How About a Day With MANY Mexicans?

Regardless of where you stand on the issue of undocumented workers in this country, I trust that every one of you believes there needs to be a productive solution in this manner. That is why this post is to ask for your participation on this immigration reform debate.

On Monday, April 10th in over 100 other cities throughout all 50 states, rallies will be held to build immigration awareness. To learn of them near your hometown, please go to this website about the National Day of Action for Immigrant Justice."

Meanwhile, I want to point out that immigration awareness in this country is much more of an economic and social issue than it is a security issue. Consider these points:

· Various estimateshave undocumented workers of all nationalities contribute between $300 and $450 billion tax revenue into the U.S. Social Security trust each year. Consider $450 billion in tax revenue, compared to the disputed $3-to$21 billion that undocumented workers allegedly cost the U.S. healthcare system annually. What has been proposed to offset income into a trust that is allegedly on the verge of bankruptcy?

· According to Alan Greenspan and analysts at theFederal Reserve, the United States needs its labor source to grow by more than a million workers each year-yet the U.S. State Department offers only 40,000 visas annually. A large part of the economic slowdown following September 11th was the chilling effect of hiring immigrants to work in this country.

· Long term, it is fair to say that without a constant growing and vibrant labor force, the United States cannot compete effectively, particularly with China, India and other parts of Asia.

The United States has a centuries-long history of trusting the migrant labor force to build its thriving economy. So-in the words of author Juan Hernandez: "Why Are We Afraid of Mexican Immigrants?"

Fortunately my family--who are just as much Mexican Americans as they are Native American, like most Mexicans-but that's another story--had the fortune of coming to this country when it was more accepting of Latinos as a labor force. That is not the case for distant cousins my family may have in Mexico-or the workers who have been employed in my family's farming businesses in Washington state, Mexico and California respectively.

Some members of my family know that this is more an economic and social issue than one of security-and I suspect that many Americans haven't truly been able to fully grasp the financial complications of brash actions. Yet admittedly to this day members of my own family in Arizona, where the social pressure is immense, openly denigrate this labor force, and refuse to identify themselves as Latinos.

It is shameful.

By the way, this is NOT just a Hispanic/Latino experience. Fortunately, those rallying tomorrow will span people of various races, colors and creeds.

Indeed, we should all be known as Americanosall, regardless of borders.

Today, I am motivated by the notion that someday my daughters will not only be the majority gender in this country-but the majority ethnicity as well. This would bring particular comfort to members of my family-born in Mexico-who have had to deny their Mexican heritage repeatedly over the past 75 years because of economic and social pressure. Those descendants didn't have to contend with Lou Dobbs, or Tom Tancredo in the media, but they, too, faced deportation because they were perceived as a threat, ironically in the depression era, to "American jobs."

Join me on Monday to be a empathetic friend to the many distant ethnic and economic cousins we all have in this country. If you cannot join, please reach out to the various state and local representatives in California, Arizona, Georgia, the U.S. Senate and Congress and remind them of the economic ramifications of this issue.

As children learn in their Spanish classes every week: "Gracias"

As my husband and I teach them every day:
"Vayas con Dios"

Submitted by The Anonymous Source (view blog

) on Sun, 04/09/2006 - 23:21

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What a great post!

I have lived in southern CA for 27 years and am passionate about this subject. We cannot have a viable economy without our brothers and sisters from south of the border.

The ebb and flow of immigrants into our country has done nothing but enrich us.

Submitted by NursePam on Mon, 04/10/2006 - 20:30

When did Blogher become

When did Blogher become DailyKOS? I must have missed that memo.

Debi Jones
Contributing Editor, Blogging and Social Media
Feed your mobile jones

Submitted by mobilejones on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 14:28

The only time I am even

The only time I am even aware of what happens on DK is when there is some egregiously sexist discussion and the feminist blogosphere mocks them. How is this Kos-like? Because it's political? Or leftist?

Can we not be our own political discussion... it's not like Kos is the only place for it.

But I get the idea Debi that you are against immigration reform that would increase the country's openness to immigration... was that your point?

