"Some advocates of high immigration justify the harm it does to this country by arguing that we are ethically bound to honor the heroism and courage of those who leave their countries and tenaciously fight to immigrate here for the betterment of their families.
Well, I am happy to concede to my immigrant friends that they have been bold and often brave. I make no moral judgment against their decision to accept the legal option that our country offered them to immigrate. But few immigrants are heroes. For example, only a tiny portion of the foreign-born here – according to recent studies – has fled starvation, persecution, or even joblessness.
The courageous heroes on the world scene are not those men and women in poor countries who have the energy, the intelligence, and the skills to escape to a rich country but rather those remaining with their people. Rather than focus on improving conditions for themselves and their families by emigrating, they strive to raise the conditions for whole communities.
It is in those communities where more than 99% of the world’s poor will live out their lives, regardless of what rich countries do about immigration. That is where effective and, thus, ethically sound humanitarianism must be directed.
Years ago, I developed a little presentation with gumballs to help a junior high social studies class analyze this issue. I held up a huge bottle with 4,600 gumballs, each representing approximately one million people in the world who are more impoverished than the average Mexican (4.6 billion). I then removed a single gumball. This represented the one million legal immigrants the
The students had no trouble getting the point: As a humanitarian program for the world’s poor, immigration is pitifully ineffective for nearly everybody it is supposed to help.
The world's poor will not find hope in those who migrate, but in those who remain and bloom where they are planted. Heroism and courage is found among those leveraging every bit of good will and appropriate investment from outside to provide home-grown quality of life improvements."
10 comments:
i As a humanitarian program for the world’s poor, immigration is pitifully ineffective
Your trying to convince middle schoolers that the US cannot solve world poverty reminded me of James Baker and his recently published ten maxims for American policymakers. Maxim number 2: The US is not omnipotent.
I think Americans are having trouble focusing lately.
The first paragraph is a quote and should be in italics. Perhaps the kind owner of the blog could fix it please.
Surely,you of all people would agree that the US is not omnipotent and that trying to convince middle schoolers of this is your job not mine, teach! Perhaps while you at it you could also teach them the US presence around the world is as outriders of democracy rather than the frontiers of empire.
Quotes have been added per your request.
Please also explain your first statement to your countrymen who insist on crossing the border to the land of milk and honey. Should they be staying home?
I note in South Africa they are making a distinction between political refugees and economic migrants [2 1/2 million of them] spilling over the border from Zimbabwe, suggesting that the latter are not welcome while they former might be given some consideration.
There is definitely a world problem concerning mass migrations. However, the solution is not talking with one's countrymen and women, regardless of whether one is at the receiving or sending end of the migratory wave, but in changing a world system in which capital and labor flow from the poor to the rich countries.
Furthermore, I am the least authorized to tell anybody to stay put having just arrived here (where I am now) last month and being a 3rd world escapee myself.
Outriders of democracy? Gringos already indulge in too many myths to add that one to the repertoire. By the way, your outrider in chief blew it in Australia, no? How would you airbrush that one? And what about the interview he gave Robert Draper? Ay ay ay, I am glad I am not his teacher. I would be speaking with his parents about special ed.
Little Wolf: I guess I missed the Outrider-in-Chief's performance in Australia. What boo boo did he commit this time? I also missed any report on the Draper interview.
How would you change the world system to control the flow of labor and capital? Is there a way to do this without curtailing freedom?
So, you have moved from Chicago to a new location -- is the ICE on your trail? Will I need to ride or outride to your rescue?
In Australia he thanked "Austrians" for guarding him at "OPEC". He then had this exchange with Roh Moo-hyun:
Roh: I might be wrong. I think I did not hear President Bush mention a declaration to end the Korean War just now. Did you say so, President Bush?
Bush: It's up to Kim Jong Il.
Roh: If you could be a little bit clearer.
Bush: I can't make it any more clear, Mr. President. We look forward to the day when we can end the Korean War. That will happen when Kim Jong Il verifiably gets rid of his weapons programs and his weapons.
Draper interview:
On disbanding Iraqi security forces:
Bush: The policy had been to keep the army intact; didn’t happen.
Pressed as to how the contrary decision was made and his own reaction when it “didn’t happen,” Bush responded, “Yeah, I can’t remember, I’m sure I said, ‘This is the policy, what happened?’”
He added, “Again, Hadley’s [National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley] got notes on all of this stuff.”
Another pearl:
So how does President George Bush junior imagine spending his retirement years?
"I can just envision getting in the car, getting bored, going down to the ranch," he says. He also has big plans for making money. "I'll give some speeches, to replenish the ol' coffers," says Mr Bush, who is already estimated to be worth $20m. "I don't know what my dad gets - it's more than 50-75 [thousand dollars a speech], and "Clinton's making a lot of money".
How would you change the world system to control the flow of labor and capital?
Me? I will just sit down and wait. The system is imploding by itself, well, with a little help from its friend, Bush.
Is there a way to do this without curtailing freedom?
Speculators, vultures, usurers, Ponzi schemers, condo flippers, SUV drivers, McMansion dwellers, mall consumers and assorted neoliberal fauna will certainly find their freedom curtailed.
is the ICE on your trail?
Of course not. By the way, beware. Another alien has inched up to form part of that circle of criminal poverty that is engulfing you and threatening to destroy your way of life.
MWA HA HA HA!
I thought that since you just moved a month ago you must be feeling the hot breath of ICE.
A million here, a million there -- soon it begins to add up to more poverty for citizens and a lower standard of living for everyone in America including the illegals and their fellow travelers.
So what do you teach and at what level?
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