by José de la Isla

HOUSTON– So tell me again, what’s wrong with this?

The national economy has grown 54 percent since 1993. More than 25 million jobs have been created. Average unemployment dropped from 7.1 percent in 1994 to 5.1 percent in 2007. And U.S. manufacturing averaged nearly 4 percent gains during that period, almost double the previous 14 years.

To hear Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton tell it, this wasn’t good enough and it’s time to consider a “time out” or “renegotiation” over NAFTA, the trade agreement with Canada and Mexico, and other trade deals.

They were countered by a chorus of voices. One of those that rang loud came from Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutiérrez, who wrote this zinger in the Washington Post: “Taking a ‘timeout’ on trade is akin to standing at a moment when the rest of the world is moving forward.” And he added, “Suffocating our economy isn’t a viable strategy for prosperity. Pretending we’re not part of North America isn’t a prescription for growth.”

Therein lies the trade dividing line not just between parties but the ideologies going into the selection of the next president.

You can almost hear Obama and Clinton lip-syncing Britney Spears saying, “Oops! I did it again.”

Appealing to isolationism seems to be rhetorically just too tempting to withdraw from it entirely. Playing to the crowd is enticing when the audience doesn’t feel it has benefi ted as have others.

In fairness it’s hard to tell people in some parts of the country–the ones on the down side of global trade,” It’s really not all that bad overall.” Ohio has lost about 231,000 jobs in the last ten years.

But wasn’t change-wecan-believe-in Obama’s campaign theme? Change to what? How will the country redevelop by threatening, for starters, commerce with our first and third largest trade partners? What purpose does that serve if the jobs are already gone? Someone is not leveling with us on this one and that’s the problem.

Scape-goating Canada and Mexico might feel good for a while, but that’s not going to bring lost jobs back. ­A year ago, Hillary Clinton told Time magazine she believed in the “general principles of NAFTA.” She narrowed the problems down to enforcement, noting, “I believe we need tougher enforcement of the trade agreements we already have.” She claimed the Clinton administration had brought more trade enforcement actions in one year than Bush had in six.

Enforcement is a reasonable claim. But a timeout, as she asserted later, is a different matter. Obama’s assertion to renegotiate NAFTA opens up the proverbial can of worms that many experts already shake their head over.

In the fi rst ten months of 2007, trade between the three North American countries was $742.86 billion. Bilateral trade with Mexico was $290.38 billion, resulting in a $6.7 billion surplus in Mexico’s favor. NAFTA has produced a large and growing trade deficit with Mexico. The effects on Ohio and other industrial states have been overwhelmingly negative. In 1993, the year before NAFTA started, the U.S. had a positive $2.4 billion trade balance from Ohio’s cars, trucks, and auto parts manufacturing. By 2007, it had turned into a trade defi cit of $12 billion. The Economist magazine generalizing about NAFTA correctly says, “Trade hurts some people but helps many more.”

The art of the deal isn’t with threats to cut and run where it doesn’t work well but to figure out how to spread the pain and benefi ts and turn it into a winning hand. Telling workers they need to take night school courses for a new career can be helpful but looks like a Band-aid for a heart attack.

Secretary Gutiérrez’s boast about trade is no comfort for those on the short end of those proud trade numbers. But instead of a retreat from trade, this might be a good time to steal some of the Republican’s thunder. The discussion should turn next to accelerating the development of new technologies and how we will transition into a wellpaid, sustainable, green post-industrial, education and training-centered economy. The emphasis is no longer if but how.

[José de la Isla, author of “The Rise of Hispanic Political Power” (Archer Books, 2003) writes a weekly commentary for Hispanic Link. E-mail joseisla3@yahoo.com]. ©2008

by Felipe de Ortego y Gasca

In the current flap over building a wall between Mexico and the United States, it would be well to keep in mind Robert Frost’s injunction “something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” That “something” is that a wall is a barrier.

In the case of a “wall” between the United States and Mexico, a wall is a manifestation of conflict, just as the Berlin Wall was a manifestation of conflict. A wall between the United States and Mexico will only escalate the enmity between the two countries.

