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Book review: The Closing of the American Border
October 10, 2008
Recommended reading: “The Closing of the American Border” by Edward Alden, which I reviewed in the newspaper earlier this week. I’ll paste the review after the jump.
Five of the 19 terrorists who attacked the US on September 11, 2001, had broken US immigration laws. Their leader Mohammed Atta had previously overstayed a visa and should not have been allowed back in. As a Justice Department official put it: “The abuse of US immigration laws was instrumental in the deaths of nearly 3,000 people.” It was not going to happen again.
The government set about tightening the rules and their enforcement. Six months after the attacks, Atta’s application for a student visa to take flying lessons was approved, and a letter saying so arrived at the flight-training school in Florida. The story caused a fresh outcry. The agency responsible was purged, shut down and replaced. The rules were tightened again, and zealously enforced.
There has not been another attack - and Edward Alden, a former Washington bureau chief for the FT and now a scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations, recognises that foreign terrorists find it much harder to get in. The trouble is, so does everybody else, including people that the US needs. On balance, Alden argues, the new regime has done more harm than good even in narrow security terms, to say nothing of the wider human and economic costs. Few who read his compellingly argued and meticulously researched book will be inclined to disagree.
The Closing of the American Borde r tells heart-rending stories of immigrants who have lived for years in the US, maybe serving the country with distinction as doctors or scientists, running businesses and paying their taxes, giving no grounds whatever for suspicion that they may have ties to terrorists, and yet fall foul of the system.
They may have come from Pakistan or Somalia or they may be Muslim: that can suffice for them to be denied re-entry if they should leave, while inquiries are undertaken. People guilty of petty infractions of complex immigration rules have been handcuffed, jailed, thrown out and refused permission to return. The system has taken on a cruel and tyrannical character - and understandably so, since it is what America’s voters and politicians appear to want. Pity the immigration officer who gives the next Atta his visa.
In recounting the history of the immigration system post-9/11, the book tells of the quarrels within the administration over how to mend it - and how to balance reducing the risk of letting terrorists in while staying open to the skilled immigrants that the country wants and once welcomed. In these debates, as the book explains, the false argument for reducing risk to zero mostly won the day.
Alden blames the administration’s single-minded focus on the war on terror. “[T]he way Bush defined the post-9/11 war on terrorism - as a global struggle for survival with a foe he deemed as menacing as Nazi Germany or the nuclear-armed Soviet Union - made a nuanced and proportionate response almost impossible,” he writes. Is that quite right? Terrorists might very well acquire a nuclear weapon, and 9/11 showed that some would have no compunction about using it. One does not need to argue that the terrorist threat has been blown out of proportion to find the country’s current attitude to border security ill-advised. As Alden argues, the approach most likely puts the country at a net disadvantage in the war on terror.
First, it misdirects resources. Vanishingly few immigrants are terrorists, so it makes little sense to see immigration policy as part of counterterrorism policy. The effort spent on combing through immigrants, as though each might pose a threat, denies resources to intelligence-gathering and other more purposeful anti-terror efforts.
Then there is the economic harm. US companies continually complain that they can no longer hire the best people and bring them in. It is easier to take the work to them by investing abroad. The country has thrived all through its history by attracting the best and brightest of the world. An enfeebled US will find all of its goals - including national security - harder to achieve.
Worst of all, it is an approach that loses friends abroad rather than making them. Immigrants come to the US because they admire it - and they find ordinary Americans to be the most welcoming and hospitable people in the world. These visitors become unpaid US ambassadors to friends and families abroad. The government’s institutionalised hostility to immigrants is undoing much of that benefit.
Alden quotes a governor who travels abroad to find investors for his state: “When you go to Europe, the whole first half of every meeting is about how they’ve been travelling to the US for 20 years and now they’re treated like criminals by the immigration system.”
This is not the price you pay to win the war on terror. It is how you lose it.
Clive Crook, in his excellent review, was obviously not thinking of Sarah Palin when he mentions a governor who has frequently traveled overseas seeking business for his or her state. That in itself says a lot about what is wrong with our immigration system.
The fact that a presidential candidate who was formerly in the forefront of the battle to rid our immigration policy of the prejudice and racism against Latino, Asian and other non-white immigrants that now disfigures America’s national character felt it necessary, not only to reverse his previous tolerant stance, but to pick a running mate who has no knowledge of the outside world and whose main activity is in helping him smear his African-American opponent shows what is wrong with this country’s approach to immigration.
Mr Alden notwithstanding, it is not the “war on terror” that is turning away so many qualified immigrants and filling up our prisons with people whose biggest “crime” is that of seeking a better life in this country. It is America’s endemic racism.
Now that the economy is tanking, anti-immigrant feeling will only get worse, stoked by professional bigots like Lou Dobbs and Michelle Malkin, as well as natural haters of anyone who stands in their path to power such as Sarah Palin. This may sound extreme, but I would not rule out the possibility of anti-immigrant riots in the streets by unemployed American workers sometime in the near future.
It is almost an irony worthy of Soren Kierkegaard himself that a more liberal immigration policy, with regard to both foreign professionals and less skilled workers, might have done much to avert the current economic crisis. We may all be paying a huge and terrible price for giving in to bigotry.
Roger Algase
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 7:44 am | Report this commentI’m really tired of the knee jerk charges of bigotry and name calling (hater) leveled at anyone who dares to believe that the current massive levels of immigration are not in the best interest of American citizens. The United States takes in nearly as many immigrants every year as the rest of the world COMBINED, yet still, STILL even these huge number of immigrants aren’t enough for Mr. Algase. Mr Algase charges that our prisons are filled with people who’s biggest crime was wanting a better life are ridiculous. If that was their worst crime, they would be quickly deported back to their own home country. Racists?? Go to any Latin American country and see how they treat foreigners who break their far more draconian immigration laws. I do agree that highly skilled people should not be treated like criminals when they abide by our laws and come temporarily to our country to do business. These are our friends! Immigration Services should not lose sight of the difference between those who come for only a short while and are net contributors, and those unskilled, low wage workers who, once allowed in the country, break our laws, refuse to leave, have the audacity to hold protests in our streets proclaiming their ‘rights’ to OUR country, all while waving the flag of the country they couldn’t wait to leave, and would return to only by force, kicking and screaming. If Mr. Algase really cared about Latino and Black Americans(whose families have lived here for centuries and have no other country to ‘return to’) he would rail against the injustice that they have to go without the jobs, school funds and health care dollars going to recent low wage immigrants and their children. Now that’s true racism.
Posted by: James Dean | October 10th, 2008 at 1:56 pm | Report this commentJames Dean’s anti-immigrant rant simply proves my point.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 2:18 pm | Report this commentConcur again with algasema. Astonishing comments from Mr. Dean. It goes without saying that the USA is a nation of immigrants. New arrivals are the same as the descendants of earlier arrivals. People have immigrated for the same reasons always. No different today than in earlier periods.
Mr. Dean’s comments disparage his own forebears.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 10th, 2008 at 3:16 pm | Report this commentI know people in Calf. who are having their hours at work reduced while illegal immigrants are kept on as employees at the company.
Posted by: john | October 10th, 2008 at 4:54 pm | Report this commentJohn, I will agree with you that there are injustices on both sides of the immigration equation. This is why we so badly need a comprehensive immigration reform law to deal realistically with immigration in a way that would be fair both to new people trying to fulfill the traditional American dream of a better life and to American citizens.
Last year’s Senate bill, co-sponsored by McCain and Kennedy, would have gone a long way to helping to solve this problem. But first, it was demolished by a series of “poison pill” amendments by anti-immigrant Republicans that would have actually made legal immigration even more difficult and inequitable, thereby creating even greater pressure for illegal immigration. Second, even this very flawed bill was killed by a storm of anti-immigrant hatred stirred up by Lou Dobbs and other demagogues under the slogan “No amnesty for illegals”.
