The good, the bad and the border

Sometimes borders are a good thing.

There is a border between right and wrong, for instance, but that is a hard one for some people to see. They say there is no border, but what they really mean is that they feel free to cross between right and wrong as they see fit and don't want anyone to tell them to "get back to where you once belonged," as the Beatles told Jojo.

There is a border between you and the rest of the world, too. It's called skin, and it holds you in. Most people find it to be modestly (or immodestly, according to taste) useful and prefer not to see it breached. When stuff on the inside crosses that border, it is called bleeding. When stuff on the outside crosses the border, it is called being shot or stabbed. In either case, you should rush yourself to a hospital.

There is a border between the inside of a jet plane and the outside. It comes in particularly handy at 32,000 feet. Breaching is not recommended at any speed.

There is a border between the United States and Mexico, too - oh wait, that's not a border; it's a joke. In fact, the thing between Mexico and the United States is more accurately referred to as the world's largest unguarded port of entry.

That was established once and for all last week when a million or more illegal immigrants from Mexico and a few other countries rallied in the United States of America for their God-given right to American citizenship. Say huh? When did American citizenship become a human right? Oh that's an easy one - it happened when we decided not to enforce our border security. You can't expect to have anything precious left in your treasury when you throw open the doors, send the guards home and invite passers-by in to spend the night. At that point, what's yours is theirs, and not much you can do about it unless you have mastered the magic trick of closing the barn door once the horse is gone.

What is astounding is not that the passers-by want to take your precious pearl of citizenship with them. What is astounding is that so many Americans don't mind being robbed - apparently on the theory that we are all God's children, or maybe just because we are the softest touches on the planet. "What's yours is yours, and what's mine is yours, too."

I suppose at this point I could simply go off on a rant. How dare they! What is wrong with those idiots in Washington! Build the wall! Call in the national guard! Send the employers who are hiring illegal workers to jail! Then let's see how long the illegal immigration problem remains.

But why bother? Everyone who is concerned about the future of the United States of America already knows what needs to be done, and everyone who likes the idea of amnesty for illegal aliens has already sold out the country anyway. Globalization good for America? Yeah, I suppose so - if we aspire to be an outlying province of China. Hitler had a globalization program, too. It was called Deutschland Uber Alles, which roughly translated from the German means, "It's my world, you can cry if you want to."

But there's no use crying over spilt milk is what we are told.

So we had better stop worrying about the good old days when "the common welfare" stopped at the border. That is passe. Nowadays, Americans have a responsibility to share everything with the rest of the world. First we give them our jobs, then we give them our standard of living, and when we have nothing else left to give, we just give up.

It reminds me of the story in the Bible of Jacob and Esau. The elder brother Esau was a mighty hunter, but one day when he was hungry he sold his birthright to his brother for "a mess of pottage" - a bowl of lentils.

That's kind of the position we are in, too. The immigrants are telling us they have something we want - cheap labor - and if we don't want big problems, we had better give them what they want: our birthright of citizenship. Esau decided he didn't want to be troubled with finding a solution to his problem of hunger, so he gave away everything for next to nothing. "Behold, I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me?" So he took the easy way out, but he had a lifetime to regret it.

You hear the same kind of thinking in this country. People have surrendered to the problem of illegal immigration. "What can we do?" people ask plaintively. "Send them all back?" Well, no, probably not, but if we make sure they can't get jobs or government services, they will probably tend to migrate in the opposite direction on their own. That's one of the nice things about an open border. It works both ways.

But let's be realistic. There is almost no chance our government will take any action at all. Like Esau, our president and legislators are "faint." They will take the bread and lentils and rise up and go their way, having given away everything for next to nothing.

So we had better start to assess what we have left and make plans to live in the new world without borders. There are some advantages, after all. It would eliminate the need for passports, for one thing. No need to get the paperwork stamped anymore since you are a "citizen" as soon as you cross the former invisible line that was a border. (By the way, does an invisible line become visible when it becomes former?)

But really, what are you a citizen of anyway? I mean since there are no borders anymore, then we don't really have countries anymore, do we? It's all just one big happy family where you do your thing and I do mine.

But how exactly does anything get done when there are no governments? Or is there just one big government for all of us? And if the majority of the world's population lives under some sort of dictatorship already, then won't the populations that favor dictatorship persuade the rest of us - like the Borg in "Star Trek" - that "resistance is futile." Isn't it inevitable that one-world government will eventually go the way of all governments and become uncaring, corrupt and deadly? And when the one-world government goes bad in a world where there are no borders, where exactly do we go for help?

Borders? We don't need no stinking borders! Just buy your ticket to the dark ages and hold on. It's a helluva ride.