Marietta Daily Journal

Editorial: Open Borders?
May 14, 2009

Should the United States be poorer and Mexico wealthier? You don’t have to read too far between the lines to know that’s what ex-Mexican President Vicente Fox was arguing for on Tuesday at a forum sponsored by Kennesaw State University and the Commission on North American Prosperity, aka North America 2050.

First, we’ll stipulate that most U.S. residents would overwhelmingly agree that our country does not need to be poorer, and that Mexicans would probably agree by similar margins that their country should be wealthier. Who wouldn’t want their country to be wealthier, after all?

Second, we’ll agree that there are steps that can and probably should be taken to make the flow of goods and yes, people, more efficient between our country and our closest neighbors. Steps that would make each country a more attractive trading partner, while yet safeguarding jobs; and steps that would provide a more orderly, better regulated and much safer flow of labor between the countries.

Yet we doubt many Americans would favor formal agreements with Mexico or Canada, or any other country for that matter, that would tend to undermine our economic health just in order to raise the standard of living in those countries. And we don’t think many would agree that the elimination of all immigration laws and the “pooling” of sovereignty among our country, Canada, Mexico and our other neighbors to the south is the key to a bright future.

That, however, is what the Commission on North American Prosperity is all about.

“My desire is that there will be no borders” between the countries, he admitted. His goal is something similar to the European Union, a gigantic North American entity within which people and goods move freely and much more of the wealth and power flows southward,” Fox said at KSU.

“I want a better future for North America,” he told the crowd. “(The) dreams of our founding fathers will be fulfilled with freedom and better distribution of wealth.”

Sorry, but Karl Marx was not one of our founding fathers, regardless of what Mr. Fox might think. And James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and the other founders who labored to craft the U.S. Constitution did so not with the aim of a creating an all-powerful central government, or one that goes out of its way to penalize hard work, initiative and creativity just in order to “spread the wealth around.”

Fox touted how each country in the EU contributes 2 percent of its gross national product for investment in “underdeveloped areas and poor families.” Well the fact is, by the time one adds up the billions that U.S. taxpayers already shell out to help poor people here at home courtesy of welfare, housing assistance, food stamps and myriad other services; and the billions more we fork over to underwrite the bulk of the budgets for the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and other such organizations whose primary goals include helping develop downtrodden areas of the world; we are already paying well in excess of that 2 percent. In fact, it might be a better bargain for U.S. taxpayers to try things Fox’s way.

In all fairness to President Fox, there are plenty of those on this side of the border, many of them in high places in Washington and elsewhere, who are just as ardent in their support of an open-borders, “pooled sovereignty” version of North America as he is.

But we suspect that the more most Americans learn about the idea, the less they’ll like it. And rightly so.

HERE

Meet Robert Pastor: Father of the North American Union
by Jerome R. Corsi

Robert Pastor intends to give away U.S. sovereignty to a newly forming North American Union exactly as he gave away the Panama Canal to Panama during Jimmy Carter’s presidency.

As we are taught in grade school, George Washington is the Father of our nation. If the North American Union comes into existence as the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) asserts, then we all better get prepared for a new hero. Robert Pastor is the person most likely to be proclaimed the father of the North American Union, a designation consistent with his decades-long history of viewing U.S. national interests through the lens of an extreme leftist almost anti-American political philosophy.

Dr. Pastor’s early professional career involved a working association with the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS). Here he participated on the Ad Hoc Working Group on Latin America, which produced a 1977 report, “The Southern Connection: Recommendations for a New Approach to Inter-American Relations,” arguing for the U.S. to abandon our anti-communist allies in Latin America in favor of supporting “ideological pluralism,” a code word for the revolutionary socialist forces taking hold in Latin America, including the communist Sandanistas and other revolutionary terrorist groups that were developing in countries such as El Salvador. Author David Horowitz’s DiscoverTheNetworks.org identifies the IPS as “America’s oldest leftwing think tank” that “has long supported Communist and Anti-American causes around the world,” with a place for KGB agents from the Soviet embassy in Washington “to convene and strategize.”