As a result, we are left only with a punitive, vindictive “enforcement only” policy, which McCain has signed onto in order to avoid antagonizing his right wing, anti-immigrant base, and which is causing what amounts to a reign of terror in minority, mainly Latino, communities.
Now, anti-immigrant bigots are trying to blame Latino immigrants for the subprime debacle, because many of them were, allegedly, poor credit risks. While this may have been true to some extent, how good a credit risk would anyone be who is barred from getting a social security number and therefore subject to losing his job at any time, or who might even be locked up and deported on a moment’s notice?
This may sound like a radical statement, but if the comprehensive immigration reform bill had gone through last year, enabling millions of minority illegal immigrants to obtain legal status, many of them would not have been forced into the subprime market and would be paying their mortgages instead of being kicked out of their homes. Millions of other minority immigrants would be using their entrepreneurial skills to create job producing businesses and the boost economic growth on which our prosperity depends, instead of languishing in immigration jails in which so far, dozens of immigrants have died as the result of insufficient medical attention or similar cruelties that no civilized society should tolerate.
Instead, the American public heeded the siren song of those who want to preserve America’s “identity”, i.e. white supremacy, at all costs, and have succeeded in going a long way toward virtually closing our borders. Look where that got us.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 5:33 pm | Report this commentErratum (algasema): “and who have succeeded”.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 5:36 pm | Report this commentRoger and Wendell,
I am not an American and thank God not an immigrant, but does James Dean not have a point in that today’s immigrants to America are mostly from one homogenous source, a fact which could tip the cultural balance?
This differs from past waves of immigration which contributed to America’s rich cultural mosaic. The fear, as I understand it, is of one ethno-cultural group trumping all others.
Posted by: RCS | October 10th, 2008 at 5:39 pm | Report this commentRCS, that is also nothing but anti-immigrant propaganda. Here in New York, it is almost impossible to find an ATM machine that is not accessible in at least four languages. In the school systems of large cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, I understand that as many as a hundred different languages are in use. If I am wrong about Chicago, I know that John Powers will correct me within seconds.
Nor is the Latino community itself monolithic by any means. The only thing that might be said to be common to most Latino immigrants is how quickly they assimilate and learn English, compared to, for example my grandparents’ generation of immigrants who came here in the late 19th century.
Even though America’s Jewish population is small in numbers, for example, there has never been any shortage of people in this country who think that even one Jew is too many. This latter statement can be made about Latinos as well. As was the case with Jews and so many other earlier immigrants, some of the worst prejudice is in states with comparatively small immigrant populations.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 6:29 pm | Report this commentRCS: I agree again mostly with algasema. From what I have read about anti-immigration attitudes among the populace in the past, it is the same now as it was with earlier waves of immigrants, whether Irish, southern Italians, Eastern Europeans and so arrived.
Also I suspect that virtually any employer which employs Mexican workers anywhere in the USA (I employed a few amazingly enough in a small factory I owned in semi-rural northern NY State in the 1990s) will confirm that they are fantastic workers.
The level of assimilation of Mexicans in particular is a subject of scientific, demographic analysis - outside my interest or knowledge. I do not know whether algasema is correct on his point regarding assimilation.
Even if a large portion of Spanish-speaking immigrants does not assimilate to the degree that earlier immigrant groups have I do not see that as a negative. More spice and diversity added to the mix. It may force bi-lingualism - a positive for anyone.
Mr. Dean’s comments are xenophobia at its worst.
FYI: are you natively bi-lingual, tri-lingual?
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 10th, 2008 at 6:48 pm | Report this commentI am 1/4 Native American and my European and Hispanic ancestors came here at lease 350 years ago, and some presumably thousands of years ago. Every nation is a nation of immigrants so that argument doesn’t hold up. And yes, I am bilingual (speak Spanish) born and lived most of my life in the American Southwest, married to a man of Mexican heritage who’s ancestors have lived here for hundreds of years. I have travelled extensively so please don’t make me out to be some xenophobe who hates foreigners. I spent nine months working in an Aids orphanage in Uganda. I lived in Scotland for two years, paid my taxes, followed the law, enjoyed the people and the culture of the host country without forcing my own on them and then went home. That’s all we ask of others. The underlying question is does the native born population of any country have a greater claim on the land, resources, jobs, tax dollars, culture, language and political power in their home country than a large newly arrived immigrant population? If elected governments do not represent their citizens collective interests over that of others, then who will advocate for them? If Britain or Canada or Australia, believes that massive immgration, far higher than their current levels, is a good thing, then why aren’t they taking in the millions a year until like Americans, they no longer recognize themselves or their culture in their neighborhood and feel like a stranger on the streets where they and their parents have lived their whole lives. There are cities within America where you would be hard pressed to find even one store clerk or bank teller who speaks English. My parents continually need me to interpret for them to conduct business in their own hometown. And why is it that some on this blog are ardent defenders of any culture, any people, any language, any traditions, any religion, except those of their own country.
Posted by: Melonie Garcia | October 10th, 2008 at 8:07 pm | Report this commentWendell,
I perceive that you (and even Roger) are not unequivocal in your support for unhindered immigration — and why should you be? It is natural for a nation to want to preserve its cultural integrity; the economic benefits of immigration should be carefully weighed against the ability of the host culture to assimilate any new arrivals. In any case, I do not believe immigrants have an inalienable right to emigrate to a richer neighbour. I also view this as potentially very damaging for the source countries, especially in the case of a skilled ‘brain drain’. The morally right solution is to help developing countries overcome the income gap with rich nations, both through funding and expertise. The Chinese path to development has lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty, without recourse to a debilitating mass emigration which would have robbed China of its best human resources.
There is another point to be made: in a globalised world in which languages are disappearing at the rate of dozens a year, I believe it is just as important to preserve cultural diversity as it is to preserve bio-diversity. If the movement of labour were as free as the flow of goods and capital, then very soon human culture would be as similar in different parts of the globe as toothpaste is today.
As per your query, I am natively mono-lingual (Hebrew). My English knowledge comes from a couple of years spent in North America, supplemented with regular reading and, since discovering the FT.com blogs, regular writing — which has proven to be an excellent exercise.
Posted by: RCS | October 10th, 2008 at 8:44 pm | Report this commentNow I see on the page “Les Idées” today of the Paris paper “Les Echos” an article entitled “The End of the American Century”. And on CNBC’s news site to my complete astonishment, Henry Paulson has apparently said that Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley will probably have to be taken over by the state and that might happen this weekend. And did you know that the USD700B bailout is to be overseen by a 35 y.o. ex-GS guy named Kashkari who has 6 years’ experience in finance. This is extremely depressing.
Finally Venezuela has ordered the closure of all the MacDo’s in that country for 2 days.
Posted by: J.J. | October 10th, 2008 at 9:02 pm | Report this commentGood argument, RCS, and well put. The only thing wrong with it is that this is the same argument that has been made as long as there have been immigrants coming to the US, with only the target group or groups differing, whether Irish in the 1850’s, Chinese in the 1890’s, Italians in the 1920’s, or European Jews trying to escape from Hitler in the 1930’s.
I will admit, however, that this argument has not always been made as elegantly as you put it. Far from it. Unfortunately, even though you have phrased it in English that is second to none, that does not make your point any more valid.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 9:29 pm | Report this commentAttitudes to immigration are imo very much based on personal experience. An employer finds they
are more productive (lower paid, work longer hours); a Swiss-German who likes Asian food is happy to have a Thai wife at his beck and call;
a British family living in South London hates
his jobless black neighbours because they have street parties till late at night in the summer, and I could go on for ages about this. In Switzerland it’s quite a problem because the locals get up at 06.00h and go early to bed around 22.00h or a bit later and anyone living in a rented apartment gets a 2-page list of
what they are NOT ALLOWED TO DO.
