[Vision2020] Providing a Foreign Advantage (Molly Ivins)

[Tom Hansen]

>From today's (May 24, 2006) Spokesman Review -

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Providing a foreign advantage 

Molly Ivins 
Creators Syndicate

May 24, 2006

Last week, President Bush visited Yuma, Ariz., to tour a portion of the
U.S.-Mexico border by Border Patrol buggy. Maybe Jorge was doing a little
measuring for the $3.2 million-a-mile fence the Senate recently approved,
which I guarantee will be really helpful. 

Are they insane? As Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano observes, "Show me a
50-foot wall, and I'll show you a 51-foot ladder." 

Meanwhile, Republicans in the Senate have constructively declared English
the national language. That'll fix everything. Every foreigner at our
borders will stop and say: "Gosh, ma foi! English is the national language
here. Good thing to know. I'll begin speaking it immediately."
 
Yes sir, you want a solution, call a Republican. 

Of course, I am enchanted to discover that the entire project will be turned
over to Raytheon, General Dynamics and other military contractors - think
Halliburton with noncompetitive bids, anyone? Because this outsourcing stuff
is just working like a charm. Another Republican solution. 

Naturally, in Texas, National Laboratory for Bad Government, we do it all
first and worst. We started with this dandy plan to outsource applications
and enrollment for social service programs such as food stamps and Medicaid.
In theory, we were to save millions - though I never could understand it
myself. You see, Texas has one of the cheapest state governments on the
continent, but when we hire outside contractors, they expect to make a
profit. Add profit, add cost. Oh well. So, the state hired this firm based
in Bermuda on an $899 million five-year contract. So far, the health and
human services commissioner has been forced to ask 1,000 state employees who
were scheduled to be laid off by the end of the year not to leave after all
- and to offer each of them a $1,800 bonus to stay. Oops. 

Among other errors, the private consortium mistakenly dropped 6,000 children
from the children's health insurance program. The state comptroller says the
program is "a perfect storm of wasted dollars, reduced access to services
and profiteering at the expense of Texas taxpayers." 

With a record like that, of course, Republicans want more outsourcing. Ted
Koppel suggests in the New York Times that we outsource war: "Blackwater and
other leading security companies are seriously proposing to officials at
very high levels of the government that their private forces could relieve a
number of the burdens now being shouldered (or not) by American troops. .
The Pentagon . is nonetheless struggling to come to terms with what it now
calls 'the long war.' There is every expectation that the fight against
global terrorism and the most extreme forms of Islamic fundamentalism will
last for many years. This is a war that will not necessarily require
aircraft carriers, strategic bombers, fighter jets or heavily armored tanks.
It will certainly not enable the United States to exploit its advantages in
nuclear weapons. It is a war, indeed, that favors the highly mobile and
adaptive fighting skills of the former Special Forces soldiers and other
ex-commandos." 

"Will"? Hell! Did and does. This is a war that is being fought with the
wrong tools - and, in Iraq, at the wrong time, in the wrong place and
against the wrong enemy. 

It never did call for tanks, jets or carriers - just a combination of good
detectives and good intelligence. In other words, smart, clever people with
language skills. All of which we have fully available to us because of .
immigration. Lebanese, Iraqis, Iranians, Syrians, Pakistanis and Indonesians
have all become Americans, and in so many cases we got the bravest of the
brave - those who fought Saddam, the Ayatollah and Assad, Lebanese who saw
their country torn apart by religious factions. These are Americans who know
the culture and language of the Middle East and other Islamic countries, and
who care deeply about how it all comes out. 

By all means, reform immigration with this deep obeisance to the Republican
right-wing nut faction and their open contempt for "foreigners." But do not
pretend that it is not a craven political bow to racism (yes, racism - I am
calling them racists, although they pretend it hurts their feelings; try
reading their Web sites and see for yourself), and to nativism, to
xenophobia and to know-nothingism. Just don't forget what you are throwing
away in the process.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

t hansen-moore
Moscow, Idaho

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"In America, anybody can become president.  
That's one of the risks you take . . ."

- Adlai Stevenson

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