These are the thoughts of a dear friend who knows what he's talking about... Reprinted with permission, of course!"The pResident's speech on Immigration was the act of a desperate man. Polls lately have shown that the Republicans are at an record low in popularity polls. The Democrats have benefitted, not because they offer a better way, but because they're percieved as the only alternative. The Dems think they're going to take the Senate come the fall. The contractors are likely to be Confinement Corporation of America and their ilk. Private Sector Detention Services are one of the fastest-growing industries in the nation, didn't you know? Immigration Customs Enforcement has had a hand-in-glove relationship with these Service Providers for decades. We contract 'em, and they build 'em. Except that they won't have to build them.
I now know what they're going to do with all those closed Military Bases in Texas and throughout the West and Midwest that they barb-wired up seven or eight years ago. I had assumed we were going to do a mass-detention of Iraqis, Iranians and Afghans like we did with the Japanese back during WWII; but it looks like we'll be doing it to the Mexicans and Central Americans instead.
I disagree with you that many Immigrants do jobs that Americans won't do. They do jobs that Americans won't do for less than a living wage, medical benefits, and acceptable safety standards. If those three criteria were met, there would be a lot more citizens and *legal* immigrants willing to take those jobs. But employers don't want to *pay* a living wage; they don't want to *pay* for medical benefits, they don't *care* about acceptable safety standards, they regard the illegal immigrants as an easily disposable and replaceable labor commodity to be used up and cast aside, and they *exploit* them in ways that ARE criminal, and for which they ought to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
And you know, employer sanctions was a subject the President was rather silent about in his speech the other night... funny how he could have overlooked that... NOT.These are the issues we ought to be addressing. America should take care of its citizenry. America should protect its borders. America should stop the flood of illegal immigration and the Gangmembers and Criminals who exploit those they smuggle in. What the Coyotes do is often kidnapping or slavery.
I'm sure everyone remembers those poor people that died in the abandoned truck down in Victoria two years ago? Well, they are just the tip of the iceberg. Hundreds of illegal immigrants die every year in cargo containers, in trucks, under the wheels of trains, or out in the desert abandoned by the Coyotes who were supposed to guide them. Increased enforcement of border security by Immigration and Customs *saves* lives, believe it or not. Because they Coyotes don't give a shit about the people they smuggle. The gangs that control places like Neuvo Lardeo charge the Coyotes $25,000 (yes, twenty-five THOUSAND) a month to stay in business. And they use those profits to smuggle their Heroin and Cocaine-- they don't usually bother with Marijuana anymore, it's usually not profitable enough-- 50 pounds of Cocaine is as profitable to them as a TON of Mexican Dirt Weed, and much easier to smuggle in. That's the ugly side of the Issue that you won't see La Raza, La Resistancia and the other Immigrant Rights groups addressing.
The profits that the Coyotes and the Gangs make are staggering, and of course the Mexican Federalis take their share of the cut. That's why this is going to turn into a terrorist-style border war, if it wasn't already-- the black market of drugs and alien smuggling must continue, and the smugglers and gangs are already armed, both on the Border and here in the U.S. where gangs like M-13 have set up shop from Coast to Coast, for their alien smuggling and drug distribution network.
That must be why Dubbya is sending the National Guard. I fear this is going to get very ugly indeed. The Coyotes, the Gangs, the Employers who hire here in the U.S., they *all* criminally exploit the illegals, and often subject them to life-threatening risks and situations. And you won't hear that discussed on CNN, or even NPR. And it's a horrendous dirty secret, the proverbial dead elephant in the living room that nobody is talking about."
And, just this morning, from International Action Center:"The US war against Latin America has entered a new phase when President George W Bush last night laid out his plans to militarize the border with Mexico. This time the war against the peoples of Latin America will also be launched inside the United States.
This is a blatant example of the racist and genocidal character of the government of the USA. It exposes the hypocrisy of its “democracy” and its true mission on behalf of the business community by proposing a new “bracero” program that will treat immigrant workers as slave laborers with absolutely no rights.
But while Bush increases funding to militarize the south and further repress the immigrant community, the countries of Cuba and Venezuela work incessantly to bring education, health care, jobs, decent housing, and dignity to millions of people. Not only to the population in their two countries, but to the peoples of the whole region and beyond. Even to the poor people in the United States, as the aid offered during the Katrina devastation and the delivery of subsidized oil through CITGO attest.
The development of a country to satisfy the needs of its people is something that the United States cannot tolerate and works round the clock devising ways to destabilize and destroy. Cuba and Venezuela, and now Bolivia, are the nations that the peoples in Latin America look up to while they construct a new future for the new generations. Venezuela and Cuba’s Bolivarian Alternative to the Americas or ALBA, the program of regional integration, cultural, economic and technical exchange based in solidarity and respect, is completely different from the cruel free trade agreements pushed by the US like NAFTA that destroy national economies and force the emigration of millions of workers from their homeland.
That is why the United States is desperately launching a hostile campaign to destroy them. The situation is urgent and needs the firm and loud opposition from the people of the US.
A nuclear-powered U.S. war fleet and 6,500 Marines are conducting maneuvers in the Caribbean that threaten Cuba, Venezuela and other anti-imperialist countries throughout the Americas.
According to the Cuban newspaper Granma, the scope of the U.S. military maneuvers dwarfs even the Pentagon’s naval deployment during the October 1962 missile crisis. Similar maneuvers in the past were used to gather information needed to launch aggression, like the "exercises” that preceded the U.S. invasion of Grenada in 1983.
They can also be used to send a direct threat, as the Virginian-Pilot newspaper, which is published in the heavily militarized Hampton Roads area, noted in a March 28 article:
“Some defense analysts suggested that the unusual two-month-long deployment, set to begin in early April, could be interpreted as a show of force by anti-American governments in Venezuela and Cuba. ‘The presence of a U.S. carrier task force in the Caribbean will definitely be interpreted as some sort of signal by the governments of Cuba and Venezuela,’ said Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute, a pro-defense think tank in Washington. ‘If I was sitting in the Venezuela capital looking at this American task force, the message I would be getting is America still is not so distracted by Iraq that it is unable to enforce its interests in the Caribbean,’ Thompson said.”
Radio Havana says this ominous show of force will be followed by yet another maneuver in the Caribbean involving 4,000 NATO troops and lasting from May 23 to June 15.
It is urgent to tell the Bush administration loud and clear: Hands Off Venezuela and Cuba!
On Saturday May 20th join New York high school students, Cuban Americans, Bolivarian Circle activists and many other marchers from Detroit, Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, New York, Richmond, Va., Washington, D.C and other areas, who intend to say no in person to new anti-Cuba and anti-Venezuela measures planned by the U.S. government. "
It's gonna get ugly.... Real ugly...
