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 Editorials | July 2007 
Mexico's Troubles Also Ours
 Randy Scholfield - Wichita Eagle
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The U.S. Senate's failed effort to pass U.S. immigration reform failed to address a principal player in the problem: Mexico. No effort to solve America's immigration woes can ignore what's happening south of the border. The ongoing exodus of Mexican workers sneaking into the United States is largely driven by growing economic and political turmoil in Mexico.
Its problems have become ours, too.
America doesn't need to offer a huge Marshall Plan-type economic bailout, say many observers - Mexico, which has plenty of oil revenue, is hardly destitute.
What Mexico does need is political and economic reform. America should offer assistance and pressure toward that goal.
The new Mexican president, Felipe Calderon, has made a good start by declaring war on the nation's vicious drug cartels and their insidious hold on many public institutions.
More than 1,000 Mexicans have been killed so far this year in brutal "narco wars," including police officers and reporters, with drug criminals launching increasingly bloody and daring paramilitary-style operations, often in broad daylight.
Calderon has ordered 24,000 troops into this war and last month purged some 284 commanders from Mexico's corrupt and demoralized federal police forces, which in recent years have been widely infiltrated and intimidated by the gangs.
Mexico's glaring economic disparities help fuel such illegal activity. A small ruling class continues to wield most of the power and privilege in the country, while millions struggle merely to survive.
Absent a U.S. immigration reform bill, it makes sense, as Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff recently argued, to pursue better border control and enforcement of existing laws.
The United States must also work more closely with Mexico to stop the illegal flow of people, guns and drugs across the border.
And President Bush should step up pressure on Mexico's government to follow through on political and economic reforms that could give Mexicans more reasons to stay at home.
At present, many Mexicans are voting with their feet. |
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