A feature of these more recent rallies as opposed to the more spontaneous ones earlier in this round of debate over the issue was how much more organized things were. The word got out to carry an American flag and to show pro-American sentiments.
I think this accomplished a lot: - In terms of sheer numbers, these rallies are huge. That demonstrates a fairly large body of people too deal with, and potentially to earn the support of, should they become citizens.
- the earlier criticisms about waving the Mexican flag, or chanting negative messages has been overshadowed, I think, by a show of how organized these folks can be, and their desires for their future here in this country.
- it makes nay-sayers like State Rep (Ariz) look pretty darned bad:
quote:Still, along march routes yesterday there were some voices of those opposed to illegal immigration. In Phoenix, state Rep. John Allen (R) held a sign that said "Governor, I'll hold them off, you get the National Guard."
"The question is, when do we stop this activity of illegal immigration?" he said into a battery of cameras. "Right now, it's like Groundhog Day. You wake up every day and there's more of them. It will be this way until we have a closed border."
While some may applaud his gruffness, in the midst of a peaceful, pro-American rally he looks like a complete @ss, IMO.
. . .
Ultimately, I don't know if these rallies have changed any minds among those who really dislike the idea of the latinization of America, or dislike the whole idea of illegal immigration into the US. But...I do think there's a powerful message here for those who may care to listen, even out of self-preservation.
Anytime a peaceful rally can draw this many people in this many places simultaneously it says something pretty impressive about the organizing power of the community involved. It doesn't take much imagination to think of what this would look like if we let it get negative. Right? And the impact of repeated peaceful rallies is also something difficult to ignore -- assuming these crowds will grow and major cities throughout the US will find themselves hosting a gathering of 200,000 (give or take).
I say, good for them! I don't mind a general amnesty. I wouldn't mind an easier legal immigration policy.
I would be bothered by strong-arm tactics at the border, and I think we'd be ill-served by any new law that calls for use of force against the poorest of the poor crossing our borders.
These are indeed interesting times for America. A bit of soul searching is in order, to say the least. And I'm looking forward to seeing how well our government institutions rise to the challenge posed by the obvious call to share our good fortune with our nearest neighbors.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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I am going to don my paranoid hat and admit that I fear this current trend is going to result in a tighter militarized border, and that the stated reason of preventing unwelcome immigration is also going to result in tougher emigration as well.
That is, my paranoid self recognizes stirrings of chaos in the party in power, increased militaristic and nationalistic rhetoric, a tightening of organized social control, and concern about the permeability of our borders. Given that The Handmaid's Tale has been leering ove rmy subconscious these last few years, I'm going to breathe a lot more freely once I have crossed the border successfully again.
(And yeah, I know it's crazy. There it is.)
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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Is it crazy, though? I think the craziness feels like it's coming from the Bush administration. I'm really worried about our country, and what it is becoming.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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Oh, I dunno. Considering that the estimated total number of foreigners in the US without proper documentation is 9,000thousands*, rallies of 100s of thousands would seem to indicate that an overwhelming supermajority of even that select group of foreigners disagree** with the rallies' goals.
* Mid-range estimate of undocumented immigrants in 2001 plus the ~250thousand per year estimated to have entered the US since that time. ** This forum really really really needs a tongue-in-cheek smilie.
posted
I was suprised to hear that there was a huge rally in D.C., as it didn't receive any significant coverage on the local news stations.
Posts: 1480 | Registered: Dec 2004
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People who oppose making illegal immigration easier to bypass seem impractical to me.
If they are going to be in our country, and there is no stopping that without relatively evil tactics, they should pay taxes like all the other people who live in it.
Of course, because they should pay taxes, they should also be granted privileges which a mere foreigner or visitor wouldn't be allowed. It works both ways.
Posts: 484 | Registered: Feb 2006
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I have difficulty reconciling my positive views on legal immigration with this ground-swell of support to essentially pardon people who have broken our laws and circumvented the checks and balances that were put in place to control immigration.
On a personal level, I understand and sympathize with illegal immigrants. Often, I think, they become a faceless threat to our way of life, and that's a tragedy. Most illegal immigrants are just like you and me, and if we interacted with them on an individual basis, we'd probably rail at the idea of having them deported or criminalized.
