far as you do. However, some of what you say resonates with me. As I teacher and then administrator in the Washington, D.C. area, I got to work with and socialize with a far more eclectic population than any of my relatives ever did, and frankly, more than most of my friends did. I found it immensely interesting to be invited to a Burmese Buddhist temple, or a post-Ramadan party with clients from Muslim Malaysia, or a party where I was the only white person among a sea of Pakistanis. Some of the rudest people I ever met were white Americans being touristy in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia. And what I find is that the Americans who seem to think they are experts at immigration issues, are most often people who have never been outside the United States, except maybe somewhere in Canada or Mexico. There's a whole world out there with various immigration issues, and America is not alone in that.
I can honestly say that in my years living in the D.C. area, I met and worked with some illegal Latino people who were remarkably nice, hardworking folks. And I also met some Latino gang members who were the scum of the earth. I had friends who were petrified to go into many parts of D.C. because of the majority Black population...and yet, the three times I was robbed in D.C. it was white guys. And yet my friends would say, "Well that was just an aberration". Good people are good people. Bad people are bad people.
All of this doesn't mean that I am for open borders. We have a fixed resource pool in this country, and it is not our business to solve the horrendous conditions that exist in countries like El Salvador. But all too many Americans, particularly on the right, and too darned scared of people that aren't carbon copies of themselves. And frankly, those are the people I don't like to associate with.
Mandatory birth control in all developing countries or countries in distress. As the photographer Peter Beard pointed out in a lecture about elephants and the famine in Biafra.... it's not enough to give aid in the form of food and medicine. Those lands in Africa can't support all those human beings. Food imported to them, either donations or through commerce, only translate into the people there becoming healthy and having more sex and making more babies. Giving them medical help only insures that all babies made survive into adulthood. And traditionally, Africans have had large families due to a lack of birth control, it's an indication of a man being extremely manly, and to continue the family lineage when many babies died at birth or childhood diseases.
Globally, we have a population explosion amongst the impoverished, the uneducated, and any culture or religion that believes it's their duty to multiply. And it's not fair to those in 1st World countries to have to take in the overflow from the developing countries.
Therefore, any aid given to developing countries MUST be given with the stipulation that the population uses birth control and family planning until their country is functioning and not producing waves of exiting economic immigrants.
Also, I don't think that 1st World countries should ever take in refugees and give them temporary status. I think it more cruel for a country to take in refugees and then expect them to be happy going back to their much more primitive country. Those refugees should be staying in a host country that is similar in the quality of their country's life, culture and language.
For instance, with the Haitian refugees, they should have been housed in the Dominican Republic with the US and other countries donating food and supplies for the refugee camps. And money given to the host country to pay for their people to pay for staff to keep the camps in order.
And with Central American refugees, the US and the U.N. should be helping host countries to take them in, one that shares the same language and lifestyle. And it would cost the US so much less to not have to take them in and educate their children etc...
Therefore, any aid given to developing countries MUST be given with the stipulation that the population uses birth control and family planning until their country is functioning and not producing waves of exiting economic immigrants.
We certainly agree. Except I think that many "famished" countries need the humanitarian crisis to receive "aid" which then disappears into the twin ratholes of war and Swiss Bank accounts.
Quote:
Originally Posted by miu
Also, I don't think that 1st World countries should ever take in refugees and give them temporary status. I think it more cruel for a country to take in refugees and then expect them to be happy going back to their much more primitive country. Those refugees should be staying in a host country that is similar in the quality of their country's life, culture and language.
Temporary status is rarely temporary. The logistics and politics of repatriating tens or hundreds of thousands of refugees is daunting.
Quote:
Originally Posted by miu
For instance, with the Haitian refugees, they should have been housed in the Dominican Republic with the US and other countries donating food and supplies for the refugee camps. And money given to the host country to pay for their people to pay for staff to keep the camps in order.
The trouble with that idea is that the two countries are separate due to long-standing hatreds and persecution.
Quote:
Originally Posted by miu
And with Central American refugees, the US and the U.N. should be helping host countries to take them in, one that shares the same language and lifestyle. And it would cost the US so much less to not have to take them in and educate their children etc...
