To the extent that existing weapons laws are ineffective or not wholly enforced, yes, government needs to do a far better job. But the remaining “emergencies” of drug use, homelessness and health insurance are individual responsibilities. Admittedly, many are failing at taking responsibility for their drug use, homelessness and health care but that’s no reason to replace personal responsibility and maturity with a robust nanny state. Liberals refuse to acknowledge that this country once accomplished great things like the transcontinental railroad and Panama Canal without health insurance or welfare or food stamps or labor laws. In fact, those things might well have held us back from greatness.
4
I have worked with dozens of (legal) Central Americans in the landscape trade over the past two plus decades; these are truly the hardest working and most conscientous people I have ever known.
Please keep marching north, dear future residents. Canada will always need people like you.
18
An NYT article 2 days ago said "...nearly 400,000 people were apprehended on the border for the fiscal year 2018, which ended Sept. 30." (!)
And my fellow Democrats insist there is no immigration problem. And the NYT continues to call "illegal immigrants" merely "migrants," deliberately obscuring the fact that they are in or trying to enter the U.S. illegally.
No country has open borders, and ours shouldn't, either. Most Americans welcome legal immigrants, but not illegals. US laws allow foreigners to seek entry and citizenship. Those who do not follow these laws are in this country illegally and should be detained and deported, as is policy in other countries, too.
We cannot support our own citizens: the poor, the ill, elderly, disabled, veterans, et al. It is thus utterly impossible for US taxpayers to support the hundreds of millions of foreigners who would like to come here.
Why aren't the NYT and the other media looking into the details of the current "caravan"? Who is funding and organizing it? Why are the Red Cross and the UN aiding these invaders? Why are Mexico and other countries abetting this assault on the U.S.? Anyone who believes these poor, uneducated peasants have somehow organized themselves for this journey is deluded.
Abolishing ICE makes sense only to advocates of open borders, a policy no nation will ever accept.
If open borders and abolishing ICE are made planks of the Democratic Party we are doomed to lose the midterm and 2020 elections.
16
@Mon Ray
Migrants that are granted asylum are, by definition, not illegal immigrants. Also, migrants in Mexico that have not yet tried to illegally enter are not "illegal immigrants." With Trump's new focus on due process, maybe we should wait for them to actually break a law before calling them "illegal"?
And you are arguing against a straw man - no significant portion of any political party wants "open borders" immigration policies. That phrase is ridiculous propaganda.
"Why are the Red Cross and UN aiding these invaders?" What is wrong with you? This country is founded on "invaders" as you so crassly put it. And if you don't know why the Red Cross and UN--two organizations with strong humanitarian leanings--would help these impoverished "peasants" then there is really no help for you.
"Anyone who believes these poor, uneducated peasants have somehow organized themselves for this journey is deluded." You literally started your post by saying 400,000 immigrants were stopped at the border last year. Is it really hard to believe several thousand, traveling together for safety, are arriving at one time without external funding? Or are all the other 400,000 immigrants funded as well?
3
Trump is not "ignoring" them. He does not even know they exist, and would not care if he did. His ONLY goal is daily headlines with his name in them, and how it looks for his sycophantic supporters. His administration is so corrupt and incompetent that even if someone in it actually did want to do something, nothing would happen, or they would screw it up so badly that it would make things worse.
This is our country now -a corrupt, incompetent banana republic "led" by an psychopathic egomaniac.
36
The Easter bunny or Jesus huh? Yea I'd say that's comparable to criminals possibly being there coming from some of the most dangerous and poor countries on earth.
The caravan as is stated here doesn't make a dent in our immigration, but neither does a school shooting in our gun violence. This logic cuts both ways and is inherently sociopathic. Democrats can ignore illegal immigration all they want, but Trump is winning on it because there is no real plan on their side.
16
We have a "National Emergy" alright. And it's currently undergoing a slow death at 1600 Pennsylvania due to some unannounced neurological disorder that causes it to slur its words, write on a 3rd-grade level, speak on a 4th grade level, and conduct our country's national affairs on the level of a badly compromised, terminal CTE sufferer. I have compassion for the ill, but my Feynman ! .... Can't someone get a competent neurologist into the White House and get the lowdown on exactly what's going on ? If there ever was a case warranting invocation of the 25th Amendment, we're living through it right now.
33
Mr. Kristoff is changing the subject.
There are, indeed many unsolved problems in America, not excluding, in this case, irresponsible armchair pseudo journalism.
Shall we get down to basics, and deal with this Honduran "caravan"?
Who, actually are the travelers? Is there any documentation known to Mr. Kristoff?
Is there such as thing as a government in Honduras? How must it change, and who will change it?
How is this particular "caravan" funded?
Who is providing funding?
Are remittances from the US required from the impoverished travelers?
What assurances have been given to the travelers?
Who is providing transportation on trucks for the those obviously healthy, well clothed, well fed, and well hydrated travelers, I mean those seen in the photo-ops?
Who is providing food and water to the travelers?
Who is providing disposal of their excreta, out of camera view, of course, and how?
Who is providing diapers and disposing of them and how?
Assume they arrive, thousands of them, simultaneously at the US border, how does Mr. Kristoff suggest they be initially, and after processing, be housed and cared for? Where? At whose expense?
And why should they be admitted to the United States, when other non-"caravan" persons, awaiting immigration approval, are not?
What exactly, if it exists, is the plan of the Democratic Party,
if it takes control of the legislative branch of the Federal government, to deal with this and the next and the next "caravan" to come?
20
@ATMDPHD
so much to unpack here. 4 points. First, why must we know the answers to these questions? You imply they are funded by some outside source. If that's the case, why are they walking for months? publicity? give me a break. Also, how are we supposed to investigate who is giving them aid (like giving water and food to weary travelers is some sort of crime) when it's occurring in another country, and why does that even matter? Should we really encourage people to let these migrants starve to death on the side of the road?
Second, as for what will happen when they all arrive at the border, the same thing that happens to everyone that arrives at the border to claim asylum-they will be detained (usually in private prisons) while their claims are evaluated. This can take months or years considering the under-staffing of immigration personnel and courts.
And I can't speak for what the Democratic Party plans to do, but I'd imagine it would be similar to what is already in place, but hopefully with better staffing. Immigration laws have not changed since Trump took over, aside from the child separation policy and DACA suspension (not laws).
Lastly, you ask what Democrats would do when you should be asking what REPUBLICANS ARE DOING. They have no answers to your questions except to use immigration as a wedge issue. The fact that the Party in total control of the federal government has evaded responsibility for this issue is incredible, and you're falling for it
17
@URNOPHD
Yes. This is an organized effort and funded by some entity. Even a modicum of critical thinking would conclude the same. People just don't show up at the same time, right before an election, carrying new backpacks and being followed by support vehicles. We must send them back to their homelands to work out their own problems and culture.
1
And why would the Democrats or any supporter of the Democratic Party finance and provide for a caravan of 3,000 impoverished people right before the mid-term election?
If someone is “responsible “ for such movement of migrants towards the USA at this moment in time, it seems to me that it would the people who’s cause is best served by such “agitations”.
2
Jesus was in fact a refugee to Egypt, when Joseph and Mary had to flee from Judia to save Jesus from the crazy Herod who killled the innocents hoping to kill Jesus too.
Turn away the refugee from death squads and yes, Jesus is among those that you turn away.
76
Donald Trump and the Republicans could very well be financing the immigrant caravan; Trump could very well be the antichrist; Trump could very well be the most ignorant man in America; Trump could very well serve only serve one term; Trump could very well have supplied the cash to make the pipe bombs; Trump could very well be hatching the next war to direct attention away from his reign; the "could very well" list goes on and on...
15
Sovereignty is sooooo passé, declares NYT’s Kristof. Ok then, Someone organize our homeless to caravan to Central America to carve out some new colonies...if it’s a human right to march on borders and demand compliance with one’s demands.
11
You're too much work. Where to begin? Nicholas. The number may not seem significant to you, but the principle is. Answer please: Do we have a right to control our border, or don't we? If we wave this caravan of migrants on in, what does that say to those who followed our rules to immigrate here? It says "you were chumps." And maybe 5,000 doesn't bother you (I think it's more than that, btw), but how many more will follow if we allow this? And yes, it has been confirmed that there are gang members and Middle Easterners in the caravan, but that's almost beside the point. Are we allowed to control our border, or aren't we?
So, yes, the issue really is immigration.