However, I think it's important to remember that uncontrolled immigration (illegal) is a threat. Not at the individual level where illegal immigrants are our friends, or coworkers, or neighbors, but as a whole, where they threaten to overwhelm our social systems.
Posts: 1480 | Registered: Dec 2004
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Its sort of funny, the people out there supporting illegal immigrants aren't trying to let them stay illegal, they're pushing for ways to make them legal, and pay taxes, et cetera.
People don't come to America as illegal immigrants because they want to not pay US taxes, they come to America as any kind of immigrant they can because they want to work in the US. If we make legal immigration a viable alternative, and create programs assimilating illegal immigrants, the number of illegal immigrants in the country will constantly decrease, and be moved under legal regimes.
As for making it a felony and trying to hunt down illegal immigrants, if you think our justice system is overburdened now . . .
To say it would be a waste of resources is a gross understatement. Illegal immigrants are for the most part productive members of society. The sooner we acknowledge that, rather than try to undercut their contributions and kick them out, the sooner we won't be creating whole new levels of government waste.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Except that what their doing is illegal, its like saying drug dealers make alot of money and spend alot of money in this country so we should lighten up on them. Some may argue that these
"Illegal immigrants are for the most part productive members of society." where as drug dealers are not. The way i see it law is law no matter how "beneficial" it is to society it shouldnt matter how we view the criminals.
Posts: 201 | Registered: Mar 2006
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If we grant amnesty again, we are essentially saying to the world that we will allow essentially unlimited immigration. We will have established a pattern of granting amnesty (second time in 20 years) and will have no credibility about enforcing the general (not "no felons" type laws) immigration laws in the future.
That may be a desired outcome, but we should be explicit about acknowledging it.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I don't think a blanket amnesty is a sound approach. Partly because an earned amnesty program predicated on achievable goals creates an incentive for illegal immigrants to be productive, and partly because there is good reason to try to make legal immigration the better-seeming alternative.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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BTW, regarding illegal immigrants being criminals, I believe they are currently misdemeanants (and I think that's recent in the cases of visa overstays, which used to be a purely civil offense). Do you want people who trespass on others' property to in every case have substantial rights taken away and be kicked out of the country, too?
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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How about we expedite & greatly expand the number of slots for legal immigration from Mexico -- but you have to be IN Mexico to apply. No legalization of anybody that's already here criminally. You want legal residency / path to citizenship? Fine. Go back across the border and wait your turn. After X months/years, any illegal found in the U.S. would be permanently barred from legal status.
Posts: 326 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Because it says "okay, it doesn't matter if you've been productive and would gladly pay taxes, you have to leave and not come back for a while," creating absurd quantities of waste, not to mention spectacular enforcement problems?
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Regarding the pro-criminal rally comment: some of the people at these marches are there to protest the bill that would make helping an illegal immigrant a felony. Many of the churches in my area are concerned that humanitarian aid for immigrants may be punished under this law. Granted, some senators have said that they don't intend for the law to be interpreted this way, but it's certainly possible that a judge could.
Does Congress really want to criminalize giving food, water, clothing, or shelter to "the least of these"?
Posts: 3546 | Registered: Jul 2002
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I don't see how Congress is going to enforce anything in the grey area between "blanket amnesty" and "Send them all home."
If they go with the current plan, and let whoever has been here for five, three and two (or whatever it is) years stay or go by putting them in different groups with different standards, how the hell are they going to prove how long they have been here? Who vouches for them? Their employers who illegally employed them? Especially if this criminalization act passes that stiffens fines for employers hiring illegally, there is no way an employer is going to vouch for an illegal. Besides, the employer is guaranteeing that he'll either lose a low paid worker, or will gain a higher paid one.
What thought has been given to HOW they'll determine how long anyone has been here?
If I were forced to make a plan, I'd say let everyone who has a job stay. Make them pay a fine, say one or two thousand dollars, and the same sum for each additional family member, and let them stay and become active, working, LAW ABIDING Americans.
If they don't have a job, send them home. If they have a record of ANY criminal activity in America, send them home. Increase the number of slots open for them to come back, but in the mean time they have to go back to Mexico and get in line with everyone else. It's not fair to those in the rest of the world that want to come here, and it's not fair to Americans to have dead weight on their society.
