Tag: border
Worthwhile Canadian Observations, Or Resistance North Of The Border

Worthwhile Canadian Observations, Or Resistance North Of The Border

For those puzzled by my headline: Back in 1986 The New Republicchallenged its readers to come up with a headline more boring than “Worthwhile Canadian Initiative,” the title of a New York Times op-ed by Flora Lewis. They couldn’t. Canada, you see, was considered inherently boring.

As I wrote a couple of months ago, economists have never considered Canada boring: It has often been a laboratory for distinctive policies. But now it’s definitely not boring: Canada, which will hold a snap election next month, seems poised to deliver a huge setback to Donald Trump’s foreign ambitions, one that may inspire much of the world — including many people in the United States — to stand up to the MAGA power grab.

So this seems like a good time to look north and see what we can learn. Here are three observations inspired by Canada that seem highly relevant to the United States.

Other countries are real

I don’t know what set Trump off on Canada, what made him think that it would be a good idea to start talking about annexation. Presumably, though, he expected Canadians to act like, say, university presidents, and immediately submit to his threats.

What he actually did was to rally Canadians against MAGA. Just two months ago Canada’s governing Liberals seemed set for a historic collapse, with Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre the all-but-inevitable next prime minister. Now, if the polls are to be believed, Poilievre — who has been trying to escape his image as a Canadian Trump, but apparently not successfully — is effectively out of the running:

I won’t count my poutine until it’s served, but it does seem as if Trump’s bullying has not only failed but backfired spectacularly. (And, arguably, saved Canada; all indications are that Poilievre is a real piece of work.) But why?

Much of this is on Trump, who always expects others to grovel on command. But it also reflects a general limitation of the American imagination: we tend to have a hard time accepting that other countries are real, that they have their own histories and feel strong national pride. Canada, in particular, arguably defined itself as a nation in the 19th century by its determination not to be absorbed by the United States.

In fact, there are almost eerie parallels between some of those old confrontations and current events. The 1890 McKinley tariff, of which Trump speaks with such admiration, was in part intended to pressure Canada into joining the U.S.. Instead, it inspired a backlash: Canada imposed high reciprocal tariffs, sought to strengthen economic linkages between its own provinces, and built a closer economic relationship with Britain.Sure enough, Mark Carney, the current and probably continuing Canadian prime minister, has emphasized removing remaining obstacles to interprovincial trade and seems to be seeking closer ties to Europe.

Trump may expect submission; he’s actually getting “elbows up.”

Time and chance happeneth to us all

Why, but for the grace of Donald Trump, was the Liberal Party headed for electoral catastrophe? There were specific policy issues like the nation’s carbon tax and Justin Trudeau’s personal unpopularity, but surely the main reason was a continuation of the factors that made 2024 a graveyard for incumbents everywhere, especially continuing voter anger about the inflation surge of 2021-22.

Some of us tried to point out that the very universality of the inflation surge meant that it couldn’t be attributed to the policies of any one country’s government. If Bidenomics was responsible for U.S. inflation, why did Europe experience almost the same cumulative rise in prices that we did? But there was never much chance of that argument getting traction in the United States, where we have a hard time realizing that other countries exist.

The Canadians, however, definitely know that we exist, and you might think that public anger over inflation would have been assuaged by the recognition that Canada’s inflation very closely tracked inflation south of the border:

But no, Canadian voters were prepared to punish the incumbent party anyway for just happening to hold power in a difficult time. The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet electoral victory to parties with good policies; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

Life is about more than GDP

Canada’s inflation experience looks a lot like ours, but in other ways Canada has clearly underperformed. In particular, it has had weak productivity growth, which has left it substantially poorer than the U.S.. Canada, The Economist declared in a much-quoted article, is now poorer than Alabama, as measured by GDP per capita.

That’s not quite what my numbers say, but close. Yet Canada doesn’t look like Alabama; it doesn’t feel like Alabama; and by any measure other than GDP it isn’t anything like Alabama. Here’s GDP per capita along with a widely used measure of life satisfaction, the same one often cited when pointing out how happy the Nordic countries seem to be, and life expectancy at birth:

So yes, Canada’s GDP per capita is comparable to that of very poor U.S. states. So is per capita GDP in Finland, generally considered the world’s happiest nation. But Canadians appear, on average, to be more satisfied with their lives than we are, although not at Nordic levels. We don’t have a comparable number for Alabama, but surveys consistently show it as one of our least happy states.

Part of the explanation for this discrepancy, no doubt, is that so much of U.S. national income accrues to a small number of wealthy people; inequality in Canada is much lower.