18
Please let's not forget the damage we do the environment. Soon this planet may not be able to sustain life. The Caravan is a fake crisis for a president who doesn't even know where truth starts and lies and end. The caravan at its largest is less than twice the size of my son's high school. 7,200 people is hardly a threat to nation of 300,000,000 unless you have trumps gift with math. Wake up and focus on real problems
34
The real national emergency is a disingenuous, mendacious and ineffective president loyal only to himself.
32
You think?
2
It makes no sense whatsoever to protest illegal immigration while opposing all measures to limit further population growth globally.
23
Me. Kristoff quips “Jesus Christ could very well be in the caravan”. I say if he is, Trump and his followers will crucify him all over again.
17
When does Trump complain that Democrats don't want to protect us from alien space invaders? Will his "base" be more afraid?
6
I am an immigrant from Switzerland. I encourage you to watch the movie "Das Boot ist voll" - "our boat is full" - by Markus Imhof. A true story. A train from Germany during the the NAZI regime halts briefly in an isolated corner of Switzerland. Six people jump off seeking asylum: four Jews, a French child, and a German soldier. They seek temporary refuge with a couple who run a village inn. ... I think you can imagine the synopsis of the remaining story.
My shame runs deep.
I am now American - and my shame runs deep again. There is no escape from the villain of so called patriotism.
31
Climate change is the real national emergency since if our planet is inhabitable nothing else matters.
21
Mr. Kristof, you have really zeroed in on trumps mid-term solution. Focus everyone on problems elsewhere so they don't realize where the blame belongs.
Our infrastructure has no solution nor a plan from this administration, one of his big promises (LIES). He's breaking faith with every ally we have and creating a huge mess of the world economy. His solution is to close the borders and yell about all the problems outside them he's "saving" us from.
VOTE GOP OUT. CONGRESS!!! HE'S YOUR PROBLEM!
24
The ironic thing to me is that Donald J Trump didn't even know where Wisconsin, W. Virginia or Montana were ever located before he realized how easy it would be to manipulate the citizens of these states.
Trump is a NEW YORK CITY liberal and always was. It's where he'll return after his term is over. He will step over the homeless, and make sure his own son attends a pricey private school FAR AWAY from drug addicts and poverty.
You will NOT find a coal stove, a 1970's color console TeeVee or a Pontiac ( the industries he keeps promising to resurrect so life can be like the 1970's when UNEDUCATED white men could get jobs)......at gilded Trump Tower.
No sirree......Why do you think his rallies are held at or near the airport? SO he won't have to mingle with the common voters who are STILL WAITING for the promised benefits to land on them.
Like the ones that will benefit Trump and his family and his"new" party for generations.
25
My earlier essay was actually a response to a different article in the NY Times, one by Thomas Edsall.
I so share Kristof's disapproval of Donald Trump. Yes, he appeals to the uneducated Americans as Kristof points out with the bad spelling of emergencies. But in a democracy all the people vote, including the uneducated. We could try to remedy that by making university education less expensive, or by limiting population growth which would enable states to shift funding from K12 to universities.
Yes, I agree that we need to work on the shared priorities of Americans. Why is it that unlike Canada and Great Britain, the US still does not have universal health care, in spite of past promises by Hillary Clinton and other Democrats? Di the Democrats sell out to the insurance lobby?
Meanwhile, homelessness is becoming more visible in the US. People in the middle class see incomes stagnating and turn to drugs. Yes, I oppose the widespread access to firearms.
But Democrats including Kristof ignore the real problem, which is population growth. If you visit the third world, say Nairobi or Cairo or Delhi or Sao Paulo, the effects of population growth hit you in the face. The poverty is bone-crushing.
So why aren't we discussing that problem? It would explain why the other problems Kristof mentions are so resistant to policies that have been pushed by the Democrats.
And it would explain why we need rational policies to limit immigration and encourage small families.
5
@Jake Wagner
The United States still does not have universal health care because the congress would not support it being influenced by free enterprise ideology, the fear of socialism and the health care lobby. Few seem to remember how successful Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance run by government taxes has been all of which are now under attack by the GOP.
12
The persistent lack of empathy and disregard for human life from our President makes my heart ache, but the level of support he receives is terrifying.
19
Let me see if I can summarize this "article" properly...
There's a caravan of foreigners intent on busting the border in a couple weeks. They don't have the right to enter the country legally. The President says they can't come in and will enforce that with troops if necessary.
Kristof says that the caravan isn't something we should focus on, that we should focus on other issues that are completely independent of the election, who is president -- the full generic list of imperfections that have been challenges for decades, and which haven't improved on anyone's watch appreciably. Including Lord Obama's.
Kristof doesn't believe anything should distract us from how icky Trump is and how if we just stamp our feet for long enough, magic rainbows will appear and we can all live in Brooklyn and subscribe to McSweeney's.
Did I get that right?
8
@Captain America
Let's see if I can summarize all the flaws in your post properly...
There is a caravan of would-be refugees is walking toward our border. Under US law they are legally entitled to enter the country by claiming to have fled their countries out of fear of persecution over their race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. They will then be subject to an immigration hearing to determine the veracity of those claims. However, given the huge backlog in our immigration courts many will be released on their own recognizance into the US after being detained for the maximum amount of time permitted by law.
Rather than stoking fear and hatred and threatening to sending troops (whatever that means) to confront hungry families fleeing violence in their home countries, President Trump could a take the far more effective and humane approach. That would be to actually do something to clear the immigration court backlog (which he could do directly by hiring immigration judges). Those courts could then review case in a timely fashion, and either deport or grant asylum to asylum seekers before they are released onto US soil.
Also, Obama did do something about at least one of Kristof's issues. Remember the ACA? Peer reviewed research suggests it drove statistical significant reductions in mortality by expanding health coverage. Search "Health Coverage and Mortality, New England Journal of Medicine" as a start.
21
Mr. Kristoff, you're such a liberal -- as am I -- and you're clueless about what matters to the majority of voters in this country. I chose voters specifically, instead of people or citizens, because it's only voters who count -- sadly. To say that drug use/opioid use, guns, healthcare and homeless are national emergencies is to look at the world through a lens of care and empathy. Voters today look at things selfishly -- where's my tax cut; keep "those people" away from me; lock up anyone even accused of a crime (as long as the crime is sexual assault), ad nauseum.
Those people are not drains on our country, in fact, some of them might find immediate work in the service sector, which can't seem to fill open jobs. Lack of language is only a barrier for a few weeks.
I believe what you do, Mr. Kristoff, by voters don't (except maybe for healthcare) and that is why we are here today.
8
At the very same time, Trump complains about this group of poor migrants and aid to their countries of origin.
Few people are motivated to leave their homes when they are employed and doing well economically. They leave when they can't find work, when they are terrorized by gangs and their own governments.
We desperately need the young people in the photo here to do the menial work that Americans don't want to do: picking crops, cleaning up after us, etc. We need them to shore up Social Security.
As Mr. Kristof pointed out, they are a very tiny percentage of all would-be immigrants to America this year.
But as the midterm elections draw near, Mr. Trump needs to drum up fear and xenophobia, so he has seized upon this downtrodden people to do so.
Better that we be afraid of his decision to leave a long-term treaty with Russia over arms. It only takes one nuclear missile to destroy a large part of our country
5
N. Kristof points out that good government is bad politics and vice versa. This is so because of the deplorably poorly educated voters who easily give in to a deceitful demagogue. Ecclesiastes says in Ecc. 9:17 [ My translation:] "The quiet words of the wise are more readily heard than the shouts of the fools." This idea is true when speaking to educated thoughtful people but does not work with uneducated simpletons. Trump can lie and be admired for his imaginary accomplishments by his diehard followers. For example, he claims credit for a strong economy and high employment. In reality this upward trend began in the Obama presidency who managed to pull us out of the economic disaster of 2008 (the almost repetition of the 1929-40 Great Depression) , probably caused by the deregulation policies of his Republican predecessor. Trump gives no credit to Obama, never acknowledges others. All good comes only from his beneficence. And Obama's slow , growing improvement was accelerated by Trump's massive tax cut for corporations and the very wealthy. This tax cut did stimulate the economy, made it stronger. But at what cost? It would be like a family gaining access to the credit markets who then borrow to the hilt. For the time being they are all living in La-La Land, happy and content---until they have to pay back and no longer can afford their home. Here too we stand to lose Social Security, medicare, etc. to pay for the growing massive deficit from these policies.
