Los Muertos que Vos Matasteis Gozan de Buena Salud (Don Juan Tenorio)

“The Dead You Have Killed Enjoy Good Health”. That’s a line from the well known “Don Juan Tenorio” and it seems to fit the bill perfectly with the results of our foreign and domestic policies on practically everything, from economy, immigration and foreign relations to the present war in Iraq. Thanks to the present policies, we now have destroyed our reputation, most underdeveloped countries enrolled in the leftists movements, our internal economy has suffered, our streets have become less safe than ever and the migration of undocumented workers has exploded in numbers. Hence the comparison with the line from Don Juan where things went tragically wrong for the main character.

Our perennial denial

For too many years, we as citizens of this wonderful country have kept mute about many of the problems the rest of the World face. A state of mind mostly driven by complacency on our part and more often than not plain ignorance of the facts. Since we started kindergarten and all through college, our books and teaching materials kept reminding us how great this country is and all the good things we’re supposed to enjoy as citizens. At the same time, real life in other parts of the planet was presented as anecdotic with colorful images of native people and their habits and costumes. Other times those countries were synthesized in cold statistics, mentioning number of inhabitants, rate of this and rate of that. Very seldom anyone talked about real people. They were numbers, bulk shadows in our minds, as if everything not American took second place. The result is a numbing effect and therefore we are grown to be concerned only with our own problems and social issues from the inside.

The so-call globalization promoted mainly by large corporations and always driven by money in one form or another has created in my opinion many of the maladies we are now starting to confront in our own little world. Issues like immigration, violence, drugs, lack of jobs and down right poverty in our country are becoming a real threat to our idyllic perception of what the American style of life should be. And we are beginning to experience the results of our own ignorance and lack of attention to others in this small planet.

The immigration issue.

Why do we have so many people coming to the U.S., a lot of them risking life and limb illegally? Is it because they really want to be here instead of their own place of birth? Probably not. They don’t think of themselves as conquerors and adventurers willing to leave their families behind just for the fun of it. Instead they are driven by the human need to make a decent living and since their countries are mostly lacking real opportunities our shores are the only ones where they perceive their chances as better.

Now, why, even with the influx of big corporations in their own country, there is not enough for them to feed a family? Is it because they overspend in yet another television set or a new car or is it because the salaries are not enough to support them and their families? Probably the latest. Otherwise it wouldn’t make any sense for these people to cross the border.

Who are then those who profit from this situation? Well, for one, the big companies, getting to produce a lot of goods on the cheap. Second, some corrupted local governments in the respective countries getting kick back money and cozy benefits from the foreign corporations. And don’t forget us! Yes, we benefit too! Let’s face it, we all like to go to places like Wal-Mart, just to mention one of many, and buy inexpensive stuff, from shirts and pants to TV sets and other gadgets. Now, when was the last time you looked at a label in a product to see where it was made? Right, I thought so.

And this is only to mention one sector of the labor and consumer markets. There are a myriad of examples like these that have helped the exporting of our labor on one hand while not providing enough income for the recipients of that benefit in the respective countries on another.

Meantime…in this good old U.S of A. profiteers from inexpensive labor, indirectly encourage immigrants to come here, sometimes covertly, by not paying a decent wage to the American worker, others openly, as in the case of so many growers who claim that they couldn’t survive without foreign workers. And, once again, ourselves, who want perhaps cheap tomatoes or lettuce and look the other way on how this produce got to our tables.

So you see, the chain of events in immigration matters is not so difficult to follow. We want cheap goods. Bid Corp goes to a foreign country and pays a lousy wage. Big Corp sends the product back to us. We are happy! At the same time, in that foreign country, cheap labor still is not enough for the workers and they look at our wages, prompting their exodus to the north. Legal or illegal, here they come.

Twelve million and counting.

According to some statistics, there are roughly between ten and twelve millions people living in the U.S. without proper documents. Congress, as always manned by big influential money, keeps on dancing around the issue trying to please everyone, especially during election years. Amnesty has become a bad word, so now they are considering other options with different labels to solve the problem. But, do they really want to solve the problem, or are they just posturing to make us believe they’ll do something? It remains to be seen.

Opponents of a massive regularization process claim that people who have broken our laws by entering our country without a visa or a work permit, shouldn’t be rewarded with any form of path to legal residency. Technically, they may be right, in practice however doesn’t make sense and it would be unenforceable.

The ones who favor some sort of integration of this impressive number of people into our society, think that removing such a massive amount of people from our country, besides constituting a physical impossibility, could create enormous problems at many local levels, the labor market and wreak havoc among many families. There are not only practical reasons not to expel so many people, but also humanitarian ones.

The realities are such that, in most cases at least, the very survival of countless businesses depend on immigrants, legal and illegal ones. From fast food restaurants to high priced hotels, low cost labor is the preferred option for the moguls, and that cannot go along with the expected pay most American workers desire. Once again, we as consumers have to assume part of the blame for this situation. But mostly the never-ending gullibility of the Corporations striving every year to show more and more profits to their shareholders. One blatant example of this is the construction industry, where foreign workers at a lower rate of pay have rapidly replaced American workers. Has this translated into more inexpensive houses? On the contrary, houses are at an all time high price level! Who then pockets the difference? You tell me.

