Following World War II, in 1945-46, more than 8 million ethnic Germans were expelled from the Eastern Territories in less than a year. Although this amply demonstrated the logistic feasibility of a mass repatriation of foreign nationals, few Americans believe it is desirable or necessary to undertake a similar effort now to rid the U.S. of most of its 12 million illegal aliens. In any event, everyone knows it couldn’t be done overnight even with our modern transportation systems. That, of course, does not deter the mass legalization proponents from claiming time and again that mass overnight deportation is the only model under consideration.
Krikorian has suggested a different and more suitable model from the business world.[1] When a business needs to down size it may (1) institute a hiring freeze, (2) make some layoffs, and/or (3) create incentives for early retirement. The analogues for illegal aliens would be (1) secure borders to stop new illegal violations and settlements, (2) conventional deportations, and (3) the creation of incentives for self-deportation by denying employment opportunities to the illegals.
This is a suitable model because, properly administered, it could be very effective. It is fair because it incorporates the same general rules under which citizens, who have a much higher degree of entitlement, must work.
Even Ruben Navarrette, columnist for the San Diego Union and the darling of the pro-illegals, has conceded the need for some if not all of these measures.[2] He says by way of enforcement that we need to stiffen penalties on employers. This certainly is a way of denying employment opportunities to illegals particularly if those penalties are on an escalating scale. Moreover, he agrees that the word “knowingly” must be removed from any future reform proposals because that loophole permits employers to escape punishment merely by claiming they “didn’t know” an employee was illegal. The elimination of this single word is therefore of vital importance.
Navarrette is serious about enforcement. He would add an identification card, better tools for the border patrol, continued workplace raids, accelerated deportations, arrest of an employer once in a while, and an extension of the deployment of the National Guard at the border. These are all good ways to help enforce the law.
On the other hand, Navarrette wants to legalize those aliens who can prove they have been here 5 years or longer. This is not an unreasonable proposal when it is coupled with his other requirements: irrefutable proof of length of time in the U.S., fluency in English, a $5,000 fine, and a criminal background check. In addition, illegals would have to initiate and process applications for legal entry in their homelands and then accept a position at the back of the line of all prior applicants. Navarrette would also impose a lifetime ban on welfare, food stamps and Medicaid but allow those whose applications are approved to collect whatever they had contributed to Social security.
Krikorian’s “conventional deportations” could be construed to be applicable only to the illegals who have been here less than five years. Limiting deportations to more recent arrivals would be consistent with Navarrette’s recommendation. But since many deportees are back in the U.S. within 24 hours and since 97% of those who attempt to violate the border are ultimately successful, simple deportation is not a solution. Without some additional penalty, deportation is not much of a disincentive for the illegal who wishes to return.
Many will disagree with Navarrette regarding his proposal to increase the allotment of green cards, including H1B visas for highly skilled workers and triple the number of legal immigrants admitted annually to 3 million. The former might be reasonable if that increase is precisely tailored to the demonstrated needs of our economy and approved by local unions and professional organizations. Of course, citizens must be assured first dibs on all jobs at the standard wage rate for citizens with equal credentials and experience.
The proposal to triple the number of legal immigrants ignores all the changes in our society, economy, government, education, technology, natural resources, demography and lifestyles that have occurred since the previous immigration waves of the 19th and early 20th centuries. When proposals of this nature are made there is never any reasonable rationale whereas there is an ample rationale for reducing the number of annual legal immigrants allowed. Declining natural resources, congested highways and streets, and environmental damage are only a few of the many reasons to reduce that number to more like the 200,000 per year. This was the level just a few years ago. According to the UN, the annual output of pollutants by Americans is 20 metric tons per capita. This means that as our population increases by another 300 million people before the end of this century, we will produce another 6 billion tons of pollutants annually at the present rate. Even if we were to be able to reduce our annual output to 10 metric tons per capita (the output of Mexico) we would still be unable to reduce our total annual production of green house gases below the present level, leaving us with the status quo ante.
Labor demands are certainly important as Navarrette suggests but families should be required to apply as a group to avoid the family reunification ploy. Nevertheless, in a competitive world, education and skills cannot be ignored and are certainly far from “silly” as Navarrette has condescendingly called them.