From February 1975 to January 1977, Dr. Pastor was executive director of the Linowitz Commission on U.S./Latin American Relations. The Linowitz Commission supported President Carter’s decision to negotiate a treaty to turn over the Panama Canal to Panama. Pastor left the Linowitz Commission to join become director of the Office of Latin American and Caribbean Affairs in the National Security Council in the Carter White House. There Pastor served as Carter’s “point man” in getting the Senate to narrowly vote for the Carter-Torrijos Treaty on April 18, 1978, despite staunch objections from conservative politicians including Ronald Reagan.

In December 1993, President Bill Clinton nominated Pastor to be U.S. ambassador to Panama. Pastor’s nomination was approved by a 16-3 vote in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and his confirmation looked virtually certain. The nomination failed, however, and was withdrawn by the administration in February 1995, after then-Sen. Jesse Helms (R.-N.C.) swore to prevent a Senate vote on Pastor’s nomination. Helms, who had vehemently opposed the turn-over of the Panama Canal, placed much of the blame squarely on Pastor, declaring when he opposed Pastor’s nomination that Pastor “presided over one of the most disastrous and humiliating periods in the history of U.S. involvement in Latin America.” Helms also claimed that Pastor bore responsibility for what Helms saw as “a Carter administration cover-up of alleged involvement by Nicaragua’s Sandinista government in arms shipments to leftist rebels in El Salvador.”

Dr. Pastor has also co-authored a 1989 book with his long-time friend, Jorge G. Castañeda, who began his career as a member of the Mexican Communist Party. Castañeda, a life-long admirer of the radical left, published in 1998 an admiring biography of the revolutionary “hero” Che Guevara. Castañeda, like Pastor, has sought to work in government positions to implement his theories, not satisfied to be a political scientist who writes books and teaches at universities. Castañeda too has mixed his career as a government employee by alternating time spent as an author of more than a dozen books and a university professor at various times on the faculties of the University of California at Berkeley, Princeton University, and the New York University.

Castañeda was an aggressively pro-illegal immigration foreign minister when he accompanied President Vincente Fox in the U.S. in 2001. Those were the days when Vincente Fox was declaring himself to be the president of 100 million Mexicans at home and 23 million Mexicans in the United States. Castañeda also attended with President Fox on a three-day state visit to pre-9/11 Washington. There in a joint statement on Sept. 6, 2001, the two leaders announced a bilateral “Partnership for Prosperity,” which after 9/11 evolved into the trilateral summit statement of a “Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America,” announced in Waco, Tex., on March 23, 2005. Castañeda is probably best remembered for telling in 2001 a group of mostly Latino union workers that Mexico was going to press for “the whole enchilada,” intending to legalize all illegal Mexicans aliens in the U.S….

MORE HERE

Associated Press

May 12, 2009

Fox encouraged about US cooperation in drug warBy KATE BRUMBACK – 1 day ago

KENNESAW, Ga. (AP) — Former Mexican President Vicente Fox said Tuesday he is encouraged that the Obama administration accepts some U.S. responsibility for drug violence ravaging Mexico, but he is not yet persuaded it will lead to concrete U.S. actions.

“The responsibility is here as well as it is in Mexico, so it’s a joint responsibility,” he said in an interview in suburban Atlanta with The Associated Press. “Finally they have accepted this.”

He said it’s not yet clear whether the U.S. will join Mexico in the fight against the drug cartels, or if “they want to protect the border and they just want to protect U.S. citizens.”

Fox, who was president from 2000-2006, said he was similarly encouraged early in his own administration when former U.S. President George W. Bush enthusiastically promised immigration reform. But he was later disappointed when Bush made repeated excuses about why it wasn’t possible, he said. Fox said he fears the same may happen with the drug war if the U.S. doesn’t make a real commitment.

“As long as this nation, and I mean the United States, does not reduce or eliminate drug consumption, Mexico will have problems,” he said.

After a trip to Mexico in April, President Barack Obama said strengthening border patrols and cooperation between U.S. and Mexican officials would help make cross-border crime a manageable problem.