And I don’t know about you, but I believe that one important contributor to the quality of life is not being dead, something Canadians are pretty good at; on average, they live more than a decade longer than residents of Alabama.

The general point here is that while GDP is a very useful measure, and is generally correlated with the quality of life, it’s not the only thing that matters. And the more specific point is that Canada, which among other things has universal health care, has some good reasons beyond national pride not to become the 51st state.

So Canada isn’t boring now, and it never was. As I said, try looking north; you might learn something.

Paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize-winning economist and former professor at MIT and Princeton who now teaches at the City University of New York's Graduate Center. From 2000 to 2024, he wrote a column for The New York Times. Please consider subscribing to his Substack, where he now posts almost every day.




Reprinted with permission from Paul Krugman.

Tim Scott

Whining About Border, Republicans Refuse To Fund Security Measures

Since President Joe Biden took office in 2021, congressional Republicans have hammered him with claims of a border crisis and lies that Democrats want open borders. But as they continue to demand more border security, most of the same GOP lawmakers are pushing a bill that could slash funding for it by 22 percent.

“On Joe Biden’s watch, illicit fentanyl poisoning is wreaking havoc on American families. The Biden administration’s reckless open border policies have created a national security, public health, and humanitarian catastrophe. We MUST secure the border #BidenBorderCrisis,” tweeted Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) on Thursday.

“President Biden’s open border policy is an attack on every county in America,” South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott said a day earlier, as he entered the Republican presidential primary. “A nation without borders is a nation devoid of law and liberty. Restoring hope in the future of America starts with securing our border.”

Both were among 43 Senate Republicans who signed a May 6 letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer endorsing demands by their House GOP counterparts that significant spending cuts be paired with any move to avert a catastrophic default on the national debt.

“The Senate Republican conference is united behind the House Republican conference in support of spending cuts and structural reform as a starting point for negotiations on the debt ceiling,” they wrote in the letter.

On April 26, with no Democratic support, House Republicans passed the Limit, Save, Grow Act, which would cut all programs in the federal budget by 22 percent, with no adjustments for inflation. The bill contained no language exempting veterans’ benefits, the Social Security Administration, or the agencies responsible for border security.

Zephranie Buetow, an assistant secretary for legislative affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, on March 19 sent a letter to Connecticut Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the ranking member of the House Committee on Appropriations, in which she said that those proposed cuts would harm national security:

The entire Department and the critical services we provide would be impacted, including but not limited to the following:

  • A reduction in CBP frontline law enforcement staffing levels of up to 2,400 agents and officers;
  • A reduction in our Department’s ability to prevent drugs from entering the country;
  • Cuts in federal assistance to state, local, tribal, territorial, and private sector partners for disaster preparedness; and
  • Reductions in TSA personnel that would result in wait times in excess of 2 hours at large airports across the country.

Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas announced on May 11 that the Biden administration was rebooting its asylum process following the end of the COVID-19 national health emergency and urged comprehensive immigration reform.

He told reporters: “Our current situation is the outcome of Congress leaving a broken, outdated immigration system in place for over two decades, despite unanimous agreement that we desperately need legislative reform. It is also the result of Congress’ decision not to provide us with the resources we need and that we requested.”

In the previous Congress, most GOP lawmakers voted repeatedly against laws that contained funding for the border security they demanded.

In 2021, 30 Senate Republicans and 200 House Republicans voted against the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which included $430 million for Customs and Border Protection to spend on “the construction and modernization of land ports of entry and equipment and fixtures for operations” and $3 billion “for critical investments in CBP’s Border Patrol stations and land ports of entry.”

Last year, 29 Republican senators and 200 GOP representatives opposed an appropriations package containing $6.3 billion for security operations at the nation’s northern and southern borders.

Reprinted with permission from American Independent.

To Reform Immigration, Biden Must Show Resolve At The Border

To Reform Immigration, Biden Must Show Resolve At The Border

Undocumented immigrants have been surging to the U.S. border, some wearing T-shirts with the Biden campaign logo and the words "Please let us in!" What gave them the idea that they could just show up and come on in? President Joe Biden did.

Oh, Biden didn't exactly say that. He said to not come now, as we rebuild the immigration system. But that isn't the same as saying they can't come illegally later. And since it implies that later on, whoever wants to come can, the migrants can reasonably assume that an arrival now without papers will eventually be overlooked.

Adding to that impression, Biden made a show on his first day in office of ditching five of the Trump administration's immigration policies. Sure enough, human smugglers began telling desperate Central Americans that Biden opened the door and the smugglers will get them through it for $6,000.

