Will this be yet another, bash Bush blog entry? It depends on how you look at it.

Today’s topic. Immigration. We are a nation of immigrants. Even the Indians who were here first. You might say they were colonizers. In that sense, that is true. Why is everyone up in arms over illegal immigration? The Europeans stole this country fair and square. They marginalized the original population in the most brutal manner. The Americans stole half of Mexico fair and square from the Mexicans who in turn stole it fair and square from Spain who in turn stole it from the natives.

Are we not a nation of illegal immigrants? I’ve traced a few of my ancestors. I have a French surname, but they were ethnic Germans who came to the US in the 1920’s from Romania. Before WWI it was part of Hungary. My great grandparents had five boys and five girls. The boys were all born in the same house, but in two different countries, Hungary and Romania. The girls were all born in the US of A. Maybe it was a change in the water?

The Merle’s orginally came from the Alsace-Lorraine at the end of the 18th century and were part of the Danube Schwabians who immigrated into Hungary while it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The matrilineal line was already here. They were Cherokees and were immigrants into Oklahoma, forced out of their traditional homeland in the Carolinas. Other ancestors that I’m able to trace came from England, Ireland, Scotland, and Germany. I’m a little over 1/2 German and 1/8 Cherokee. The rest is mixed in the other 3/8.

Confused yet? What does this have to do with Bush? Well, seeing how he is President, he’s in the news alot. Lately, he’s been going on about illegal immigration, so have the Democrats, the Republicans, and the illegal immigrants. Reagan, the patron saint of the conservative movement, granted amnesty to illegal immigrants in 1986. If it was good enough for the conservatives then, why not now?

The problem is Americans are addiction to cheap labor. They are addicted to cheap oil and illegal drugs. Surprise, suprise. The solution to any problem is go to the source. Don’t go after the immigrants. Go after the people who hire them. If no one would hire them, they wouldn’t come.

Americans have always hired cheap labor. After abolishing slavery, the Irish and the Chinese were among some of the early groups to replace them. And cheap labor is what it’s all about. The biggest cost in any business is labor. Keep those costs down and you can keep your profits up.

In the dot-com era, we had the H1-B’s, high tech coolies from India, were effectively indentured servants. There was no shortage of skilled labor. There was a shortage of cheap skilled labor. When the H1-B visa cap was reduced, companies started outsource heavily.

I’ll have something to say on the economy and the belief that it is a zero-sum game, which it ain’t. I’ll also have something to say on minimum wage and health insurance too. Anyway, it’s a time honored tradition to hate immigrants. By making them illegal immigrants, we can hate the doubly so.

Here’s my two pesos on what to do. Grant amnesty, but make the clock for citizenship start today. At best a two for one for time already served with a minimum of three years. I’m not to keen on a guest worker program, because that effectively creates indentured servants. I suppose we could raise the minimum numbers allowed in, and any over that number would be given guest worker status.

Also, we need to heavily invest in Mexico’s future. If there is any country we should interfere with that would be Mexico. By working to increase the standard of living and reduce crime and corruption. Less people would desire to come to the US. But their are vested parties on both sides of the border that like the status quo. Companies want cheap labor and Mexico gets rid of their surplus population. And if the companies are going to outsource, lets outsource to Mexico. It’s a lot closer than China and India.

Unless the powers that be can create a vast permanent underclass as a pool of cheap, plentiful, and powerless labor, outsourcing and immigration will run the world out of cheap labor. Id like to see a large sustainable global middle class. We can’t do it with current American technology. It’s too wasteful, but it is possible. It’s not likely to happen, but it’s something that I can hope for.