Exactly. Someone has to play sugar daddy. The best approach, in my opinion, is soft colonialism. Maybe call it something different, i.e. "protectorates" rather than "colonies." Self-determination is an illusion; it is really "determination" by thugs and despots.
If tomorrow there were an Angela Merkel-style “welcoming” of 100 million immigrants from Syria, Iraq, North Korea, Nigeria, Libya, Guatemala, Bolivia, Cambodia and Yemen, I would welcome it. Why? Here in the Midwest, we have too many cattle and not enough people. We have empty houses and emptying towns. We need the people. Second, I very much welcome a punctuation of the monotony and monotonicity of local life. I’d love to see a mosque here and there, instead of the ceaseless carpet of churches. I want to hear other languages, besides the stilted, garbled, untutored “English” spoken by the locals.
I want to hear other languages, besides the stilted, garbled, untutored “English” spoken by the locals.
We need more immigrants, not fewer.
The problem with your Midwest area with too many cattle and not enough people is... because of a lack of good jobs. Importing immigrants to your area wouldn't help improve the density of the population because they would eventually leave and move to parts of the US where the better paying jobs are. What American wouldn't want to move to your area with the lower cost of living and affordable housing? Except... that there is no work for them. Housing is cheap where there are no jobs. And when there are good jobs created, the costs of housing go up.
If you want to hear other languages being spoken, just move to any major city. Personally, I would prefer not to listen to Spanish while riding public transportation. If I wanted to hear foreign languages being spoken, I would go to an ethnic restaurant or go traveling. Americans should be speaking English. That is our only common bond as a country and a nationality.
The problem with your Midwest area with too many cattle and not enough people is... because of a lack of good jobs. Importing immigrants to your area wouldn't help improve the density of the population because they would eventually leave and move to parts of the US where the better paying jobs are. What American wouldn't want to move to your area with the lower cost of living and affordable housing? Except... that there is no work for them. Housing is cheap where there are no jobs. And when there are good jobs created, the costs of housing go up.
Typical liberal lack of thought. Anyone who understands economics knows that you have to subsidize people who are dumped in an unproductive area.
Quote:
Originally Posted by miu
If you want to hear other languages being spoken, just move to any major city. Personally, I would prefer not to listen to Spanish while riding public transportation. If I wanted to hear foreign languages being spoken, I would go to an ethnic restaurant or go traveling. Americans should be speaking English. That is our only common bond as a country and a nationality.
On that I agree. And it should be considered an issue of safety; people would be better off understanding what is said in public.
The guest worker program also is/and has been, an invitation to undermine the entirety of America's labor compensation structure. From Wiki: "Under the (bracero) program, total farm employment skyrocketed, domestic farm worker employment decreased, and the farm wage rate decreased." On the other hand, I think it's past time to close the door to all foreign labor coming here. But, politically, that's not going to be a substantial part of the two parties agenda, serving corporate America is the real task of politicians, so lost jobs for US citizens is simply a collateral damage they are willing to risk.
That move should end the vitriolic debate surrounding the suspicions of both side regarding the prospects of obtaining enough American workers to fill all the available job openings. I've been saying for years that the wage floor was dropped a few stories by the presence of foreigners coming here to find their slice of the American pie. Closing the door would drive up wages and prices, but, that's the system (capitalism) most say they want..
The biggest obstacle to any real change lies in the fact that labor immigrants serve the profit motives of American capitalism. Trump's wall is simply a political sloganeering attempt to garner party support by exploiting the anger over perceptions of foreigners taking jobs from Americans. A wall has been dismissed as something doubtful at best, and useless at worst in the face of "guest worker" allowances, day trippers who just overstay their welcome, and those smuggled in under the radar of border patrols at the various crossing points. Stopping ALL, legal, and illegal from coming here would certainly bring the most pressing questions of immigration VS American labor to the fore.
Extraordinary post, Jer. The political elites on both sides love to keep us debating the legal vs. illegal question when in fact, ALL immigration needs to stop, period.
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