Obama also named former Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske as the U.S. drug czar. Kerlikowske has said he will focus on reducing demand for illicit drugs — a contrast with the Bush administration’s focus on intercepting drugs as they cross the border and punishing drug crimes.

Fox said Mexico’s current president, Felipe Calderon, is making a “courageous” effort to cut the drug supply, but he said the U.S. and Mexico must share information and strategies, “and not only send the army or build walls.”…

MORE HERE.

Global Atlanta

Former Mexican President: North America Can Learn From Europe

ENTIRE ARTICLE and VIDEO HERE
David Beasley
05.13.09

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox sees the European Union as an “inspiration” for much closer economic ties between the United States, Canada and Mexico.

“What they have is a super-national organization without losing sovereignty, culture or anything,” Mr. Fox told GlobalAtlanta in a May 12 interview at Kennesaw State University. “It’s not just a trade agreement. It’s a partnership.”

The EU system, which has a common currency and trade standards, no passport requirements for travel from one member nation to the other and other standardized regulations, has helped narrow the wealth gap, Mr. Fox said.

“Today Ireland has about the same per capita income as France and Germany or Britain,” he said. “Today, Spain is very close to the per capita income of the leading nations. Now, the newcomers, Poland, the Czech Republic, Turkey are joining the union and now they begin the process of reducing the gap, increasing their income.”

Mr. Fox, a former Coca-Cola Co. executive who was president of Mexico from 2000-2006, stressed that gains by the poorer countries in Europe have not come at the expense of the wealthier nations. “The most significant thing is that nobody has lost income,” he said.

Mr. Fox drew a contrast to North America, where Mexico’s per capita annual income of $10,000 is less than a fourth of that in the United States and Canada. A more prosperous Mexico would go a long way toward solving problems such as illegal immigration, he said. “What would better for the United States than having a healthy, wealthy neighbor?” he asked.

Canada and the U.S. already are on par economically, he added. “When you have that, you don’t have problems on the border,” said Mr. Fox. “You can open the border to go back and forth freely.”

At Kennesaw State, Mr. Fox was the keynote speaker at a meeting of the Commission for North American Prosperity, a forum on the future of relations between the U.S., Canada and Mexico. On May 11, Mr. Fox gave the commencement address at Emory University.

In the interview with GlobalAtlanta, Mr. Fox praised the North American Free Trade Agreement, which went into effect in 1994, but said that even broader economic integration is needed. “Nafta is just the beginning,” he said. “We can see a Nafta plus ahead which is further integrating, which will bring many additional benefits to our three nations.”

While Nafta focused primarily on trade, the push now should be on creating “a real partnership,” Mr. Fox said. He envisions Canada, Mexico and the U.S. having standardized duties for imports and exports, financial systems that work in harmony, standardized rules and regulations perhaps as simple as recognizing academic degrees from one country to the other.

But he fell short of calling for a complete duplication of the European Union. “I would only say that it is an inspiration,” said Mr. Fox. “ It is a very bright idea but has to be adapted to our circumstances here in North America. I think there are many good ideas that we can take from that 50-year-old exercise.”

Strengthened cooperation would make it easer to fight the drug problem, said Mr. Fox. Yet he emphasized that it is not Mexico’s problem alone.

“The one that permits the drugs to be distributed and lets it circulate in its territory is the United States,” said Mr. Fox. ” When the drugs cross the border, who moves it? Who takes it to the Chicago market, who takes it to the Atlanta market? Who collects the money from selling the drugs, who launders that money? Who brings that money back to bribe Mexican officials?”

A closer relationship with the United States will help create more developed societies, with higher levels of education and less poverty, making it easier to cooperatively fight the drug trade, Mr. Fox said.

“It’s a joint responsibility,” he said. “We all have to work together.”

Your morning jolt: Former Mexican president says we need softer border, receives (honorary) Georgia citizenship
May 13, 2009, by Jim Galloway

The former president of Mexico on Tuesday pointed to the European Union, where there are softer borders, a common passport design, and only one currency — the euro.

Mexico, Canada and the United States need something like that, said Vicente Fox, wrapping up a two-day visit to Atlanta at a conference at Kennesaw State University.