Ronald Reagan’s plea to Gorbachev to “tear down this wall” referring to the Berlin Wall is not what brought down the wall. it was Mikhail Gorbachev’s response that brought down the wall. Instead of escalating the cycle of conflict, the Soviet leader chose to ignore the rhetoric of conflict and for whatever reasons took the first step in repairing U.S.-Soviet relations.

When asked about the U.S.-Mexico wall in a 2006 visit to the United States, Mikhail Gorbachev responded that the United States seemed to be building the Great Wall of China between itself and Mexico.

In the current rhetoric about controlling the nation’s borders, the question looms large: Why on the one hand did the U.S. want the Berlin Wall torn down and on the other hand does it want to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico?

Between the 8th and 5th centuries BC, the northern states of China built a wall along their northern border to stave off Mongol penetration. In places, the 4,000-mile-long wall was 25 feet high and 30 feet wide.

In 122 AD the Roman emperor Hadrian built a wall across Britain to keep Romans safe from the hostile Picts. The wall stretched from the North Sea to the Irish Sea, 80 Roman miles long, 10 feet wide and 15 feet high.

In like fashion, in the 20th century the French built the “Maginot Line” as a walled fortifi cation against German incursions. With the use of aeroplanes, the Germans simply fl ew over the Maginot Line. General George Patton called the Maginot Line a monument ­to man’s stupidity.

Even the Berlin Wall was not impenetrable. A U.S. wall on its border with Mexico has as its objectives to keep out extra-territorial infl uences (the uninvited, the unwelcome and the unwanted) that are deemed anathema to the apodictic values of the United States.

Why not a wall between he United States and Canada? Or a wall along the Florida coast to keep out Cubans? The inference is that Canadians and fl eeing Cubans are good neighbors; Mexicans are not. A wall between the United States and Mexico is intended to keep Mongol hordes of Mexicans at bay.

Will a wall help the United States in controlling its border with Mexico? What is that lesson here? That walls are no substitute for diplomacy.

According to the International Boundary and Water Commission, the U.S.-Mexico border, 1,951 miles long, from San Diego to Brownsville, is the most frequently crossed international border in the world, with some 350 legal crossings every year.

In a washingtonpost.com article last summer, Luis Alberto Urrea quoted the Mexican consul in Tucson calling the U.S.-Mexico wall “the politics of stupidity.”

Yes, there are many Mexicans coming north into the United States. Struggling to shake off its repressive colonial past, Mexico is like most developing nations charting a course for its people across rocks and shoals diffi cult to navigate. Democracy is a process, not a product. That’s why we can’t just hand off “democracy” to the Iraqis and say, “Make it work.” Democracy takes time. After 231 years, in the United States we are still struggling with the democratic process.

Every year hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens leave the United States to live elsewhere. It’s sometimes hard to defi ne the nature and patterns of human migration. Hispanic Link News Service.

(Dr. Felipe Ortego y Gasca is Emeritus Professor of English, Texas State University SystemSul Ross. Email him at ortegop@wnmu.edu. This commentary is adapted from a lengthier, soonto-be-published essay the author has prepared for a university publication. Readers may find it at www.hispaniclink.org). (c)2008

by marvin J Ramirez

Marvin J. Ramirez

While the U.S. presidential primaries continue in heated contests in several states, a group of Republican senators introduced a package of bills on immigration that represents harsher immigration regulations ‘but not the comprehensive approach that is needed to fix the broken system.’

One of the original negotiators during last year’s attempt to pass a comprehensive immigration reform, Sen. Robert Menéndez (D-NJ), challenged on March 5, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), the presumptive Republican presidential nominee who in the past has worked on comprehensive immigration reform, to reject this Republican approach.

In a written statement, Menéndez called on McCain to reject the content of the package.

Said the statement: “I am calling on Sen. McCain, as his party’s presumptive nominee, to reject this draconian approach to immigration reform, which would demonize the Latino community. As a past sponsor of comprehensive immigration reform who has since said he would have voted against his own bill, it is important for Sen. McCain to define his position on this cynical Republican effort. The mainstream of America knows full well that the immigration system is broken, but they also recognize that an unbalanced, narrow approach won’t fix it. We need a system that is tough but smart and civil and actually works for our economy – a system that protects the borders while protecting our legacy as a nation of immigrants. Many of the 44 million Latinos in this country will be eager to hear where Sen. McCain stands.”

