I'm sure the Aztlan people will love this idea - Annex Mexico
From someone who thinks inside the box (which is, in and of itself, a refreshing thought):
If we can't secure the borders, move them, goes the argument -- Annex Mexico to the United States. When I first saw the idea in bloggerland, I have to admit my gut-reaction was, "won't that get us another 100 million workers coming after the US jobs American would do if they were ever offered legally through their local unemployment offices?" But, after a little thought (very little), I find the idea intriguing....
If Mexico insists on giving the US all its poor and downtrodden, and our politicians insists on taking them, lets insists on getting something in trade -- all of Mexico's land area that could support the Mexican people if the land were under the umbrella of US laws and economic development....
Let's give Mexico's citizens what they so loudly proclaim they want -- US citizenship -- by adding Mexico's 31 states (and 1 federal district) to the US's current 50 and create one big happy supersized, English-speaking-singing United States of America!...
We don't have to go to war to make it happen -- the Mexican government is all for an open border. Mexican nationals on both sides of the border are begging for the rights of US citizenship. Isn't that what the strong cries for amnesty and guest workers status is all about -- creating an expedited path to US citizenship and the American dream for the citizens of Mexico. We can do that just as easily by annexing Mexico as by granting "guest worker" status.
All that's needed to make it happen is a little paperwork and an election. Mexico Annexation won't cost the US taxpayers as much as anything else on the table, leaving more money to build missle defense systems -- we might need those if China and Cuba decide to do more together than drill for oil. Bottom line -- Merging the Mexican states with the US states is the homeland security, fiscal conservative, economy building, democracy spreading thing to do!...
NAFTA is a failure -- the proof is in the 12 million Mexicans now here and the great majority of remaining Mexicans in Mexico who say they will come just as soon as they can. Economic studies show that even with heavy US investment in NAFTA, Mexico has failed to achieve any net improvement in private sector jobs.
Thanks to NAFTA, Mexicans live in crime-infested border towns, and our manufacturing and high-tech workers -- the US middle class taxpayers -- have lost their formerly well-paying family-feeding-educating factory jobs to an illegal workforce here. The Economic Policy Council found that by the Year 2000 (six years ago), NAFTA had cost the US almost 800,000 jobs and stagnant wages for millions of US workers.
Jobs losses on the US side of the border moved with sonic speed during the Bush administration when the remaining "jobs Americans no longer have an opportunity to do" in manufacturing and in high-tech began flying offshore to "trading partners" India and China as well.
NAFTA is as bad an idea as all the other free-trade/global-economy schemes the current administration clings to -- schemes that continue to destroy the wage base of US workers -- legal and illegal. Under the "guest worker" idea, workers on both sides of the border will continue to be exploited.
Since nature abhords a vacuum, I'm told, and NAFTA really needs to go, let's stick something else in place, something bigger and better than NAFTA. The most humane something is to welcome the 12 million of Mexico's poor and downtrodden masses already here -- the ones that didn't realize any economic benefit from NAFTA and were forced to flee their homeland to feed their families -- into this land of opportunity in such a way that we might eventually have the means to support all 12 million of them and the 100 million plus of their families still in Mexico in years to come.
The only sure way to make the lives of the Mexican people better is to welcome all the lands of Mexico along with the Mexican people into the United States and get busy making their world (and ours) safe for democracy and economic development....
The only possible reason people would flee their homeland and risk their lives to petition a foreign government for amenesty rights, instead of petitioning their own government for the rights to liberty and persuit of happiness and jobs, is that they are in fear of their own government.
Fear of their home government is the universal sign of an oppressed people. The United States of America, land of the free and home of the brave, is not going to stand for fear and oppression in the rest of the world. (Maybe at home, but not in the rest of the world). If the Mexican people are living under fear of a historically corrupt government that has stolen the people resources and deprived the people of the living standard they feel they're entitled to, and those people have the gumption to petition the government of the United States for help, then, by golly, it's the duty of this great nation of ours to demand that the Mexican government step down, shock and awe them if they don't, and redistribute the wealth to the people! (Sorry, I was channeling Bush for a moment.)