“Walls don’t work,” Fox said repeatedly, “There is a sense of fear in this nation after Sept. 11, and I understand that, but building walls is not the answer.”

Fox spoke to a group of about 150 who attended open panel discussions on the future of the North American Free Trade Agreement. They included my AJC colleague Mary Lou Pickel, who filed the information above — and below.

Outside, a handful of protesters gathered to tell Fox to go home. One sign read “No American Union.” D.A. King, president of the Dustin Inman Society, an anti-illegal immigrant group in Marietta, said he did not organize the protest. King sat quietly inside, listening to the panel discussions and taking notes.

Fox spoke to graduating students at Emory University on Monday and received an honorary degree there. At KSU, state Rep. Pedro Marin (D-Duluth) presented Fox with a state certificate that declared him an honorary citizen of Georgia. The gesture was stuffed with irony.

The certificate was signed by Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel, who strongly supported a new law this year demanding that new voters show written proof of citizenship before they’re allowed to register.

Proponents of that law said it would cut down on fraud and make sure that illegal immigrants do not vote. Opponents said it amounted to a poll tax against the poor and elderly, who would have to pay to get documents proving they were born in the United States, rather than simply swearing to it, as has been the practice.

Handel is now running for governor. Marin, a Democrat, just smiled when asked about the citizenship certificate. “I want him to keep Georgia on his mind,” Marin said.

The H1N1 virus was another topic of conversation. In Mexico, and here.

(Mulligans, a bar in nearby Marietta, known for its controversial messages on its sign out front, had this one this week: “Swine flu – another Mexican import!”)

Fox said his country was prepared to handle a pandemic, which the outbreak was not. But the country has seen a 90 percent drop in tourism, Fox said.

Cruise ships no longer want to stop at Mexican ports. “Oh, Mexicans have influenza! Right away – everybody hide!” Fox joked.

“The Chinese say, ‘We don’t want Mexicans for the moment,’” Fox said. Mexico, insulted by China’s stance, chartered a plane to pick up about 43 Mexican citizens who did not have the flu, but were quarantined in China nonetheless.

“It’s time to invite everybody to come back to Mexico,” the former president said. He plugged a festival in early June sponsored by his “ El Centro Fox,” a kind of presidential library he founded in Guanajuato, as a lovely reason to visit Mexico soon.

He did not say whether he would now attempt to register to vote in the 2010 race for governor of Georgia.

….more here

Martietta Daily Journal
May 13, 2009

Mexican leader calls for unity

By Talia Mollett
tmollett@mdjonline.com

MARIETTA – Former Mexican President Vicente Fox pushed Tuesday for forming a union between Canada, Mexico and the United States. Fox was the keynote speaker at Kennesaw State University’s inaugural summit on the Commission of North American Prosperity, or North America 2050.

“It was this leading nation (the United States) that came up with the idea to convince every other nation to open its market and borders. It was this leading nation that said this was the path to go. We saw the Coca Colas, hamburgers and cars coming into our county and we were frightened because we were concerned about losing jobs. We were afraid of opening our markets because we didn’t feel self-sufficient and competitive enough,” he said. “It was very difficult in the beginning, but today Mexico is a competitive country with more trade agreements than any other country. We’re a very solid and strong contributor to this economy.”

Referencing the European Union, Fox said the common market is both powerful and productive.

“The most powerful tool in their market is the cohesive fund. Each country contributes 2 percent of their gross national product, which is invested in underdeveloped areas and poor families. This is the core of their strength,” he said. “I want a better future for North America.”

Looking down the road, Fox said he believes in 20 years the “dreams of our founding fathers will be fulfilled with freedom and better distribution of wealth.”

Fox also addressed drug violence in Mexico on Tuesday, saying that the United States’ consumption has encouraged a continual problem. Discussion panelist U.S. Col. Eric Rojo, international consultant on border security, concurred.

