by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
Ricochet.com<\/p>\n
We will see more of the same in 2011 in Mexico. The drug cartel killing spree raises a number of less discussed considerations. We are told the huge American demand for drugs, both grown and manufactured, creates the problem; perhaps in part, but note that we have a longer, more porous border with Canada and we are not seeing a shoot ’em up culture arising in Calgary or Toronto over meth or heroin exporting to the US. Something else is going on as well. We were also told that the continuation of massive illegal immigration from Mexico to the US at least had a ‘safety valve’ effect that lessened tensions in Mexico while earning it nation-saving foreign exchange; but after 11-16 million Mexican nationals have fled to the United States in the last 20 years, exactly how has that mass flight and ensuing remittances of an estimated $30 billion per annum made things any better in Mexico?<\/p>\n
In short, everything from the drug industry to illegal immigration is symptomatic of a larger pathology in the sense that Mexico has not embraced open markets, truly consensual government, respect for private property, transparency, and an independent judiciary \u2014 in the style of the reformist agendas in Chile and Brazil \u2014 and thus cannot provide security and prosperity for its own people. We could legalize drugs, let in another 20 million illegal aliens, allow $100 million to be sent back to Mexico from nationals here \u2014 and there would still be violence and instability in Mexico.<\/p>\n
The answer is not to intervene in Mexico, but in polite and friendly fashion to distance ourselves a bit from Mexico, by securing the border and ending illegal immigration. America’s drug appetite, and an open border between two vastly different societies, coupled with the disruptive effect of draining Oaxaca and other provinces of working-age males, are only force multipliers of Mexico’s more fundamental unwillingness or inability to fully westernize. In a larger sense, America has never been honest about American-Mexican relations of the last half-century, and the result is that millions here and in Mexico do not dare ponder exactly why millions risk their lives to come northward to a country that is constructed as some sort of exploiter in the Mexican mental landscape, and as not much better here at home in elite multicultural circles.<\/p>\n
There will be no real progress until those on both sides of the border begin the painful discussion of why America works and why apparently millions of Mexicans want to be part of it rather than of their own native Mexico. Blaming America or creating an Orwellian situation in which millions of illegally residing Mexican nationals are hyper-critical of or indifferent to the US, while wanting amnesty from it, is sadly illustrative of the our shared inability to address the problem.<\/p>\n
\u00a92011 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Victor Davis Hanson Ricochet.com We will see more of the same in 2011 in Mexico. 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Are millions\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Border_patrol_car_patroling_on_border.jpg?fit=800%2C533&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Border_patrol_car_patroling_on_border.jpg?fit=800%2C533&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Border_patrol_car_patroling_on_border.jpg?fit=800%2C533&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Border_patrol_car_patroling_on_border.jpg?fit=800%2C533&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2538,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/illiberal-immigration\/","url_meta":{"origin":4109,"position":1},"title":"Illiberal Immigration","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 12, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Recently, in symbolic fashion, spectators of Mexican ancestry in Pasadena\u2019s Rose Bowl did not merely cheer on the Mexican national soccer team in a game against the US national team \u2014 such nostalgia would be natural and understandable for recent immigrants \u2014 but\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2563,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-philosophies-of-illegal-immigration\/","url_meta":{"origin":4109,"position":2},"title":"The Philosophies of Illegal Immigration","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 3, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media Dinosaur Thinking Even to talk of illegal immigration earns slurs. I can attest to that. It is the most self-censored topic in America today, where we construct artificial worlds of rhetoric that in no way resemble reality (e.g., try to suggest that California\u2019s current\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11596,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-ironies-of-illegal-immigration\/","url_meta":{"origin":4109,"position":3},"title":"The Ironies of Illegal Immigration","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 10, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Estimates suggest that there are eleven million to 13 million Mexican citizens currently living in the United States illegally. Millions more emigrated previously and are now U.S. citizens. A recent poll revealed that one-third of Mexicans (34 percent) would like to emigrate to the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mexico"","block_context":{"text":"Mexico","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/mexico\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1322,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/illegal-immigration-is-immoral\/","url_meta":{"origin":4109,"position":4},"title":"Illegal Immigration Is Immoral","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 15, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Illegal immigration has been in the news daily during the Republican primary campaign, even though a depressed economy here, stronger border enforcement, and vast new finds of petroleum in Latin America may soon radically curtail the number of illegal entrants into the United\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8628,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/how-illegal-immigration-finally-turned-off-the-public\/","url_meta":{"origin":4109,"position":5},"title":"How Illegal Immigration Finally Turned Off the Public","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 31, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"If there were not a Donald Trump, he would likely have had to have been invented.\u00a0 by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ PJ Media Why did the illegal-immigration issue launch Donald Trump\u2019s campaign? Why did his recent tense press conference exchange with Univision\u2019s Jorge Ramos please even some of Trump\u2019s liberal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Shot and chaser: Democrat activist Jorge Ramos of Univison badgers Donald Trump; is (temporarily) deported from presser by Trump\u00e2\u0080\u0099s security. 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