The automatic problem however, is that wages for many of them making less than minimum wage is an automatic spike in the cost of labor for employers using illegals. Any plan would have to come with a massive increase in border security. Be it through laser and camera operated blimps, cameras, fences, more security personnel, whatever, but not one person should be able to get in who isn't checked and documented.
I'm all for increasing immigration quotas. I want to bring in both the poor and tired, AND the skilled and the educated. But this is for LEGAL, CONTROLLED immigration. America is NOT a free for all.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Well, my "If I were Queen of the world" solution is this:
Set up a guest worker program so that people coming across the border seeking work and employers seeking employees can get together legally. Pay the workers at least minimum wage, cut taxes, do everything legally. Have a citizenship program that allows people who have been working legally and paying taxes to become citizens of the country.
If an employer is caught employing people who are not legal guest workers and pay less than minimum wage and such - throw him in jail. Increase drastically the fines and penalties for hiring illegal workers, including prison time. Make it so undesirable for people to hire illegal workers that it becomes virtually impossible for an illegal immigrant to find work unless he/she goes through the guest worker program and does things properly.
And yes, I know there are tons of problems with the idea, but my point is that the people who hire illegal workers, pay them nothing wages and run honest business people out of business by undercutting them are a major part of the problem. We need to be going after them.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
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posted
Here's the problem I have with these rallies. I am immediately suspicious and dead-set against any group who says "You're oppressing me!!".
I'm sorry, but there's one key word in the phrase "illegal immigration". Can you find it? No . . . left . . . a Liiiitle bit further . . . THERE it is!
***ILLEGAL***
As in against the law. Already. Currently. Given the present state of affairs. It is a criminal act. Which ALL of these people undertook with FULL KNOWLEDGE of what they were doing. Does that give us the right to treat them as sub-human? No it doesn't. We should give them the same respect as all other life.
Does that give us the right to treat them as criminals (in a legal sense?) . . . why yes it does. Why? Because they broke the law! And now they're upset because they're going to be punished for breaking that law which they KNOWINGLY broke.
I fail to see the problem with that.
Now . . . what's the REAL problem? Let's address that.
It's safer, easier and more desirable to try to make a life as a permanent fugitive in the U.S. than it is in Mexico. (or other countries, but we all know the general assumption being made here.)
Ladies and gents, change the situation. Period. There's three options.
1) Make it easier to immigrate legally -- I see problems with this one, but I'm willing to accept it. After all, our country has a reputation as a safe refuge that I'm proud of and willing to stand behind even perhaps to my personal detriment.
2) Make it less desirable for people to immigrate illegally -- How? Well . . . by making the penalties for getting caught tougher. Or by enforcing current laws more rigorously.
3) Make it more desirable for people to stay where they are -- There's the root of your problem. How do we fix that? I have no idea. There's gotta be a way though, but it'll take time, without a doubt. So . . . in the meantime, what are the options? Well . . . 1 or two.
The people at the rallies want option #0. Keep the situation like it is.
quote: Here's the problem I have with these rallies. I am immediately suspicious and dead-set against any group who says "You're oppressing me!!".
I'm sorry, but there's one key word in the phrase "illegal immigration". Can you find it? No . . . left . . . a Liiiitle bit further . . . THERE it is!
***ILLEGAL***
I can't speak for everyone, only myself, but please don't adress me like that.
I think if any changes are going to happen with immigration, it needs to be done in the Mexican Government. Specifically, America has to stop pretending that everything is hunky-dorey down there and start making some demands that they change the way they treat their people. Mexico has already made some changes, but by and large, the people are still poor, the police, still corrupt, and the government not doing enough to stop it.
It's time for America to start attacking the root of the problem: why do these people some here in the first place.
Furthermore, if we make it easier to come here legally, and thus manage to cut back on the number of illegal immigrants in the country, then companies that usually pay them crappy wages will have to up those wages. Two things happen, Immigrants make the money they need faster and return home, and business owners have less incentive to hire immigrants because their legal and can demand minimum wage.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Because it says "okay, it doesn't matter if you've been productive and would gladly pay taxes, you have to leave and not come back for a while," creating absurd quantities of waste, not to mention spectacular enforcement problems?