7
The POTUS has created a Monster with Immigration, tax cuts and increased spending.
These are all problems that have no solution.
They can be part of the "hammer" used to bash Democrats if the Republicans lose the House.
So, the issues will remain alive for years to come....
4
Nick, you're right on many fronts. Unfortunately, the national media has become Trump's puppet. Its unrelenting coverage of all things trump played a huge part in getting him elected. Now the media is letting every trump tweet determine the news cycle for days and days. If you stop repeating trump's tweets, there'd be room for actual, factual news again. Reacting against trump is a losing proposition, and plays right into his playbook. Stop it. Have another meeting to figure out how best to cover what's happening outside of trump's sorry imagination.
Do it! Please do it!
10
True, but let’s at least start with making sure 7000 poor, unemployable people don’t make it on to US soil.
9
@Crossing Overhead
Imigrants may be poor, but since they will go anywhere in the US and take any job offered, they are (in our current economy) employable. This is in contradistinction to poor unemployed former coal miners in W. Virginia, who won't leave to take other available jobs.
12
@Crossing Overhead
They are totally employable, but at extremely high cost, which must be admitted. A family that arrives with 3 kids could consume $300,000 of education alone. The wages uneducated people earn in the US (citizens too) will never support them paying this single cost. No way. Low wage workers may do things no one wants to do at the given wage, but anyone earning less than 60-70K is a net negative to the finances of the US.
4
@Crossing Overhead No. Let's make sure 7000 homeless veterans, or 7000 poor hungry Americans get the help they need. Let's have 7000 people each volunteer to get out the vote, no matter what party they favor. Let's have 7000 less people shot, and 7000 more people freed from drug addiction. This is what the article is trying to say. And as long as we distance ourselves from our real problems in America and blame all our troubles on people who look or speak differently than the standard white male, then we will reap what we sow: division, violence and hatred.
6
So according to Mr. Kristof... Obama, Clinton, Schumer and the large majority of Americans that all stated that we need a secure border are bigots.
Until Trump took office the issue of ILLEGAL immigration was a bipartisan issue. Why is the left now pretending that this isn't an issue, much less the very complicated issue that it is?
13
@Shane
"Why is the left now pretending that this isn't an issue"
Because illegal immigration wasn't a major issue until Trump decided to make it one. Nothing unites losers - especially trump losers - like blaming their woes on a common enemy.
There were plenty of jobs the illegals worked that are still available. But you refuse to keep up on current events about farmers not having people to gather crops or work in slaughterhouses.
4
@Shane There is nothing illegal about asking for asylum.
5
I don’t see this caravan coming to a good end. You can’t stop people from wanting to save themselves and their families. Eventually a few of the marchers will reach the front gates of Mar-a-Lago. Garbage will begin to pile up. The marchers will take to wearing “Make America Great Again” hats. Leftists egged-on by George Soros will install portable showers on the front lawn. Donald and Melania will adopt their familiar tactic of throwing paper towels at the protestors. This time the protestors will throw them back.
I would urge the President to try a different tactic. Register them and check them for criminal or terrorist leanings. Let the migrants who pass these tests stay in the country on the condition that they will immediately be deported to their countries of origin if they ever cause any trouble. Announce that no federal funds of any kind will be provided to the migrants past a one-month period of their arrival in the U.S. Then stand back and leave the job of settling them into the country up to charitable organizations and free enterprise. Not for nothing was this country once known as a safe harbor for huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
3
When Trump, in his vast ignorance, stated America First, and then ignored the importance of global security and stability in keeping our citizenry safe and our country "strong", he sowed the wind and now we're reaping the whirlwind.
How he and his advisors can be so stupid and ignore history and the truth (or "fake news" as they call it), the entire world will pay.
2
"I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda."
You "fear" that you have become his puppets? Buster, that train left the station a long time ago -- after the media created Donald Trump with 30 years of fawning, feckless adoring news coverage -- and non-stop, 24/7 campaign coverage that put his face on every TV channel, all day, every day for ten months. No wonder halfwits took him to be a legitimate, serious candidate.
You, my dear wretch, are responsible for creating -- and empowering -- Donald Trump. He is your Frankenstein.
Nice going.
13
It this current idiotic environment, it is so refreshing & comforting that there are still Americans who can speak sanely about issues and prefer reality based information.
And, a sad state of affairs that approx. 35-40% of this nation, who are supposedly educated, prefer to dwell in a cartoonish freak show and allow themselves to be fed a steady diet of unreasonable fear mongering. HINT: There really isn't a boogeyman around every corner or under every bush. The fear is a construct of a fevered mind.
10
@KaneSugar
When Trump was elected no one realized and still may not realize that Fox News isn't a cheerleader but actually a policy director. The country elected policy to be directed by the editorial board (if there is one) of Fox News. So, if we, as concerned citizens can get Fox News to be concerned about long term issues such as medical issues, etc.. then maybe there will be a chance the President will address something more than the current list of hot button issues. Hello Fox News? Please step up and realize your responsibility.
1
Trump is a talk show host. He has been rich his whole life. The problems of the American people are total abstractions to this guy- he is completely undeveloped as a human being. He approaches the job of President as an entertainer. That’s who we have at the wheel. Maybe tanked 401Ks will break the spell.
17
Donald J. Trump never had a clue as to the needs, wants and fears of the real America. Trump's America within America has focused on Trump as the focal point of American life and his mind has been starved of any knowledge by his choice to remain ignorant. Fortunately, Trump found 52 million people within the real America who have the same narcissistic, racist disposition and intellectual myopia as he has fostered his entire life. Lucifer's seed spawned Donald J. Trump and only God can help us now.
4
Supporting legal immigration and sovereign borders while rejecting illegal immigration makes me a bigot? Sign me up.
14
@Dave C
You don’t have to miss the whole point. The discussion should be about humanity, about what is our role as a nation in addressing the current needs and the future of mankind. And a reminder that we are all people, all the same, all want to live and breathe freely, all love our children.
3
@Kathleen. You are inadvertently calling for America to colonize the world with your post.
It is about propaganda and brain washing campaign by the fascist authoritarian regime Trump Republican administration. Americans fall for such campaigns time and again, all by Republican governments. Sad.
4
Vote. Out. Fear.
3
As opposed to the official Republican party platform, Guido.
"Vote Out Of Fear (and Greed)": GOP 2018
November 6 2018
4
The real national "emergy" is this presidency. An ignorant, venal, vicious pathological liar in the White House has turned our nation on its head, appealing to the worst instincts of an American minority, decrying our immigrant roots, destroying our democracy, corrupting our morality and alienating us from the rest of the world. Our enemies in Russia and China are watching in gleeful amazement as he accomplishes what they could never do by tearing up the very fabric of our society.
24
Just look at the faces of the people in the photograph!
These are the people we desperately need in our country, men and women who will work the really important jobs that put food on our tables and roofs over our heads. They will farm our vegetables and butcher our meat, build our houses and pave our highways in the hot Texas and Georgia sun, clean our homes by day and our offices by night, and wipe our butts and empty our bedpans when we are elderly and infirm.
Also, these are the children and young people who will grow up to fund and sustain our Social Security and Medicare.
We don't need to mount a recruitment campaign to lure the people who will support our privileged way of life. They're coming to us! We just need to open the gate!
47
Based on the extremes in the comments to Mr. Kristof's article on "the caravan", this is certainly a hot issue in the U.S. It also certainly seems clear that the subject of immigration is a rallying point for the Republican Party. Republicans, please keep in mind that Immigrants are a vital source of energy to any economy. Exhibit A is Japan and exhibit B is Korea. Neither country allows immigration and both are facing a demographic crisis as the number of births is not sufficient to replace the number who die. This is further compounded by an increasing number of the aged as people live longer. Judgments made in fear rarely lead to optimum results.
2
what about the ticking time bomb - the national debt, you know, that thing republicans use to cry about when a Democrat was in the white House
33
I am opposed to this caravan getting into the country. Any of them.
I agree that not a one of them is likely a 'terrorist'.
But I see lots of children in the caravan. There are things one can do to help one's self. If they can make it to this county 2000 miles away, surely they can learn about birth control and use it.
That's what civilizations do in times of scarcity. Thats how they stay civilized.
Climate change, gangs those are all reflections of too many people for too few resources.
It is estimated that there are a minimum of 12 million people living in this country illegally. They have more kids on average than American citizens. Let's say they now have 6 million legal children living here. It costs 10 thousand dollars a year to educate each of them.