No democratically-elected government, however firm the demands or wishes of their constituents might be, has been able to move quickly to solve problems that profoundly affect the country they are sworn to protect against enemies, foreign and domestic.[3] Often, in its attempts to act, government is unable to avoid policies that have unintended consequences because policymakers rarely understand the scope and long term impact of their actions. Likewise, although members of Congress and the President may understand the need for action they may not fully appreciate the danger or cost or long term effect of further delays. As a result of this lack of a sense of urgency, they fail to expend the energy necessary to achieve compromise on bipartisan solutions to the important problems facing our country. Moreover, they tend to evaluate new proposals in terms of the here and now rather than what those proposals, if enacted, might mean to the long term viability of the American culture, language, ideals, environment, natural resources and prosperity. Their prodigious myopia leads to another set of unintended consequences later when it may be too late to correct their errors.
Just as often it means that Congress and the Administration have failed to comprehend the import of the dramatic changes that have occurred in our country over the last 100 years. Many of them are still living in the past. Their thinking is still constrained by the false idea that since America was once a nation of immigrants with seemingly unlimited natural resources, it should or can always be. They are deluded into thinking the status quo in that regard is in the national interest.
Does this sound like they have changed with the times? Does it sound like they have fully digested all of the changes in our government, economy, population, natural resources, education, technology, demography and lifestyles that should affect their thinking about major problems like immigration, illegal aliens, birthright citizenship, and population growth. The present Administration and the Congress have neither responded to these changes nor to the exigencies of long term population growth occasioned by excessive legal immigration and the uncontrolled, unarmed invasion by illegal aliens, some of whom would do us great harm.
Many proclaim the importance of secure borders but at the same time propose a mass legalization of the illegals already present in the U.S., granting to them what many call, with some justification, an outright amnesty not unlike the failed one of 1986. The 1986 measure assumed that once amnesty was granted to those already here, the borders could then be secured to avoid future problems. Instead, that amnesty gave a green light and extended an open invitation to millions of additional illegals. Obviously, the borders should have been secured before any amnesty was granted and yet, in spite of the aftermath of the 1986 measure, a significant number of those in Congress want to repeat that mistake. It doesn’t matter whether there are some conditions imposed for legalization, this approach will still be perceived as an open invitation for additional millions of illegals. Those who cannot meet the conditions will simply stay on illegally while their progeny acquire birthright citizenship.
The greatest perfidy of many of those who claim that they support secure border is that they offer only lip service and continue to deny the DHS the tools it needs to achieve that goal. Anyone with knowledge about horrendous amount of vehicular and pedestrian traffic and the others circumstances at the borders knows that only the most stringent measures have any hope of success. Improvements in staffing and infrastructure at the borders are bound to fail unless they are buttressed by changes in the rules of engagement and a defense in depth.
The rules of engagement must permit hot pursuit and the use of lethal force against drug runners and other violent criminals encountered in the immediate environs of the border. Other illegals who are apprehended must be detained and required to work on border infrastructure projects at minimum wage for an appropriate time before they are released with the admonition that if they ever return illegally they will do hard time for two years for the first repeat offense and five years for each subsequent offense. No form of catch and release can be permitted even for those apprehended immediately at ports of entry. If illegals are simply escorted back across the border, they will try again and again, sometimes in the same day, with an ultimate success rate of 97%. Obviously, a policy of immediate expulsion is utterly useless and ineffective.
Defense in depth means a program of vigorous and continuous internal enforcement using mandatory E-verification of work status as one of its most important tools. Both employers and employees that violate the rules must face an escalating schedule of penalties sufficient to deter future violations. To be effective the cost of breaking the law must always dramatically exceed the benefits.
Other features of the failed comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) proposals of the past include new forms of visas, major increases in the number of visas granted, and a huge temporary worker program without any teeth to assure that these workers are indeed temporary and that they promptly return to their homelands when their visas expire.
While no one wishes to deny employers the labor they need, immigration policies must assure that foreign workers are paid at the same rate as their citizen counterparts and that they are provided with full family health care coverage so that that cost is not offloaded on the unsuspecting public. Employers must demonstrate that they have been unable to meet their needs by offering their jobs to qualified citizens at a living wage. Otherwise, the importation of cheap foreign labor would constitute unfair competition with citizen workers.
