May 1st in the United States was "The Great American Boycott". Here in Mexico it was "Nothing Gringo on May 1st."
So what did I do on May Day?
Did I gather other expatriate gringos and march in the streets, waving the Stars and Stripes and demanding my "rights"?
Hardly! Had I done that, I wouldn't be in Mexico anymore. The Mexican government, unlike our leaders, still understands such quaint concepts as national sovereignty and national identity. So they don't put up with that sort of thing.
But I had a good day anyway. I dined at an American franchise steak and salad restaurant, with my wife, our boys, and the suegros (my wife's parents). And my father-in-law paid.
Leaving the restaurant, we stopped an American franchise office supply store, and then passed by a Wal-Mart Super-Center.
Judging from the parking lot, the Wal-Mart didn't look very boycotted.
Overall the "Day Without Gringos" didn't amount to much down here. May Day is an official holiday, so the boys didn't go to school (nor did my wife, who is a teacher).
There was a pro-forma protest at the American embassy, where demonstrators were regaled with a speech by "Delegado Marcos", the white Mexican leader of the Chiapas Indian movement.
In Tijuana and Nuevo Laredo, protestors blocked the border for a few hours.
The real May Day action was in the U.S.A., and I watched some of it on TV.
It's sad to watch the slow-motion fall of one's own country from foreign soil. It's no wonder the Mexicans don't respect us—we don't respect ourselves. A great nation wouldn't allow this sort of thing. A great nation wouldn't have allowed it to get this far.
As I reported earlier, the Fox administration had previously taken a neutral stance on the "Great American Boycott", instructing Mexican consulates not to participate.
On the eve of May Day, Fox advised the marchers to be prudent…so as not to provoke "xenophobia". [Espera Fox que boicot en EU no alienta xenophobia, EL Universal, April 30th]
And on May 2nd, after the marches, Fox's spokesman Ruben Aguilar extended his congratulations to the marchers in the U.S. for being peaceful and respectful. Aguilar stated that the Mexican government supports the demands the "migrants" are making in the United States. [Congratula a Presidencia marcha pácifica de migrantes, Universal, May 2nd, 2006]
As I reported in a previous VDARE.com article, U.S. immigration policy is an issue in the Mexican Presidential election.
On May 2nd, PRD candidate Lopez Obrador (aka El Peje, aka AMLO) said that, if elected, he would make "migration" his number one priority in relations with Washington. [ Mexico leftist to push US on immigration reform, By Kieran Murray Reuters, May 2, 2006
The same thing is true of Fox, who has always made it his top priority.
Oddly, the possibility of the leftist AMLO winning the Mexican presidency has so scared some U.S. pundits that they are ready to surrender to Mexico on immigration in order to prevent it.
Chief among these is Dick Morris, Bill Clinton's former spin doctor.
In a recent piece of scaremongering propaganda Morris says that Americans must help PAN candidate Calderon beat AMLO, by surrendering on immigration. Because, according to Morris, "A harsh shift in U.S. immigration policies could fuel a leftist victory in Mexico….We have only to hope that Congress won't pass legislation that alienates the Mexican electorate and delivers the country into AMLO's hands." [Mexico's Hugo Chavez by Dick Morris FrontPageMagazine.com, April 4, 2006]
Morris tells us that "Lopez Obrador has attacked U.S. attempts to restrict Mexican immigration and will benefit tremendously if Congress alienates the Mexican electorate."
Morris is worried about Congress "alienating the Mexican electorate"?
How about alienating the American electorate?
Here is Morris' flawed logic:
"Mexicans are deeply offended by the idea of a wall designed to keep them out. Building a wall on the border without also starting a guest-worker program will play badly in Mexico. A wall with a guest-worker program might go down better, particularly if the legislation didn't include punitive provisions making illegal immigration a felony."
So Morris would have us craft our immigration policy around what he thinks would benefit a Mexican political party?
This is madness. US immigration policy is already in bad enough shape without making it even worse in order to manipulate the Mexican election.
Dick Morris worked as an advisor for Vicente Fox in 2000. He may be working for Calderon in this election. And he has the gall to tell Americans to adopt a surrender-to-Mexico immigration policy to influence a Mexican election.
AMLO may lose anyway. Calderon has been ahead in most of the latest polls.
But why are people concerned about Mexico having a "pro-American" president? Being "pro-American" is not part of the job description of the president of Mexico.
It's a lot more important to have a pro-American president of the United States!
A pro-American president of the United States would put the jobs of American workers ahead of the jobs of the "willing workers" of the world.
A pro-American president would care about American citizenship and national identity.
A pro-American president would defend a distinct American nation with its own future.
If we had that kind of a president, it wouldn't matter to Americans what the president of Mexico did or didn't do!
American citizen Allan Wall (email him) resides in Mexico, with a legal permit issued him by the Mexican government. Allan recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq with the Texas Army National Guard. His VDARE.COM articles are archived here; his FRONTPAGEMAG.COM articles are archived here his "Dispatches from Iraq" are archived here his website is here.
