Asturian-American Migration Forum

Art

When Midwest farmers who plow their fields from dawn to dusk to keep from losing their farms vote Republican, and big-city people who wear suits and ties to their air-conditioned desk jobs vote Democrat, there's more to it than "demagoguery".

Hi, Corsino,
How would you explain it?

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Hola, Corsino,

¿Cómo lo explicarías?

Hi Art

Of course, there's no simple, single explanation. But overall, the Democratic politicians have lost credibility among those that struggle to make a living on te farms, oil fields and ranches. They are viewed like those smooth-talking salesmen that used to roll into town selling bottles of elixir...a lot of promises with no substance.
It's probably true that in this last election, moral issues played a hand in the results, but the perception of Democratic politicians throughout the south and midwest has been changing for many years.

I agree with Corsino. Take Kansas where I live outside of Kansas City, Missouri, and Kansas is a Republican state. Kansas City itself is heavily Democratic (lots of blacks and Mexicans reside within KC and are registered as Democrats). However, even Missouri is now changing with Republican senators and a Republican governor.

A state that I like to compare is West Virginia, being originally from there. The demographics are changing in that state with a Democrat registration of around 70-75 per cent. However, in the last election the state went for Bush by about 60 per cent. State now has one Republican and two Democrats in Congress and two Democrat senators. One of which, Robert Byrd, could lose his re-election bid when he comes up for re-election. Big change in that state is the eastern panhandle near Washington, DC, going Republican. Families and retirees have been escaping the District of Columbia and its surrounding suburbs to the eastern panhandle of West Virginia for a more economical way of life.

Lots of Democrats are dissatified with their party in that state as they have controlled the statehouse for some many years one loses track of how long, and with no positive economic results. State continues a population drop (exception of the eastern panhandle), and most college graduates leave the state for economic opportunities elsewhere, as I did in 1963. That's over 40 years of lost population and lack of economic progress with a Democratic controlled statehouse, legistative body and leadership.

I have two kids that graduated from college in Texas, and they were liberal Democrats while in high school in Kansas, until they started working and paying their own way. Now they are very conservative in their views and lean to the Republican party. One lives in Dallas and the other in Fort Worth. Democrats scare them with the Dems views on abortion, gays, taxs, and all the negative noise being made in Washington by Howard Dean, Kennedy, Barbara Boxer and a host of other liberals. So my daughter and son tell me.

Anyway, as we age and try to make a living, our views change as I did in the 1970's from Democrat to Republican. My wife is the same as me in changing views over the years.

Dems need to wake up and see what is surrounding them outside of New York City, Los Angeles city proper. Check the red counties within those blue states. That map is very telling and interesting for the Dems.

Well, of course I'm not so qualified to speak about USA internal affairs, not having even been there in a vacation trip. But there are some points I want to make clear:

1.- When Democrats accuse President Bush of creating that tremendous deficit your nation has now, I think they're not telling all the truth.
Doesn't matter who'd been in the Oval Office after '00 Elections. Most of that deficit came out as a result from the effects on the Economy brought by 9/11 terror attacks.

I mean, US had never suffered so direct and HUGE terror attack before. As a result of this, a logical feeling of fear make his way through people's mind. MAYBE Republicans have got benefits from that fear, and the way Americans support their Presidents in war times but if the sides were changed, it will happen too. It's the way politics work, you know.

But returning to the Economy, the attacks affected the world's perception about America's invulnerability. And money is coward and has no sense of patriotism, we all know that. In addition to this, there a growing economical power rising from South/Eastern Asia: China, Malaysia, India... No social coverage, no labor unions or Government influenced ones, thousands of people willing to work hard for less money/day than we, Europeans and NAmericans pay for a single newspaper... So, their products are cheaper than ours, and we all want to spent less money to get a similar product, so we can go on holidays one more day, or buy a bigger car...

That's affecting every western rich country, and so our nations face an important challenge. Government must spend less money, and change the way Social Security brings us its service. That's the goal President Bush's personal accounts Program pursues, and that's the path European Governments should follow.

Let me make this very clear: I'm not rich, I come from a middle/low class family, and I'm young (24) so I will be very pleased if SS in Spain could continue working the way it does nowadays. But I'm not stupid, and I see that this system will go to bankruptcy in less than 15, perhaps 20 years if there's no solution plan working by 2010 or sooner.

And a Nation's deficit is not only a percentage drawn on a piece of paper. Whenever a country's economy is weak, it reflects on its citizens AND its enterprises and corporations. When production costs (taxes, workers wages) rise too much in my country, the company travels outseas and brings its business into a new area, where taxes and costs are lower. And of course, me and my friends've been fired. So, to prevent this from happening, the only road we can go ahead is the one that makes Government spend less money and that brings companies better opportunities to compete.

