The Latino giant awakes

[Flabbergasted]

http://www.newstatesman.com/200605010019

Andrew Stephen
Monday 1st May 2006


The new political and economic power of Hispanic immigrants is fuelling an ugly mood of racism in America, where "illegals" are accused of taking healthcare, jobs and housing. By Andrew Stephen

I first visited the United States as a teenager in 1970, when the number of people living here who had been born abroad was 9.6 million. Just a decade later, it had risen to 14.1 million. By 1990 the figure was 19.1 million, and in 2000 there were 31.1 million people living in the US who had not actually been born here. Overall, according to the Centre for Immigration Studies, 7.9 million people have moved to the US in the past five years - two and a half times the total that came in the last record wave of European immigration, a century ago.

But if you think this means America is still a land that welcomes the tired, poor and huddled masses yearning to breathe free - to quote those wonderfully idealistic words by Emma Lazarus, written in 1883 and still proudly exhibited on the Statue of Liberty as if they were true - think again. Isn't this, after all, a nation of immigrants that constantly strengthens itself with new blood and brains? The likes of Bill Gates and Microsoft certainly want it to be: not long ago he made a rare visit to Washington to lobby for more visas to be granted to people from countries such as India, because he knows from personal experience that well-educated youngsters from these backgrounds have the know-how and eagerness that native-born Americans simply do not possess.

[mohinoaklawnillinois]

1. Well written and thoughtful article, although

I do disagree with Mr. Stephen's characterization of Bill Frist...