Another example: There are special areas set aside for dog toilets (Hundeversäuberungsplätze) here but I recently saw a big pile of dog s**t on a pavement. Guess what, someone had put a plastic bag on the ground beside the s**t and put a stone on top to secure the bag!
Why? Because there are metal containers all over town with these free bags and dog owners are expected to pick up the s**t, using the bag as a “glove”, invert the bag, tie a knot in it and deposit it in the lower part of the boxes provided. A Swedish businessman in my canton devised this system and it’s now prevalent all over the country. Also, if one puts one’s plastic bag full of rubbish earlier than the NIGHT before collection, it may be found emptied next morning on your doorstep. I have seen that on a neighbour’s door mat…
Foreigners living here need to have a lot of self-discipline and be willing to adjust. Many immigrants resent this; they feel it infringes on their freedom of action
Posted by: J.J. | October 10th, 2008 at 9:44 pm | Report this commentJ.J., it is late on Friday afternoon in New York, and I have been posting all day on this topic, so I hope I will be forgiven for a slightly (but only slightly) facetious comment, probably my last of the day, to the relief of many.
There are valid arguments that can be made both for and against various levels of immigration. But most of the arguments against immigration that one hears today in America are a good deal nastier than questions of where people should put their “pooper-scooper” plastic doggie bags.
To the contrary, these arguments are mostly based on the most vile kind of racial prejudice - that Latino and other minority immigrants are “criminals”, “terrorists”, “job stealers”, “welfare cheats” “cannot be assimilated” “hate America” and worse. These arguments are worth no more than the contents of the plastic bags you mention.
Posted by: algasema | October 10th, 2008 at 9:58 pm | Report this commentCorrection: In my msg at 9.02pm, on line 3
the person I named should be
Hugh Hendry and NOT Henry Paulson.
Posted by: J.J. | October 10th, 2008 at 10:14 pm | Report this comment“I also view this as potentially very damaging for the source countries, especially in the case of a skilled ‘brain drain’. The morally right solution is to help developing countries overcome the income gap with rich nations, both through funding and expertise.”
“I believe it is just as important to preserve cultural diversity as it is to preserve bio-diversity.”
I agree on both counts.
I will read the book Mr. Crook reviews. The primary point in Mr. Crook’s review is that the desire on the part of the Bush Administration and the various Congresses during the two Bush terms to assure as close to 100% exclusion of potential “foreign” terrorists from entering the USA “homeland” is doomed to failure in that goal. It is foolish and unobtainable.
One side benefit however of pursuing the goal is enormous expenditure of tax-payer funds in favor of the infamous “military-industrial complex”. The side-detriment - aside from the massive waste of financial and human resources - is damage done to USA society in the ways mentioned by Mr. Crook.
Regarding recent Spanish-speaking immigrants, due to the size of the influx and the continued use of Spanish in its various versions by many, assimilation does not appear to be occurring into the “melting pot” in the same way as occurred for other large immigrant groups in the past. That I guess is what triggers attitudes such as Mr. Dean’s because it requires accommodation to another culture by the nativists on the nativists’ soil.
FYI: Completely off-topic, but I am still curious. Your grasp of written English is outstanding as is that of J.J. who apparently is a non-native speaker and frequent commenter here. Compliments to you both.
One other question in that regard: how easy is it for a Hebrew-speaker to learn Arabic? I know nothing about either language except that they come from a common Semitic root language from some point in the distant past. They could be as different as are for example Hindi and Icelandic both of Indo-European origin. On the other hand they may be as similar as Spanish and Italian.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 12:19 am | Report this commentI use Mexicans a lot in my business. They cost next to nothing and they never complain. We could use a lot more of them. Open the border!
Posted by: Ted | October 11th, 2008 at 4:52 am | Report this commentJulia, I live in Manhattan and saw the smoke burning from the twin towers on 9/11 from my own window (at a distance of several miles). Except for some fortuitous circumstances, one of my daughters (who is almost the same age and who has the same first name - without the final “h” - as the current governor of Alaska) would have been passing through the WTC at the time that the first plane hit. I also knew at least a couple of people who worked in the buildings and who, fortunately, survived.
At the time, CNN estimated that about 500 of the WTC victims were non-US citizens, from about 90 different countries in every part of the world. Most were here with legal visas, as employees of the many financial companies that occupied the buildings. Others, especially service employees, were “illegal aliens”.
In the ensuing seven years, there have not yet been any reports to the effect that the terrorists asked who was American and who was not, who had a legal visa and who did not, how much Spanish was spoken in the building compared to English, or whether the WTC complex was being “taken over” by a “foreign culture”, before they crashed the planes into it.
On another note, even though I have been following presidential campaigns for at least the last 60 years, I have never seen anything like yesterday’s TV clips of John McCain being booed by his own furious supporters when he tried to call off the hate and smear campaign against Barack Obama and asked that Obama be treated with respect.
It is as if Faust has suddenly told the devil that the deal was off. Unfortunately, it will not be as easy to call off the hatemongers and attack dogs against America’s Latino (and black, and Asian, and Middle Eastern) immigrant population.
In fact, McCain himself (not the one we have have seen recently who picked Sarah Palin, but an earlier, far more decent one) tried to still the voices of anti-immigrant hate in one of the early Republican presidential debates last year. He called the current wave of anti-Latino prejudice equivalent to the anti-Irish “Know-Nothing” movement in the 19th century.
But his tolerant immigration bill was buried under an avalanche of hatred using the slogan “No amnesty for illegals”, so reminiscent of the “No Irish need apply” slogan of 150 years ago.
With the greatest respect to Wendell, J.J., RSC and other well-meaning commentators of good will like them who clearly do not have a single gram of prejudice anywhere in their makeup, beware of swallowing whole any argument suggesting that there is a legitimate “cultural” case to be made in favor of the current wave of anti-immigrant persecution.
This sort of polite pseudo-sociology is, in the last analysis, far more insidious and damaging to the cause of tolerance and racial justice in America than the overt anti-immigrant hatred and bigotry that one can find so easily by clicking on the Internet, reading the letters page of any US newspaper, or turning on the radio.
Posted by: algasema | October 11th, 2008 at 8:04 am | Report this commentI haven’t read the book, but I can tell you that whenever the percentage of foreigners reaches around 20% in Switzerland, some organization or political party will start collecting enough signatures (100′000) in order that a referendum can be held to put a limit on immigration. To date these referendums have been defeated, but probably only because it’s the border cantons where immigration is high (like the half-canton of Basel City and the canton of Geneva where the percentage of foreigners is 28% and 38% repectively) and in addition most immigrants are German, French, Italian (the most popular foreigners here) from the adjacent countries.
Tens of thousands of well-qualified Germans have come to live and work here in recent years, and they have no problem integrating. Turks don’t seem to be able to integrate even in the 3rd generation and are not popular here.
The 2m (or more) Turks in Germany are extremely unpopular (many live in ghettoes) and Germany will never imo accept Turkey in the EU. Neither will the Danes, the Dutch or the French, imo.
Incidentally, there is a referendum coming up to ban the building of any more minarets (I think there are three mosques in Switzerland). I can fully sympathize with Julia in Detroit.
It’s our great good fortune in Switzerland that we have a direct democracy (the right of referendums) and so here “Das Volk hat das letzte Wort” - and the people have the last word. The politicians are afraid of referendums because then their proposed legislation has to be put on ice for up to two years until the referendum has taken place. So they try to make sure (by sounding out public opinion) that any legislation is acceptable and will not to give rise to a referendum. This was particularly the case when the pols wanted to increase sales tax a few years ago, and had to bring down the increase down to a level which no party threatened to challenge with a referendum. Then it got through parliament.
