From the “fair point” reader below:
Jonah,
I want to elaborate further on my previous e-mail regarding borders. Pick any two countries in the world that share a border and you will not find a greater prosperity gap between those nations as the one that exists between the US and Mexico. North and South Korea would be the only example I can think of, and the mountainous border makes it nearly impossible to cross, though North Koreans try all the time. There was another example back in the 80s when Germany was broken into East and West. East Germans regularly risked death to climb the wall and make it to the West. Should these “law-breakers” have been sent back? Which brings me to my next point: If Mexico was a totalitarian dictatorship, would the Derb, Stuttaford, Ponnuru, et al, be calling for the US to send back these immigrants from Mexico? Mexico may not be a dictatorship, but the living conditions are every bit as bad and the local authorities are so corrupt the country might as well be a dictatorship. Why are immigrants from Cuba and Haiti who brave the Ocean to come here for freedom hailed, while the illegal immigrants from Mexico are treated with such disdain?