I have seen a great many of these illegals and there are many entrepreneurs among them. I think many of them have come here for opportunity not handouts. I see many older illegals out on the street selling fruit or flowers. Many street corners has an illegal and an American, the illegal is selling fruit and the American is asking for a handout.
If anything our government is corrupting the illegals into the welfare system.
Agreed that the immigrant and illegal populations bear too large of a brunt of criticism. A great deal of America’s problems are home grown - useful idiots spawned in 60’s counter culture, crassness and instant gratification cultures.
While hispanic/latin immigration has many elements of an invasion through the sheer volume, the culture is also much more conservative, hard working, and family centered than say your average indigenous inner city “American” neighborhood. Education in the first generation of Latin immigrants is an issue, not language or culture. Sure there are plenty of bad apples in a group of 10-20 million, but there are much more chronic and deteriorating issues with say, American Black culture.
I have good friends that specialize in marketing to latin/hispanic households and can tell you that there a lot of reasons to be optimistic about the group in aggregate. Strong patriarchal structure in the families with sense of duty to provide for family over self first and foremost, and duty to the community.
I venture that many “native” Americans probably resent Mexican nationalism because complacency and political correctness has rendered American nationalism are fogotten and lost relics of our grandparent’s generations. While I don’t agree with these awkward early steps into/against assimilation, I do admire the spirit and potential they have to re-energize the American spirit.
My great-grandparents were uneducated German and Prussian farmers who worked the land and spoke their native tongues their whole lives in America. My grandparents generation spoke both languages and many fought boldly in Europe as Americans in WWII. My parents left all old-world traditions behind and were without doubt average middle class Americans. I am part of the first generation in my family to be college educated and fully removed from any remnants of the old world. Being blessed to have record of my family’s development here in America, I can’t help but have optimism for this new wave of immigrants.