Sometimes the easy choice must take a back seat to what's right.
Posts: 326 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
As for option 3, Bush took a stab at that a couple weeks ago during his Cancun summit. One of the major topics of discussion was a way to integrate the security and economy of all of North America into one giant flow of goods and free borders. There's a massive array of problems with such an idea, but on the surface it all sounds nice and cheery doesn't it?
One of the biggest problems is Mexico itself. First off, the Mexican government is talking about backing out of NAFTA, which is just silly considering their trade with America has TRIPLED since it was first introduced. 90% of Mexico's trade is FREE due to the number of free trade deals they have with other nations. It's a bad idea for a whole host of reasons, not the least of which is for American business which will suddenly find it more expensive to do business in Mexico, and to operate factories there. That'll probably hurt as much as help Mexico. American companies will raise prices to deal with new tariffs, but I wouldn't be surprised to see worker layoffs and slashed wages in Mexico as well.
Integrating our economies as they are is next to impossible. They have a huge unemployment rate, crime is rampant, most of the people are unskilled and poorly educated by first world standards. It would be impossible to have a free flow of jobs, skill, and technology with that massive a gap between them and us. Integration with Canada would also be difficult, but a million times easier.
We can't help Mexico until they help themselves. Crime and corruption in their government is so insanely rampant, we'd never make any headway without first getting them removed from power. The drug cartels there won't go without a fight, a bloody one. If they cleaned up their act, made some real progress, cut their crime and proved corruption was down, and made some efforts to reduce the 40% poverty level of their country, I would have zero problem with an American/Canadian backed effort to modernize and improve Mexico as best we can. Use local Mexican labor to build new schools, new police stations, all the basics of infrastructure that they currently lack or need more of. But make sure that money isn't being funneled to drug cartels and dirty politicians too.
We can't do it all for them, and considering the progress they've made in the last couple decades in improving their economy and infrastructure, I'd say there's hope. But that's your long term solution.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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I find it ironic that it seems to be people who generally support the minimum wage who are so supportive of illegal immigrants. The whole thing of paying people less then minimum wage sounds strange to me. And the argument of there are jobs Americans don’t want to do it highly confusing to me. Admittedly I live in low immigration area, but we don’t have a rough time of finding people to clean toilets or work as garbage collectors.
Posts: 2845 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I am not in the least opposed to legal immigration. If these people have the drive to come here and succed, by all means do so. They'll make America a better place, as all hard-working immigrants have.
But, we are a soverign nation. Citizens of other countries don't have the right to come here, and don't have the right to do it illegally. To get the benefits you have to follow the rules, regardless of if you think they're stupid or not. So, it would help if those of Latin origin (immigrants or not) who espouse this "colonize the southwest, it's ours anyways" would shut up.
More legal immigration, crack down ruthlessly on illegal immigration (and the hiring of illegals, as Belle said). If you're caught trying to sneak over, you're marked and lose your chance to come over legally (for a time or forever, can't decide on which). As for the people here - that egg is already scrambled. Create a legalization program with no tolerance during the process.
Posts: 1069 | Registered: Feb 2005
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They had an "immigration reform protest" rally here in Wichita yesterday. THe protestors planned it for right at quitting time downtown (4:30 - 5 PM) and started at cityhall with about 1,000 protestors, which grew to about 2 or 3,000 by the time they marched down by our building here and up by Senator Pat Robert's office and basically totally gridlocked all of downtown at quitting time. It really built momentum after it started. When I left work at 4:30 (avoid it becaue I go west from our building instead of east/south/north or any further into downtown) there were quite a few high-school aged kids just coming in to take part in it.
I was kinda surprised to see it here - hadn't heard much rumblings about immigration reform. In a way I'm glad to see that Kansans are at least listening to national news and aware of the issues.
Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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I fail to see what's particularly "right" about policing illegal immigrants like violent criminals instead of treating them as normal people who have committed a minor transgression.
