Mexico has formally complained to the United States about the forthcoming immigration reforms:

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexico formally complained to the United States on Monday in an escalating dispute over immigration that led President Vicente Fox to make remarks last week that were widely condemned as racist.
Foreign Minister Luis Ernesto Derbez told reporters that Mexico sent Washington a diplomatic note, a form of official protest between two countries.
Mexico is complaining about tough new U.S. rules on foreigners that make it more difficult for millions of illegal immigrants from Mexico to get driver’s licenses.
The controls, passed by Congress as part of a larger legislative package, also allow the extension of a fence on the border between California and Mexico aimed at stopping illegal immigrants.
Differences over immigration came to a head when Fox, frustrated that a proposal by President Bush to ease immigration restrictions had bogged down in Congress, told business people in Texas on Friday that Mexican immigrants “are doing jobs that not even blacks want to do there in the United States.”

Okay, time for a reality check here: Does anyone really give a damn about what Vicente Fox says or thinks? From what I can tell, the only thing that he has done since taking office is escalate the number of illegal aliens who sneak across the border.

Here in Texas, it is taken for granted that the Mexican government will never do anything to stop or slow down the illegal border crossings. The reason they won’t is economic: the more Mexicans who illegally enter the US to take advantage of the free medical care and welfare programs, the fewer people the Mexican government has to support. Also, most of the illegals who get jobs in the US send the money back to relatives in Mexico, so a major revenue source would be cut off if illegals were actually stopped.

The reality is that Vincente Fox, or whoever else is in charge down there, will never lift a finger to stop the illegal immigrants. In fact, as this story shows, they will go to great lengths to ensure that it is as easy as ever to sneak into the US. This reality is one of the reasons that most Mexican-Americans who were either born in the US or have legally entered the US hate the illegals as much or more than anyone else.

As far as the US’s relations with Mexico are concerned, I would like to see an approach based upon the number of illegal aliens entering the US from their country every year. As the number goes down, the relations would get better. Conversely, as the number increases, the amount of money and aid would decrease and be used to pay for the services that the illegals are stealing using.

Another thing that should stop is the conferring of American citizenship to any person born within the physical borders of the US. This practice should be replaced with a system which conferrs citizenship upon only those infants who have at least one parent who is already a citizen. If a parent has applied for citizenship, but not yet received it, then the parent would have to apply for citizenship for his child as well.

Further, driver’s licenses wouldn’t even be a question; unless you are in the country legally, you don’t get one. If you’re caught driving in the US without a license and you can not prove that you’re in the country legally, out you go.

I would also like to see a wall built along the US – Mexico border. I envision something with a lot of razor wire, gun turrets and a 100-yard kill-zone between two separate walls. We’d hire a ton of new border agents to patrol this fence and keep the illegals on the other side.

Once you realize that these people, whatever their motives, are criminals and should be treated as criminals, a lot of the questions about how to treat them answer themselves. Also realize that each one of my suggestions would in no way prevent anyone from coming from anywhere from entering the country legally. The idea here is not to stop immigrants from coming to this country; indeed one of our strengths is the diversity of the people who live here. The idea is to prevent those who enter the country illegally and bankrupt it via the abuse of the healthcare and welfare systems from getting in.

Bryan Preston at the Immigration Blog has some thoughts on this subject that are well worth your time.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 18th, 2005 at 12:54 pm by Nick, and is filed under World Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.