P.S. I can tell you also that the Swiss bank secrecy law will never be repealed, as no Swiss
wants the tax authorities here to have the right to inspect his/her bank accounts. That is why foreigners can also benefit from the Swiss bank secrecy law. The law was NOT introduced for the benefit of foreigners.
P.P.S. WM. E is my mother’s language.
Posted by: J.J. | October 11th, 2008 at 8:23 am | Report this commentWendell, Arabic and Hebrew are cognate and have a similar morphology, but differ in their phonology. That means, I guess, that it would be easier for a Hebrew-speaker to learn to read and write (Modern Standard) Arabic than to speak it. Perhaps similar to the situation of Hochdeutsch vis-a-vis Dutch.
Posted by: RCS | October 11th, 2008 at 10:14 am | Report this commentI made my first and only trip to the US almost exactly a year ago. I was travelling with a bunch of British colleagues and I warned them that I was likely to take ages to clear immigration since I hold an Indian passport. ‘Don’t wait for me,’ I told them. ‘I’ll make my own way to the hotel.’ However, I was amused to find that I cleared immigration ahead all of my friends with British passports. The immigration officer must have spent less than two minutes on me. I’m not sure how common my experience is. Am I in a minority? Do foreigners have a torrid time more often than not?
Posted by: Vinod Joseph | October 11th, 2008 at 10:46 am | Report this commentLet’s face it, the US does face a terrorist threat. A serious threat. It is very likely that the would-be-terrorist will have an Islamic name– Richard Reid was an exception - and will be a man of colour. Though it cannot be denied that the US needs to improve its procedures, I don’t blame them for keep them tight, inconvenience to foreigners be damned.
Security checks at airports may be justified, but there can be no excuses for a xenophobic attitude to immigrants once they are past the immigration barrier. If you find any immigrant breaking the law – be it domestic cruelty or otherwise, prosecute him or her. But please do not judge immigrants by the countries they come from. It is not only Saudi Arabia and Somalia that treat other religions unfairly. Israel doesn’t have a great track record in its attitude to Islam and Christianity. www.winnowed.blogspot.com
Ted and Wendell,
Of course Latinos and other immigrants are good factory workers: they are in a weak position and would rather be grateful, shut their mouths and not complain. Is this not being exploitative? But once they reach a critical mass they will demand their rights and eventually demand political power as well. Then cometh the day of reckoning for the former masters; better avoid such explosive situations.
Any immigrant who has been willingly allowed to overstay, even if by the turning of a blind eye, will eventually gain rights to his adopted country. This is no different then landlord and tenant acts in property law: the length of stay determines the tenure.
Posted by: RCS | October 11th, 2008 at 10:58 am | Report this commentRCS: Regarding Mexican workers, I disagree with Ted’s comments which I suspect sarcastic. The few Mexican workers whom I employed showed the basic diligence and work ethic that any employer wants from any worker. Their employment had nothing to do with exploitation due to lack of knowledge of English or anything else. They in fact were better paid because of their diligence and productivity than generally far less productive, “native” workers. Lot more to that situation not worth elaborating on now, but at least one small illustration of reality.
Any other small employer I talked to said the same regarding literally any Mexican worker the employer had employed. Note that the area was about as far as one can go from the Mexican border, so the number of Mexican workers available was very few, so I do not suggest that my experience applies to areas where there is a very high percentage of Mexican immigrant labor, although I suspect it is still true from what I have read or otherwise seen.
algasema: “I have never seen anything like yesterday’s TV clips of John McCain being booed by his own furious supporters”
I saw the same clips yesterday evening as well. These events are about as incredible to watch as the turmoil in the financial markets. Thank god McCain is no Hitler, although were the person Governor Palin rather than McCain I doubt the response would be the same as his. Not only is Governor Palin the dishonest non-entity that she has revealed herself to be, but she seems to be fully in her element in the role of cheerleader for outpouring of hatred.
Ironically enough after seeing those clips I listened to part of an interview by Charlie Rose (a “responsible” talk show host for those unfamiliar) of the journalist Ted Koppel about a program he just completed on the “last known lynching” of a black man in the USA in 1981. The fervor of the crowds corraled into the recent Palin/McCain rallies as depicted in the clips of the crowd Senator McCain addressed certainly seems to me to be the environment in which such “lynch mobs” generate sufficient frenzy to actually go through the act of lynching - an act that I cannot even fathom.
algasema: “beware of swallowing whole any argument suggesting that there is a legitimate “cultural” case to be made in favor of the current wave of anti-immigrant persecution.”
I can’t write on behalf of J.J. and RCS, but I have never asserted here that there is any argument for persecution of recent immigrants on any basis.
Regarding assimilation of recent (last 30 years, let’s say) Spanish-speaking immigrants similar to the historic pattern, I do not know whether you are correct in your statement that the assimilation is faster than for any other non-English-speaking group in the past. It seems the opposite in fact, but I make no attempt to do any research on the topic, so have no idea other from casual observation.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 1:20 pm | Report this commentRCS: Last more or less off-topic question, but still related to the issue of immigration in Mr. Crook’s posting: part of my reason for asking about Arabic-Hebrew similarity is how Israeli-Arabs and non-Israeli Palestinian workers in Israel communicate with Hebrew-only speakers or whether Hebrew native speakers can somewhat easily learn to communicate in Arabic.
Many business owners/managers who employ a large number of Spanish-speakers in the USA and who otherwise have no interest in language are forced by economic necessity to learn the rudiments of their employees’ language rather than the other way around. Positive phenomenon from my perspective because I am a strong believer in the value of bi- or multi-lingualism whether learned or native for any number of reasons.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 1:46 pm | Report this commentWM. I found my Spanish (univ. level) very useful in visits to Calif. German is the language I use when deciding on my investments, since I only invest in CH and German stocks.
Posted by: J.J. | October 11th, 2008 at 2:28 pm | Report this commentMy mother invested in the privatizations in the UK (a bonanza) and when years later, Germany
started to privatize too, I jumped on the bandwagon. I like the German language as it is so precise - in economics and stock market reports for example. But as far as literature/poetry is concerned - no.
All Swiss-Germans (apart from some in remote areas) are more or less fluent in High German. It’s quite usual in job ads to see
German and English as a must, with negotiating ability required in French/Spanish and since a few years, Russian. When my former employer first started trading with Russia (metals) in the early 90s and my boss visited plants in remote areas like Khazakstan, my Russian (from univ days) was v useful as hotel receptionists didn’t speak anything else, so I could ask for his room number and if he wasn’t there, then I would ask them to page him in the bar - if he wasn’t there, then I asked them to look in the dining room. I always got him. Mittal Steel Co. was already in places like Khazakstan with his Indian staff living permanently in hotels, cooking their curries in their rooms…
J.J.: Sorry to others for off-topic, but why the distinctive sing-song quality to spoken Swiss-German? And do most Swiss-Germans when talking among each other speak Swiss-German as opposed to Hochdeutsch? I cannot understand a word of Swiss-German. Also how many Swiss-Germans speak Italian and vice-versa how many Swiss-Italians speak French or German and if German is it Swiss-German or Hochdeutsch?
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 3:45 pm | Report this commentWendell,
Most Jews in Israel do not speak Arabic, it is the Palestinians who have had to accommodate: Israeli Arabs speak fluent Hebrew; many of the West Bank Palestinians (especially the men, who have formerly worked in Israel) speak a heavily-accented rudimentary Hebrew. However, note that Palestinian labourers from the West Bank are a thing of the past. They have not been allowed into Israel since the beginning of the second murderous suicide-bomber Intifada, and in recent years have been replaced by workers from Thailand (in agriculture) or Romania (in construction work). A second note: Arabic is a group of languages; Modern Standard Arabic stands in relation to the various local Arabic languages as Hochdeutsch stands in relation to the various German dialects. Palestinian Arabs speak Palestinian Arabic, which is not the same as the written MSA. I am not certain how well the less educated villagers can speak and write MSA.
