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*Reader R. Wagner wrote: “Vivian Lewis' cheap shots at Lou Dobbs in 5/2 commentary were unwarranted. I listen to Lou Dobbs regularly and have never known him to show prejudice against foreigners. He, as am I, is a strong opponent of ILLEGAL immigration (most recent incidents of which seem to involve Mexicans) and its costs to American citizen workers and taxpayers. He abhors, as do I, the U.S. Govt's failure to protect its citizens from dangerous imports from abroad (most recent incidents of which seem to involve products coming from Chinese manufacturers). Despite the principal sources of these problems, he has never disparaged either Mexicans or Chinese, or any other foreigners. It does not pay a dividend, one reason the stock is down. Another is that the chairman warned that austerity and higher interest rates are possible this year, which could nip growth from the prior year levels. But the company is still well liked by analysts, expected to report profits of $1.20/sh this year vs $5.44 last year. ivian Lewis considers this "jingoistic" whereas Mr. Dobbs is simply an American for sovereignty, as am I.
“Jingoism is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘extreme patriotism in the form of aggressive foreign policy’. In practice, it refers to the advocation of the use of threats of or actual force against other countries in order to safeguard what they perceive as their country's national interests, and colloquially to excessive bias in judging one's own country as superior to others.’”
Thank you for your note and for taking the time to write.
I disagree with you. As a New Yorker (immigrant central) and as the child of a pair of legal immigrants to the U.S. (my parents, who left Nazi Germany in 1937 separately; they married in the U.S.), I know how hard it can be to immigrate legally. Many of my parents' relatives could not meet the standards to get visas for the U.S. They were killed by the Nazis, but the blame has to be shared by the barriers put up by the U.S.
So I do not think the onus should be put on "illegal immigrants". They are illegal because the system has been set up to make it almost impossible for them to immigrate legally. Of course I am not sure when your ancestral Wagners came to the U.S., but I'd be willing to bet it was during a period when it was a lot easier than it was for my Goldschmidt mother and Oppenheim father to come here from Germany.
In fact, most U.S. Germans are descended from people who emigrated from Germany between 1850 and 1920, after which the barriers went up. The odds are that your Wagners came here in that period.
Back then it was easier than it is today for Latin Americans to say nothing of my German relatives. A question to consider is this: would your ancestors have met the current quotas and criteria?
The fact is that older Americans, among whom I number myself, need to have more immigrants coming to work in the U.S. to pay for our pensions. I would rather they were legal and able to earn more (and therefore pay more social security tax.) I think we need to provide better retraining and services to U.S. citizens who lose their jobs because the economy has changed. They will not then be as anxious about immigration, which tends to fill jobs Americans don't want.
I think Mr. Dobbs' broadcasts focus on the wrong issues and are demagogic as well as jingoistic.
As for dangerous imports of goods from China, I totally agree with you and with Mr. Dobbs that we need better enforcement and inspection of our imports. But that is a separate issue from immigration.
