Unabashedly Unhyphenated: Latino nations play extortion games with America's sovereignty

This is going to be a quick fisk. Former Mexican Foreign Minister ~~Jorge~~ Georgie Castaneda, who has been bestowed a professorship at NYU, proves himself to be not very smart.

Good Neighbor Policy - New York Times

THERE are many excellent reasons to salvage the immigration bill that collapsed two months ago in the Senate. But one of the most overlooked lies not in the protests that have filled streets in Los Angeles and Washington, but in the wave of populism that has swept Latin American cities like Caracas, La Paz, Lima and Mexico City.

Translation: "Don't you dare focus on America's sovereignty and laws because there are bad people in Latin America who will not like you if you start acting like a nation!" Thanks Georgie. We already know that all too well, and we also know they won't like us regardless of what we do.

An ultra-nationalist candidate, Ollanta Humala, seems poised to win a runoff this month in Peru's presidential elections. He wants, among other things, to renationalize Peru's natural resources, promote coca cultivation and align Peru against Washington with Venezuela's Hugo Chávez and his Bolivian neighbor, Evo Morales (who on Monday sent soldiers to take control of Bolivia's oil fields and refineries).

Oh my! They're nationalizing important stuff down there. So what? Georgie, there isn't one nation to our south that has ever risen above banana republic status; of course, this does not include the tribes of penguins in Antarctica who have proved quite capable of walking in straight lines. Pick any Latin American nation and it is a smart wager to assume that if today's leader doesn't do something totally corrupt, idiotic, boneheaded or self-defeating, tomorrow's leader will. It is noted that you wrote "renationalize" rather than "nationalize." So, its not the first time, eh Georgie? Sounds like a symptom of something that persists, not something new. I'd much rather the leaders of these third-world cesspools be open in expressing their hatred for my nation, then my president can't be their best buddy lest he appear more like the Chamberlainesque boob that he has turned out to be.

Mr. Humala is part of Latin America's new left turn - the wrong part of the left. Progressive leaders in countries with a long leftist history - Brazil, Chile and Uruguay - are economically moderate, ideologically tolerant and internationally open-minded. The other left - Mr. Chávez, Mr. Morales, Mr. Humala and Néstor Kirchner in Argentina - springs from a populist past and seeks a populist future: big-time spending, authoritarian governance and militant anti-Americanism.

Thanks for the history reminder, George. If these guys take power down there, Congress will have its hand yanked out of some of its corporatist-supplied cookie jars.

The great populist hope of that left is, of course, Mexico City's former mayor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a strong contender in Mexico's presidential race. By background and policies, he clearly belongs to the wrong left. Mr. López Obrador comes from the corrupt authoritarian machinery that governed Mexico for 70 years, just as Mr. Kirchner descends directly from Juan Perón, and Mr. Chávez and Mr. Humala began their political careers with failed military coups against corrupt but democratically elected governments.

Georgie, you write "wrong left" as if there is a "right left"...how professorial of you. And again, thanks for the reinforcement history lesson. You're right: the countries you love are historically pathetic. Fortunately the one that I love only has asshat leaders, and has proved historically capable of exercising The People's means of dealing with that.

It is one thing to have populism in power in the Andes; it is quite another to have it controlling a 2,000-mile border with the United States. This is where leadership on immigration reform from George W. Bush and broad-minded Republican senators comes in.

Ohhh. I think he's about to make his point! I'm all flushed with anxious expectation. Or maybe it's gas.

Nothing could contribute more to the continuity of sensible policies in Latin America than a clear signal from the north that cooperating with Washington, and renouncing America-bashing, pays off, even on an emotional issue like immigration. And few things could offer ultra-nationalist leaders better proof of America's not-so-benign neglect and imperial arrogance as further paralysis on immigration.

Thanks Georgie, but I think instead of "pays off," you really meant to say "payoff," didn't you? I mean, it sure sounds as if you're playing the Mexican cop extortion game here: "If you don't legislate the payola of amnesty and open your borders, there will be a Mexican leader who thinks badly of you." It is far better for my nation to have a declared enemy than a disingenuous "friend" like Vicente Fox, especially when we have given power to an insipid xenophillic sovereigntyphobe and let him live in the White House.

President Vicente Fox of Mexico staked much of his prestige on President Bush's commitment to fix immigration policy. First Sept. 11 got in the way, then Iraq did; and so Mr. Bush left Mr. Fox empty-handed. But immigration reform along the lines of the Senate compromise would still give Mr. Fox a huge boost.

So, Georgie, what you're implicitly threatening is that Vicente Fox may lose the election if America doesn't let him be the back-seat driver of immigration reform here. That's a pretty pathetic reason for us to cave in to your meager attempts to extort our sovereignty from us.

It would strengthen support for Mexico's policies of the last decade: economic stability and growth, democratic rule, a mature and responsible foreign policy and an innovative war on poverty. It would allow the United States to encourage that continuity, whoever wins Mexico's July 2 elections, without interfering in its neighbor's political process.

Oh, God forbid we ever interfere with Mexico's political process! Mexicans just couldn't handle the quid pro quo of it all.

Along with all the other good reasons for sensible immigration reform, this one is certainly worth acting on.

You're right, Georgie. We better get crackin on building that wall lest we not be prepared for another massive exodus of Mexican aliens that is sure to be unleashed if a leftist reconquistadore becomes president down there and replaces the kleptocratic reconquistadore we've been dealing with of late.