That comes to 60 BILLION DOLLARS A YEAR. Just for education - and I've low balled the figures.
The nice thing about getting older is you know the limits of one person ability to know about different things. Kristof, you are a smart man with good things to say - but you apparently know little about the costs of these immigrants.
While you take you and your students on sabbaticals all over the world, the rest of us are working three jobs to support these illegal immigrants.
Let them get in line - as Obama says and not jump ahead of everyone.
This Democrat is voting Republican. Reluctantly so - but hearing Kristof's mindless arguments leaves no choice.
8
@Ben Ross: And you don’t mind the tax cut for the rich, with 85% going to the top 10%, resulting in adding TRILLIONS (is THOUSANDS of Billions) to the national debt? And we get nothing back for that except cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public education and infrastructure development and improvement? And the tax cuts are slated to be phased out for the middle class but made permanent for companies... Those 7000 are just a drop in the bucket and at minimum we get their work that Americans won’t do from them, plus taxes they contribute. Of course they will have to receive legal work permits after being screened, if only for a few years, after which they can either be renewed, made permanent, or refused in case of criminal activity.
2
@Ben Ross: Republicans oppose all forms of family planning. Population growth alone assures that climate change will be driven into runaway positive feedback in this century.
1
@Ben Ross - First of all I don't believe you're a Democrat but aside from that I have to ask. Why on earth would you support a party that tries to hamper contraception efforts not just here in the U.S. but all over the world?
5
Sounds great, but you are preaching to the choir. The people who need to be reached don't even read the Times, and even if they did, they would ignore it because they have been "Trumped"....and he can say and do what he wants as far as they are concerned.
On the other hand, let's ignore his base. Its the other 65% of the voters who may yet come to their senses and vote to get this thug and his cronies our of Washington for good.
5
Republican politicians don't care about any of those things. They only care about tax cuts for the rich. Letting corporations do what ever they want without any regulation. and making money. Anything else? Nope.
Oh, immigrants? That is all just a smoke screen to keep people occupied while the politicians go about the business of destroying our country.
Do republican voters care about any on that? They say the do, but they keep electing Republican politicians that don't do anything but giveaways to the rich and corporations. So it is kind of hard to believe they really care about any of these things. Their is no evidence that that do.
7
My family in Ohio is terrified of the caravan and the hiding terrorists within and what they're going to do to this country! Guess how they're voting. Forget about the humanitarian savagery in this "godly" state....forget about babies and children separated from parents in this "godly" state, (Perhaps the anti-abortionists would care for those children) Talk to them? They don't want to hear anything. They only want to hear their only good station - Fox. This president has divided not only the country, but my family.
11
@Carol - I'm assuming that my family is doing the same thing. I don't know for sure because I don't bother talking to them since they voted for Trump and co.
You're welcome to come here to Vermont for the holidays and I'll treat you to dinner.
7
Mr. Kristof's words in the penultimate paragraph remind me of another famous author's words writing in a different time when fear ruled the United States. In Act 3 of Arthur Miller's McCarthy Era play, The Crucible, John Proctor rails against accusations of the invisible: "There might also be a dragon with 5 legs in my house, but no one has ever seen it!"
And the reply: "We are here precisely to discover what no one has ever seen."
Through Proctor's incredulity, Miller like Kristof, demonstrates that logic is ineffective during a time when fear reigns and people believe precisely what they cannot see.
3
nicholas is a typical liberal !
Thousands of people invading our country IS a national emergency and ties right into the other issues that he considers to be national emergencies !
For starters lets point out that those people are unskilled and uneducated , they do not speak english and unlike legal immigrants have not undergone a background check or heakth exam , this means that a big percentage of those migrants will become a burden to the american taxpayers , since they can not be employed many of them will become criminals or join the drug trade , the ones who can find a job will displace blacks who as a result will go on wellfare or become criminals too !
6
@fritz Nobody is invading the country. Nobody. Immigrants often come here seeking asylum or refuge, that don't speak english. There's a good chance you wouldn't be here if one of your ancestors hadn't come to America without speaking english.
People seeking to get into America do get vetted. We have a system that's worked for over 200 years. Use it.
2
Thanks for ignoring climate change.
2
Nick Kristof identifies several important issues. They are symptoms of several overarching and existential threats:
1. Climate change - if we do not get this under control, and fast, kiss your children and family good bye. The moron in chief denies this reality.
2. "The system" - the business as usual mindset - maximization of short term profits at ALL costs is killing all life on earth. See #1 above
3.Donald Trump - we could not have a worse human being as president than the criminal occupying our White House. With smart, honest and positive leadership, we can tackle anything. And climate change is also the economic and job creation opportunity of of the 21st century. We must make the transformation to the low carbon, clean energy economy and future. Without that, without positive leadership, we're done.
19
It is beyond hubris to believe we can dial the Earth's temp up or down by 2 degrees like it is the thermostat in the UN building, then all will be well for our children.
1
@J House: The more of us there are, the less each one of us is worth to everyone else. The marginal return from further population growth is negative.
1
@J House
It is beyond hubris to think that we have no responsibility to take any action to prevent catastrophic changes to the climate, regardless of whether or not it is human-caused. Aren't we supposed to be good stewards of the Earth?
And despite what many say, almost all credible and independently-verified evidence suggests we likely will "dial the Earth's temp up" by 2 degrees. If so, why wouldn't we be able to prevent and reverse those changes?
We've got to stop paying any attention to this man and start paying attention to the best and fastest ways to get him out of the White House.
He just now tweeted that he doesn't use a cell phone and the tweets are signature stamped as being made on the Twitter app on an iPhone.
Good grief! How does anyone lie so much?
2
The caravan of brown refugees is nothing but a smokescreen for the Trumpian half of white America to camoflauge the fact that they and their great leader are America's biggest threat with their racism, greed, propaganda and threats of violence. Calls for mobilizing the military to meet unarmed destitute poor people including women and children at our border when they are a couple thousand miles away, really? Manufactured right wing hysteria for silly hateful people with too much free time on their hands, with guns in those same hands.
Let's do the time warp again? It's like we never left the 60s of JFK, MLK and RFK with right wing threats of violence to poor minorities and Democratic leaders. The orange ogre is not a legitimate leader having lost the popular vote, he represents a disgraceful minority.
It's time to do something about the white elephant in the room, as in decent civil people of all stripes uniting to vote him and his supporters out of office. Yes we can get out and vote.
2
Why worry about problems we can't solve when we can just create problems that don't need a solution?
1
"I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda."
Gosh, do you think?
5
There is a long and ugly history of anti-Mexican xenophobia.
With the onset of the Great Depression, Mexicans living in the U.S. became prime targets.
Los Angeles County Supervisor John R. Quinn in advocating mass deportation said on January 26, 1931:
"If we rid ourselves of the aliens who
have entered this country illegally since 1921
stealing in as burglars might enter our homes,
our present unemploytnent problem would shrink
to the proportions of a relatively unimportant
flat spot in business.
In ridding ourselves of the criminally
undesirable alien we will put an end to a large
part of our crime and law enforcement problem,
probably saving many good American lives
and certainly millions of dollars for law enforcement
against people who have no business in this
country."
For good measure Quinn added that "the red problem" would disappear "with such riddance.
Trump is reinventing the wheel.
5
One sure-fire way to make Trump back off from these reckless, inhumane and crazy thoughts and actions: Give him the Nobel Peace Prize!
And if he does not stop his mildly insane activities, we will be able to badger him with the 'Nobel peace prize recipient' stick, i.e., he got the peace prize and look how disgracefully he is behaving; we should ask the Nobel committee to take back the prize, etc.
Like we were/are doing with Aung San Suu Chii of Myanmar.
They gave the former President a Nobel Prize and he used NATO air power to overthrow Qaddafi. Since, things in Libya haven't been going so well. In his last week in office, President Obama was dropping bombs on ISIS...in Libya.
1
Trump's affinity for isolationism, autocrats, white supremacists, tariffs and inciteful campaign rallies, and his hostility towards climate scientists, the free press, women demanding workplace equality and reproductive autonomy, people of color, Muslims, the LGBTQ population, liberals, Democrats, the educated), prove over and over that HE is our national "emergy".
3
You just can’t lead a chant of “Build that Wall” for problems like drug addiction, homelessness, gun violence, health insurance, retirement security, food security or climate change. Distraction and control of the narrative is the name of the game. It will be very difficult to beat him at this game, as Senator Elizabeth Warren convincingly just demonstrated. My answer would be to develop a section of the news just for Trump similar to the sports or business section. My New York Times app would allow me to bury that section.