There is a broader issue related to our ability to assimilate large numbers of legal immigrants and illegal aliens or foreign workers. Krikorian has pointed out how the changes in American society have made it much more difficult if not impossible to achieve the kind of assimilation that occurred following past waves of immigration.[4] Trans-nationalism, a cousin of globalism, facilitated by modern communication, is only one of several factors that reduce the probability of assimilation.
The characteristics of our newest immigrants are not that different from those of a century ago. Their faces and their languages may be different but their aspirations, work ethic, and desire to improve their lives and those of their families are not much different from those of the earlier immigrants. They are not necessarily the poorest of the poor but now they come from what many of us would call third world countries. The earlier immigrants from Europe were often poor but they came from countries that were never considered third world. Those countries were the font of learning and scientific achievement.
So what is different today that justifies a more critical view of the newest immigrants and illegal aliens? It is the changes in America itself more than the differences in the immigrants. The society, economy, government and technology of the past, which were so fundamental to our success in dealing with the waves of immigration extending from the middle of the 19th century to the early 20th century, no longer exist. The changes that define modern America mean we can no longer depend on what once worked to assure the assimilation of millions of foreign-born immigrants and illegal aliens.
A vast unsettled continent lay before the Founding Fathers and their successors. Its natural resources were virtually untapped and appeared limitless. Arable land and water were abundant. Family farms were scattered across the landscape and farming, hunting, fishing and herding employed more Americans than any other occupation. Now thirsty cities are buying up water rights to serve their burgeoning populations leaving behind the land made unproductive by the lack of water resources. The ranches and farms will no longer be able to produce the food needed to feed the growing numbers of Americans as our population doubles again by the end of this century to 600 million people.
When one young leader spoke eloquently and passionately in 1933 about the need for change and denounced the old system, the people were receptive.[5] Elsewhere, in 1950, another such leader sounded a similar note. The press fell in love with both and never questioned who their friends were or what they really believed in, until it was too late and the moment had passed. When they said they would help the farmers and the poor and bring free medical care and education to all, the adulation was predictable. When they promised to restore lost power and bring justice and equality to all, the people said, Heil!” or “Viva Fidel”. When these leaders said, “I will be for change and I’ll bring you change” the cheers were unending. Does that sound familiar?
But nobody asked about the change, so by the time the concentration camps were set up and the executioner’s guns rang out, the people’s guns had been taken away. By the time everyone was equal, they had no rights and equality was worth nothing. By the time the press noticed, it was too late because it was now controlled by the government or the propaganda ministry. The endings of these stories are well-known. Millions died, treasuries were depleted, and more than a million people had taken to boats, rafts, and inner tubes to escape the tyranny of change.
Luckily, in America, we would never fall for a young leader who promised change without asking, what change? How will you carry it out? What will it cost America? How is the change you offer different from the change all politicians offer? And the free media would never be seduced by political rhetoric of change. Instead it would examine all of the consequences of proposed changes and ask the hard questions about how these changes would be paid for while paying down the national debt, balancing the budget, restoring the value of the dollar, and repairing America’s decaying infrastructure. No, we wouldn’t do that in America, would we?
To suggest that the main reason for the opposition to excessive legal immigration and the flood of illegal aliens is the fact that they are not from Northern Europe is at once an error and a gross oversimplification. Nevertheless, this is the chief argument of those like Ruben Navarrette who refers disdainfully to those who disagree with him as “nativists”.
Immigrants in the past were largely white, but now they are not; they used to want to assimilate, but now they don’t; they used to be self-sufficient, but now they seek out government assistance. We’ve all heard those laments and they are largely true. But the America of our ancestors no longer exists and that is a fact. Change, of course, is inevitable. Some changes will be good; other changes will be bad as they were in the Germany of the 1930s and the Cuba of the 1950s and beyond. We all welcome the spread of cheap communications and transportation but mourn the weakening of our communities; the establishment of trans-national communities; acceptance dual citizenship; the failure to enforce, language, citizenship and immigration laws; the use of drugs; the spread of fast foods; the dumbing down of our schools, the excessive cost of education and health care; and the inactivity and increasing obesity of our children.