Charles N. Steele echoes similar thoughts:
The remedy for Latin American economies is relatively simple to write...
1. Macroeconomic stability (cut government spending and push for balanced budgets, avoid inflating the money supply)
2. Microeconomic liberalization (free prices, free entry and exit, abolish gov't monopolies and privatize state industries, open the borders to free trade)
3. Drastically reduce corruption
4. Develop private property rights for the poor (Hernado de Soto's remedy -- the poor have enormous potential capital they could use for productive investment, but corrupt elites refuse to protect the rights of the poor)
5. Hanging Hugo Chavez and that goofball in Bolivia (this would have a salutory effect on Latin America's would-be socialists; hanging Pinochet in the interests of being "fair and balanced" would be a reasonable step as well)
For Mexico, I suppose the easiest way to do achieve all this would be for the U.S. to simply annex Mexico as its 51st state, imprison any corrupt Mexican officals (i.e. all Mexican officials) and grant automatic citizenhip to Mexicans. We'd then have traded an immigration problem for a "re-unification" problem similar to Germany's -- but unlike Germany, we have a dynamic economy that could handle the problems.
Of course, this is a ridiculous proposal that no one but me (and maybe a few poor Mexicans) would ever support, and so it has no chance of even being considered. But still I like it... unlike the "solutions" under consideration (sealing the borders , guest worker programs, felonizing anything vaguely connected with immigration, tattooing "U.S. Property" on all citizens, etc.) it actually addresses the root problem and doesn't involve setting up a system of internal passports in the U.S.
Peter Waitzman:
Should we build a wall to separate Mexico and the U.S.? I say we annex Mexico as a U.S. territory, raise the standard of living, reduce the government corruption and build a wall separating Central from South America. That'll be cheaper, easier to patrol, and bring in millions of new citizens to help us with this manual labor shortage that everyone wants to chit-chat about but no seems to be able to pinpoint.
Laslo:
Has anyone seen how huge our border with Mexico is? The best way to fix the immigration issue for all parties involved is simple. Annex Mexico. Turn this nation into ten new states. "You want to come to America? Congratulations... you're already here." Mexico has no lack of natural resources. The government is so busy stuffing their pockets that the citizens have nothing. With the American machine in Mexico, though, minimum wage, medicare, and a government that is bent on success how can you [lose]?...
How you may ask will we convince the government to hand over their country? Several options are available. How about offering the Mexican military a place in the much better paid American military for starters. (could that possibly solve the low recruitment issue too?) Circulate pamphlets to the civilians outlining our plans to take them out of poverty. Then offer the Mexican politicians a healthy retirement for co-operation. All parties happy.
Prairie Pundit:
What is really bizaar about this fantasy world is that [the reconquistas] want to make the Southwest intothe land they fled. If Mexico and Mexican rule was that great why do they leave? If instead of reconquering the US southwest as their goal, they wanted the US to annex Mexico, the country would immediately become more wealthy and people would have fewer reasons to flea north for jobs. It is the incompetance of Mexican goverment that is the problem not an ancient dispute over real estate. You put any real estate under the rule of incompetant and you would get the same results.
The Skreeching Skraeling:
The big stories of today:
1. Illegal Immigration.
2. Oil and gas prices.
3. Securing our borders.
Here's my solution to the problem. Annex Mexico. With one fell swoop, I just eliminated all the other problems.
1. Illegal Immigrants will no longer be illegal. No amnesty needed because they'll get their wish and be citizens.
2. Oil and gas prices. Mexico has a huge supply of oil just waiting there to be shared with their fellow citizens up north. AND they're not afraid to drill in pretty places to get it.
3. Securing our borders. Unlike the current US borders, Mexico's sourthern borders are walled and secured complete with machine guns. AND they're not afraid to shoot people who try to cross.
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