2
Sure. So adding millions of uneducated peasants will lead to a decrease in homelessness, gun deaths, and lack of health insurance. Liberal logic at its finest.
5
@Tim Sullivan
Ya, but while you, the President, and Congress are getting all upset about a couple thousand migrants, none of those other issues you mention are getting any attention. That's the point - stop focusing on the minutiae and look at the bigger picture.
4
@Tim Sullivan
In the 19th. century there were signs in bars, No Dogs or Irish Allowed'. Did you forget?
3
It's about security and sovereignty. You don't open the front door of your home to anyone who wants to live there. Same is true for our borders.
The caravan is a giant Swiffer Sweeper for criminals and drug runners trying to blend in. It's an organized effort. They didn't all just happen to show up at the same time with new backpacks and support teams to feed them. The press needs to do it's job (which they won't) and dig into what started this flood right before an election.
6
If borders are really open, shouldn't there be two way migration? Yet American workers cannot migrate into Mexico and seek work there, could they? Because Mexico does not allow that.
5
This is so true I almost want to cry. One of the tragedies of this administration is that it's so busy chasing phantoms and inventing problems and behaving badly that nothing that genuinely impacts Americans is being addressed. This is why I've never understood this America-first business. With a lunatic in charge chasing his own fantasies, nothing real can get done.
5
This is what a crazy Pollyanna I am. I imagine the President ordering troops to the border. The troops see the caravan coming, they lay down their arms. Each soldier picks an immigrant group and welcomes them with a meal. They sit and talk. The soldier posts info about the group, work skills etc and since each soldier has a different social network, the immigrant groups are matched up with sponsors all across the US. Marc Zuckerberg hears that FB is finally used for something worthwhile and pays their relocation costs.
2
Why is is so difficult to be a nation of laws? If we have a law that is regularly being violated (immigration or otherwise), why can't the law be enforced, or changed in Congress if it is not enforceable?
Is Singapore a nation of 'bigots' because they have immigration laws preventing an invasion of their small country from Indonesia, an impoverished nation of over 200 million?
6
@J House immigration laws are enforced. Daily. Is that news to you? the fact that some also evade and sneak is is old news - it has been happening since immigration laws were established. It will never stop because people want to come here. And those who do have a far superior work ethic compared to the lazy people already here who can't be bothered to get a job where ever it is and want the guv'mint to bring the jobs to them.
3
There are currently approximately 20 million people already in the United States illegally, depending on what study you look at. Clearly the laws are not being enforced, and that is not news to me.
Nice try, but it is about importing more democratic voters you the left call regain power. No one is being fooled.
4
@David HAHAHAHAHAHA. Riiiggghht. "importing voters" Do you really believe that right wing entertainer joke? Wow. Guess you got fooled!
2
The country may be overdue for a Hispanic president in the
White House, in order to address these problems on all fronts, without picking and choosing.
Climate change, Mr. Kristof. If we don't deal effectively with that, no other issue will matter because we won't be here.
5
@Stephen Merritt Exactly what I was about to post.
If it's about "not about immigration," by all means, please explain how, with an increasingly tech-driven economy, it's of any benefit to the United States to import thousands and thousands of low-educated, primarily non-English speaking manual laborers.
4
@Joe Pike - You might want to take a look at Trump's efforts to bring people in from other countries to work in his businesses.
2
True, we have a lot of problems, but none of them will be helped by adding more unskilled laborers to our population. And if the folks in this caravan succeed in entering the U.S., how may more caravans will we see spring up in the next year? Kristof does not care -- he seems to be OK with open borders. But most Americans believe we should have orderly and legal immigration, not the kind of illegal and chaotic immigration represented by this caravan and the recent uncontrolled migration that hit Europe. Unfortunately, that kind of chaos leads to the rise of law-and-order, nationalist-type politicians. Those who oppose Trump and his ilk should be able to understand that, but they don't and thus they won't criticize this caravan.
7
@Prudent Man
This is getting absurd. No significant portion of any party is advocating for open borders. To say otherwise is pure propaganda and fear mongering.
And you are entirely missing the point of the article, which is that Trump should be focusing his and the public's attention on more pressing issues -homelessness, gun deaths, drugs - than a migrant caravan that poses no threat to the safety of Americans. If and when the caravan arrives at the border, they will be handled the same was as the thousands of others who try to pass our borders every year. Focusing incessantly on this one group is not helpful.
5
@Prudent Man Caravan is about half women and children. Maybe in Vermont your job is at risk from child labor but I don't think it's a national problem. Since you brought up Europe, Germany has an unemployment rate lower than ours. I suggest improving your skill set and stop worrying about 2500 manual laborers.
2
@Prudent Man "none of them will be helped by adding more unskilled laborers to our population." actually most immigrants are skilled. You only hear about the unskilled because they do the jobs no "american" will do. Of course there are plenty of unskilled Americans who could do the jobs. They just would rather do drugs.
5
Trump is incapable of determining priorities. His mind has no training to consider the past and it's bearing on the present, nor has he the capacity to consider the implications of steps today for the future. In other words he is not the person to be making any national decisions. The tragedy we face is that he has been making them and will continue doing so until we vote him out of office. A possibility would be voting the Democrats into House control and then impeaching the fraud. The key is VOTING.
1
Until those facing homelessness, drug addiction, gun violence or lack of access to healthcare start wintering at Mar-a-Lago, he'll never see it, therefore it doesn't matter to him.
Nick, I’m quite sure that Jesus Christ, Allah, Mohammad, and Yahweh, and all other caring deities are in the caravan working through the people with love, compassion, and solidarity. They could hardly be anywhere else given their striving for justice and peace. Thanks be to God for their presence.
The problem with the caravan is the optics . It seems designed to shame us into changing our policy. We need immigration reform but we don't need the Central Americans grandstanding to force our hand.
This country has plenty of problems, including those that the author mentions.
Homelessness in intractable. If we create inexpensive housing options, it would soften the price of housing and break the mortgage banking system. Many homeless also need mental health services, which falls under medical care.
Our medical system is one of the most fixable of the listed problems. All we need to do is break a bunch of golden rice bowls and take away a cudgel used to keep people in their jobs.
Getting rid of all the guns isn't going to happen. We could tighten things up a lot though, and get rid of assault weapons.
As long as I can remember, there has always been some sort of drug crisis of the moment. Prohibition, weed, acid, heroin, coke, crack, meth, and now opioids. Americans get high; can't we find a way to make it safe? We've been fighting it for 100 years and we're still losing.
We we still need immigration reform. How about a guest worker program so they can work the season, go back to be with their families, and return again next season? We can't be the sink for the hemisphere's population overflow; we don't have a frontier anymore. I'd suggest we try to help those countries straighten themselves out, but whatever we do seems to make things worse.
4
@mlbex The caravan was started to shame the Honduran government due to their corruption and incompetence, NOT to influence the US government. That is all Trumps delusion. Past caravans of the same sort mostly petered out by the time they got to the US border.
2
@Joe Rockbottom “The caravan was started to shame the Honduran government due to their corruption and incompetence, NOT to influence the US government.”
Then why aren’t they marching on Tegucigalpa? They are trying to shame the Honduran government by...leaving?
..and climate change is not just a national but a global emergency.
7
For years, we have been taking one step forward and two back. Our problems have been multiplying faster than we can solve them. The biggest national "emergy" at present is a president and congress who have no loyalty to their country or its citizens. Their primary interest is making the comfortable more comfortable and leaving everyone else to their own fate.
2
"It’s not about immigration. It’s about bigotry."
I'm intrigued at Nicholas Kristof's supernatural ability to look into the hearts and minds of 60+ million Americans (Trump voters used as a proxy for those favoring his immigration policies). Are they all bigots? I doubt it. No wonder Democrats lost half the union vote last time around.
"the Caravan won’t make a bit of difference to America"
It's not in the numbers, Mr. Kristof. It's in the principle. Do we have borders and laws - or don't we? Why won't you give those of us who look at it that way the benefit of the doubt?
