Our Border, Our Safety & Our Army

California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas our border states with the nation of Mexico. Historically a place of great debate. What do we do with the situation of a bordering nation that within its borders there are high levels of unemployment, corruption, death, despair and human strain. Many postures have been proposed. Our president attempted to build trade with Mexico in an attempt to create opportunities for its citizens. Simultaneously, the drug trade and organized crime seem to de-rail any direct benefits of international trade from reaching the everyday man and woman. One of the results of this phenomena, people begin to migrate to the land of opportunity-America. So much so that we have found that we do not know what to do about the mass amounts of people in this nation. We talk of assimilation. We talk of deportation. We speak of creating laws to provide criminal charges~as if this will stop a nation of people seeking a better life for self but mostly for others. Many nations have tried to regulate immigration through legal means, I don't know of any nation that has had success in doing so.

So now we wait on the eve of our President's speech where it is purported that we may use the National Guard of the border states to assist in closing the door to illegal immigrants from Mexico. I guess I heard this correctly, the plan is to deploy the reserve forces of the United States Military to the border to "police" the border. Hmmm. I am not an expert on the constitution, but I think there is some policies or laws that state what the military can do and what they cannot do. National Guard troops are designed for state emergencies (floods, earthquakes and such) I am not sure (someone can correct me) if border security is their funciton. I served in the National Guard and I don't remember border security as a mission we trained for.

So we are at a place where our President is contemplating or perhaps his staff is contemplating moving in the direction of placing an overexteded military (in this case the US Army) into another deployment cycle. This time to the border between the US and Mexico. This plan goes into increasing a military budget for that deployment, the absence of wives and husbands from homes and places of business, and a cost to the readiness of Army units for a war on terror and a war to get Iraq on the road to Democracy. When we add in other plans from this administration to address the oil crisis, raising national debt, the trade deficit, national administrative unravelings and the perception by some American voters that our current president is being seen in a less favorable light than his predecessor who was seen as a "scum bag" because of his personal indiscretions~is it any wonder that this time in American history is confusing and troublesome.

But what about the immigrants from Mexico? What do we do? It appears to me that we need to do what American businesses have always done, find a way to capatalize on their being here. Not in such a way that we manipulate them and abuse their humanity, but in such a way that communities are improved, schools are repaired and made to be beautiful, that our highways get cleaned, that our factories produce more goods and services and reduce cost to the consumers, and that people help people make contact and grow the American dream, a dream that is being lost by a lot of Americans, for everyone.

Of Immigration

We find ourselves at another time in the American history where there are people yearning for legitimacy in a society sometimes wrapped around an ideology of what America is and who Americans are. We find ourselves watching human beings taking to the streets to protest and to demand the right to be considered legitimate. This is, to me, the matter before the American people of all ethnicities and skin colors.

Legitimacy is the force that is driving this issue that is long overdue. The need to be ligitimate is an ingredient crucial to the end result of self-worth, self-esteem, value and respect. The need to be legitimate provokes the cries of the voiceless and unrepresented.Legitimacy allows individuals to walk in and around members of the same society feeling like and actually being integral members of their society.

All people from the rainbow of the Latin world have entered the quasi-political scene of open protest and freedom of speech. Mexicans, Salvadorians, Central Americans, Islanders and the like all entered into American streets to show their faces, ethnic pride and desire to be a legitimate member of the ideology of America that states everyone has the right to live, be free and pursue happiness.

It is my belief that my Latin brothers and sisters have come up against what many minorities (and women on occassion) encounter on a regular basis-the ideal of supremacist ideology that provides an inherent belief that one group is superior to the other. When you digest the fact that 15 million people (and co-incidentally a larger amount in key voting states such as California and New York) there can be no confusion among the onlookers that "granting" legitimate citizen status to a large group of people who's ideology may differ substantially from that of the power structure provokes fear and suspicion.

Ultimately, like DuBois, we as a nation will have to offer an answer to his question of what it feels like to be a problem. DuBois asked this question in 1903 concerning a large group of African descendants turned loose in America without capital and without rights. My Latino brothers are asking not too exist in this nation as a problem, they want to be legitimate and seen as an important piece of the American fabric, to be included in the discussion on what happens to their lives and for them to able to legitimately have a hand in their destiny-to be an American without an asterisk. It appears that they, like African Americans and the founding fathers, have the same idea.

The Vision of Humanity

The position of all humans in this current world involve a myriad of responses to the way in which our world is shaped as it relates to our position in life. Academically, we exist in a microsystem of self and family that begin to shape the collective consciousness that we use to live, grow, love, work and play. I am not always sure, no matter our starting point, if we get a view of life that leaves room for understanding of ourselves and the people that surround us. In short, who am I? Why and I here? What am I supposed to do with the tools I have at my disposal? Who are the people that direct my path? What makes me listen to them? What makes me grow to disbelieve their guidance? All worthy questions to ask in my educated opinion. In future posts, we will begin to unravel these questions systematically.

More to come. . .