Jay: I'm not generally supportive of the minimum wage, so I assume you're talking about somebody else
All the arguments that are being presented here for some sort of extremely strict crackdown (far more than we currently do) on illegal immigration don't proceed based on any arguments for bettering the country, they are based on rather unusual interpretations of what it means to be a state and what it means to be an illegal immigrant. These are people, people who did something a little bad and are often doing a lot of things very good. To react disproportionately to the negative out of some sense of moral duty disavows the notion of a public morality in favor of self-righteousness.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Potential LEGAL immigrants waiting their turn across the oceans probably don't feel the same way, fugu.
Thing is, I've yet to see anyone explain how you're going to separate the ones that ARE violent and bad for the nation from the ones that are productive and helpful to America. I doubt you are suggesting we just keep them all and sort it out later. Though if you are, I strongly disagree with that. Their illegality is what makes weeding out the bad ones so hard, and is why we have a legal process to begin with, the same process that millions of other people around the world are going through, have gone through, and wish to go through.
To suggest that all 11 million of them are perfectly peaceful helpful and productive members of society is dishonest, just as portraying them all as useless barnacles is just as dishonest. Truth is, we don't know. We don't know which ones are criminals making things worse and which ones are holding down jobs that keep America running.
Such is my suggestion to FIND OUT. Send home the bad ones, keep the good ones, and yes, protect the moral duty to be FAIR to everyone on the planet that wants to come to America. We all talk here about how lucky we are to be born in America, and we are. But what about those who are unlucky enough to not be born on the North or South American continent? The ones who can't hitchhike their way to a better life and are stuck across the sea? Shouldn't that moral duty also be to protect the equality of their chance to come here, rather than give free rides to people who circumvented the system just because they were lucky enough to be close enough to hop the fence?
I don't think an "extremly strict crackdown" is necessary. I do however think an extremely far reaching effort to document them, weed out the bad, and major efforts to restore order at the border (ooo, I feel a slogan blossoming in my head!) are extremely necessary.
It sends a message to the rest of the world that America is a land of law, and it's a land of opportunity and fairness for ALL, not just for those lucky enough to be geographically close enoigh to cheat their way in.
It sends a message to those who would immigrate here illegally that we aren't going to stand for it anymore, and that if they want to get in, they'll have to do it legally. And Congress should thus create a new legal path, be it a guest worker program or increased immigration quotas to accomodate that new message. It supports it twice over.
It sends a message to those that would enter this country for dangerous purposes as well. America doesn't have an open door for anyone who wants to just waltz in and harm the country, we're serious about our borders.
It sends a message to Americans everywhere. It reaffirms that we are a welcoming nation of immigrants who will still take in the tired, and the poor, but will do so in an orderly fashion tha respects the current situation in America, not an America that existed a century ago. It tells everyone that we're in the business of securing American and making it stronger, and not just letting people do whatever they want.
This mess has been decades in the making, and cleaning it up will be very, very messy, and costly. But better we do it now, fairly for all, and in order to secure our borders now and forever, than offering up amnesty for everyone and encouraging the next generation of illegals that America is a giant free ride for all, laws be damned.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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The individual act of an illegal immigrant is a little bad. May we all go our entire lives doing no more than that little bad.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote:Originally posted by fugu13: These are people, people who did something a little bad
These are people whose very first act on American soil was the willful violation of statutes lawfully passed by our Congress. They can wave U.S. flags for the cameras if they want, but their actions speak louder than words, and they express a contempt for the Constitutional system that flag represents.
For us to shrug and say, 'that's ok' is equivalent to a slap in the face of every current or potential immigrant who's gone through the proper legal channels.
Posts: 326 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:These are people whose very first act on American soil was the willful violation of statutes lawfully passed by our Congress. They can wave U.S. flags for the cameras if they want, but their actions speak louder than words, and they express a contempt for the Constitutional system that flag represents.
Most of the people who have been waving the US flags for the cameras, are legal residents of the United States. Many of them are US citizens, others are legal immigrants. Virtually every legal immigrant in the US has been marching the streets requesting legal status for illegal immigrants. If it's a slap in their faces, why are they protesting in favor of it?
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:These are people whose very first act on American soil was the willful violation of statutes lawfully passed by our Congress. They can wave U.S. flags for the cameras if they want, but their actions speak louder than words, and they express a contempt for the Constitutional system that flag represents.
