Tempers are flaring as both sides debate the recent Arizona law passed and signed into law to address the kidnappings, sex slave trade, drug trafficking, and other matters spilling in from Mexico through the porous border, resulting in Phoenix having more than one kidnapping a day in 2009. Caught in the middle are the illegal immigrants who flee to the USA to escape the danger and poverty that is an unalterable way of life for those born into the permanent underclass of Mexico. Well educated and upper class Mexicans are not nearly so interested in living in the USA.
I spent the last week of April 2010 attending a seminar I had sought to attend for a number of years, where I met and conversed with a number of veteran military, intelligence, and law enforcement operatives who had served in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Gitmo, under both the American and the United Nations flags. During the breaks between the lectures on the principles of interviewing and interrogating (not the same philosophy as tactical interrogations where lifesaving information needs to be extracted from unwilling sources quickly), I learned some things from several well-seasoned veterans of the drug wars and other conflicts. They are unanimously contemptuous of elected and appointed officials on both sides of every conflict the USA is involved in, and are convinced that the financial gains realized on both sides of the various conflicts virtually guarantees they will not be allowed to end anytime soon. Too much money, and power, is yet to be made.
The greatest tragedy, of course, has to do with those caught in the middle. In every conflict it is the little guy, the poor, the uneducated, those who do not wield power and are not related to those who wield power. They are the ones who suffer. They are the ones who are pushed out of Mexico by danger and starvation (Why would anyone risk illegally entering the USA if it was not to escape greater danger at home?) They are the ones many of our fellow Americans, frightened that we are losing our American way of life, aim their anger at . . . mistakenly. To be sure, no nation in history has survived the penetration of its borders from unwanted outsiders, be it China when invaded by the Mongols or Rome when invaded by the Huns, Germanic tribes, etc. Therefore, the concern is a valid one, though I am persuaded anger and frustration is more properly directed somewhere else.
The immigration issue is a political issue, unlike that of the Huns and Mongols and others. Peggy Noonan is correct, in my opinion, when she blames both American political parties for not attempting to resolve the matter, though she does not go far enough. The immigration problem is related to both the cultural push from Mexico and the cultural pull here in the United States, and no answer that ignores Mexico can be adequate. Mexico is a perpetually corrupt society, never having benefited from a culture heritage altered by the Protestant Reformation. Our country is becoming corrupt, as we left behind the effects the Protestant Reformation had on those who founded this nation. For the sake of the poor and frightened who seek safety and freedom by leaving Mexico, we must close our borders to stop the influx.
Must we close the border because the illegals are evil, wicked, mean, and nasty? No. Though they are a drag on our society, it is not for that reason we must deny them access. Access must be denied because only when they cannot come here will their discontent result in real solutions to Mexico's perpetual corruption. Our own Revolution was the result of immigrants (Pilgrims) going where they could go (leaving England and coming here), and then finding there was nowhere else to go without pulling up roots (which they were unwilling to do a second time). They had to either revolt against unjust rule by the British crown or submit. Mexicans, on the other hand, have three choices; to submit to the corrupt government and violent criminals, to revolt and make things better, or to enter the USA. Until we deny them the third option they will not take the second option, the only option that will benefit everyone in Mexico in the long run and preserve a United States that still resembles the country our fathers founded.
Though blame can presently be placed directly on politicians of all stripes on both sides of the border, as well as criminals both inside and outside of government on both sides of the border, it did not begin with those corrupt and wicked men. It began with common and everyday citizens of the United States. Let me explain: People my age mowed lawns to earn money as kids, and worked as bag boys in grocery stores. We washed cars and performed odd jobs in the summer. We bussed tables in local eateries and worked party time in hotels and at resorts. Such jobs are now held by immigrants. Why? Because U. S. citizens murdered so many of their unborn children that an economic vacuum developed that became the Yankee side of the push-pull immigration force. Remember, it has always been bad in Mexico. There has always been a push from south of the border, but it was not until women began aborting their children that an economic pull was created by the void of fewer and fewer young people available to bus tables, pump gas, bell hop luggage, and care for lawns.
No country that murders her own unborn children has a right to survive. Closing our border will help Mexicans by provoking them to demand better from their politicians. However, unless our people stop killing our unborn, and start having children again, there is no hope for us as a nation. It is all about sin in the end, is it not? Americans killed and are killing their kids and are now threatened by people from the south who are not murdering their children. Our country, like most of Europe and Japan and China, has become a nation of murderers. Such countries have no right to survive. Citizens of such countries are in need of heartfelt repentance.
What will I personally do about the immigrant issue? I will confess to God the sins of my people. I will become more and more angry at those responsible for the conditions (past and present) that made this problem. And I will both love and befriend the little guys caught in the middle, who seek only safety and security for their loved ones. If they live close enough, I will invite them to church and hope they stay.