7
False. Geez, I can't believe you're ignorant so you must be misleading people deliberately. Yes, illegal immigration IS a national emergency and needs to be stopped. No, Trump is NOT ignoring drugs, homelessness (9 of the top 10 cities in terms of homeless problems are run by Democrats), gun deaths and lack of health insurance. Trump declared the opioid epidemic a national emergency and signed legislation to expand addiction treatment, speed up research on alternative drugs, and provide Medicaid funding to treatment centers with more than 16 inpatient beds and steered $6 billion in funding to fight opioids. Trump has made health insurance more affordable by expanding alternatives to the absurd costs and lack of choice of Obamacare policies.
Kristof appears to be just another victim of TDS and cannot see the good things happening under this administration.
5
Remember when we had leaders who could spell and had a vocabulary larger than a 3rd grader? A world view bigger than a mirror? (No insult to 3rd graders intended). It's harder and harder to believe as time goes on that we have such a person in the White House.
2
The crony capitalist media is fanning this story to help Trump, just like they did in 2016 by failing to mention that Mexican net migration since Obama was negative without a wall. So Trump won on fake news that he conjured up, and supported by the crony capitalist media. They got rewarded with huge tax cuts, more consolidation, and more deregulation from the Grand Oligarch Party (GOP).
You mean that our serial liar, fourth-grade vocabulary president is out of touch? No kidding. Don't be complacent or indifferent to what our country has become in less than two short years. Exercise your vote like there's no tomorrow (and that could come true if we don't get rid of Trump) on November 6. Our future is truly at stake.
8
In Vienna, where it is refreshing to read the reasonable, still angry but reasonable, words of a fellow Oregonian. This is a beautiful city of glorious music and architecture, but its history and treatment of "outsiders" and Jews is eyeopening. It seems that autocrats and the desire for wealth are skewing decency everywhere. Yet, everywhere I read pleas for more kindness, for implementing democracy by voting. Fear weaves in and out of everyone's thoughts. In my seventies, it is the first time I have felt such fear for our country, for its citizens, and for a world which once looked to the United States to rescue others from fear.
6
Thanks!!! Along with the national emergencies you mentioned, the sacrificing of our infrastructure and programs to help lower income Americans are among the most important parts of the current trend to just let the shared features of the US fade away.
5
Great column, lots of statistics--could have been written by Angel Merkel three years ago. All that's missing is the "We can do this" thing.
How'd did that turn out for her and for Germany and the EU?
9
How many of those "gun deaths" are really "drug deaths"? Counting suicides is also logically problematic, and many domestic homicides may be also.
We need to have two competing political parties in this country, as monopolies tend to perform very poorly for their customers and lack accountability.
As long as many Democrats blame "all guns" as a social evil, they will have almost no chance to win in many regions of the country. Apparently the 2016 election results were not painful enough to get some people to take a sincere assessment of how voters actually feel. It seems very clear that when many Democrats talk about guns, it is no different that listening to pro-lifers. Both often try to appear moderate, but are not-so-secretly working towards a total ban.
For the record, I do not own a gun and never have, and there are plenty of gun restrictions that make sense without interfering with people's independence. Many "stand your ground" laws belong in a museum of the worst ideas ever, and private semi-auto rifle ownership could be restricted by the same law that restricts sub-machine guns - people buy over-engineered toys (such as all-wheel-drive or very fast cars) all the time. This is one reason why government has a role in setting limits.
Climate change and corruption are "race against the clock" issues, but guns have been here and will be here for a long time. The political cost to social benefit ratio of the gun control debate is simply too high for now. Let it go.
4
@Alan Can you stop thinking in extremes. Gun control doesn't not mean Gun Prohibition. It means you can get a gun, provided you are of reasonable mental health, can register your gun (so no one can steal it and use it), and law enforcement can ensure you have no criminal records. This way, those who have guns are less likely to have the need to use it (safer society). This is born out by states that have more gun control, versus states without gun control.
1
Stoking fear has long been the "Conservative" and "Republican" way of exciting voters, who in turn vote for things that help the rich and powerful maintain the status quo.
17
@Rupert Laumann Pretty much the same with Dems, apparently Trump has signaled the apocalypse, if you don't call what Dems are doing stoking fear then what is it?
1
Mr. Kristoff, you do know you're talking to 'The Wall' right?
2
No, all of these issues are mere annoyance compared to climate change, which will kill all of the people helped by solving these issues. And if we don't address it now, it will cross tipping points that render it unstoppable. Our national emergency is stupidity, ignorance and short-sighted self interest, among the populace, and also among the intelligencia in the media, who should have demanded CC be addressed long ago. Why don't the Times, the Post, NBC, ABC, etc. organize a week of all Climate education, all day, for a week. It can't be more useless than video of bomb cars rolling in the streets for hours on end. It might work.
I am trying to remember when the republicans made any attempt to govern the USA for the benefit of 99%, but I'm drawing a blank (I'm only 50 - maybe it was before my time). All that I can remember as far back as my memory goes is republicans stoking misplaced fears to win power and distract their supporters while they looted the country for the benefit of the 1%. Expecting any other kind of behavior from republicans is foolish.
14
@Sean My wife and I have a combined income of $85k and we love being Republican. I want to belong to whichever party most promotes individual liberty, limited government, free enterprise, and private property. Right now that is R instead of D. I want the government to do 3 things: defend the shores, deliver the mail, and leave me the heck alone.
2
Come let them live at your house if you want them so bad. This is a thinly veiled excuse to have more voters of the Democratic Party because they can’t seem to win elevations with the folks that are already here.
4
Yes but the pictures are scary.
Another real emergency is the need for criminal investigation of all of the republican members of congress as well as all officers and minions of the RNC for the organized effort they have been engaged in for several decades to steal our government from us and to us the authority they gained by deception to sabotage and undo the people's work at making their own lives better by using their government.
11
@magicisnotreal
"steal our government from us"? "to sabotage and undo the people's work at making their own lives better by using their government." LOL!
Honey, it's YOUR responsibility to improve your own life. It's called "freedom" and "personal responsibility". Nowhere in our founding documents does it state or imply that government is required to make your life better
1
Embracing Trump’s “What’s in it for me!” stance, his Great Americans have forgotten how to take pity on the less fortunate and are averse to paying for anyone else’s emergency, even when it makes economic sense.
They don’t get the concept with their own homeless locally and refuse to see how providing aid beyond our borders could give would-be migrants hope in the future where they live. Great Americans run for their guns.
The press has the job of reporting the facts and reining in their adjectives. Hyperbole is Trump’s style guide. Having created the mess of family separation, he is about to get a huge social services bill due to the need for childcare with each separation. His attempt to use the military for a non-military situation will escalate into crisis.
Cooler heads must prevail. Migrants came here without proper documentation in the past. The government dealt with them with far less chaos. The legislators have to work together on legal solutions.
Trump is the surly old guy at the end of the bar who just got his chance to snap his fingers and fix this problem. Professionals who know how to deal with migrants as migrants, not criminals, must be allowed to do take charge. There is nothing lawless about treating migrants as humans.
5
Of course Trump is ignoring our nation's real emergencies, whether they be gun deaths, lack of affordable health care, or climate change. But we must ask why he is ignoring these real problems, you know, the ones based on facts and science, and not on racist, groundless fears of "unknown Middle Easterners" coming here from Central America.
The answer is really quite simple. His voters don't want him to address our nation's true problems. They want only one thing from him -- his affirmation that as whites, they are the "favored" Americans, and they occupy a place above the rest of us citizens. As long as he continues his racist rants, he will keep his base, and he will remain in power.
Of course Trump voters lose health insurance, or are victims of opioid abuse, or cannot afford higher education. But they do not care, as long as their "president" tells them that they are the "real" Americans, and that the KKK and neo-Nazis are some very fine people.
I have a lot of respect for Mr. Kristof, and I consider him to be one of the most important journalists of our time. But unless this column is tongue in cheek, he must understand that it is pointless to expect that Trump would consider the welfare of all our citizens.
I have only one request for the New York Times - stop treating Trump, his cronies, and his base, as decent, normal people. They are not. They are ignorant, vicious bigots. Hillary's term "deplorable"? A charitable assessment. The gloves need to come off - now.
3
Let's talk about the greatest and most immediate threat facing this nation, as evinced by the explosive devices sent to prominent Democratic political figures. Terrorism. Specifically terrorism from the right wing supported and promoted by Trump. If the Democrats do not employ rhetoric sufficient to educate the public about the nature and degree of the threat to democracy that Trump and his jack booted followers represent, then the Democratic leadership is the pathetic, clueless bunch that I have increasingly found them to be.