Certain changes have been embraced by some but not by others; the growth in government, for instance, is seen by the Left as recognition of our social responsibility to the poor and the marginalized but feared by the Right as likely to erode liberty and personal responsibility and require confiscatory taxes. One presidential candidate promises higher taxes, the other advocates making the present tax rates permanent. Neither discusses paying down the national debt, balancing budget, fixing our decaying infrastructure or restoring world confidence in the dollar as the international medium of exchange. One proposes various alternative energy initiatives coupled with a new push for conservation but opposes development of known oil fields and nuclear power. The other sees offshore drilling as essential to provide oil during the lengthy transition period to alternative energy sources and for the other uses of oil and petrochemicals that cannot easily be replaced.
We are all familiar with the inherent characteristics of our modern society and how they affect the way we live. Fewer understand or even think about how immigration undermines many of the objectives that our modern, middle-class society sets for itself and exacerbates many of the problems brought on by modernization. As Mark Krikorian put it, “…mass immigration is incompatible with a modern society”. John Fonte, a Hudson Institute scholar, stated it even more succinctly, “It’s not 1900 anymore.” Those who keep haranguing us about our immigrant past fail to see how changes in our society make it a whole new ball game that needs fresh thinking rather than remaining mired in the past.
The process of Americanizing immigrants was tumultuous and wrenching for everyone involved but eventually successful. Those prior immigrants have indeed become one people because American nationality is not based on blood relations, like a biological family, but is more like a family growing partly by adoption, where new immigrants attach themselves to their new country and embrace the cultural and civic values of their native-born brethren as their own. Instead of rejecting the moral underpinnings of our republic as the archaic thoughts of some crusty old men, the earlier immigrants earned the right to claim those moral principles as their own as though they were blood of blood, and flesh of flesh of the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence, and so they are.
This was illustrated poignantly in 1920 when Japanese American children in Honolulu’s McKinley High School referred to “our Pilgrim forefathers” and were able to recite the Gettysburg Address from memory. And they had every right to do so because they had adopted those moral principles on which our country was founded and which were totally foreign to the country of origin of their parents.
The changes in America since the mid 1800s and early 1900s are many. Some examples of those changes are as follows:[6]
Economy: A century ago, what economists call the primary sector of the economy (farming, fishing, hunting, and herding) still employed more Americans than any other, as it had from the dawn of humankind. Today only 2 percent of our workforce occupies itself in this way. Meanwhile, the tertiary sector (service industries) now employs 80 percent of working Americans, and the percentage is climbing.
Education: Along with the change in the economy, education has become more widespread. Nearly a quarter of American adults had less than 5 years of schooling in 1910; as of 2000, that figure is less than 2 percent. Likewise, the percentage that had completed high school increased six fold, from about 13 percent of the totals to 84 percent. And the percent of college graduates increased tenfold from 2.7 to 27 percent. Another way to look at it is that in 1900, only a little more than 10 percent of high-school age children were actually enrolled in school; in 2001, nearly 95 percent were.
Technology: In 1915, a three-minute call from New York to San Francisco cost about $20.70 (about $343 in 2000 dollars); the same call in 2000 cost 36 cents. In 1908, a Model T cost more than two years’ worth of the typical worker’s wages; a Ford Taurus in 1997 (a much better car) cost eight months’ work. A thousand-mile airline trip in 1920 would have cost the average American 220 work hours; by 2000, it cost perhaps 11 work hours.
Demography: The birthrate fell by half during the past century, while infant mortality fell by 93 percent. In 1915, sixty-one out of 10,000 mothers died during childbirth; in 2001, only one out of 100,000 did. Life expectancy went from 47 years in 1900 to 77 years a century later, while people 65 and older have tripled as a share of the nation’s population, from about 4 percent to more than 12 percent.
Government: In 1900, total government spending at all levels equaled about 5.5 percent of the economy; by 2003, it was more than 36 percent. Total government employment (federal, state and local) went from little more than 1 million in 1900 (about 4 percent of the workforce) to more than 22 million in 2000 (more than 16 percent of the workforce).
Lifestyle: America’s population was still 60 percent rural in 1900; in 2000, only 21 percent of Americans lived in rural areas (and only a tiny fraction was involved in farming). The average household went from more than 4.5 people to a little more than 2.5, while the number of people per room in the average house fell from 1.1 in 1910 to 0.4 in 1997.
