| It provides our nation's economy with hundreds of billions of dollars in productivity gains in the form of labor force that is pliable, cheap and can be disposed of without great consequence. It provides our government with hundreds of billions of dollars in tax revenue and hundreds of billions more in social security contributions that will never be claimed. It provides an excuse to fatten defense contractors and bloated security bureaucracies with contracts for virtual fences, detention centers and our immigration and customs enforcement gestapo.
It also provides millions of votes because the dissonance between our "laws" that we don't (and can't) enforce, and the demographic changes this has led to in our population, are a source of terrific agitation to the xenophobic and superficial thinkers. These know nothings predictably whip up the haters with anti-alien propaganda, and urge them to swarm for politicians who will cough up the slogans and terms they have claimed as their badge.
Politicians who trade in the discourse with the terms illegal, aliens, secure the borders, invasion, and sovereignty are guaranteed cheers and applause from a crowd that burns with intensity about the issue. Those who will not participate in the debate on the xenophobes' terms, are derided and their offices harassed with angry phone calls.
Our current situation is the product of the collective intentions of our current political establishment. It's been working just as it should be expected to work. It allows those in power to avoid the tough work of crafting real policy, provides constituents with the labor inputs they need, bulges the pockets of reliable campaign contributors and creates a force of shock troops ready to pounce on the "traitors" who deviate from the rhetorical dogma that has dominated the discourse.
Like every convenience, it has come at a price. Foremost the cost of this policy has been borne by the poorest immigrants. The individual immigrant driven by economic necessity is compelled to endure harrowing risk to come here and live branded as an alien and a law breaker once she arrives. She will make $6.00 an hour at a thankless job, or two, in the best of cases, but is happy for the opportunity. The worst cases, however, result in tragic outcomes; mothers locked in detention centers for months and years; migrants thrust into the arms of an increasingly violent smuggling trade; slavery in brothels. Thousands have died on our southern border from heat exposure and thirst.
There are also costs to the nation's that they leave behind who are deprived of some of the hardest working, innovative and entrepreneurial members of their societies. This only further retards the economic growth that Mexico and other sending nations so desperately need if they ever hope to provide genuine opportunity to their populations. The remittances from abroad are needed, but they cannot be applied towards a concerted program of economic growth which every developing country must have if it is to become a South Korea, an Ireland or India. Every development success story depends upon large investments in human capital in the form of education and cultivating a labor-intensive domestic industry. Remittances alone cannot lift Mexicans into near economic parity with the modern economies of the world. Immigrant- sending nations must be able to retain people with talent, ambition and ideas instead of sending them to wash dishes in Charlotte.
One must also not forget to have compassion for those Americans inclined to see our new immigrant neighbors as a threat and competitors. Many of the alien-haters are also poorer than average, under-educated and tend to have more interaction with the newly arriving immigrants in their neighborhoods and jobs than the immigrant sympathizers who can afford them as nannies and gardeners. I disagree profoundly with the impulses of the Minute Men and their compatriots, but I think it sad that their lack of power, lack of ideas and lack of political access is so predictably exploited, massaged and molded into hatred of others and disgust for human diversity. In order to challenge the appeal of the xenophobes, the exploitative nature of their propaganda must be seen for the dehumanizing drivel that it is. There are no aliens among us, and to convince a man that his neighbor is an alien is not only a lie, but also an attempt to corrupt his intellect. It is the intentional distortion of a complicated set of phenomena that act to create international migration into caricature, race baiting and modes of thinking which lead to no understanding.
One last cost of our collective national bargain for an immigration policy of inaction and convenience is the price that is about to be paid by the politicians who have bet that they could win elections upon the shoulders of the anti-immigrant movement. For all the shouting and phone calling, and blogging and cable show demagoguery the alien-spotters' movement has proven to be politically impotent. This election will hopefully serve as a bold statement about the unreliability of a cynical political calculus which expects to turn a profit on the situation created by inaction and a vacuum of ideas. Although mostly ignored by the presidential candidates, the immigration issue has featured largely in races for the House and Senate and local governments throughout the states. The secure-the-borders crowd is about to take a whipping.
If the Democrats are smart, they will seize this moment to realize that the public will not tolerate political inaction on this subject forever. Their predecessors, who thought they could secure office by scapegoating others for the policy that they have done nothing to correct, are a valuable object lesson. With a massive overhaul of our immigration system, which includes broad and accessible paths to citizenship for our neighbors out of status, much easier access to our labor markets, especially for Latin Americans, and a continued commitment to the traditions of family-based immigration and liberal asylum, the Democratic Party could accomplish much.
It would cement a youthful and growing demographic into a position of lasting political loyalty for the next generation. It would show that the Democrats can deliver sound policy on a complicated issue with tangible economic benefits. It would lift the yoke of our "broken" policy from the shoulders of so many millions, and if done correctly, it could put us on a course of much closer ties and more constructive cooperation with Mexico.
Now is the time. This election will bring a sea change in many policies. The immigrants of our Nation and their allies need to rise to ride the crest. |
I frequently hear the tired old song that our immigration system is broken and must be fixed. Inevitably, the next line is a conclusory shortcut to thinking that involves massive fencing, rounding up morenos with military tactics, the forced separation of families, demonizing Spanish, or some combination thereof. Changing the debate surrounding immigration policy, and turning others to see immigrants as persons and not objects, requires that we reject the terms that are carelessly taken for granted. So I begin with this. I challenge the very premise that the system is broken at all.
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