The health market

Given the fact that health costs are enormous by any measure, the health market has seen the growth of a parallel industry, mostly dedicated to low-income immigrants and low-income people in general. Hundreds of small clinics have sprung up in many neighborhoods, mostly Hispanic, where charges are far less painful than that of traditional American entities. Not only their fees are lower but they also provide help without so much bureaucracy as their traditional counterparts, to the point of not requiring in many cases proof of identity or a social security number. Some of the clinics are manned properly and offer quality service; others are just profit driven stores with dubious credentials. Is this the way we want our population, legal or illegal to be taken care of? Health issues affect us all and when we don’t provide adequate care to everyone, regardless of their legal status, we may be endangering ourselves in the process.

Illegals and the taxman

Folk stories tell us that the illegal population is costing us, the taxpayers, millions of dollars. Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is that many illegal residents don’t even bother to file taxes. For one, some of them are afraid to reveal their legal status and avoid tax filing like the plague, thinking that dealing with the issue openly will prompt a visit from the immigration authorities. The others, the ones who understand how to file and obtain a tax number can usually get back only up to the amount it was taken from them when using a fake number. No special credits, no EIC, nothing over that. So, basically they get if not all, some of the money they paid when at work. Is this unfair? I don’t believe it is. After all, that money, including part of what they’d made as salaries, goes back to the economy in the form of purchases, rent, car payments and what have you. You see, even illegals have to buy food and pay utilities. More than that, all the money they’d paid to social security while working goes to the general fund from which they’ll never see a dime! I’d dare to say that we all profit from illegal workers more than we want to admit.




A racial issue

In general, I believe immigrants constitute a racial issue for those who oppose them and nothing more. I have to admit that some changes in many communities can be frustrating with the massive influx of foreigners of any kind. Different business open to cater their tastes, foods in our supermarkets are aded to please that crowd, strange music and faces are on display and many other indicators that things are “different”. And we all love the status quo, don‘t we?

Personally, I don’t enjoy loud mariachi music when it’s shoved down my ears at 200 decibels, but hey, give me a Cinco de Mayo celebration any time! I neither enjoy noisy rednecks guzzling beer 20 feet from my house, but I love country music and honky-ton. I guess what I’m trying to say is that we can’t have it all.

The Ideal World

In the ideal world of racists they should be free to hire those cheap laborers when they need them and then send them back to wherever they came from. In an ideal world, there ought to be all-white neighborhoods, separate from black people and other colors in between. In an ideal world, Anglos, even though they are the minority, should dictate the rules and everyone else better keep quiet.

In an ideal world we should have the right to buy inexpensive goods, made by some underpaid worker in another part of the planet without having to think about the global consequences. After all this is America, the self-proclaimed better country in the world! As such, we have the God given right to live better at anyone else’s expense. Unfortunately, we all live in an imperfect society and a very convoluted world.


Looking Abroad With Sadness

When considering our relationship with the rest of the World, it seems as if we are now trying to change the culture and the habits of millions of people via the Iraqi conflict. That’s a big mess and a real flop! Not only have we lost whatever prestige we may have had in the past but also we are increasingly making enemies out of people we never heard of until now. In this continent, our recent Latin American policy has been practically non-existent and we have allowed other voices to call the shots. Starting with the failed and stubborn Cuban embargo, where we have potentially lost billions of dollars in commerce and trade driving an entire country more deeply to the left and continuing with the flourishing influence of guys like Hugo Chavez, practically every country south of the border is suffering from our disastrous handling of such population and markets.

While big name corporations are profiting handsomely in most of those countries, the lack of ethics and clear guidelines on how to conduct business properly, increased the poverty and need for most of their inhabitants. The same ones by the way who have little choice but to look to the north for a better life.

In most of Central America and Mexico, crime, corruption and drug trafficking are an everyday thing and we are doing very little to help. As a consequence, we have now in our streets a growing gang problem and the eternal illegal alien situation. Was it worth it? Was having a cheap TV worth the price we are paying now? Was ignoring our neighbor’s plight good policy? Neglected for years, Latin America has become more anti-American than ever before. Can we blame them? Or should we blame ourselves?

For all practical purposes, re-establishing a sound investment policy south of our border should be priority number one for any administration. Never mind Bush and Co. They have done most of the damage they could possibly do single handedly. Soon, a new administration will take over and it’s time to start thinking about a 180 degree change, even though may take a while to get things in order.

It’s also time to establish a reasonable policy with other nations, not telling them what we want but talking with them to find a common ground. It’s time to show the rest of the world that not everything is lost in our soul and we can really communicate with others without having to use our military to impose our views.

Can we do it? May be. I sincerely hope we can.