3
What we have to fear is not fear itself...and certainly not approaching immigrants fleeing starvation and crime. What we have to fear is Trump and his supporters. They are here! AMONG us! We should be afraid. Very afraid...they are not some imaginary, Trumped up boogeymen, they are real.
Trump's boogeymen hate us; hate anyone/everyone who does not look white/like them; hate education, truth and facts; would like to rough us up; put us in our place.
Trump's boogeymen love guns, the bigger the better. One or more of them sent pipe bombs to Liberals who Trump routinely demonizes. The boogeymen among us are Trump's angry-men, hatchet-men, hit-men, his kind of men.
Trump's boogeymen don't believe elections and voting are for anyone but themselves. They, like him, do their best to stop Americans from going to the polls and voting. They like to intimidate Americans, but they will also resort to violence. They like to own arsenals, they like to join militias, they like to march with tiki torches, they like to shout "Lock her up!" they send pipe bombs, they have heroes like Timothy McVeigh.
Trump's boogeymen are scary...(and to use something like his language) They’re on drugs. They’re committing crimes. They’re raping America. And some, I assume, are good people.
What we have to fear is not below our southern border, it's in the White House and in our neighborhoods.
4
Why would criminals and terrorists walk 2000 miles, to get to the United States? Immigrants used to come by the boatload, arriving after a similiarly difficult journey, and they proved to be the soul of our country. Who better to have here? People who walked 2000 miles to get here, or a bunch of fear mongering, self interested politicians?
4
An NYT article 2 days ago said "...nearly 400,000 people were apprehended on the border for the fiscal year 2018, which ended Sept. 30." (!)
And my fellow Democrats insist there is no immigration problem. And the NYT continues to call "illegal immigrants" merely "migrants," deliberately obscuring the fact that they are in or trying to enter the U.S. illegally.
No country has open borders, and ours shouldn't, either. Most Americans welcome legal immigrants, but not illegals. US laws allow foreigners to seek entry and citizenship. Those who do not follow these laws are in this country illegally and should be detained and deported, as is policy in other countries, too.
We cannot support our own citizens: the poor, the ill, elderly, disabled, veterans, et al. It is thus utterly impossible for US taxpayers to support the hundreds of millions of foreigners who would like to come here.
Why aren't the NYT and the other media looking into the details of the current "caravan"? Who is funding and organizing it? Why is the Red Cross aiding these invaders? Why are Mexico and other countries abetting this assault on the U.S.? Anyone who believes these poor, uneducated peasants have somehow organized themselves for this journey is deluded.
Abolishing ICE makes sense only to advocates of open borders, a policy no nation will ever accept.
If open borders and abolishing ICE are made planks of the Democratic Party we are doomed to lose the midterm and 2020 elections.
3
Mr. Kristof should pay attention. Mr. Trump signed a bipartisan Opiod bill today. And that wall he wants will reduce trafficking by the cartels. The media is so wrapped up in their identity politics, self pity, and Trump bashing that they are missing quite a bit of what is going on. Trump is successfully executing a massive overhaul of trade and foreign policy to reflect the new realities in geopolitics. Perhaps the media should catch up a bit. The press has gone from smug and all-knowing, to petty and ignorant real quick.
5
When Republicans see the caravan, all they really see is potential votes for Democrats. Just another way immigrants make America great.
1
Thank you Mr. Kristof. Now, could you speak to Baquet and any other people who decide on the front page, and convince them that they have more important stories to display than this poor caravan, one thousand miles from our border?
2
Maybe it is and emergy issue, Nick....it keeps emerging everywhere, like an emergency does.
4
Trump can't spell? What's more important is once again the left is being dismissive on illegal immigration. Only five thousand? Thanks for the statistics but if you don't believe in Trumps lies and the ridiculous wall you still have a problem and not a simple one.
Any sane person knows open borders can't work. Don't believe me read what Obama and Schumer have to say about it. If comes down to good and evil you have to ask why is the march talking place. It's doing a good job of dividing us. Isn't immigration breaking the back of the EU? It's seems a tried and true method of sowing discontent maybe the Russians are behind if.
Thanks again for statistics but numbers aren't everything.
5
@JoeG Where is the GREAT wall that Mexico is paying for? The house, the Senate and the POTUS are all Republican, they have had a majority for 18 months. Why have they not passed some new immigration bill? Because they have NOTHING. Repeal and replace? Replace with what? Please get out and vote this year , our country needs you more than ever.
1
Unfortunately Nicholas President National Emergy isn't going to read your article. Heck he doesn't bother reading the National Secrty Breefin, so why would we expect to read your opinion piece.
But there is a silver lining, we read it, and "We Vote". And I already did, Democrat up and down the ballot.
2
Certainly any country in the world faces many “emergencies”. We have been discussing all of our emergencies routinely in the press. Health care as an emergency is something that has been dredged up routinely by the Democrats even though everyone has access to healthcare including illegals. Most Americans don’t know this but any illegal immigrant can walk into a hospital here in the US and get health care and then turn around and just walk out without paying. That’s right. Our laws say this and an illegal immigrant that I know personally just had this work for him. I am not saying that this is wrong, but stop with the press and Democrats saying that the Repubs are going to throw 30 million people out of the health care system. These people will always be able to walk into a hospital and get care, free of charge.
Stop the illegals at the border and let them go to the end of the line for a visa as Barack Obama and Bill Clinton have said.
2
I like Mr Kristof .. but his sappy approach to the problems of Central America and why people are fleeing is ridiculous, naive & blind... More aid?? The Illegal drug trade has ruined these countries. Gangs fueled by profits from the sale of mostly Cocaine, Heroin & Pot have taken over. And they are ruthless. They have corrupted all law enforcement & government. This is big time money, Some estimate bigger than the oil industry. You want to stop the chaos, and not only there but here in places like Chicago... Legalize it all.... Regulate it & control it. The murders, corruption, and most of the refugee crisis will end tomorrow.
5
People do not understand numbers. Each year, tobacco kills 480.000 in the US according to the CDC but, spread evenly over the country, these deaths are invisible. If grouped together, it would be the same number if two fully-loaded jets fell out of the sky each and every day. No one would ever fly again.
Republicans understand the power of images (even those lifted from other conflicts and times--see today's NYT for a story on this) and use them to stoke fear.
And fear makes people far from the southern border turn violent. A man shoots in a bar in Kansas, killing an Indian-American. Another man kills a gas station owner in Arizona after 9/11 because he is wearing a turban.
Republicans, if they had their way, would have the rest of us sew "D" emblems on our clothing, A new Kristallnacht would be welcomed in many dark parts of our country.
We can and we must knock the wheels off this juggernaut at the ballot box.
11
@Douglas McNeill
"When debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the losers."
-Socrates
2
Drugs are an issue so let’s legalize marijuana. That will drop the crime rates and make people more motivated to get better educated and find better jobs...NOT!
3
As for the conditions Mr. Kristof describes,
"...migrants fleeing Central America...drugs, homelessness, gun deaths and lack of health insurance".
This was different under Obama in what ways? At least Trump has passed a bill to fun more help with the drug crisis--and those who choose not to purchase health insurance at least are not paying a penalty for their choice.
The bias in this publication is breathtaking. It is not much less than a mouthpiece for the DNC.
7
Could not be truer words, "I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda."
Trump has played the media like a fiddle from even before he announced his presidency. He has gotten 100% free publicity from the media. Every word of his is repeated a million times by various media outlets, so even if people do not want to hear what he is thinking, we have no choice, because you regurgitate his words for him, you are his loudspeakers, his mouthpiece, unwittingly.
Not too long ago, you were the ones who were trying to manipulate Obama. With laser sharp focus, he was busy restoring the economy and the reputation of the country, after George W Bush's disastrous handling. Yet, you distracted him constantly, we have your columns in the archives. Here Obama, do something in Egypt! Obama, do something in Libya! Obama, do something in Syria!! You wanted him dragged into every chaos, when all he wanted to do was fix our own country, and undo the damage done by George W Bush's two unfunded and unfounded wars.
1
The president's response to the bombs is to blame the Media and others and take no personal responsibility for the inevitable effect of his bellicose and incendiary words on the public. Someone has emerged to carry out hits on his enemies and Trump looks at others to correct the problem. Instead he needs to be the first to change his behavior, get a civil tongue in his mouth, show some respect for others, and stop bellowing. Everyone is getting a headache from all his screaming. Grow up, act with decency and civility, stop calling people names and hurling insults. Stop advocating body slams and other violence.
