When I visited Oaxaca City, Oaxaca in southern Mexico, I was surprised at how arid the city was in the middle of the spring. Somehow, I expected the terrain to be more wet and humid. But what really impressed me, was when I visited the ruins of Monte Alban on the hilltop overlooking the valley and seeing the wide open spaces.
I am not comparing my panoramic views of the Oaxacan valley to the borderlands between the United States and Mexico, but I am saying this very clearly: the proposed wall across the border is the worst and quite possibly the most embarassing legislative decision of 2005.
It is incredible to digest that over 260 congress men and women honestly believe that building a wall across the entire border with Mexico is a good idea.
The mere proposal of such a plan is such a huge slap in the face to the millions of hardworking immigrants that come to this country to do the work that no American citizens want to do. It is frustrating to acknowledge that after hundreds of statistical reports demonstrating that immigrants contribute incredible wealth to our economy, our elected officials continue to legislate against the grain of such hard evidence in order to please a xenophobic and racist subgroup of our society.
For many of us on the sidelines, witnessing the slow decline of American benevolence and goodwill is hard to watch. Where have our leaders gone? Where are our FDRs, Eleanor Roosevelts and Robert Kennedys?
My generation longs for those Americans that acted on justice, fairness and for the true meaning of America. Is America destined to become just another country that promised so much, but that in the end became the victim of its own greed and selfishness?
Has history not taught us anything about our country's role in the world? For the United States to build a wall across the border with Mexico sends a message of intolerance, lack of compassion and most unfortunately a commitment to the true bottom line: money over people.
But there are alternative options available. For such a wealthy country full of thousands of research universities, it is a shame that our foreign policy towards immigration has been reduced to the rebuilding of a Berlin or Chinese Wall across our southern border. But the wall won't solve any problems.
You can't stop a river from flowing when you have thousands of employers on the inside of the wall thirsty for cheap and unprotected labor.
The real solution will surface sooner or later. It is only a matter of time.
Below is an article on the subject of the Wall of Shame that the U.S. plans to build across the border with Mexico:
Mexico seeks international support against deadly US border wall
12/28/2005 11:53
http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/91/368/16687_Mexico.html
US lawmakers proposed to build some 700 miles of barriers to stop illegal immigration from the South.
Sixteen years after the fall of the Berlin wall, another barrier of bricks is being fuelled to separate two nations and stop immigration. A proposal by U.S. lawmakers to build some 1,130 kilometers of barriers along their nation's southern border as part of efforts to stop illegal immigration has irritated Mexicans, who are seeking international support to block Washington's plans.
The Mexican Congress is asking legislatures in Spain, Portugal and Latin American countries to join a coalition against the US proposal. The request, backed by the Mexican President Vicente Fox, is contained in a letter drafted by the speaker of the Mexican lower house, Heliodoro Diaz.
"I hereby ask you, in an act of unity among Ibero-American Congresses, that you share our concern about and condemnation of (the U.S. wall), and that you express the deepest solidarity with the Mexican Congress, in order to impede the construction of a wall on the border of the United States of America with Mexico, and the approval of the law promoting it," says the missive.
On Dec. 16, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill that envisions building 700 miles of fences along the border with Mexico, makes illegal immigration a crime - it is currently a civil offense - and calls for prosecuting U.S. citizens who aid undocumented migrants.
Mexican authorities have expressed their concerns on the proposals, as if it is finally approved by the Senate, it could become a hot spot in what already is a key issue for the relations between both North American nations.
In his letter, Diaz expresses his respect for the legislative function of the United States Congress, but points out that the phenomenon of migration, for its social and economic effects, should be looked at in a comprehensive way within a bilateral framework.
"The aforesaid law, should it be approved, will result in highly negative effects for our countries, such as criminalizing migration, violating the human rights of migrants to that nation, exacerbating racism against minorities, and repudiating various agreements achieved through existing free-trade treaties," the document says.
Mexican Foreign Minister, Luis Ernesto Derbez, met Monday with the US Secretary of Commerce, Roberto Zoellick, to complain about the initiative. Derbez said the bill was "racist." President Fox had said last week that the new wall was "a shame" and a "bad signal of the United States to Latin America."
According to Human Rights groups, about 500 Latin American immigrants die annually in the US-Mexican border, many of them killed by US guards. Those immigrants looking for better conditions of life are only from Mexico but from close U.S. allies such as El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and other Central American nations.
If finally built, the wall will be the longest in world's history, not including the Chinese one in the list.
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