-----------------
Liz Henry
lizzard@bookmaniac.net
Badgermama - personal & mommyblog
http://liz-henry.blogspot.com

Submitted by Liz Henry on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 14:46

Right or Left?

I would love to see some alternative points of views posted at Blogher - Debi, it sounds like you've got one. Care to post it? I probably disagree with you but I prefer to see all points of views represented and we're seeing very few "right wing" or "conservative" points of view.

~Denise
Daily Dose of Denise

Submitted by Denise on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 14:49

Read the Blogher Mission

Thanks, Liz. You made the KOSesque experience complete by making a wild assumption and imposing a position on my comment that isn't there.

What I do know for sure is that the above post has zero to do with the Blogging and Social Media category. I'm not going to be baited into a discussion that I feel is inappropriate in this space. Anyone who is spoiling for political fights or support can take those discussions to places that are defined for that purpose.

I do participate in political forums and political campaigns. Blogher is neither. At least, I hope not.

Debi Jones
Contributing Editor, Blogging and Social Media
Feed your mobile jones

Submitted by mobilejones on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 18:26

Hmmm, sorry... I clicked

Hmmm, sorry... I clicked over to it from the "Politics" category! If what you were complaining about was that it was not in the right category... I missed that part, and did assume you were objecting to the lefty political content.

-----------------
Liz Henry
lizzard@bookmaniac.net
Badgermama - personal & mommyblog
http://liz-henry.blogspot.com

Submitted by Liz Henry on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 21:34

A political call to action

A political call to action versus a post about bloggers posting about politics are different. DailyKOS is a political community site regardless of it's leanings. So a political call to action whether it be for leftist reasons or rightwing reasons is appropriate for a political community like DailyKOS. Blogher isn't the place for political calls to action according to it's mission as a site dedicated to the education and visibility of women bloggers. That was the point.

We have many places in the publics to be divided. Blogher shouldn't be one of those places. My comments would have been the same regardless of whether this was a rightwing or leftwing call to action. You risk alienating part of the community and creating an environment of competing calls to political action.

Nothing in my comments indicates which side of the political spectrum I'm on, and I've intentionally omitted a declaration of my personal political association from this discussion. It's not relevant.

Debi Jones
Contributing Editor, Blogging and Social Media
Feed your mobile jones

Submitted by mobilejones on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 22:43

Looking on with a bit of

Looking on with a bit of distance, and liking the idea of blogher, it seems to me the idea is to have a free form exchange of ideas/views/opinion.

Are the categories set up for the purpose of making it convenient for the average amateur blogher member to find things of interest, or are they meant to be narrowly defined boxes from which none should deviate?

Just me, but I really get antsy when we must take our pov and move it elsewhere for want of violating category. Give me a good opinion, no matter what it might be, and let it lie where it is. That most recent listing surely comes in handy.

And yes to Denise's call for more conservative, alternate views. mobile, this is not a slam on your pov all the way around, merely my own view of all this.

Denise would probably say I am decidedly left, maybe... maybe... but I will stand for the right of everyone to offer up their pov. I just prefer the boxes be for the convenience of the searcher of opinion, not where it must go.

Nelle

Submitted by nelle2nelle on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 18:45

why bother with categories?

Nelle, categories are used to assist with navigation. If the content under a category isn't related then using a category is nonsensical and doesn't help with discovery.

So why use categories at all? If I come to Blogher looking for blogs about Health and Wellness, but the free for all use of the category to ensure wider visibility of a post means I have to wade through political blogs to find blogs writing about health issues, I'll just give up and move on.

So if you want Blogher to be useful to people looking for a resource, then the use of categories provides organizational and navigational assistance. Categories that contain unrelated posts are not useable. Your proposal would render the navigation tool worthless.

Debi Jones
Contributing Editor, Blogging and Social Media
Feed your mobile jones

Submitted by mobilejones on Tue, 04/11/2006 - 19:24

Agreed, and it is helpful.

