First, if you are confused, go back and read the title again. Is it clearer now? Good. Now let’s see what can be done about getting America back on track. We’ve all heard, for as long as we can probably remember, that “America is a nation of immigrants”, and that is certainly true. We should remember, however, that the immigrants that came here in the last years of the 19th Century and the early years of the 20th Century were as different from those coming here today, as is night from day.
In my own family, my immigrant grandparents came here from Poland, Russia and England and only the English ones could speak any English. That didn’t stop the others from becoming citizens eventually. They studied the language, the country, and the customs and WANTED to become as American as possible. Our American history is dotted with people from other lands who came here, absolutely penniless, and made something of themselves.
Alright…that WAS immigration. Now let’s look at emigration, and it’s as complicated a subject as anything could be. There are hundreds, if not thousands of Americans that live abroad for all sorts of reasons. Some may be living there, wherever “there” might be, for their jobs. Others could be living overseas because their spouse might have been a citizen of that country and wanted to return. Still others might have made the move out of the United States for political reasons, or because they’re on a fixed income and their money goes further in whatever country they’re in now. For whatever the reason might be, or have been, they emigrated. Does that make them less of an American? Perhaps, if the reason they left the country of their birth because they had a skewed vision of what America is, or was, like.
My father used to say that “Those who say, or think, that they know it all are particularly annoying to those of us that DO!” and it could be that you have met one of these people. Maybe you ARE one of those people…the ones that say or think they know it all, or maybe you fall into the latter category. Either way, you’re wrong. Pretending to know everything, on a given subject, can get you involved in all sorts of things…most of them not good. If the truth be known, that attitude has gotten ME both in AND out of some tight spots…but that’s another story.
We have, as all countries do, other countries on our borders, so let’s look at our two “neighbors”, Canada and Mexico. The country to the North is a lot like America although in certain parts they seem to prefer to be more French than American. It’s a large area, and some places are sparsely populated, sort of how our Western states were, maybe a hundred and fifty years ago. Like much of our own country, Canada has a rich Indian heritage and it’s reflected in some names scattered around it.
We Americans are welcome in Canada and, for many years, could travel back and forth without a passport, but that’s over. There was, if you can believe it, a movement at one time to annex all of Canada into the United States, but it didn’t gain much traction. I have heard some people refer to Canada as “America’s kid brother” and while it’s understandable, it’s probably not what most Canadians want to hear.
Mexico, on our Southern border, is an entirely different thing. It does not share a common language with us, their money system is different and, if you generalize, it’s as foreign as any neighbor could be. In the early part of the 20th Century, Mexican bandits, Pancho Villa mostly, made raids into parts of the southwestern United States and killed some Americans. Mexico has been immortalized in song and music, as well as being a great romantic getaway for years and years.
Perhaps the biggest difference between Mexico and Canada is how “immigrants” are treated.
Immigration, even legal immigration, is a slow and convoluted process…worse than ours as I’ve been told. There is an entire industry of bribery that goes on and, in recent years, gangs and cartels have sprung up making it even more of a danger to emigrate there. Unlike Canada and the United States, their penal code is extremely harsh and their prisons are hellholes.
America is, I believe, rapidly getting to the point where the population is going to have problems. Adding in illegals, “refugees”, “chain migration” and “anchor babies” the United States is reaching saturation.
There must be a solution, and I think that solution is emigration.
Let us take the illegals, the “refugees” that we can prove are NOT what they claim to be, along with malcontents of our own, and ship them out to other countries. People that said they’d leave the country if Trump was elected, and are still here…need to go. People that believe that America is the reason the world is in turmoil…need to go. People that aid and abet the enemy…need to go. People who believe they’d do better in another country with a different political system…need to go. Put them all together and you’ll probably have several million people that American just doesn’t need.
Parting shot: “Citizenship consists in the service of the country.” … Jawaharlal Nehru
Image: CCO Creative Commons; Excerpted from:https://pixabay.com/en/farewell-say-goodbye-bye-road-3258939/