“We’re very good at blaming Mexico for drugs, but we consume them. As long as there is demand for jobs and drugs, there will be a supply and no army can stop them. All these expenditures on security are a waste of money,” Rojo said. “Security is about trust, and today we have a lack of trust. Unfortunately, we go to whipping posts like Lou Dobbs and they fuel the ignorance. The largest bridge we need to cross is the ignorance amongst ourselves.”

Dr. Peter Appleton, who represented Canada, said leaders should look for similarities among the countries when trying to solve problems. Appleton is the president of the U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce.

“I think it’s important that we talk about common concerns so we can find common solutions. If ever there was a match in theory that was made in heaven, it is North America. Canada and Mexico both have the oil supply and the United States needs resources. Why can’t we work together? Ronald Regan took down the Berlin wall and we’ve spent the last 10 years putting one up. Where’s the logic in that? How is that fair?”

Dr. Robert Pastor, professor of international studies at American University, said closing the borders to the U.S. would be self-defeating.

“A country that opens itself to the world will do better. The best way to improve the lives of your people and to protect your sovereignty is to open yourself to the world,” he said. “The European Union called on all people to unite. North America didn’t do anything like that with NAFTA. We didn’t have a spiritual vision past anything other than a business contract.”

Economists predict China will have the largest economy in the world by 2040, eclipsing the United States, which will slip into second place. India will move up to third place and Mexico is expected to rank fifth, Fox said.

The United States has the opportunity to remain on top by joining with its northern and southern neighbors to form North America, he said.

“If we’re going to have a partnership between the U.S. and Mexico, we need to do it all the way, not just in places,” Fox said. “My vision is that if we work together, use our minds and plan for the future, those numbers in 2040 will be different.”

Panelists also fielded questions from the audience at yesterday’s summit. Audience members asked why Mexican trucks had trouble crossing into the United States, how did Canada benefit from NAFTA and whether it was realistic to push for immigration reform with the current state of the economy, among other questions.

Joan Manning, of Marietta, listened intently at the summit.

“I’m impressed by what considerate minds they are and by their tolerance and desire to improve the relations between nations and living conditions among the poor. They’re also looking to the future and not just stopping at today. I came primarily because I wanted to hear Vicente Fox, but I really have enjoyed and learned a lot from these men.”

Fox also delivered the keynote address for Emory University’s 164th commencement ceremony on Monday.

HERE

STATE OF GEORGIA

OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR

Sonny Perdue
GOVERNOR

For Immediate Release Contact: Office of Communications

Tuesday, May 12, 2009 (404) 651-7774

Governor Perdue Signs Legislation Into Law

ATLANTA – Today Governor Sonny Perdue announced that the following legislation was signed into law. For more information on this legislation, please visit www.legis.state.ga.us.

House Bills

HB 2

HB 60

HB 114

HB 178

HB 179

HB 186

HB 189

HB 202

HB 261

HB 318

HB 383

HB 386

HB 437

HB 459

HB 509

HB 518

HB 534

HB 541

HB 557

HB 561

HB 562

HB 564

HB 583

HB 584

HB 593

HB 594

HB 596

HB 598

HB 618

HB 624

HB 626

HB 632

HB 633

HB 638

HB 642

HB 643

HB 646

HB 659

HB 666

HB 670

HB 672

HB 678

HB 682

HB 685

HB 686

HB 687

HB 688

HB 689

HB 696

HB 701

HB 706

HB 711

HB 712

HB 713

HB 714

HB 715

HB 718

HB 720

HB 721

HB 722

HB 725

HB 726

HB 728

HB 741

HB 743

HB 745

HB 746

HB 749

HB 751

HB 755

HB 756

HB 757

HB 765

HB 766

HB 770

HB 776

HB 778

HB 781

HB 782

HB 783

HB 784

HB 787

HB 791

HB 793

HB 794

HB 796

HB 798

HB 801

HB 802

HB 803

HB 806

HB 808

HB 809

HB 810

HB 813

HB 830

HB 841

Senate Bills

SB 66

SB 104

SB 191

SB 200

SB 265

Many thanks to Mr. Dick Pettys, Insider Advantage editor
Insider Advantage Georgia is a prescription Website. HERE

Insider Advantage Georgia ( a subscription Website)

Guest Column – D.A. King: :
Open-Borders Idea Hasn’t Faded
By D.A. King

(5/12/09) Along with Robert Pastor, author of a pre-9/11 book entitled “Toward a North American Community,” former Mexican President Vicente Fox will advance his “new vision for North American Prosperity” at a public Kennesaw State University event this afternoon.

