Mexico seems to be pretty upset over the Senate proposal to build a 700 mile long fence along the border between the U.S. and our southern neighbors. So upset that they are begging POTUS to veto the bill.
From Reuters:
"The Mexican government strongly opposes the building of walls in the border area between Mexico and the United States," President Vicente Fox's spokesman Ruben Aguilar told reporters.
"This decision hurts bilateral relations, goes against the spirit of cooperation needed to guarantee security on the common border, creates a climate of tension in border communities," he said.
Aguilar said Mexico would send a diplomatic note to Washington on Monday urging Bush to veto the bill, which requires the president's signature to become law.
[...]
Mexicans are livid about the fence plan, which is seen as a slap in the face to efforts during Fox's near-completed six-year term to come to an agreement with Washington on immigration.
President-elect Felipe Calderon, who takes office December 1, also has lambasted the fence plan and the issue promises to prickle his relationship with Washington from the outset.
Hundreds of Latin Americans, mostly Mexicans, die each year crossing perilous rivers and deserts separating the two countries, and tougher control has increased fatalities.
"Partial measures focused exclusively on security ignore reality and represent ... a political answer rather than a viable solution to this problem," Aguilar said.
Asked about the fence at an international media forum in Mexico City, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon said: "We need to know who's coming across our borders and after years of not paying that much attention to the frontier ... we are now attempting to come to terms with it."
"We recognize that how this is perceived outside the United States is not positive but we would ask for patience."
Patience, hell. If other countries don't like the fact that we are enforcing our laws and protecting our borders from criminals and illegal aliens, I guess they'll just have to learn to live with disappointment. The American people overwhelmingly support border security and seem poised to make it an election issue, if necessary.
But why does Mexico object? Victor Davis Hanson says that Mexicans send some "$10 billion and $15 billion annually in remittances from its expatriate population in the United States." From Real Clear Politics:
Millions of unemployed Mexicans are now dependent upon money wired from the United States, where low-skill wages are now nine times higher than in Mexico. On the national level, such subsidies, like oil windfall profits, allow just enough money to hide the government's failure to promote the proper economic conditions - through the protection of property rights, tax reform, transparent investment laws, modern infrastructure, etc. - that would eventually lead to decent housing and well-paying jobs.
It may be counterintuitive to think that checks from hard-working expatriates are pernicious. But for a developing nation, remittances can prove as problematic as the proverbial plight of the lottery winner - sudden winnings that were not earned. In short, remittances, along with oil and tourism - not agriculture, engineering, education, manufacturing or finance - prop up an otherwise ailing Mexican economy. This helps explain why half of the country's 106 million citizens still live in poverty.
The billions of dollars Mexicans in the U.S. send back to their country pose another economic and ethical dilemma. Many illegal aliens in the U.S. allot nearly half their weekly paychecks to relatives in Mexico. But such deductions come right out of the workers' food, housing and transportation budgets here. So to survive, illegal aliens in the U.S. must endure cheap, substandard and often overcrowded housing. They cannot easily purchase their own health care or invest in safe and reliable cars.
Because the United States is a caring nation, the state often intervenes to offer illegal aliens costly entitlements - emergency-room medicine, legal help and subsidized housing and food - that provide some sort of parity to all its residents.
And when aliens are often paid in cash - that is off the books - the problem of remittances only worsens: The beneficiary Mexico still gets help from workers' pay, while the benefactor United States does not collect taxes.
Along with the lack of English, illegal status and insufficient education, remittances explain the poverty of many Mexican aliens in the U.S. In the American Southwest, it is now possible to see apartheid communities of Mexican nationals whose standard of living does not meet national norms.
Americans are often blamed for such disparities, as we saw in the recent immigration protests. But the tragedy is more complicated than the failure to offer workers sufficient compensation - especially when such communities are often the recipients of millions in federal dollars to improve schools, roads and police forces that cannot be maintained through customary taxation of local residents.
It might be cruel should remittances somehow come to an end. But it may be even crueler in the long run not to deal with a broken system that facilities such massive transfers - both for millions here in dire need of retaining all their earnings, and millions more in Mexico in more dire need of vast structural reform.