I want Democrats, Socialists and the rest of the left's political forces throughout the world to find a way to sustain (and increase) social services the same way they're working now (with no SS reforms, with no Private Accounts...) and at the same time, keeping our economies growing (have a look and see that most of European countries that have decided to NOT start looking for solutions on SS, such as France, Germany, Spain and many others are facing BIG economical problems awaiting for us to come in a few years, and trusting our economical fate completely to immigrant workers is not right, as they can cost the nation more money in SS than they produce through their work).

I'M NOT TELLING YOU THAT IMMIGRANTS ARE ALL BAD PEOPLE, THAT THEY'RE ALL THIEVES OR NOTHING SIMILAR. I'm not a racist, nor stupid. U.S. was forged with the hard work of many people coming from the "Old World". And so was Spain, and Spaniards have continuously gone to America (I mean not only the U.S., but Central and South America, also). We all know that, it's out of discussion. The only thing I'm saying is that they're not the miraculous solution to our economies that some political forces and mass media commonly suggest.

And if Democrats, Socialists or whatever other group find out the way to solve this problem (SS rising costs and economy growth), I'll be glad to hear that solution, because I simply don't think it has been found yet.

bartlerules -

1.I agree with you that the US deficit is not Bush's fault. There are several reasons for the deficit and the present economic woes. Throughout history there are natural economic cycles which are difficult to prevent, regardless of who is in power. The economy tends to overreact from one extreme to the other. It is difficult to predict when and what is going to cause the economy to start changing direction.

2. A major part of the present deficit is caused by the Iraq war. Although the Democrats now criticize the war, they initially supported it. Their excuse now that they were ignorant of the facts is pure hogwash. Washington simply cannot keep a secret . It is like a house with a leaky roof. If they really didn't know the facts, then they were indeed ignorant and not paying much attention to their jobs.

3. It is interesting that you bring up the problem of illegal immigration. It is a very controversial subject. The news this morning is that President Fox of Mexico got himself in trouble by saying that Mexicans will do work that even Blacks don't want to do. That is true. The problem I have with "wetbacks" is that they get paid "under the table", which means that they don't pay taxes. Furthermore, their children get a free education , welfare payments etc.. at the expense of those that pay taxes.

Corsino-

I absolutely agree with you on your points. And referring to illegal immigration. It's absolutely true. Mexicans there, here people from Morocco, Romania and Ecuador, all of them are continuously exploited and forced to work in all kind of works that we don't want to do. And as you point out, their money doesn't pay taxes, but they get free education and social services from those who pay their taxes. It's the same thing whether you are in the U.S. or Spain.

So, who gets the benefit from illegal workers coming to our countries? It's time to fight against those employers who tend to use illegal immigrants to accomplish his objective. BUT the fight must include making more competitive his business with economical measures and enforcing legal punishment, to make sure the employers do not pay those wetbacks because it's become a non-sense for him.

The problem I find with this subject is that, from certain left groups and political party and associations, it's very common (at least here in my country) to support the 'Let ALL immigrants come here, because they're only looking for the opportunities they deserve' POV. Well, I know it sounds very good, but I think it's a stupid measure.

As the economic markets work nowadays, there's a limited amount of working opportunities available for all of us, and this includes immigrants too. And admitting more immigrants in one country than the country really needs, it's a simple recipe for unemployment, poverty and finally, crime increases (not to mention the tax problem you were talking about in your post). We have to TRULY help those poor countries all over the world, yes. But I think it's demagogical to confront this enormous trouble the way some left politicians are doing it. They appeal to all those good human feelings we have, but if we try to set up the table for a discussion on how immigration could have bad effects in the nation's daily life, liberal media just begin to blame you and treat you like a racist.

Well, i'm not racist. I don't consider black people, or chinese people, or mexican people less 'human' than we are, it's stupid. I know immigration has many good effects in our economies, but I just want to know that our leaders analyze those 'not so good' possible effects on our future, instead of being immediately accused of being politically incorrect for questioning those things. I simply don't think one thing could be just 'perfectly good' from all points of view, and that's the way it seems to be considered by most of the media here in Spain, I don't know how does it work in the U.S.