My point is I don't think anyone intentionally sets out to misplace a topic, they tend to evolve, or have some tangental relevance. You could find the immigration issue show up under the food section, because a sizeable number of illegal immigrants who work in the production of food, and the politics of food would be fair game, imo.

If good discussion sprouts, water and nuture it. It may not be the usual location, but that's ok... the topic is interesting, and people have need to get their thoughts out.

Categories - boxes if you will - are ok, but to me the real end game is the content and the participation, not so much the structure or appearance. They exist to make the former two easier.

Nelle

Submitted by nelle2nelle on Wed, 04/12/2006 - 13:43

Category Dispute

Debi, did you ever consider taking your thoughts regarding the category issue directly to the editor who wrote the post? This is the process suggested at Blogher. Why did you choose to manipulate the issue in this way?

I've got no problem with a bit of manipulation. Getting us to take the bait and make assumptions that you KNEW we would make, just so you could call us on it and talk up your point, is all part of the game. And, you just played it very, very well. Kudos to you. Unfortunately, I'm better at doing the manipulating than being manipulated so I'm probably not going to play again unless I know up front that we're playing.

~Denise
Daily Dose of Denise

Submitted by Denise on Wed, 04/12/2006 - 01:49

Welcome to my experiment

First, let me preface by saying thanks for your comments to my post. Whether in favor or disfavor of the original thesis, I appreciate you taking the time to read and discuss. Afterall, blogs are conversations, right?
I admit the post was a passionate call-to-action because I believe this--along with gay marriage--will be the civil rights war of the 21st century. Having said that, I assure you my category tag was only partially ill conceived. As I was previewing, I thought: "Who is reading this stuff anyway??" And then I remembered, the times I've gotten comments involved times when I have written about blogging. So I threw the category just to see if it indeed applied.
Bingo! BlogHers like to have conversations, but they're really just into reading about blogging, or people they know here that blog.
Now--don't get all bent thinking I'm going to manipulate you or commit some further disingenuous blogHer foul. I won't. And I apologize if I wasted anyone's time...HOwever, that said: There should be more conservative POVs on this site. And YES--we should be able to frankly, yet maturely discuss political opinions because the last time I checked, discourse--while an endangered species in this country--is still a very good thing. I'll be the first to try to find ways to argue a more conservative point of view...just not on this particular subject. Thanks again all!

Submitted by The Anonymous Source on Wed, 04/12/2006 - 21:06

your experiment

thank you for the first post, anonymous. although, i find the bits about what should go where tiresome (read: why categories at all; why not tags? maybe they are there, if so, i'm sorry; i'm new), but that's just me.

overall, i think the call for more conservative posts would be better served if others tried playing devil's advocate rather than wait for some f_xwatcher to rain down their rants upon this fledgling community. for if it has hit the street (ala what, usatoday?) then can the others be far behind?

as far as the first post goes, the obvious response is: why won't those who wish to come to this country apply for immigrant status in a legal manner? i live in chucotown, er...el paso, texas (re: place of the porous border, minutemen, patriot freeway; future home of the 21st century's contra-wall: keep 'em out, not in) and some-granted, not many-who live here think that if their parents/abuelos came here legally, then why couldn't those who are now here illegally?

Submitted by chacal la chaise aka c.r. drapes on Wed, 04/12/2006 - 22:13

I'm still confused

in that I clicked over here from Race & Ethnicity. I didn't find it at all surprising or objectionable that there would be a political call to action under this category.

Who said that the personal is political and vice versa? Why on earth would one expect someone's posts to be without political opinion?

As I health care provider I can state, unequivically, that politics enters even into the health care arena. This doesn't mean I care to read about someone's politics if I am searching for information on hyperthyroidism. But most likely I would search Encarta or WebMD for that.

Personally, I am not interested in surfing this site if there cannot be political content or opinion. I am a grown woman who is capable of sifting through the sandbox without throwing sand because I don't agree with someone.

I can find great blogs on my own. And I have found many. There has to be more to BlogHer than a specialty search engine.

JMHO.

Submitted by NursePam on Sat, 04/22/2006 - 13:08