There is a saying that life is a marathon, not a sprint. This is incorrect. Life is a relay race. Our job is to run our lap the best we can, then pass the baton to the next generation. But are we doing that? Or are we fumbling the pass? Are we dropping the baton?
A colleague of mine headed the employee health program at a large public hospital. She was responsible for pre-employment physical exams. She told me about an applicant for a food-handling job. Because he wanted to work in a hospital kitchen, regulations required a medical exam, including a stool exam, to be sure he would not transmit diseases to patients with reduced immunity.
But the applicant could not be hired – his stool specimen revealed two kinds of intestinal worms as well as amebas. My colleague told him that he could be treated at a county clinic, then reapply. Needless to say, he never returned. Unlike in hospitals, food handlers elsewhere in California are not required to have medical exams. The man could have gone to any restaurant in town and been hired to tend the salad bar that very day. Think about your lettuce being handled by him. Do you prefer your worms and amebas with ranch dressing or a light vinaigrette?
The man was a recent immigrant. This is irrelevant to his medical problem, but it is very relevant to our immigration problem. Immigrants may carry not only intestinal parasites, but also other infectious diseases such as hepatitis and tuberculosis. A recent problem is that some strains of tuberculosis have become resistant to the usual medications. These strains are referred to as multidrug resistant. Even worse, some strains are resistant to almost all medications. Such strains are referred to as “extensively drug-resistant TB” or “XDR-TB.”
Some time ago, a man with XDR-TB entered the United States. He flew from Europe to Canada, then drove unhindered across the border – although border agents had been alerted to look for him. If we cannot intercept one man we are looking for, it seems unlikely that we can stop terrorists about whom we know nothing. Anyone who says we can have homeland security without border security is delusional.
The man lived here and was returning from abroad. When I first heard this, I thought, he’s just returning home – the only problem is the people on the airliner who were exposed. But then I had second thoughts. The fact that he had been under treatment for XDR-TB here was the only reason we knew he had this potentially lethal disease. If he arrived never having been here before, we would not have known – especially if he came illegally.
That’s the real problem. If immigrants arrive illegally, or even legally but not properly screened, who knows what diseases – or other dangerous things – they may be carrying?
My object is not to update you on infectious diseases. My object is to stimulate you to think about the problems of poorly controlled borders. If a patient carrying XDR-TB can enter the country, so can a terrorist carrying nuclear, chemical, or biological agents. And if that thought doesn’t cause you to lose sleep, read “Executive Orders” by Tom Clancy. It is a fictionalized account of how Middle Eastern terrorists spread Ebola virus in America. No, the story isn’t factual, but the basic thesis is all too real. Remember the anthrax attacks in 2001? After 13 years, we still don’t know who was responsible.
The worst problem with illegal immigrants is not that they break the law, or wrong those waiting in line, or take away jobs, or overwhelm social services, or cause schools, jails, and hospitals to overflow. The worst problem is that no one knows who they are.
Do you really think that an illegal immigrant bringing his family to America from Mexico would risk everything to stop the coyote (smuggler) and say, “Hey, those four guys in our group, the ones with the heavy backpacks, they aren’t speaking Spanish – is it Arabic?” Do you think the smuggler would care? Do you think either one would call the police as soon as they arrived here? Are you joking?
● Anyone who proposes a complex new law, when we are failing to enforce the simpler existing law, is living in a fantasy world.
● Anyone who believes a second amnesty, however well disguised, with work any better than the first amnesty is badly mistaken.
● Anyone who claims that voting should not require a photo ID, but using a credit card should, is irrational.
● Anyone who claims that we are waging an effective war against terrorists, yet at the same time we have borders so porous that millions can enter without our knowledge, is deceiving himself − or trying to deceive us.
The first amnesty in 1986 was agreed to with the condition that it would be followed by tighter border security. That never happened. Now we are preparing for a second amnesty with the same proviso. How can anyone say that without laughing?
A second amnesty will, in effect, nullify our immigration laws. Teaching immigrants that flouting our laws brings rewards, not penalties, is the worst lesson we could possibly teach them. No, wait. Teaching immigrants that we do not value our borders, our language, or our culture is an even worse lesson. But we are teaching it to native-born children as well as immigrant children.
In a Colorado high school, students were forbidden to wear red, white, and blue clothes to celebrate America voluntarily, though they were required to observe Mexican Cinco de Mayo. In fact, we are no longer teaching young people to be citizens of a constitutional republic. Instead, we are teaching them to be compliant subjects of a soft tyranny, one which hands out goodies to those it favors – and harasses those it dislikes. And many of us don’t even notice.
To paraphrase author Stephen Hunter, it is useless to argue national security with people who barely understand the concept of nation, much less security.
If you don’t bother to close the back door to your home, and you don’t carefully check everyone who enters through the front door, in what sense is it still your home, rather than merely a place you happen to live for the moment? Home ownership carries responsibilities as well as privileges. So does citizenship.
We no longer Americanize the children of immigrants. This is no surprise – we no longer Americanize our own children. We no longer even use the word “Americanize.” We no longer understand the concept of passing on our values to young people, because we no longer know what those values are. As Dennis Prager points out, they can be seen on any coin: In God We Trust, Liberty, and E Pluribus Unum. Instead, we trust in Big Government, give up our liberty, and practice multiculturalism – which means respect for all cultures except our own.
We are dropping the baton. This is unfair to all Americans, but it is especially unfair to immigrants. They come here hoping to find a nation of freedom and opportunity. The last thing they want is to find themselves in a nation as unfree and lacking in opportunity as the nations they left. But if we don’t reverse course, that’s exactly what they will find.
First close the back door and check carefully those who come through the front door. Greet them with a large helping of Americanism. Then talk to me about legalizing those who are already here. Until you do that, you might as well save your breath. I’m not listening.
May Day demonstration, Arizona
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