May 1, 2006
by Jesse Toler

The current cultural conflict between North Americans and Mexico, ironically enough, began with the ending of another war back in 1848, at the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe. Without a doubt, that single event guaranteed these United States would become a world superpower one day, and Mexico's future would be a daily struggle to make up for it. Least we forget, within weeks of the signing, gold was discovered in the hills of California. Overnight the Siberia of the Spanish Empire became the place of limitless opportunity. This set of events set in motion the gold rush of 1849, propelling the Bear Flag Republic almost instantly into the world's focal point for finding great wealth inside "inexhaustable gold mines" where found and gold was "free for the taking". A century and a half later the 31st state to be added to the Union is no less than one of the worlds top producing economies. America's good providence at the end of the Mexican-American war has had a great deal to do with such a blessed manifest desstiny, and Mexicans know it. Each and every one crossing over our Southern border knows that one hundred and fifty years ago, they signed away the resources which have made Mexico, not America, the leader of the free world.

Ever since the signing of the treaty, there has been a robust and aggressive plan to haul the Southwestern United Stastes back into Mexico proper. That plan has gained a great deal of momentun in the last few decades as Mexican immigrants pass the twenty million mark, and is increasingly more popular with Hispanic acedemia, the existing Mexican governmemt and the newly arriving Mexican immigrants. In 1997, then President Zedillo declared that, "...the Mexican nation extends beyond the restriction of our own borders." But it didn't stop with the former Mexican administration. President Fox has been nothing short of relentless in his demands for us to let his poor, unemployed, sick and desperate breech our borders. President Fox has described the border region as a "joining line" rather than a clear dividing line and a legitimate boundry. Fox's constant request for amnesty, driver's licences, free education and healthcare for illegal aliens, if followed, would make the U.S. No more than a welfare state for the millions of Mexican nationals who President Fox's administration has virtually abandoned.

The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that the annual cost to the the American taxpayer is somewhere is the neighborhood of eleven to twenty-two billion dollars, mostly in the areas of education, criminal justice, and emergency medical. About three billion of that is drawn from taxpayers right here in California. Much of the money being spent at the national level is in the area of immigration enforcement actions. In 2004, the Dept.Of Homeland Security deported 88,897 "criminal aliens", and the vast majority at 68,771 were from Mexico. During that same year 1,241,089 foriegn nationals were apprehended and over 92% were from Mexico. That's a lot of money not being spent on protecting our ports, railways and airports.

It's not only Mexican government officials that have taken the position that hte Southwestern United States is an unlawfully annexed Mexican province. Mexican-American Legal Defense Fund founder Mario Obledo has stated, "California is going to be an Hispanic state. Every constitutional office in California is going to be held by Hispanics in the next 20 years. People who don't like such demographic changes should just go back to Europe." Such jingoist statements are reminicent of tjhe Balkans War of the 1990's, where warmed-over nationalism led by Slobodan Milosovich whipped Serbs into a murderous frenzy by summoning the ghosts of the battle of Kosovo (600 years ago) as he urged the Serbs to "take back" what had been stolen from them.

Here in the states, Mexican-American acedemics have taken sides. Juan Hernandez, a close adviser to Vincente Fox and an American educator, has made it clear that,"We must not only have a free flow of goods and services, but also start working for the free flow of people." That means open borders, without limitations.

America's reluctance to open her borders without some restrictions is no crime, and to call securing our Southern bordres "inhumane" as some have said, is a disgraceful red herring with no merit. One look at the recent demonstrations in favor of amnesty shows most participants weren't waving Old Glory, but a flag quite a bit different. Of course, the American flag is being seen more and more, no doubt from all the bad press.

Jesse Toler [send him email] is an activist and freelance writer in Southern California.