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 Editorials | Opinions | December 2006 
Our Opinion: Good and Bad Voiced by New Leader of Mexico
 Tucson Citizen
| | Mexico's president, Felipe Calderón |
We commend Mexico's new president, Felipe Calderón, for vowing to create good jobs in his country to bolster the economy there and deter Mexican migration to the United States.
We also appreciate his support of the Paisano Program, launched in 1989 to clamp down on corrupt officials in Mexico's government.
That effort is particularly important at this time of year, as an estimated 1.2 million Mexicans return home to their families for the holidays.
Calderón said 1,100 volunteers were sent to checkpoints along the U.S.-Mexico border and to airports to guard against Mexican customs officials demanding bribes from returning Mexicans and stopping bureaucrats who try to plunder the belongings of their returning countrymen.
The new president, who took office Dec. 1, also has promised to combat corruption to attract more foreign investors to Mexico.
"We need to ensure that more investment crosses the border into Mexico rather than Mexican labor heading to the U.S.," he said Wednesday in Nogales, Son., his first official visit to the border.
In that assessment, he is exactly right.
Calderón, unlike predecessor Vicente Fox, plans to focus on his jobs initiative rather than trying to persuade the United States to enact a guest worker program that would allow workers to enter legally.
That's a sensible choice, as U.S. immigration policy is the province of this nation's leaders, not Mexico's.
We also empathize with Calderón's desire to protect the rights of Mexicans who have immigrated to the United States.
However, we hope he understands that while human rights must be accorded to all peoples, the rights of illegal immigrants are far different than the rights of U.S. citizens and foreigners legally here.
Alas, one of his comments in Nogales this week suggests otherwise.
Calderón insisted that migration is a natural tradition, not a crime. That stance is technically correct, but in the practical sense, it is purely erroneous.
The first time people illegally enter the United States, they are committing a civil offense, not a criminal offense. But in every perceivable sense, the flood of illegal immigrants has become a serious crime resulting in enormous grief, thousands of deaths and the weakening of our binational bonds.
The new president's pledge to create jobs, decimate governmental corruption and support his citizens is a promising start to his six-year term.
We have high hopes for Calderón's success on these fronts. At the same time, it is imperative that Mexico's president recognize the legitimacy of U.S. laws governing the border.
Granted, we believe a guest worker program is essential, both to fill workplace needs legally and to deter deadly immigration across our border.
Such a program never will eliminate illegal arrivals by drug smugglers and other criminals, however.
And crossing into the United States without legal permission is wrong, no matter the circumstances.
That is a simple reality that Felipe Calderón must understand, respect and abide by. |
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