I think it's smarter telling people:
'Listen friends, there's probably gonna be some troubles with integrating muslims inside our society. Maybe some extremists groups will begin riots in some cities, and some radical right-wing guys are gonna try to attack some comunities. Please, keep calm. We'll get rid of them both, and after some time has passed, we're all gonna be working together as usual'

rather than:
'Oh, my God!!! Please, how could you suggest this country, plenty of educated and polite men & women, isn´t gonna accept a new culture in less than two days????

No way, dude!! You're offending us with that opinion. Let all the people continue to watch this starry night as if you've never talked about this before.'

Because I feel much better when I see our politicians DO think how things could get worse in a nearby future, and ask for preventive solutions to experts. And I think it's not happening here in Spain. Neither with former conservative Government, nor with the new Socialist Government.

bartlerules-

Boy ! Your English seems to be improving with each post you write !

I didn't realize that illegal immigrants were such a problem in Spain. But I don't know much about the economy in Spain, or what the government is doing about it. But considering that Spain is not as industrialized as the US and is a much smaller country, I can understand how it could be a problem.
Actually, I have mixed feelings about the illegal immigrants. If I were, say, a Mexican with a hungry family to feed and just across a river there were job opportunities, I might try it too. Apparently, there's a demand for cheap labor, but I think the whole problem is being grossly mishandled. If there's need for the workers, there should be a satisfactory plan to solve the need of both sides. The immigrants shouldn't have to be smuggled in hot tractor-trailers across desert country, sometimes dying of the heat inside the trailers.
The optimum solution might be to improve the living conditions inside the poorer countries, but that is easier said than done. It seems that every time the US tries to send aid to a country, very little of it filters down to the needy, because of corruption in those countries. So sometimes I wonder if those in power in those countries are really interested in improving the living conditions of their people, or they are mainly interested in themselves.

Thank you very mutch, Corsino!! I wish I'm not making too much spelling/grammatical mistakes.

Immigrants in Spain are not yet such a problem, in fact. Most of them (99.9%, I'm sure) work VERY hard and try to live a better life while helping their suffering relatives with part of the money they get.

BUT there's another reality that most of the media and some politicians aren't ready to accept. Spain's population was five years ago up to 39 million people. Now, we're beyond 44 million. That is 10% + in a few years!!!

For your better comparison, if we have a look to USA population by 1970 -www.library.yale.edu-, we'll find out that total population was aprox up to 202 million people, with more than 3 million legal immigrants and 21 million of black people registered. Note that I mentioned black people because here in Spain it was not so common seeing black people 10 or 15 years ago, you see. And so your country is far more used to live in a mix of races and religions than we are here. Now imagine that, by 1975, USA population has reached 222 million people. Don't you think it's too fast growing not to even bother your leaders?

Fortunately, the Spaniard people (most of them), despite all our failures, is very open-minded, nice and not afraid of living with immigrants with different cultures and manners. But politicians've forgotten that Spain is still living through a period of economic growth from mid 90's, which -as always happens with the economy- will come to an end. And the first people who'll become aware of bad times for the economy, will be the immigrants. That means, in a few years we'll have maybe 1.5, 2 or even 3 more million people requesting unemployment wages, in addition to the 'habitual' 2 million of native Spaniards who are currently unemployed. Also, they're gonna bring their families here to Spain, of course. So, we could be talking about 6, 7 million immigrants in 2 or 3 years. WHY DOES OUR GOVERNMENT NOT SEE (or want to see) THE TRUTH ABOUT THESE POSSIBLE FLAWS IN THE CURRENT SITUATION??

Of course immigrants deserve a chance to earn a better life. Of course they must be protected and it's not fair nor properly human that those poor people had to risk their lifes in a 'truck-boat' to reach Florida, or come to Spain hidden at the bottom of a bus. But the answer to this problem is not firing at them when they attempt to cross the frontier, or letting them all come freely as some liberals suggest. Western richest countries've to compromise in a true effort to help those people's origin countries to develop themselves. And if their leaders are corrupt (as you remarked, this is one key point to the solution), both their people and western civilizations have to take down those rulers who only want to keep power and wealthy, while his people is starving.

bartlerules

Are you sure you are Asturian? You sound more like an American (broma).

I'll tell you something that at the time sounded funny to me. It was the first inkling I had years ago that there was resentment in Spain about immigrants. I was talking to a young lady relative in Spain, and for some reason she made some remark about Latin Americans coming to Spain. When I asked her why she resented them, she replied "Because all the prostitutes come from Latin America. In some parts of Madrid you have to keep your car doors locked as you drive by, or they'll open the door and try to entice the men out."

I doubt that there has been a politician, or ruler, in history that hasn't lied to his country. The problem is knowing at the time when they are lying or telling the truth. But this also applies to newspapers, radio, television, and ordinary people. Nobody tells "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth". It may just be that politicians, by definition or by necessity, are better liars.