BTW, foreign workers in Israel are noted in this weekend’s FT travel article on Tel Aviv:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/61877eca-9662-11dd-9dce-000077b07658.html
Posted by: RCS | October 11th, 2008 at 3:46 pm | Report this commentRCS: Okay, thanks. Very interesting. Also I was unaware of the current group of immigrant workers along with the complete exclusion of Palestinians. I thought that was on-again, off-again.
Sorry, one last off-topic question: I read a novel by Amos Oz for the first time last year (To Know A Woman). Interesting and well-written (in translation obviously so no doubt much lost in the language), but its meaning was beyond me. I simply could not understand the context and therefore the thoughts and actions of the characters within that context. How do his works resonate among Israelis? Does the resonance depend on political perspective?
I promise I will stop off-topic questions after this.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 4:09 pm | Report this comment“But once they reach a critical mass they will demand their rights and eventually demand political power as well. Then cometh the day of reckoning for the former masters; better avoid such explosive situations.”
Yea I remember reading about Marx in college. Now for reality. First of all there are already more Hispanics than Blacks in the United States. Second, it’s not exploitation to give a person a job they want. It’s called getting a chance. You have to start somewhere. Mexicans, who have not been affected by generations of welfare state mentality, understand this better than Americans. I know a lot of Mexican attorneys and judges as well as businessmen. Their children will grow up to be the leaders of the country. The Mexicans are assimilating into American culture and making us better. It’s not something to fear - it’s something to celebrate.
Posted by: Ted | October 11th, 2008 at 4:12 pm | Report this commentWM. There isn’t “Swiss-German” as such - there are different forms of that in each Swiss-German canton, Zugertüütsch (Zug) , Züritüütsch
(Zürich). Some are hard to understand (Bern, Valais). The reason that Switzerland is so “villagey” is that each person has a “Heimatort” (belongs to a specific parish), and each Swiss also has a Heimatschein (a paper certifying the person’s Heimatort), an ID card and a passport. There is no such thing as a Swiss citizen - if you are a citizen of a Swiss parish, you are autoamticatically a citizen of a Swiss canton and of Switzerland. If you move from one canton to another, you have to “check out” of canton Zürich, for example, and then “check in” at canton Vaud, new ID card, …and if you can’t speak/write good French, then dealing with the authorities, TV/landline-phone/gas/electricity/
dentist/doctor/police etc is going to be a problem, and even more so for a French-Swiss moving to a Swiss-German-speaking canton, where they will hear only Swiss-german dialect although the written stuff will be in High-German. People are often very reluctant to change jobs here if they have move into a different language region.
It’s all a HUGE BIG HASSLE, WM.
Posted by: J.J. | October 11th, 2008 at 4:47 pm | Report this commentJ.J.: Last questions for you: Does that mean that a native Swiss-German speaker from a particular Heimatort will have trouble understanding the Swiss-German speaker from a Heimatort 100 kilometers away, or is the Swiss-German close enough to be readily understandable by both?
Also what about the Italian-speaking Swiss? Do they have to know how to speak Swiss-German or French either for practical or other reasons? Is study of German and French required in school, if not learned natively, in Ticino?
Yes, it does sound like a hassle.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 5:11 pm | Report this commentWendell,
I have not read Amos Oz since having to study one of his novels for my matriculation exams at the end of secondary school (and even then I cheated and read a digest
). All I know is that he is highly regarded by literary types (or literary wannabes), who were hoping against hope that he would win this year’s Nobel. My own tastes draw me to a very different setting: the surprising world of Finnish literature, especially the great novelist Timo K Mukka, whom I read in Hebrew translation, and is in my opinion one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century, though he has never been translated into English! (except for a few short stories, here is a link to one of them, please scroll down to where the story ‘The Wolf’ begins: http://books.google.com/books?id=vGUri9Qr22wC&pg=PA276&dq=timo+mukka&ei=JNPwSLP2HZK6tQOy_MXRBg&sig=ACfU3U077PWm7hvcRBpljSufS7ZpyjY7bA
Posted by: RCS | October 11th, 2008 at 5:28 pm | Report this commentRCS: Okay. Will check the writer out. Never heard the name before. Good brief article on Tel Aviv in the FT that you referenced as well. What is this about people not reading writers in their native language?
An Italian friend of mine (just retired as a teacher of Italian and Latin in any Italian liceo classico) recommended the Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk when I asked her what contemporary Italian>/i> writers she likes. Oh well. Thanks.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 5:38 pm | Report this commentWendell, I certainly did not mean to attribute any opinion supporting the persecution of immigrants to you and I apologize if my comments could have been understood that way. The point I was trying to make is that the alleged need to preserve American “culture” or “identity” in the face of an influx of immigrants coming from different “cultures” is frequently used as a euphemism for the most blatant kind of prejudice against Latino and other non-white immigrants in the current immigration debate.
I could use up a great deal of space and time on this, but, instead, I will mention only one of many other possible examples. About three years ago, in December 2005, the then Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed an immigration bill that was so full of draconian penalties for minor immigration offenses that even the Chinese exclusion laws of a hundred years ago would have seemed mild by comparison.
For example, the bill (H.R. 3437) would have made it a felony, punishable by 5 years in prison, to overstay a visa by even one day, for a foreign student to miss a single hour of required classes, or to be involved in any one of literally hundreds of other purely technical immigration violations.
But that is not all. Any US citizen giving any “assistance” to any immigrant who had violated any immigration regulation, however technical, would also have been guilty of a felony, also punishable by five years in prison.
This bill was rightly denounced by Hillary Clinton and others as threatening to turn the US into a police state. The reason that I mention it is that the preamble to the bill stated that one of its objectives was to protect American “culture”. Fortunately, the bill never became law, because the Democrats took over control of the House the following year.
My mentioning this example does not mean that the Democrats have a spotless record of refraining from persecuting immigrants either. One the most drastic features of our current immigration law is one which REQUIRES the imprisonment and deportation of longstanding legal US permanent residents who may have committed minor crimes many years before the law was even passed.
According to some newspaper reports, thousands of people who have been living in this country legally for many years have been arrested, imprisoned in inhuman conditions and deported, some of them for the crime of stealing a pen or a tube of toothpaste, without regard to their US citizen spouses or children or long standing ties with this country.
Of course, as Clive Crook points out in his review, we need to have some protection to make sure that 9/11 will never happen again, so it is understandable that sometimes we may err on the side of being overly strict. The only problem with this argument is that the law I have just mentioned was signed seven years BEFORE the 9/11 attacks, by President Bill Clinton. It is still on the books.
Let me now join some of my fellow posters in going refreshingly off topic. Someone mentioned the contemporary Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk. I started to read his novel “Snow”, about modern Turkey, and was absolutely fascinated by its depth. If Pamuk were a European or North American writer, he would be a household word. The same is true of the great contemporary Indonesian novelist Pramoedya Ananta Toer, the modern Chinese novelist Ma Jian, whose book “Beijing Coma” has just appeared, and the incomparably great early 20th Century Japanese novelist, Natsume Soseki.
Posted by: algasema | October 11th, 2008 at 7:29 pm | Report this commentCorrection: the draconian immigration law mentioned above and signed by President Clinton was enacted, not seven years before 9/11, but five years before, in 1996.