Basically, without the money that Mexico gets from the Mexicans in our country, they cannot sustain their country without significant improvements. Another example of a government doing what's easy instead of what's right.
But does Mexico have a double standard when it come to immigration policies? Consider that the Mexican Constitution:
- Bans immigrants and foreign visitors from public political discourse
- Denies immigrants equal employment rights
- Denies immigrants and foreigners certain property rights
- Bars immigrants and naturalized citizens from most public service positions and from becoming clergymembers
- Allows the government to expel immigrants for any reason and without due process
From J. Michael Waller's Mexico's Glass House:
Mexico's constitution contains many provisions to protect the country from foreigners, including foreigners legally resident in the country and even foreign-born people who have become naturalized Mexican citizens. The Mexican constitution segregates immigrants and naturalized citizens from native-born citizens by denying immigrants basic human rights that Mexican immigrants enjoy in the United States. Source
"The AP recently found that Mexico grants citizenship to just 3,000 people annually, compared to the U.S. rate of almost 500,000. Plus, Mexico actually deports more illegal aliens than the United States." According to the Waller piece, Mexico's immigration policies are "the toughest on the continent." (source: American Legion Magazine, October of 2006, Double Standards)
And it isn't just Mexico with tough immigration policies.
Consider France, from the original CTT: France approves new immigration bill.
What about the Swiss? From FOX News:
Swiss voters ratified new asylum and immigration laws on Sunday, making it more difficult for refugees to receive assistance in Switzerland and effectively blocking unskilled workers outside Europe from moving to the country.
Over 67 percent voted in favor of the stricter rules on asylum, originally approved by the Swiss government in December, the office of the federal government said, announcing official results. The proposal was overwhelmingly accepted in all of Switzerland's 26 states.
[...]
Those refusing to leave despite a rejected application can now be denied social welfare. Adults deemed to be only posing as refugees can be imprisoned for up to two years, and children for one year, even if they are never charged with a crime.
[...]
There were 10,061 asylum applications in Switzerland last year, a 30 percent drop compared with figures from 2004, according to the U.N. refugee agency. People from Serbia, Turkey, Iraq and Russia are the most frequent to seek refugee status in the country. Numbers have continued to fall this year, even if Switzerland as a country of 7.4 million people remains in proportion to its population one of the world's top destinations for asylum seekers.
The country's cherished system of direct democracy means that the people's consent is required on any major issue. Referendums occur regularly throughout the year.
Voters also said yes in a separate referendum over new immigration criteria with 68 percent approving the government's legislation. The law is designed to tackle problems with integrating foreigners and its supporters say it will alleviate unemployment, which has risen to an estimated 5.5 percent.
It also is designed to work as a corrective to greater European immigration now that a series of agreements with the rest of the continent have been approved. The law essentially prevents all non-skilled workers living outside Europe from moving to Switzerland.
Over 20 percent of all people currently living in Switzerland are foreign nationals, one of the highest rates in the world. Over half of all foreigners come from non-European countries — who opponents of the law say will be unfairly given the status of second-class immigrants.
And the Saudis are building a border fence with Iraq.
Does anyone else see a pattern here? It seems that we're just about the only country on the planet that readily allows, and actually wants, immigrants. And as for the illegal aspect of immigration, it's not even close!
But once again, we're the bad guys, right? I say too damned bad! Obey our laws or get out!
Maybe you could move to Mexico, Switzerland or France, instead!
More at:
If the Mexicans don't want it, that means it is a GOOD IDEA. Nice post and round up.
Posted by: Debbie | October 02, 2006 at 06:40 PM
What have you done for me lately, Mexico? I'm tired of paying for YOUR citizens. It's time that money is spent on the AMERICANS who need it.
Posted by: Bobby | October 02, 2006 at 06:44 PM
Gee, why inconvenience the mexicans who are willing to die when they are crossinG the border illegally ? A fence would mean we don't welcome them over here -- and how could we be so selfish as to prefer our own tax-paying citizens have jobs first, and our hospitals aren't overcrowded with people who don't pay ?
Posted by: Anne Elizabeth | October 03, 2006 at 04:16 AM
While the damage is already done, its not going to get any better without it. A fence is just a start.
Posted by: Eric | October 04, 2006 at 02:15 AM