I agree with Corsino.

We all would be pleased if our politicians (the ones we support), our favorite newspaper or TV Network told us all the truth EVERYTIME. And we defend our personal choice as if that were the reality.

There's nobody perfect. And everybody in politics who reaches so high, has some debts to pay. All those million $ spent in the campaign had to come out from someone's pocket. It's impossible to come up with such a big amount of money from ONLY private donors. And both republicans and democrats, when they reach the WH they will have to accept some requests from their contributors. But they all try to appear as superhumans.

Now democrats and liberals worldwide try to demonize President Bush, or former President Aznar here in Spain. Somebody thinks Al Gore, John Kerry or President Zapatero have nothing to hide from public eyes??

Nobody remembers now that most of the wars in which U.S.A. was involved were started by a Democrat President. Now we all are absolutely sure that Saddam did not have WMD, but who could assure that in 2002??

I think it's too easy to say: YOUR president is a liar, MINE would've been a Saint. It's too easy to play the game of making ideal proposals, of suggesting that they can be wizards and help everybody and solve every trouble without more taxes, or less social assistances...

More bipartisan work is needed in modern politics, but I think it's more difficult every day mainly because both sides try to appear as perfect and demonize the opponents.

Well, I hope Zapatero does well for Spain. We don't hear very much about him in the US. Certainly not as much as we did Aznar, who was considered a friend. Whether Zapatero is a friend or foe remains to be seen. Although I think he'll be a "neutral" factor. I do think he made a mistake by pulling the Spanish troops out of Iraq, especially right after the train bombing in Madrid, because that made it appear that Spain got intimidated by the terrorists. Weakness in the face of terrorism only encourages more terrorism, but sometimes when people are in a state of shock, their decissions are not always the best.

Hola Corsino, estoy totalmente de acuerdo con Uds. pero yo no sé qué pasa qué cuando llegan al poder se olvidan de todo lo qué prometen y se corrompen del tal manera qué parece mentira qué actuen de esa manera, sabiendo ,qué estan de paso por ese puesto, qué cada cuatro años pueden o no pueden estar en el mismo sitio,es como ese refrán qué dice "el qué de pobre,se vuelve rico ,no hay quién le mire para el fozico"porqué perdone qué le diga pero menudos sueldos qué tienen los politicos ,el caso es qué cuando se tiene qué subir el sueldo es en lo único qué estan de acuerdo,en lo demás siempre hay disputas.saludos

Nice quotes, but there's also one truth that lies underneath:

Those who are afraid of fighting for what they think is right, tend to wrap it as a continuous search for peace.

Of course, there's nobody in the world who is willing to start a war. War time means death and suffering to everyone involved. And though it could be true that the Iraq war had little relation with WMD, have you thought it twice? A few days after the coalition forces had taken Bagdad, suicide bombings started (and continue, right now). This means Al Quaeda had really a big influence and penetration in Iraq within Hussein's last years of tirany. Too many suicide bombers have appeared since the war started, are you telling me they weren`t being trained by Al Quaeda members at least months prior to the Iraq Invasion??

I think Al Quaeda had great support inside Iraq with Hussein in charge. And for those who always criticize Bush's preventive war policy, remember British Prime Minister Chamberlain. He signed a treaty with Hitler before Poland ocupation, trying to keep UK out of the war they all foresaw it'ld come. And while he was "looking for peace", Britain lost precious time to prepare themselves for war.

Sometimes is right (hard and bloody, but right) to strike the enemy first. Al Quaeda doesn't want peace with Western civilization. They want to destroy us, and impose their way of life in our countries. No more freedom of choice, freedom of speech or freedom to choose your religion.

I'm sure Bush has some private interests in the way he rules the Government, as every politician before him. No matter how bad he is, there's no match between him and terrorists.

And have a look into Spain, Aznar was guilty of making this country a new target for islamic terrorists, by supporting President Bush's policy. Well, Zapatero won the election and pulled the troops out of Iraq. Why have the terrorists been trying to hit again our country, with car bombings outside Justice Courts (Audiencia Nacional), then??
That's why I agree with Corsino, bringing troops back from Iraq so soon after the election and without consulting our allies, sent the wrong message to the terrorists.

They simply want to conquer us, they have no political reasons, you can't do nothing to please them, except fighting against them. Peace is ok, but both sides have to look for the same goal. If it doesn't happen, you're only a fool, waiting for them to hit you once again, and it'll be harder each time.