For those unfamiliar with the ‘North Americanist,’ open-borders agenda, here is a don’t miss event.

I expect that many Georgians who have not yet heard that they should adopt a “North American identity” will be quite surprised to hear the former president’s proposals.

Whether or not the reader is planning to attend the public KSU seminar today (1 p.m. to 5 p.m.), a little background is in order.

In a 2000 interview on ABC’s “This Week,” then Mexican President-elect Vicente Fox hopefully predicted that by 2010 people would move freely across the border between Mexico and the United States.

Again in 2000 on U.S. Mexico relations, Fox forecast that “when we think of 2025, there is not going to be a border. There will be a free movement of people just like the free movement of goods.”

His cure for illegal immigration from Mexico? Eliminate our immigration laws.

While his time frame may vary slightly in speech to speech, his stated goal never does: end that old-fashioned American sovereignty and eventually integrate the nations of the Americas’– “from Canada to Chile” – into one colossal market place. Defined, defended borders are selfish and Americans live far too well.

“Is the dream of prosperity just for Americans or can it be shared with the rest of us”? Fox asks while he has constantly pushed for the expansion of the 1994 NAFTA agreement to include…people.

“SuperNafta” is the future, according to the man who was president as millions of his countrymen fled the grueling poverty of Mexico for “El Norte”.

In his autobiographical 2007 book: “Revolution of Hope,” Fox boasts: “I proposed a ‘NAFTA Plus’ plan to President Bush and Canada’s Prime Minister Jean Chretien to move us toward a single continental economic union, modeled on the European example.” (Page 101)

It would be alarming enough if Mr. Fox were a singular voice in the privileged and oh-so enlightened “Post American” ruling class.

He isn’t.

A July 2, 2001 Wall Street Journal editorial by Robert Bartley staked out that newspapers position in the title: “Open Nafta Borders? Why Not?”. Then went on: “Reformist Mexican President Vicente Fox raises eyebrows with his suggestion that over a decade or two Nafta should evolve into something like the European Union, with open borders for not only goods and investment but also people. He can rest assured that there is one voice north of the Rio Grande that supports his vision. To wit, this newspaper…indeed, during the immigration debate of 1984 we suggested an ultimate goal to guide passing policies – a constitutional amendment: ‘There shall be open borders.’

Climbing on the open borders wagon on September 7, 2001, the Atlanta Journal Constitution chimed in to the public editorial support for open borders with an opinion piece of its own headlined “Our opinions: Bush, Fox should pursue union similar to Europe” in which the newspaper went on to accurately note that “Mexican President Vicente Fox envisions a North American economic alliance that will make the border between the United States and Mexico as unrestricted as the one between Tennessee and Georgia”.

Readers who may assume that the open borders agenda has faded since the beginning of the decade would be sadly wrong.

The concept of creating a colossal, continental Walmart using the scrap of the Founders sovereign nation as a foundation is alive and well.

Opining in an editorial on what should be done to deal with what he describes as “the global mess”, Washington Post op-ed columnist Jim Hoagland last year advised the then as yet un-elected President Obama on change: “Here’s one example of new thinking he should pursue: The United States should apply to relations with hemispheric neighbors many of the lessons of the European Union and its half-century of economic and political integration. A functioning American Union that pools sovereignty is a goal worth introducing now” wrote Hoagland.

Remember that one: “pooling sovereignty.” It is likely to come up again.

We owe a debt of gratitude to Kennesaw State University for the opportunity to be exposed to Vicente Fox and his “vision” for the future of Franklin’s Republic.

We also owe it to ourselves to ask a great many questions of Mr. Fox. It doesn’t seem that the mainstream media will.

See you there.

——————————————————————————–
D.A. King is president of the Georgia-based Dustin Inman Society.

