The Mexican Country Mouse And The American City Mouse

The Fulford File, By James Fulford

...my point in reviving the Buckley quote is that it's no longer necessary to rely on the New York Times for your inspiration, when we have Google News. When I need something outrageous to blog about, I just do a news search on "immigration" and there you are.

For example, the Salt Lake Tribune story Arizona crackdown could add to Utah's illegal immigration woes [By Nate Carlisle, February 18, 2008] probably deserves a column in itself. The problem for Utahans is that if Arizona insists on enforcing the law, illegals can migrate internally. Utah is one destination, Texas another. See the Borjas Blog here where George asks “Do illegal immigrants move to states that are more willing to ignore their presence?".

Of course, if the federal government fails to defend the border, no state is even allowed to defend its own border, under a Supreme Court decision that goes back to the time of the Okie migration during the Great Depression.

So once immigrants are in, they're in. And the problem with "sanctuary cities" and "sanctuary states" is that the problems they cause don't affect only the sanctuaries themselves, but all the other states. I wrote in 2001 that

For example, you wouldn't expect Manistee County, which is in northern Michigan, to have a large Hispanic population. It's literally about as far from the Mexican border as you can go and still be in the Continental United States.