These major changes require new policies and outlooks regarding immigration and our ability to maintain the cohesiveness of our country through effective assimilation and the discouragement of trans-national enclaves and communities. The original ideal of our country are timeless but the willingness of legal immigrants and illegal aliens to accept them is in doubt
This is not to say that the national goal should be zero net immigration. Again Krikorian has the right idea.[7] He suggests a zero-based budgeting approach. This would mean that rather than dealing with reductions from the previous level of immigration we should start with zero immigration and then work up. “From zero we must then consider what categories of immigrants are so important to the national interest that their admission warrants risking the kinds of problems…” [8] inherent in excessive immigration numbers. The three major categories that must be considered are: family-based, skills-based, and humanitarian immigration. Navarrette again agrees with Krikorian that family-based immigration makes no sense except for spouses and minor children. “The others are grown adults with their own lives, for whom “family reunification” is a misnomer.[9] Navarrette would abandon the skills-education criterion and shift it to a needs basis. In other words, if we need nurses, our immigration policies should enable a fast track for the admission of those with skills and credentials in this area. I would add fluency in English as a criterion for those professions, like medicine, where this is important. In fact, I would give special consideration and priority to all applicants who are fluent in English. Krikorian suggests that aliens of extraordinary ability and outstanding professors and researchers should also be admitted quickly with a minimum of bureaucratic delay.
Policymakers have not changed with the times. They have not have fully digested all of the changes in our government, economy, population, natural resources, education, technology, demography and lifestyles that should affect their thinking about major problems like immigration, illegal aliens, birthright citizenship, and population growth. The present administration and the Congress have neither responded to these changes nor to the exigencies of long term population growth occasioned by excessive legal immigration and the uncontrolled, unarmed invasion by illegal aliens, some of whom would do us great harm.
There is a broader issue related our ability to assimilate large numbers of legal immigrants and illegal aliens or foreign workers. Krikorian has pointed out how the changes in American society have made it much more difficult if not impossible to achieve the kind of assimilation that occurred as a result of past waves of immigration.[10]
The characteristics of our newest immigrants are not that different from those of a century ago. Their faces and their languages may be different but their aspirations, work ethic, and desire to improve their lives and those of their families are not much different from those of the earlier immigrants. They are not necessarily the poorest of the poor but now they come from what many of us would call third world countries. The earlier immigrants from Europe were often poor but they came from countries that were never considered third world.
So what is different today that justifies a more critical view of the newest immigrants and illegal aliens? It is the changes in America itself more than the differences in the immigrants. The society, economy, government and technology of the past, which were so fundamental to our success in dealing with the waves of immigration extending from the middle of the 19th century to the early 20th century, no longer exist. The changes that define modern America mean we can no longer depend on what once worked to assure the assimilation of millions of foreign-born immigrants and illegal aliens.
A vast unsettled continent lay before the Founding Fathers and their successors. Its natural resources were virtually untapped and appeared limitless. Arable land and water were abundant. Family farms were scattered across the landscape and farming, hunting, fishing and herding employed more Americans than any other occupation. Now thirsty cities are buying up water rights to serve their burgeoning populations leaving behind the land made unproductive by the lack of water resources. The ranches and farms will no longer be able to produce the food needed to feed the growing numbers of Americans as our population doubles by the end of this century. It appears no one is paying attention.
[1] Mark Krikorian, The New Case against Immigration, (New York: Penguin Group,2008),p. 217
[2] http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/23/navarrette/index.html
[3] [3] Adapted from Karen Kornbluh, “Families Valued”, Democracy, A Journal of Ideas, Issue #2, fall 2006, p.1.
[4] Krikorian, Op.Cit., p.10.
[5] Adapted from Manuel Alvarez, Jr.’s letter to the Richmond, VA Times Dispatch, “Beware of charismatic men who preach change”, July 7, 2008
[6] Krikorian, Op.Cit., pp. 2-4.
[7] Krikorian, Op.Cit., P.228.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Krikorian, Op. Cit., p. 227
[10] Krikorian, Op.Cit., pp. 10-45.
No comments:
Post a Comment