Reposted here with permission

My Marietta Daily Journal column on the open borders issue today below….PLEASE make a comment to let the editors know what you think about open borders? HERE

Marietta Daily Journal

D.A. King: Open borders: Extremist solution on illegals?

Published: 05/11/2009

By D.A. King
Columnist

In a 2000 interview on ABC’s “This Week,” then Mexican President-elect Vicente Fox hopefully predicted that by 2010 people would move freely across the border between Mexico and the United States.

Most Americans will likely regard that idea as change we can live without. Change that is, at a minimum, extreme.

Extreme or not, it is not unrealistic to accept that El Presidente Fox is well on his way to getting his wish. More than 10 percent of Mexican-born people now live in “El Norte.” According to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) – even after the horror of 9/11- in 2002 about 10,000 people per day crossed into the United States in violation of American laws.

The illicit “migration” has slowed very little, and if not devotedly guarded against, will increase when there are more American jobs to illegally give to people looking for a better life than they could ever expect in the Third World.

The American worker be damned.

The most optimistic estimates tell us that about half a million illegal border-crossers are able to avoid apprehension each year. Most are escaping the misery and poverty of Mexico. It would be far too easy to ignore the fact that the strongest nation on the planet ignores its own immigration laws and that the official estimates are likely low.

Easier still to lay back and believe the drivel that we lack the ability to stop anyone from breaking into our country.

Or that doing so as the world’s leading nation in legal immigration is somehow “xenophobic.”

Or the way to virtually eliminate the crime of illegal immigration would be to allow the free flow of people as if we were a continent-wide Wal-Mart.

American sovereignty be damned.

Most Americans are not aware of the widely – but quietly – supported open-borders agenda. But it is out there.

After Fox and George W. Bush were sworn in, the Atlanta newspapers ran an editorial accurately noting that “though neither Fox nor President Bush expects to dissolve the 2,000-mile border overnight, the Mexican leader clearly prefers sooner rather than later.”

Along with other pre-9/11 American editorial pages – including the Wall Street Journal’s – the Atlanta newspapers went on to accurately announce that “Mexican President Vicente Fox envisions a North American economic alliance that will make the border between the United States and Mexico as unrestricted as the one between Tennessee and Georgia.” And it then endorsed the concept by recommending that “the ultimate goal of any White House policy ought to be a North American economic and political alliance similar in scope and ambition to the European Union.”

Fox is “El Presidente” no more and George W. Bush failed in his repeated attempts to legalize the illegal aliens who escaped American Border Patrol Agents.

Nobody has given up on the concept of expanding NAFTA to include officially open borders and the free flow of labor (i.e., people) to match the flow of goods and services. But the horror of the 11th day of September, 2001 forced those open borders advocates to go underground – aided and assisted with the near total lack of scrutiny and coverage by the media.

On “migration,” we should all be asking how large a population we want – or can support – in the United States and remember that under the current interpretation of our Constitution, most people born on our soil are awarded the title, rights and benefits of “American citizen.”

On Tuesday, former Mexican President Fox will advance his latest “new vision for North American Prosperity” at an event, partially open to the public, at Kennesaw State University.

Given his extremist record, it should not be difficult to read between what ever lines he may offer.

We should be grateful to KSU for the opportunity to hear his ideas, however softened or obfuscated for possible acceptance.

Questions should be asked. Both by average Americans and their elected leaders sworn to defend and preserve the United States Constitution.

Will we wave the flag of surrender and convert the Republic into merely a more efficient marketplace, or continue the struggle to pass on the nation of laws and defined, defended borders and a common language with which we have been entrusted?

While we are asking questions of Mr. Fox, we may want to remind him that Mexico ferociously defends its own borders.

Si?

D.A. King of east Cobb is a widely recognized authority on illegal immigration and president of the Cobb-based Dustin Inman Society, www.TheDustinInmanSociety.org

Nearly eight years ago…

July Fourth in Post-America-Behold the post-Americanism
em>By Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies

July 3, 2001

As the nation celebrates its 225th birthday, the Wall Street Journal again calls for the abolition of the United States.

