Posted on 06/04/2006 11:33:37 AM PDT by fgoodwin
Business should heed Cisneros on immigration
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA060306.1D.hendricks.271c546.html
http://tinyurl.com/k8ln6
David Hendricks
San Antonio Express-News
Web Posted: 06/03/2006 12:00 AM CDT
San Antonio businesses are eerily quiet about the pending immigration reform legislation in Washington. That doesn't make sense.
Given San Antonio's comfortable blend of international cultures and its pro-business stance with Latin America, this should be the first city speaking out on immigration.
Politician-turned-businessman Henry Cisneros did that for San Antonio businesses Friday in an impassioned speech. He articulated what many San Antonio businesses think but are not saying publicly, especially when it comes to the growing U.S. business reliance on immigrant workers in the future.
"I believe in immigration," he said. "I have used religious words in this regard. It is the salvation of the American future. In places where populations do not grow, like Japan and Europe, their markets and fiscal and social security systems are threatened."
Cisneros, speaking during the Bilateral Immigration Forum sponsored by the Free Trade Alliance San Antonio and MATT.org, cited personal reasons behind his stance.
His grandfather came to Texas from Mexico to escape persecution during the 1910-17 Mexican Revolution, a familiar story for many San Antonio Mexican Americans.
The former San Antonio mayor and U.S. housing secretary said Friday that President Bush frames the immigration issue correctly by presenting three reforms: improved border security; a channel for legal workers to be hired in the United States, and a path to earned residency and citizenship for existing and new foreign workers.
Cisneros described the push-and-pull forces that draw Mexican and other foreign workers to U.S. soil.
"Mexico is pushing out its people by its inability to provide jobs. People will come before they starve. They will come before their families starve. The push is immense, but the pull is just as strong — the job opportunities in the United States.
"The United States has a right to define its borders, to define who comes in. It is part of 'nationhood.' The United States has the right to seal the borders if it wants.
"But it should do so with a sense of humanity and human rights. Securing the border should not end in the death of people. They are not criminals. They are responding to the push-and-pull realities. There should be some reasonableness because people's lives are in danger."
Cisneros warned that sending National Guard troops to support the Border Patrol may end up being a tragic mistake because the National Guard is not trained to guard the border.
"We need to use formal law capacity and not give responsibilities over to people's prejudices and methodologies. Just sending the National Guard without specific training for that purpose is dangerous. Border security needs to be proper and effective and not waste people's lives on either side."
Cisneros said he was in Los Angeles last week to hear Mexico President Vicente Fox speak.
"I love Mexico, but I also understand Mexico. Fox said all the right things, but I do not sense a proper sense of urgency to create a growth economy in Mexico. Somewhere in Mexico's consciousness, there must be some sense of inadequacy. A country that cannot provide jobs for its citizens fails."
Cisneros added this comment on the anti-immigration movement:
"I have zero patience for the argument that immigration will change the United States culturally. We must assimilate immigrants into the American way. This is something we do together."
San Antonio businesses that have been silent should use Cisneros' comments as their cue. The U.S. House and Senate are convening a conference committee to produce a compromise bill that could, if enacted, reshape the future of U.S. business. This is the time to be heard.
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dhendricks@express-news.net
Henry, they are indeed criminals if they don't follow the laws of this country .. and by crossing the border illegally they are violatin US laws.
Yes, and this guy is just as big a crook as the ILLEGALS. Why else did they ask him to leave the administration, he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
" Mexico is pushing their people out". Hell yes why should they reform that corrupt system they have down there when they can send them across the border and they can prey on the US.
The elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about is how The Republic of Mexico is about to fail for this very reason. The Mexican Communist Party (PRD) candidate Lopez Obrador is now favored in many polls to win the July 2, 2006 Mexican Presidential Election.
"I have zero patience for the argument that immigration will change the United States culturally. We must assimilate immigrants into the American way. This is something we do together."
We tried it -- it isn't working.
Now we must do what we must -- to protect our culture.
At this point is where he lost me."... a sense of humanity and human rights"? What the hell does that mean?
Obviously we can all agree that we can't accept every person in the world who wants to come to the U.S. If it is the Mexican poor's "right", why isn't it a poor Italian's? or a poor Dane's?
Securing the border will result in the death of people only if it is their choice. Nothing that we can do can change that. Nothing short of allowing them to make up their own rules. So that's a stupid 'moral' argument.
Yes, they are criminals. Why this even needs to be argued blows my mind. Last I heard, neither Cisneros nor anyone else has asked to repeal our immigration laws and, absent that, they are criminals. Saying otherwise does not alter reality.
"Reasonableness" is a two way street. We are dealing with a mindless foreign mob. Asking for "reasonableness" from the American citizenry under those circumstances is an arrogant ignorant bit of demagoguery. Nothing more.
if we can't expect "reasonableness" from both groups in the controversy, it is a fool's errand.
As in every world conflict, there is a criminal and a victim. Here the oicture is quite clear for most of us. Trying to make Americans feel like the criminal is not a solution. It is a recipe for civil unrest at best, civil war at worst.
In the back of my mind I constantly have to push away the the concept that representative democracy is not a suicide pact. I refuse to even consider allowing millions of ignorant people into my country who will try immediately to change my culture, my country and my dreams for my family's future.
If we make our own rules and apply them justly, that's as far as I will allow our charity to go. Our American rules, American choices.
Mexican rules can continue to apply to Mexico.
Of course we have many domestic political crooks, too, but he should at least have the good graces, being a practicioner of a very common Mexican political cultural crime, to think twice before lecturing non-Mexican Americans.
Fixed it. Anytime someone uses wrong terminology, designed to hide the real issue, I know they have an agenda that they believe the average person will not agree with.
susie
Can someone remind me...Why did Cisnaros leave politics?
Watching the despicable Fox during his victory tour filled me with rage. Didn't know that Henry was was there to kiss Fox's ring or other more private body part.
Trying to do the political graft thing that American politicians couldn't do as well as a Mexican one?
Henry Cisneros has enough problems south of the border.
I see this article does not mention that scumbag Henry Cisneros is an ex-con.
Send 'em all back/ finish the fence!
The newspaper employee and the corrupt, criminal ex-politician (one of President Clinton's last minute 140 pardons) are too dense to understand the meaning of ILLEGAL -- like in document fraud, ID theft, perjury -- and, oh.. yes, "speeding."
Who cares how they feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeel.
"I have zero patience for the argument that immigration will change the United States culturally. We must assimilate immigrants into the American way. This is something we do together."
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the problem is that the US is being changed already into something that is alien to americans. we are becoming more like mexico -- which profits no one.
My cousins lived in San Antonio. They went to high school there back in the 1970's as the city was shifting over from being majority anglo to being majority mexican. it wasn't much fun for them.
For Americans, this is basically the last chance we have to control our destiny. if we fail this time -- next time --and there will be a next time-- we won't have much control to speak of.
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