Posted by: algasema | October 11th, 2008 at 7:35 pm | Report this commentI also left out the great African writers Wole Soyinka, Ben Okri and Camara Laye, as well as many, many other “third world” novelists who deserve to be read by anyone who cares about literature.
Posted by: algasema | October 11th, 2008 at 8:06 pm | Report this commentalgasema: I mentioned Orhan Pamuk. Read the comment above yours. RCS (Hebrew native language) recommended a Finnish writer when I asked for his interpretation of an Amos Oz novel which I read a while back but do not understand. Read the comment, you will understand. Too convoluted at this stage.
“we need to have some protection to make sure that 9/11 will never happen again”
My perspective in terms of policy on “homeland security” (a phrase I despise) is the same as that of the late brilliant Greek-American computer scientist, Michael Dertouzos, in regard to the actions taken to update computer systems for the year 2000. Comprehensive revision of all systems was a waste on money. An insurance fund should have been created to fund the damage done only for systems that ultimately failed, rather than spending who knows how much money to try to correct all systems.
Same thing on national security: create an insurance fund to reimburse the families of victims of terrorists (assuming there are any) who succeed in entering the USA and committing acts of terrorism that either kill or maim people or damage property.
Much cheaper than the current vast spending on measures to try to prevent a potential terrorist from entering the USA. The physical fence constructed on the Mexican border is a complete fiasco. I am sure the executives at Boeing who are trying to realize the contract know that better than anyone else.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 8:30 pm | Report this commentWM. Your ???s at 5.11pm. Sorry, I can’t help. I know very little about the Italian-speaking canton Ticino.
Posted by: J.J. | October 11th, 2008 at 9:41 pm | Report this commentJ.J.: Okay. Thanks for all the information otherwise.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 11th, 2008 at 10:14 pm | Report this commentSame thing on national security: create an insurance fund to reimburse the families of victims of terrorists (assuming there are any) who succeed in entering the USA and committing acts of terrorism that either kill or maim people or damage property.
You’ve got to be kidding! The families of 9/11 victims were reportedly highly compensated, but I doubt they would consider any amount of money adequate for their loss. People lost their lives, children lost their parents, how do you ‘reimburse the families of victims of terrorists?’ Oh well, many were just those evil white people that want to keep out poor misunderstood terrorists who are just victims themselves of racist, anti-immigrant hatred, so no harm done, right?
Posted by: James Dean | October 11th, 2008 at 10:32 pm | Report this commentalgasema. Orhan Pamuk is a household word in the German-speaking world (Nobel Prizewinner for Literature 2006). A FOAF (a baker by trade) buys the latest book of the Nobel Prizewinner every year. A good idea! This year’s winner was Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio.
I’ll be watching to see who gets the Prize for Economics. Maybe Willem Buiter??? I always read his blog (seen him on TV and is often in the press).
Anyway, GR’s bet on Obama at 7-2 (?) is looking good. BUT, if the machiavellian Paulson manages to calm the markets and the Dow goes up every day until 4 November, then McCain might turn the tables? What a nightmare.
Posted by: J.J. | October 11th, 2008 at 10:57 pm | Report this commentJames Dean: Have you ever heard of automobile insurance? Do you have any idea how many people are killed in automobile accidents per year in the USA - and how many of those deaths are due to negligent homicide (aka drunk driving)?
There is no difference to death by other means by another party whether intentional or not. Do you think the families whose loved ones are killed in automobile accidents feel better or mourn their deaths less than the families of those killed in NYC, Washington and PA on that date?
What about the untold number of people killed because of the US invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan? Do the families of those killed there feel any different?
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 12th, 2008 at 12:47 am | Report this commentNothing could possibly be more absurdly presumptuous than for me to pretend to know more about any aspect of Switzerland than J.J., but I did spend a couple of days in Lugano back in 1965. Even in that far less globalized time, I had no problem communicating in English or French in that Italian-speaking area.
To get back to immigration and national security, I am embarrassed to find myself on the side of James Dean versus Wendell Murray concerning the latter’s “insurance reimbursement” proposal for terrorist victims. I think that I can speak for at least 10 or 12 million people here in the New York metropolitan area when I say that we would prefer not to have any more terrorist attacks around here, no matter how much compensation we (or our survivors) might receive. I can’t think of any place in the US where anyone would feel differently.
My only question is whether building either a real or a virtual fence along the Mexican border is going to do anything to protect us against the real terrorists. The last time I checked the news, the 9/11 terrorists were not Mexicans and did not speak Spanish. It would, indeed, be far easier for a terrorist to come in from nearby Canada, where there is no border fence and most likely never will be since it is a predominantly white country.
Which brings me to James Dean’s last sentence above with its, plain, unabashed, in-your-face, white supremacist racism. That single sentence says more about America’s immigration problem than I or anyone else could say in any post - or book - no matter how long.
Posted by: algasema | October 12th, 2008 at 1:54 am | Report this commentalgasema: No reason for embarrassment.
My point is that 100% certainty on issues such as prevention of terrorist acts is impossible.
If a government can institute, say 90% likely forestalling of a terrorist act originating outside the USA territory at a cost that is say 1/100 the cost of an attempt to attain the impossible goal of 100%, then why not institute the measures for 90%, then provide for compensation through insurance to cover the remaining 10%?
I realize writing this is somewhat akin to an economist saying that in a free market any private entity should be allowed to, say, set off nuclear bombs so long as the company is willing to pay for the “clean-up” and compensate victims or their families, but this current mania over “homeland security” and “terrorism” is in my estimation grossly exaggerated to the detriment of most people most of the time.
Life is a routine wheel anyway. Our existence is infinitesimally unlikely given all the other beings that could exist other than us. Death is but a random event sometime in the future unpredictable by any of us.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 12th, 2008 at 2:10 am | Report this commentMy last sentence was to try to point out the fact that Mr. Algasema in my opinion, has shown in a number of his comments that he himself is racist toward white people and doesn’t even realize it. Sounds like my University Professors who loved to talk about racism and actually said only white people can be racist, minorities cannot be racist, because they are the minority. I don’t know his race but I suspect that he is of the caucasian variety who thinks if he screams accusations of white supremist every five minutes that people will view him as liberal minded and enlightened. It’s still racism, just toward white people rather than black or brown. By the way I’m not ‘white’, but my wife is. Immigration of educated professional people in small numbers, no matter what their race, is good for the country. That’s why many countries are changing their policies to exclude the unskilled and trying to attract the highly skilled. America should adopt the same policy. When you import vast amounts of poverty, and mostly of one ethnic variety, its very bad for the country. It’s very costly to provide social services to people who pay virtually no Federal or state income tax. This also creates a large parallel culture that hinders assimilation. Paying the highest price for these misguided policies are the most vulnerable, poorest Americans who must compete for resources and jobs with these newcomers on their own soil. It’s an indisputable fact that the larger supply of unskilled workers drives down the wages of lower class Americans. It’s simple supply and demand. Why is it racist to believe that America’s first priority is to its own citizens, many of whom are not ‘white’? I know many black Americans who are angry that their country has again sold them down the river by allowing the millions to pour in every year and turn a blind eye to the problem of illegal immigrants. All we want is for the number of legal immigrants to be greatly reduced, stop the chain migration where one legal immigrant can sponser 30 or 40 others, and put an end to illegal immigration. Put some sanity back into the system, make it impossible for those who are here illegally to work or find a place to live and they will go home on their own. Start putting those resources into lifting more Americans out of poverty. If all illegal immigrants left the bottom third of Americans would see their wages rise overnight and the unemployed would find it much easier to find a good job.
Posted by: James Dean | October 12th, 2008 at 6:05 am | Report this commentJames Dean,
Bravo. (Who said actors could not write?)
More specifically I agree with the latter part of your post. Your accusations against algasema are wrong. He is not grandstanding, he is a true liberal idealist. That much is self-evident from his writing.