Journal editor Robert Bartley continues his paper’s tradition of using Independence Day to promote open borders, a tradition begun with a 1984 editorial calling for a five-word constitutional amendment: “There shall be open borders.”

This year’s contribution applauded Mexican President Vicente Fox’s goal of modeling NAFTA after the EU, with free movement of people as well as goods. The headline writer asked, “Open Nafta Borders? Why Not?” Here are a few reasons why not:

1. Immigrants are people, not objects, so the free movement of goods cannot be comparable to the free movement of people. President Vicente Fox of Mexico said in January, “When we think of 2025, there is not going to be a border. There will be a free movement of people just like the free movement of goods.” But the supposed moral equivalence of trade and immigration is baseless; while an imported good can be discarded when it has outlived its usefulness, an immigrant is a human being, created in the image of God, and thus more than merely a labor input.

Even practically speaking, trade and immigration are different. Henry Simons, the pioneer advocate of the benefits of free-market economics at the University of Chicago, wrote in 1948 that, “To insist that a free trade program is logically or practically incomplete without free migration is either disingenuous or stupid. Free trade may and should raise living standards everywhere …Free immigration would level standards, perhaps without raising them anywhere.”

2. There is a very high cost to cheap Mexican labor. Adult Mexican immigrants are almost seven times more likely to be high-school dropouts than native-born Americans and account for 22 percent of all dropouts in the labor force. This means that even those who have lived here for decades continue to lag behind: Among Mexican immigrant families that have lived in the United States for more than 20 years, more than half still live in or near poverty, one-third are uninsured, and they use welfare at double the rate of natives.

3. Illegal immigration from Mexico is not a force of nature that must be accommodated, but rather an artifact of government policy that can be interrupted. We created the Mexican immigration flow, through past guest-worker programs, amnesties, and failure even to try to enforce the ban on hiring illegal aliens. To now plead to helplessness in the face of the illegal flow, as Bartley and others do, is tantamount to the killer of his parents begging for mercy because he’s an orphan.

4. Most importantly, open borders are a bad idea because Americans aren’t ready to abolish their country yet. The reason for expanding NAFTA beyond trade agreements into a regime of open borders is political consolidation — the dream of the European Union, after all, is to create a United States of Europe, with its own currency and army. A North American Union is the inescapable corollary of open borders — already, our new ambassador to Canada, former Massachusetts governor Paul Cellucci, is touting the need for common policies on energy, the environment and immigration policies as part of a “NAFTA-plus” arrangement.

The Wall Street Journal is at the forefront of this process. In Bartley’s own words: “I think the nation-state is finished.” This is not the anti-Americanism of the non-patriotic Left, but rather the post-Americanism of the non-patriotic Right. Post-Americans, like the leadership of the Journal, are not enemies of America; they have just “grown” beyond it.

The post-American trend is especially pronounced among the Journal”s corporate readership. During the previous immigration wave a century ago, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers encouraged their members to promote the Americanization of their employees, while Henry Ford established an English school for his employees, which taught immigrants as their very first English-language sentence, “I am a good American.”

The contrast with today could not be more stark. In 1996, Ralph Nader, of all people, wrote to 100 large American corporations to ask that they open their shareholders’ meetings with the Pledge of Allegiance. Of the half that responded, only one agreed that it was a good idea; the rest were indignant, saying that they were global companies, and calling the request “political and nationalistic” and reminiscent of the loyalty oaths of the McCarthy era.

An increasing number of corporate executives have been forthright enough to acknowledge their status as post-Americans and formally renounce their citizenship. Michael Dingman, a director of the Ford Motor Co., for instance, took Bahamian citizenship to avoid paying taxes; John (Ippy) Dorrance III, a Campbell Soup heir worth an estimated $2 billion, became an Irish citizen for the same reason. New names in this rogues’ gallery are published every quarter in the Federal Register.

An open border with Mexico would move us rapidly toward the kind of world sought by Bartley and his newspaper. But it would be a calamity for those of us who still cherish the republic whose birthday we are celebrating this week, the nation to which our forebears pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

HERE