Illiberal aspects of illegal immigration rarely voiced

A group of citizens calling themselves the Minutemen patrols the border looking to stop illegal immigrants from entering the United States. Mexico's president, Vicente Fox, states that Mexican migrant workers in the U.S. are "are doing jobs that not even blacks want to do."

Meanwhile, many Republicans thinkPresident George W. Bush'sguest-worker program either mocks the law or is unworkable, while in California a frustrated Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger blurts out, "Close the borders in California and all across Mexico and the United States."

Illegal immigration is again in the headlines, but the debate isn't going anywhere. Instead, all the tired controversies are again being aired.

Some believe illegal immigration is a win-win bargain: An impoverished Mexico obtains critical dollars, while job-hungry America receives industrious unskilled workers. Critics counter that millions of illegal workers undermine the sanctity of the law, and only abet a corrupt Mexican government that uses remittances to avoid needed reform.

Both sides agree that when newcomers arrive legally from Mexico in the thousands, rather than unchecked in the millions, these immigrants become among our best American citizens.

The politics are by now surreal. Those of the corporate right want cheap labor. So they join the self-interested multicultural left in politics, journalism and academia who don't mind seeing a growing presence of unassimilated and dependent constituents.

Contradictory statistics -- showing illegal immigration resulting in either a net gain or loss to the U.S. economy -- are used by both sides. Human-interest anecdotes circulate about both the amazing successes and abject failures of individuals who came here illegally.

Yet rarely mentioned in the debate are the illiberal aspects of millions coming to the U.S. in violation of the law.

For starters, take remittances. Billions of dollars are sent annually back to Mexico from its citizens who come to the United States -- one of the largest sources of foreign exchange for the Mexican economy.

But that cash does not come out of thin air. If such transfers aid depressed parts of Mexico, they also drain capital from struggling immigrant communities in the United States. Workers without high school diplomas who send back much of their wages often cannot pay for their own proper heath care, education or housing here.

In the American Southwest, entire towns are deprived of critical revenues that could be invested ininfrastructure, alleviating the need for state and federal intervention to ensure some sort of parity with American citizens.

Second, when employers hire millions of young laborers from Mexico -- often off the books and in cash -- poorer American workers cannot organize and thus are left to watch their own static wages eaten up by rising costs.

Third, what do we tell the millions of equally poor immigrants from Asia, Latin America and Africa who wait years to come here legally? It is not especially liberal to require an indigent Filipino or Ethiopian to learn English, find a sponsor, hire a lawyer and queue up for years, while others simply break the law and come here illegally.

Fourth, progressives are understandably proud of environmental legislation, zoning laws and the culture of recycling in states such as California. But when millions in this country don't speak English, are impoverished and uneducated, and live outside the law, it is only natural that they do not have the money to worry about how many families live in a single house, whether cars meet emission standards, or whether discarded furniture is disposed in authorized landfills rather than on roadsides.

Fifth, the question of concern for the underprivileged seems not always to extend to our own citizens. California, for example has over 14,000 illegal aliens incarcerated in its prisons, costing yearly more than 20 times the annual budget of the under-funded new University of California at Merced -- a college located where it could best serve underrepresented poor and minorities.

Finally, there is something elitist in this new idea that American youth should no longer work summers and after-school hours in agriculture, hotels, restaurants and landscaping. These hard jobs were once seen as ways to gain experience and understand the nobility of hard physical work. An entire generation of Americans is growing up that has never mowed a lawn, pruned a bush or washed a dish.

For too long, the debate over illegal immigration has been demagogued on hot-button issues of economics, ethnicity and relations with Mexico. The subtext always has been that those who support open borders are somehow more caring or ethical than their purportedly insensitive opponents who wish a return to measured and legal immigration.

In fact, the opposite is true. More frequently it is an uncaring elite -- made up of both Democrats and Republicans -- that advocates not enforcing immigration laws. And it is past time for them to explain why it is moral or liberal, rather than merely convenient, to import millions outside the law to do the jobs we supposedly cannot.

Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. You can reach him by visiting www.victorhanson.com. Jonah Goldberg was unable to write his column this week because of a death in the family.

Finally someone actually addressed my b*t*chings. The is NOTHING good about illegal immigration. From the American economy to the peons (messican term, not mine) the Messico gov sends over here to prop up their pathetic Government.

One good thing about massive illegal immigration (at least front the point of view of the scumbag dems) is that it surpresses actual wage levels and, therefore, condems millions of US blacks to unemployment and continuing dependency on the dems.

No issue would allow Republicans to pick up 5-10 percentage points of the black vote than to champion their employment issues.

It is clear that Fox has something on W that forces W to dither on this issue and spend more interests on non-voting illegal foreigners than on black US citizens.

I disagree! The dems think illegal immigration is wonderful!!

Critics counter that millions of illegal workers undermine the sanctity of the law

Any analysis of the costs vs benefits of illegals is overshadowed by the fact that they are, in fact, illegal. There is a rule of law in this country. The legislative branch creates the law, the executive branch enforces it, and the judicial branch sees that it is carried out. When you are stopped by a police officer for going 75 mph on a highway with a 65 mph speed limit, you have broken the law and will pay the price. It is irrelevant that there was no one else on the road at the time, or that you are a contractor whose hourly employees won't be able to start their day's job until you get there.

If the immigration laws are bad, citizens can elect legislators who will change them to reflect the wishes of the population. If that means we want more Mexicans and fewer Australians, so be it. Once the law is passed, it is duty of The President to see that it is enforced. George W. Bush twice took an oath to "faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and... to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." We're waiting.

The trait Bush has of loyalty is used against him time and time again. At some point he has to grow up and understand that FOX is NOT a friend, and any help he gave on NAFTA ( I know, I hate it to) was not out of friendship. The REAL money maker for FOX is the Billions the illegals send back to prop up his Corrupt Gov.

Hanson does this sort of thing so well.
Ok, sometimes he's a little "wordy".
Oh! And if you come up stimulated ,yet somehow vaguely unfulfilled, don't be too concerned.
He seems to have majored in "conclusio-interruptus".

he's correct about the elitism of many high school and college students not working summer jobs. the nyt just this week published an article whining that foreign students did not get u.s. govt approval this summer to work these jobs. the broadmoor hotel in colorado springs was one example cited that got no approvals.

bill handel of kfi, los angeles, stated it best: "my kids are NOT going to flip burgers".

si.

V.D. makes sense, as usual. The mind boggles at the amount of illegal invasion impact news/all of it bad, emanating from California, Arizona, Texas, N.M., etc.. We've reached critical mass, and we have to do something one way or another. Smoke coming out of my ears...Bush's recent OAS speech, and that clown whoever it was who was on tv the other day promoting open borders. These speeches and appearances are no accident.Get ready for an onslaught of pro open border propaganda. We will be told it's too late to go back to the good old days what with twenty million illegal aliens here and more coming every minute. We can't stop them, and we haven't the moral authority to deny them a good life. (Are you gagging yet?) The US owes the rest of the world, starting with the western hemisphere.

You are not kidding, mate. An ex-girlfriend and I were walking in the mall one day when we noticed a sign in a storefront window for Help Wanted. We encouraged her teenage son to go in an apply, but after only a few moments he returned. When asked what happened, he replied that they 'did not pay enough'. This was a kid who had never had a job in his life. His combined attitudes of self-importance and nonexistent work ethic were at once stunning and sad.

I myself worked summer jobs as soon as I was old enough, and upon graduation from high school was already working in a local factory. Yeh, there might not have been much of a future in it, but it was honest work and allowed Me to get My first car and begin to understand about things like responsibility, rent, and vehicular maintenance demands. I never missed a day of work or was later than a minute or so (when traffic jams were really terrible), and went into the military within a few months -after all the paperwork and requirements were met.

People who think others should throw money at them for sitting on their fat bums just kill Me.

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