The people in those protest marches aren't all illegal aliens. In fact, a great many of them are from churches organizing to draw attention to the ludicrous double-standards that exist in our treatment of the poor who migrate to our country, legally or otherwise.
For decades it has been in our economic interest to turn a blind eye to illegal immigration since it represents a cheap labor pool of people who represent very little drain on the public coffers. This is still true. What has changed is a bunch of hand-wringing about how some few among these masses might be terrorists. I suspect what is really going on is that there are many people who dislike the idea of a shift in the ethnic balance of America.
If we're going to enforce laws, how about we all start obeying all the speed limits to the digit? How about everyone pays every dime they owe in taxes? Or...how about we make every violation of ANY law a felony.
Seriously, I think the argument about "their first act was to break the law" is not just specious, but displays a profound, and even willful ignorance of the history of immigration "policy" in this country as well as a history of the contributions of immigrants and their offspring.
This kind of thing runs in cycles. There were riots in NYC (and over much of New England) when waves of Irish and Italian immigrants came here. And look! The country is not only still standing, it's the strongest in the world, and near about the strongest it has ever been.
Our Southern borders are where they are largely due to historical flukes, accidents, and outright chicanery. The people who lived one side or the other the border have a completely different perspective of that imaginary line than do people on this side who think it is something established and accepted universally.
It's all well and good to say "tough luck" but I venture to say you'd feel radically different about it if you were on the other side and knew the history of the US government's (and various proto-US governments') actions along that border.
Just read up on the wonderfully colorful folks who established the Republic of Texas and how they treated the Mexicans and mixed-blood folks in that area as they worked to grab the land that established the eventual US border.
People have long long memories for stuff like that. Especially when the look from the dirt roads on one side to the resource-rich lands on the opposite side of the border.
And it's also nice of you to just tell them to clean up their own act. But let's not forget the various policies of the US toward "OUR" hemisphere and how those policies helped to keep the other countries just a little bit backward.
The rant about how they're illegal is just too simplistic.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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I saw we round up everybody who entered this land (or whose ancestors entered this land) without a visa and ship them off to Luna.
Yes, I'm talking about you.
LOL. Unfortuantely I have to go, not one shred of native american in me anywhere. I will miss you all, thank you at least for not sending me back to Germany or Ireland. Posts: 63 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
Yeah! kick 'em off the reservations back to where they came from before we got here.
Oh wait...
Ummm....
Cr@p.
Good thing for us the European colonists all came over with pieces of paper granting them title to the land, otherwise we'd be in serious trouble!
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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And it's also nice of you to just tell them to clean up their own act. But let's not forget the various policies of the US toward "OUR" hemisphere and how those policies helped to keep the other countries just a little bit backward.
The rant about how they're illegal is just too simplistic.
Doesn't really apply to Mexico. Though Mexico isn't the only problem, they're the biggest creator of illegal immigrants. America has done a lot more to help Mexico than any other nation on the planet, and far less to hurt it than European countries did in the past.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: [QUOTE]Virtually every legal immigrant in the US has been marching the streets requesting legal status for illegal immigrants. If it's a slap in their faces, why are they protesting in favor of it?
Bull. I'm sure there are legal immigrants there who have family members who are here illegally. But as for the rest, bull.
Posts: 326 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Irregardless -- are you saying that legal immigrants, for the most part, are not in favor of a legal status for illegal immigrants?
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Um...the history of our interaction with Mexico is not all that rosy.
Recently, sure, we're on better terms and are more helpful to them. But that doesn't erase the past either.
Just because the Spaniards were worse doesn't mean that Mexicans should look at us and think we're their best friends.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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[url=http://www.historyguy.com/Mexican-American_War.html]Some words about the US policy of Manifest Destiny and why Mexicans might not (to this day) agree that we "own" the border lands.
What the words cannot describe is how wretchedly anyone not going along with this US policy was treated within the borders of the rebelling territories.
And the US government aided and armed the rebels.
Just because we won doesn't mean what our government did back then was the right thing.
Oddly enough, we were the first nation to recognize the sovreignty of Mexico when it won independence in 1821.
We just didn't agree that it's borders should be stable.
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