Posted by: RCS | October 12th, 2008 at 6:40 am | Report this commentSo far, I have been able to find only one accurate statement in James Dean’s latest post. (I will not comment at all on his irrelevant remarks about skin color, whether mine, his, or that of his wife.)
This is that immigration by skilled professionals is good for America. If I can find any other accurate comments in Mr. Dean’s post, I will not hesitate to mention them. I would like to be fair.
Posted by: algasema | October 12th, 2008 at 9:45 am | Report this commentThe influx of tens of thousands of well-qualified Germans to work in Switzerland has resulted in a boost to the Swiss GDP. And one German living in Zürich (who, for whatever reason, went back to Germany), misses Zürich so much that he’s written a pop song about wanting to go back to Zürich. He’s a singer called Arthur Horvath. Not a bad song at all, and nice views of the lake of Zürich.
“Zurück nach Züri”
http://www.blogwiese.ch/
Posted by: J.J. | October 12th, 2008 at 10:15 am | Report this comment“It’s very costly to provide social services to people who pay virtually no Federal or state income tax.”
“When you import vast amounts of poverty, and mostly of one ethnic variety, its very bad for the country.”
“This also creates a large parallel culture that hinders assimilation.”
Regarding quotation #1: This is an empirical question. The tax code requires payment of income taxes and social security taxes even by workers who are not permitted to work in the USA. I do not know the statistics but it may well be that so-called “undocumented aliens” in fact pay significantly more into the treasuries of the Federal, State and local governments than that collective group has or ever will withdraw in regard to any governmental assistance.
Regarding #2: The statement makes no sense on the face of it. Immigrants emigrate from one country (or area) into another for reasons of opportunity offered in the destination area. People move away from poverty - they do not bring it with them. What they bring are labor and brainpower that are productively employable.
Regarding #3: Another empirical question for which I do not know the statistics - perhaps algasema does, as he asserts that assimilation of hispanics is faster than the assimilation of earlier waves of other immigrants. Even if assimilation is less than complete into the melting pot at any given time, my perspective is that it makes for a spicier - more interesting and varied - melting pot.
The economic issue underlying Mr. Dean’s comments is nonetheless important. If macro-economic policies do not further full employment many people suffer, needless to say usually those at the lowest level of skill and existing income. But a high level of unemployment is damaging to all ethnic and racial groups. There are huge numbers of rura or small town whites with low skill levels who suffer more in absolute numbers (if not in percentages of the population) as non-white groups from a lack of employment opportunity.
RCS; Well, we can agree on literature and the value of learning another language, I guess. Not to mention what looks like a very interesting city - Tel Aviv. Closest I have been to Israel and the eastern Mediterranean is the Turkish coast which is spectacular. The further eastern coast in Israel and elsewhere may be similar.
I also agree in regard to control over the inflow of immigrants into any country simply because the supply of and demand for labor do not align very quickly. It is a pragmatic - not ideological - issue however.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 12th, 2008 at 2:44 pm | Report this commentJ.J. Apropos language and since you seem to have a sense of humor: Maureen Dowd’s column in today’s NYTimes is written mostly in Latin! I guess if Hebrew could be re-animated by Israelis, so could Latin by someone.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 12th, 2008 at 2:55 pm | Report this commentGuten Tag mitenand! (Good day, one and all).
WM. Warum? Is the composer hoping for a flood of job offers so he can return to Zürich as a result of this unashamedly flattering song? Well, he’s got a foot in the door - a slot at some Zürich club.
Yes, I have a sense of humour.
I must tell you the Swiss joke one day and as there is only one, I have to keep it locked away in the safe:-) but I would get it out just for you.
A NY Times column in Latin?? Pls post link.
@ algasema. Tens of thousands of Nigerians arriving in Zürich? They would be given free train tickets on special express trains and waved through nonstop to Waterloo station, London. Seriously, abt 10 yrs ago I saw a Scot in a kilt playing the bagpipes outside the office, so I went down to give him 50
and asked him how he was enjoying Switzerland (he was a law student from Edinburgh Univ on vacation).
centimes
He said that in Zürich the police took him to a police station, took a photo of him, pinned it up on the wall, then took him to a big empty cell where he had to remove all his clothes and he was HOSED down, then told to get dried, dressed and never to stay in the same spot playing his bagpipes for more than 30 mins or the same would happen again to him.
I have to tell you that the SVP (Swiss Volkspartei) is the biggest party (26% of the votes?) in CH, and it’s a right-wing nationalist party.
algy, quite seriously it would be better for all if there was FAR more direct company investment into e.g. Africa and as a result far more jobs created in their own countries for e.g. Africans and South Americans. My brother, a muck shifter (civil engineer) was with the World Bank for some years on projects in Africa - bridges, roads - and in the Indian sub-continent (a.o. village centres with clinics, schools, post offices etc).
He says a FOAF has invested millions in building/operating factories in Africa, and is now investing in and operating enterprises (a.o. farms) in agriculture and fisheries.
I think to start with the primary sector should be invested in, to make people self-sufficient in food, shelter, clothing and the basics of life. As my brother said to me “The previous generations of these people did not experience the Industrial Revolution” - and, algasema, that fact has implications.
Enough said for now.
Posted by: J.J. | October 12th, 2008 at 3:56 pm | Report this commentHere it is: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/opinion/12dowd.html?ref=opinion
I recommend Ms. Dowd’s columns for the writing style and irony rather than for facts or analysis (not to imply they are not factually based, but their purpose is not to simply report and analyze the facts).
I think you could safely post the Swiss joke in one of these weblogs without revealing it to a very wide audience.
Posted by: Wendell Murray | October 12th, 2008 at 4:16 pm | Report this commentWD. Very clever, that link. “She got up from her tanning bed and went to the woods of the land of the Eskimos…”
Anyway, THE Swiss joke. Note: the English have lots of jokes about the Irish, whom they regard as being not very smart. There’s the same genre of jokes in CH about the Austrians.
An Austrian couple come to live in Zürich, and he decides to learn Swiss-German. After a couple of years and many lessons, he feels confident enough to go shopping by himself, and goes down town, into a shop, up to the counter and says to the assistant
“Es Pfünderli Brot, bitte” (= A 500gr loaf of bread, please).
The assisant stares at him, open-mouthed, says nothing. The Austrian rather irritated says to her “Don’t you understand my Swiss-German?”
Posted by: J.J. | October 12th, 2008 at 5:55 pm | Report this commentShe replies “Oh yes, of course I do. It’s just that this is a butcher’s shop”.
J.J, according the this week’s Economist, Africa may be the big investment destination of the future. If so, I hope that we in the West will find it easier to get visas to live and work there than most Africans are able to do if they want to move to Western countries.
Of course, some Westerners are now moving to China and India in search of more opportunity. During the Olympics, the Chinese cracked down on issuing visas in order to further their version of “national security”, i.e. letting in only people who would keep their mouths shut. Still, at least according the FT, there were some complaints about the stricter rules by people from Western countries whose governments would be less than thrilled to accept significant numbers of Chinese immigrants.
Nothing is more typical of American arrogance than our attitudes toward immigration. One the one hand, we assume that everyone in the world wants to live in America and always will. We also assume that we have nothing to learn from foreign people or cultures, and that the more exposure we have to them, the less “American” we will become. Finally, we assume that Americans should automatically be welcome everywhere in the world, and wherever this is not true, the fault lies with “them”, not us.
If the current financial crisis can teach us anything, it is that Americans need to have a little more humility toward the rest of the world, economically, militarily, and with regard to immigration as well. This applies especially with regard to America’s attitudes toward the non-white world, which includes the overwhelming majority of people on this planet.