What did Biden think would happen? Officials at U.S. Customs and Border Protection warned the incoming administration of building pressure at the southern border. Fed by worsening poverty and gang violence in Central America and an improving U.S. economy, the rush had already begun in Donald Trump's last months.

It took until this weekend for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to firmly say the border of the United States "is closed." Roberta Jacobson, White House coordinator for the southern border, got still more specific. "The message isn't 'Don't come now,'" she said. "It's 'Don't come in this way, ever.'"

The earlier sloppy rhetoric handed Republicans a political bomb they are throwing at Democrats. Not that they've entirely earned the right. Trump's card trick was to hurl insults at undocumented immigrants while looking the other way when American businesses employed them as low-cost labor.

When Trump was asked whether he supported a national requirement to use E-Verify — a database that would confirm a new hire's right to work in this country — he said no. Asked why not, he used the bull argument that farmers don't have computers. Turning off the job magnet is the only way to cut the flow of illegal workers.

That is also missing from Biden's proposal for comprehensive immigration reform. He would confer legal status to most of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants. He would offer $4 billion in aid aimed at making life in some Central American countries less terrible. And he would reform the U.S. refugee and asylum systems. All good things.

But a plan that doesn't seriously stop Americans from employing people who entered illegally or overstayed their visas is not going to secure the border. Not any more than Trump's dramatics over a border wall.

Politicians of both parties should know where the public stands on these matters. A Gallup poll last summer found that for the first time, Americans want more, not less, immigration. Also, nearly 8 in 10 Americans think immigration is good for the country, with some Republicans in agreement.

In a 2019 poll, 65 percent thought the situation at the border to be a major or important problem. And 75 percent favored hiring significantly more Border Patrol agents.

What we see is that Americans support a large immigration program but want it kept legal. Canada and Australia do both. How sensible of them.

An experienced politician who wants to retain public support for a humane immigration program should know by now that an orderly border is essential — and that given the pressures, any show of laxness is a guarantee of disorder. On this issue, Biden can't be a nice guy without also being a tough guy.

He needs to show resolve and show it now.

Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com

High Winds Blow Down Border Wall In California

High Winds Blow Down Border Wall In California

A section of the border wall in southern California was blown over by high winds on Wednesday, causing the structure to fall into Mexico, CNN reported.

Mexican officials were forced to divert traffic from the area.

In an email Thursday, Ralph DeSio, a Customs and Border Protection official, said high winds “impacted a handful of panels,” adding that there were no injuries or property damage.

DeSio said that the 30-foot high wall tipped into Mexico while the concrete holding the wall in place was still drying, confirming CNN’s report. DeSio called the incident “an uncommon event,” noting winds reached speeds well over 30 miles per hour on Wednesday.

DeSio also confirmed that the construction company SLSCO Ltd was under contract for that particular section of the border wall.

In a June 2019 press release, CPB said SLSCO had been awarded an $88 million contract to replace an 11-mile section of dilapidated border wall in Calexico. According to a 2019 Forbes report, SLSCO has received contracts for border wall projects totaling almost half a billion dollars since Trump took office.

A Texas-based company, SLSCO was founded by three brothers, John, Billy, and Todd Sullivan. According to MarketWatch, the brothers donated a total of $68,000 to Republican groups or candidates in the 2018 election cycle. The only donation to a Democrat came from Johnny, who gave $2,700 to Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee.

In an email, SLSCO did not provide any comment about the Calexico incident, instead referring all media inquiries to CBP.

In addition to Calexico, Forbes reported that SLSCO’s other border wall projects include several controversial stretches along the Texas-Mexico border.

In one spot, the SLSCO’s construction will reportedly run straight through the National Butterfly Center, a private nature preserve. The center’s executive director, Marianna Wright, told Forbes that “big monarchs can soar over the wall to fulfill their migration instincts” but “some species like the endangered Quino checkerspot butterfly … prefer to flit closer to the ground and will not be able to get over the wall.”

The Catholic Church in Hidalgo County is also upset that the border wall will cut off access to La Lomita Chapel, a small historic structure dating back to 1865 when it was built by French missionaries.

Building a border wall was one of Trump’s signature campaign promises during the 2016 election. At the time, he promised Mexico would pay for it. But when the Mexican government refused to do so, and Congress refused to provide $5 billion in taxpayer funds to do so, Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border.

He then reallocated $3.6 billion meant for the military, such as school buildings for children of active service members, to fund additional sections of the wall.

According to CBP, the Calexico border wall that was blown over was funded using 2018 appropriations, not funding from Trump’s emergency declaration.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.

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