Continues the statement:

difference. This is the type“The Republican Party might think this is a wedge issue for November, but their strategy only dims their chances this year and for generations to come. Latinos are not a group on the fringes of our society that can be manipulated to score political points. If this presidential primary season has shown us anything, it is that Latinos are no longer the sleeping giant in American politics – they are fully awake, active and making a ­of cynical effort that serves to deepen the divisions in our nation that we should be working to bridge.”

Sen. Menéndez’ words, however, are only part of the problems that exist in our nation. However, as a recession is starting to hit us all, no border wall, no employer sanctions, no lowering interest rates on home mortgages will cure the ills that are affecting the country. Abolishing the private corporation called Federal Reserve Bank, and reinstituting our government the right to re-start printing our money, backed by gold, will end all infl ation and will give back the dignity to every North American. The end of the problem.

by Rigo Hernández

Isabel Barraza from Mission Cultura Center dances In SF Carnaval 2007 ­(File photo by Marvin J. Ramirez)

The Eureka Valley/Harvey Milk Memorial Branch Library, located at 1 José Sarria Court, will close for renovation on March 1. The branch will host a celebratory closing party at 1 p.m. that day.

The Jules Broussard Trio and other local favorites will provide entertainment at the event. The community will also be honoring former Library Commissioner Steve Coulter for his years of service to San Francisco’s libraries.

Prior to the opening party starting at 10 a.m., the bookmobile will make a special tour with stops at the Eureka Valley Recreation Center, the Baghdad Café and the Castro Theater. Special guests will perform at each stop.

Highlights of the branch renovation include new accessible restrooms, improved public and staff spaces, a designated teen area, more computers, better lighting, flexible spaces for programs, and new furniture, shelving, and materials displays. The project will cost about $5.4 million and is scheduled for completion in late 2009.

Mission Cultural Center For Latino Arts looking for dancers

San Francisco Carnaval is just around the corner, and the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts is inviting you to join its dancing team, which will be part of the dozens of floats in the Mission District.

The center is looking for male and female dancers of all levels to come dance merengue, salsa, and reggaeton. The event will be choreographed by the winner of the 1st prize Caribbean dance of 2007; Stephanie Owen.

Free dance classes will also be offered, starting on March 1, on Saturdays, from 3:15-6 p.m. The center is located at 2868 Mission St. for more information call: (415)821-1155 or visit their  website at www.missionculturalcenter.org.

Women’s Accomplishments topic of speech in public forum

The Commonwealth Club, a non-profit forum is inviting you to come hear Dee Dee Myers, a former White house Press Secretary for the Clinton Administration speak about the accomplishments of women in public life and the difficulties they face.

Myers, 31, the first and youngest woman to be press secretary is a political contributor to MSNBC and PBS.

The forum will be on March 6 at 11:30 a.m. in the clubs office at 595 Market St, 2nd floor in San Francisco. Tickets are $8 for members, $15 for non-members, and $7 for students.

To buy tickets call: (415) 597-6705. For more Information go to www.commonwealthclub.org or contact Riki Rafner at (415)-597-6712.

Women of Color Resource Center host Evening of art, humor & music

Speaking Fierce: Celebrate International Women’s Day is event that will feature performances and interactive creative activities for the whole family.

The Women of Color Resource Center invites women of all continents to come together and celebrate the struggle for equality, justice and peace.

Some of the guest include Brooklyn-Based Pakistani poet; Bushra Rehman, the climbing poetree a spoken word/performance art, Technological Empowerment & Media Project of Oakland, and Service Women’s Action Network. Special guest include Rythem and Blues world music singer, Jennifer Johns.

The event will be on  March 6, from 7.00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. on the First Congregational Church at 2501 Harrison Street in Oakland.

Tickets are$10-$25, but no guest will be turned down if they don’t have money.

For more information call: (510)-444-2700 x305, or go to www.coloredgirls.org.­