Posted by: algasema | October 12th, 2008 at 6:54 pm | Report this commentI read Maureen Dowd’s Latin column. Vergilius non est, sed veritas magna est.
Posted by: algasema | October 12th, 2008 at 7:29 pm | Report this commentNothing is more typical of American arrogance than our attitudes toward immigration. One the one hand, we assume that everyone in the world wants to live in America and always will. We also assume that we have nothing to learn from foreign people or cultures, and that the more exposure we have to them, the less “American” we will become. Finally, we assume that Americans should automatically be welcome everywhere in the world, and wherever this is not true, the fault lies with “them”, not us.
I have a brother-in-law. He’s been married to a woman he detests for 30 years. Every ill in the world he’s sure is her fault. To be sure, she is a flawed woman, but no more so than most, she has wonderful qualities too, one of which is soling providing a very good living for this man. For 30 years the family has had to listen ad nauseum, through every Christmas and Thanksgiving, all the shortcoming, every flaw in his wife. Sometimes within her earshot. Why she stays or at least protest his abuse is a mystery to us all. So why doesn’t he leave her and put himself and everyone within earshot of him out of their misery? As soon as you suggest that he says, “oh but I love her”, though he has not uttered one word of even the faintest praise in all the years I’ve known him. I see a lot of similarities to him and some on this blog. If the US is so unredeemably flawed and hopelessly racist, why put yourself through it, why remain connected to such an evil entity? It is true that many in the world despise us, some of it deserved, some of it not. There would be kindred spirits in many countries that I’m sure would be welcoming. Canada, perhaps? And they speak French!
Posted by: James Dean | October 13th, 2008 at 2:14 am | Report this commentWell, James Dean, before you try to have me kicked out of the country for engaging in the quintessentially American activity of expressing an opinion that you may happen to disagree with, please consider that I am not the first “left wing radical” to suggest that Americans should show a little more humility in dealing with the rest of the world. Another “left winger”, by the name of George W. Bush, made the same suggestion when running for president in 2000.
President Bush has also consistently continued to call for tolerance toward Latino and other minority immigrants though, unfortunately, his administration is not showing very much of that spirit in action these days.
Your comments show so little understanding of what it means to be an American that you could learn a great deal from asking almost any illegal Mexican immigrant why he or she risked his or her life or safety in order to find opportunity and freedom from exploitation in our country, which could never have become the great nation that it is without immigrants.
Posted by: algasema | October 13th, 2008 at 5:41 am | Report this commentNo one is suggesting that you be kicked out of the country. Just a little more balance midst the scathing critism of your homeland would be nice. We get enough of that from abroad.
Posted by: James Dean | October 13th, 2008 at 6:18 pm | Report this commentJ.J. A large part of Switzerlands success in international business is because of immigration.
This applies at the upper reaches of Swiss business, for instance Swatch exists soley because fo the intellegence and vision of a Hungarian immigrant. It also applies at the lower reaches where for instance your despised Turkish immigrants provide the workforce for the chemical industry.
The Swiss banking industries fortune seems to rise and fall with the countries tolerance of foriegners. The more xenophibic the population ( and we are talking about a country where a Berner in Zurich is considered foriegn!) the more profits fall.
In all my years in Switzerland I never once felt welcolmed or included by the host population — the whole attitude was do the work, take the money but dont expect to be invited for dinner.
Posted by: James Anderson | October 15th, 2008 at 10:50 am | Report this commentI noticed that my posting on Muslim immigration in the Detroit was removed from this blog. Why? Am I being censured? I will state again that I am upset that Muslims are able to build mosques in my community even as they staunchly defend the right of Muslim countries to forbid Christians from building churches in their home country, and making conversion to Christianity a crime severely punished. From their lack of outcry I assume they are ok with the fact that Christians have no legal rights and are routinely tortured and killed for their beliefs in Muslim countries. In their jobs many Muslims refuse service to Americans, here in the US, who carry any alcohol or pork.
They are well versed on their rights here and are fighting tooth and nail to make American laws and culture more accomodating to Muslim beliefs. They are politically very organized and western governments have allowed it and even encouraged it. Yet no news organization asks why. Islam’s truly, truly appalling record and current stance on equal rights for women is incompatible with American values. Those of you who routinely love to flog the extreme right for their record on women’s rights, and lack of regard for separation of Church and State then defend Muslims beliefs are hypocrites of the worst sort. Let’s see if FT censures this again. So much for free press.
Posted by: Julia | October 22nd, 2008 at 6:10 am | Report this commentOne further note: it goes without saying that in a majority Christian neighbourhood the muezzin should not be allowed to call the believers to prayer using loudspeakers on top of minarets.
Posted by: RCS | October 22nd, 2008 at 8:13 am | Report this commentReciprocity in this manner between my country and Muslim countries would be a great thing. Do I expect them to shed their archaic beliefs once they move here? In a word, yes. Your suggestion that I show them American values and then they’ll see the light is naive. Women have rights here, they don’t don head coverings and burkas to show submissivenes. We may drink alcohol and eat pork from from time to time. If they can’t handle working with or waiting on customers who do, then they don’t deserve a job.
I haven’t gone to church in years, yet I want the dominant religion, values in this country to remain Judeo/Christian. I want to have Christmas and Easter and Thanksgiving without having national holidays that are Muslim. Simply put, I don’t want Muslim values to have ANY foothold in my country. Yes, we have freedom of religion, but that should not extend to religions that subvert the rights and freedoms of half of their population and would subvert my rights as a woman if given the chance.
Posted by: Julia | October 22nd, 2008 at 4:15 pm | Report this commentJulia’s blatant anti-Muslim bigotry shows no understanding of the American constitution, which protects freedom of religious belief in all its forms and prohibits any establishment of religion.
There is nothing about Islam that is incompatible with American values, unless it leads to an attempt to impose Sharia law. However, this could not happen in America, because that would itself constitute a prohibited establishment of religion.
Julia talks about religious interference with the rights of women. Isn’t the anti-abortion movement, led by Christian, not Muslim, fundamentalists, a prime example of that?
Other than that, she seems to dislike people who don’t eat pork. Does she want to throw all the observant Jews out of this country too? And as for alcohol, Muslims are far from the only people who avoid it, and for good reason.
Julia may hate to acknowledge this, but we are a diverse country, racially, culturally, linguistically and religiously. We can expect that there will be more and more acceptance of national holidays that reflect this incontrovertible fact. Nothing could be more American.
Posted by: algasema | October 22nd, 2008 at 5:02 pm | Report this commentYou are correct that many in this country don’t believe in eating pork or drinking alchohol, which is perfectly acceptable. The problem is that we have store clerks who refuse to ring up your purchases because you’re buying a pound of bacon and cab driver who refuses to let you into his cab because you’re bringing a bottle of wine back from France. The problem is when Hospitals start putting in separate chapels because Muslims refuse to use the same chapel that is used by all other religions and demand one solely for themselves. The problem is when Muslims demand that employers turn the workplace upside down and incovenience everyone else to accomodate their religion.
Everything about Islam is contrary to feminism and equal rights for women. You’re right about Christians who want to tell me what to do with my body, I agree with you there. I’ve seen in many of your postings that you have absolutely no problem painting conservatives to be the devil incarnate, especially if Republican. I agree with much of your viewpoints on subjects other than immigration. What I don’t understand is why you roll over and defend a belief system that is far more offensive and makes even the most extreme right-wing Republican look possitively progressive in comparison. At least be consistent.
If you don’t think Muslims are going to work to change our country to be more Saudi Arabia or Somalia then you need to check out Detroit or Minnesota. As for your comment that Sharia law would never come to the U.S, then know that Britain is creating a separate court for Muslims that does just that.
Posted by: Julia | October 23rd, 2008 at 1:46 am | Report this comment