The protests in Los Angeles, among others, are not to be taken lightly. Especially so in LA, where it seems no one predicted the size of the protests (500,000 at last count). The people protesting will, for the most part, be dismissed as lawless advocates by many on my side of the political spectrum. It’s time for conservative pundits to can the xenophobic soundbites. Those on the left…who knows. The social dynamic in southern California, New Mexico and Arizona is something we should look more closely into. Let’s start with some reality.

We cannot seal the southern border. It is too long, too porous, and would require too much manpower. We would do better to use those resources to scan every cargo container that enters the country (also, almost an impossible task). Mexicans did not attack us on 9/11 – if national security is the real concern, we shouldn’t overlook our much longer and less monitored neighbor to the North. If it’s not national security concerning us, I think we need to ask some tough questions of ourselves.

Though it’s a popular thing to propose, it is physically impossible to block off the Mexican border, and the Hispanic vote in enough districts has become sufficiently powerful to scare many congressman away from any such idea altogether to where it is also nearly politically impossible. The alternative then, if we cannot stop the flow of northward bound immigration, is to monitor it. A guest worker program with some method of American indoctrination would do that. Some acts are malum in se (where the act itself is clearly bad, like murder). Immigration to America, which has infected so many millions throughout history, does not fall into that category. We’re talking about a set of immigration rules that have outlived any modicum of usefulness. The desire of the world to come here is a net positive. We have established a set of laws we cannot enforce, with dubious policy goals in light of the volume we must now handle and the national security concerns post-9/11. If the system isn’t accomplishing its stated goals, we have to change it.

Besides, illegal immigrants aren’t the real problem. A zero tolerance policy toward those who are here will result in the eventual de-Americanization of the southwest region of our country. If a Mexican national comes here, illegally or not, we need to assimilate them or risk an expansion in influence of the Mexican government in our affairs that we cannot afford. After the next generation of Mexican immigrants becomes newly minted citizens, border of Mexico will de facto expand into the southern border of United States. To avoid this, we need a program of Americanization, not the continued call for enforcement of unenforceable laws. Treating illegal immigrants as some scourge accomplishes nothing. They aren’t going anywhere, and by most estimates add much more to the economy than they may receive in government assistance. Let’s make the desire to reach America at any cost work for America. We can absorb more.

A guest worker program, or something similar, with a goal toward Americanization should be put into place. Mandatory English classes along with weekly American history classes would go a long way to this end. The goal should be to de-Mexicanize the immigrating Mexican worker, not foster an underground culture unassimilated into American society.

(note, a new category has been added, starting with this post, under “Immigration”).

UPDATE Harry Monroe has more here.

FURTHER UPDATE And of course, there are those who are angry and want more unrest, for no other reason than the complete destruction of American society.

FURTHER FURTHER UPDATE My point made here. As Harry Monroe said in the comments, we can’t be accused of being knee-jerk. This, however, is just that.

UPDATE AD INFINITUM Virginia Postrel notes

Anti-immigration forces have made great strides politically by cynically conflating terrorists and criminals with dishwashers and construction workers. Any real plan to “secure the borders” should make it easier, not harder, to separate the two. Workers, especially those who want to settle and become citizens (or have their children become citizens), are not threats. They’re contributors to American society.

Bingo.