Trump has the opportunity to step up, grow up, act like an adult and assume responsibility for the destructive effects his words and actions have had on Americans.
If instead you continue to point the finger at others, blame others and scapegoat you will have lost your opportunity and will remain the oversized child you still are.
2
@mike.... this is a delusional take on what 11-20 million immigrants leaving the country would do. I’m curious, do you think there would be no shortage of affordable housing in places like San Francisco, NYC, LA, etc. if immigrants left the country? Do you think it’s immigrants that cause rents in places like SF and NYC to be thousands of dollars a month creating homelessness and forcing thousands of people to leave their homes? There would be no unemployment? Seriously, if all immigrants left the country whose going to pick all the produce across the country, whose going to process all the chickens and wait what about those crabs for the wealthy in MD that are suddenly not being processed because Trump won’t allow seasonal work visas? Do you think Americans want to do that? Oh and the immigrants are using up all the water, that 11-20 million of them leaving is going to solve the water problems of the SW, which is related to climate change and not immigrants. Oh and on pollution, do you think it’s the immigrants driving huge, gas guzzling vehicles, I dare say no. I see your comment about tough choices on health care for the elderly especially those with chronic conditions, not sure where that factors into your diatribe on immigrants but clearly you have drank the Trump kool aid. Hopefully you never get a chronic illness in your old age. One might have to make some hard choices about your care.
3
You described several crises going on right now, some of them clearly fabricated by Trump and his republican minions to sow fear and hate, and division,to win by cheating. He is the main culprit, responsible for all this violence being unleashed, in stealing the forthcoming elections, to keep their power...and abuse it, as they currently are. And the only clear subject, inciting the violence as a matter of fact, is Donald J. Trump, in an uhhinged 'criminal' intent in fomenting chaos for personal gain. This is not only shameful, it is dangerous, coming from the president, unwilling to represent all people, as promised, but only his uninformed and prejudiced base...that seems unwilling to think for themselves; they just want circus, for entertainment, to escape their deadly daily routine; and found their clown in-chief to help, by lying to them, and doubling down on the press as 'the enemy pf the people'.
So the point is? Americans in favor of completing the 30 year old bipartisan bill to secure the border are bigots? A corollary to Zorn’s Law should be “the first person to use the “B” word in the absence of data points losses the debate/argument.
2
Don’t you think the effects of human influence on climate change qualifies as a national emergy, Mr Kristof?
What intellectual dishonesty!
First, the caravan of people headed towards the United States from Central America are not "immigrants" as Mr. Kristof states. Immigrants stay in their country of origin and get visas before coming to the United States or enter the country legally then adjust status.
Secondly, the drug issue has a great deal to do with immigration as almost all of the heroin in the United States comes through Mexico. It's not coming through with people who enter legally.
And finally, please stop with the tired talking point that Republicans "traffic in fear."
Every election cycle I have to listen to the left bleat on about how that if you don't vote for the Democrats your voting rights will taken away, your daughters will be sexually assaulted an then forced into back alley abortions, and that the Republicans will steal your grandmother's social security check and then throw her off a cliff.
4
Yes, let's talk about drugs and the fact that the opioid crisis is due partly to the flow of black tar heroin from Mexico, brought in by illegal immigrants.
5
I'm sorry, but the real "National Emergy" we're facing is Donald Trump's presidency. Nothing else, not homelessness, health care, immigration, infrastructure, nothing else is as threatening or damaging as the continuing presence of this man in the White House. As long as he is president I have absolutely no faith in his ability to confront the problems Mr Kristoff identifies in a way that would not exacerbate them. Donald Trump is a policy arsonist --- he throws gasoline on every policy issue he finds, then tosses on a match.
This is the tragedy of what's happening. Here we sit, almost 20 years into the 21st century, a time when we should reasonably expect social justice, environmental care, economic equality and peaceful co-existence to be, at the least, unifying objectives. Instead, our most advanced technology is a platform for our president to spew hate and lies, our leadership promotes an environmental stance that's one step removed from believing the earth is flat, our immigration policy is based on putting the military at the border, and we have all but returned to the 3/5th's clause in suppressing voting rights. Donald Trump has put on his MAGA hat, turned the country around and is marching us straight into the 19th century. At this rate he'll get us to the Civil War in no time.
Mr Kristoff is right, we have bigger problems than the caravan. And the biggest of those problems --- magnitudes bigger --- is the presidency of Donald Trump.
7
A Ford Class super carrier costs $13 billion to build. They're designed to project the F-35 fighter-bomber...which program has yielded an invalid weapon that cannot do what it was designed to do if the weather is bad.
What if we diverted just a fraction of the funds for a weapons system that is going to be worthless in the face of either a Chinese or a Gulf-state swarm attack and built a migrant camp in Mexico?
Set up tents, establish clinics and a mess hall...it will be better than what they are experiencing. And pay the Mexican government to provide them from physical security from the murders (financed by Americans drug Jones) for just one year.
Crisis averted.
I agree with your priorities, Mr. Kristof, about where our focus should be as a nation (although I'm convinced that the environment and climate change should head that list, frankly)... BUT...
Mr. Trump has one major weapon in his arsenal, and that is fear. His gift lies in his ability to frighten the living daylights out of his supporters. His 'political campaign' rallies have one aim and one aim only -- to scare people and whip up their hatred. And he accomplishes that with skill and precision and exercises it on the very people (poor, white, uneducated ones) who are least able to comprehend that they are being used for his purposes and that he cares NOTHING about them. As a result, his supporters are deafened by the scary clamor and absolutely unable to hear the voice of reason. They will not listen to you or anyone else who talks to them about logical and necessary matters in a calm and rational manner.
It's a classic tactic of authoritarian 'leaders.' Shriek loudly and blame someone else or -- even better -- slap them and joke about it. The yokels will eat it up and scream their fool heads off for you.
I'd say that -- in the present political emegency in which we find ourselves -- the top priority of thinking people might be in finding some way to disconnect the bully pulpit from the bullied people he's inciting. Perhaps less coverage of Mr. Trump's rants and more coverage of his opponents' reasons would be appropriate on the media's part?
1
The real emergency is global, but the US is a potent player. It’s climate change, and if we don’t focus on it urgently, immediately, the mass extinction is going to include humankind. The insect populations of the world are crashing: goodbye pollination, goodbye food chain. The forests are burning and dying. Goodbye oxygen, goodbye carbon sink. The methane hydrates trapped in previously frozen arctic soil are bursting free. Hello methane, nearly 30 times more potent greenhouse gas than carbon. Marine ecosystems are collapsing too — see yesterday’s NYT article on the disappearing kelp forests.
All our social pathologies, all human suffering, deserve our concern. But they will all be exponentially multiplied by climate change. And then they will all abruptly end. Not in some distant future or distant country either. Here. Now.
Why are we talking about anything else? Why are we working on anything else? Get rid of the Republican deathbringers by any means necessary and eliminate carbon emissions. And loudly proclaim the human family will meet this emergency together or perish.
1
Mr. Kristof, if you are truly worried about our drug crisis, maybe you should give more thought to the danger of this caravan and others coming across our southern border. A huge portion of the drugs that worry you flow right across that border. It is such a flood of people and trucks that so far we have been unable to control it. Perhaps a wall is not such a bad idea?
4
86 million. That's the increase in US population since 1986.
And we live on a finite planet, and in a finite country. So that increase in population of 36% means that each of us has a claim to less of the country's resources.
It is not bigotry to point that out. It's not bigotry to try to find ways to decrease population growth.
Yes, for a long time Americans denied global warming. But global warming is only one of the consequences of population growth. Other consequences including declining living standards, overcrowding, congestion in large cities like NY and LA, running out of water in California, and so on.
Liberals tell a huge lie. That immigration doesn't matter. That immigrants do not take resources away from America's poor. And then they compound it with the claim that anybody who worries about population growth is a bigot.
This is one of the reasons that politics has become so toxic in the US. Nicholas Kristof and other NY Times op-ed writers impugn the motives of those who have a different opinion.
We need to discuss possible solutions. We need to compromise.
Sadly, the extremist rhetoric of Kristof's essay is a step backward.
4
Many of us (Trump's voters) have become convinced that all we as a nation need to do is stop giving money to a list of people from the poor who are seen as undeserving, to poor nations that they believe are leeches. They somehow think that this will solve all our economic problems and lead us back to the world the grew up in. It is simplistic and wrong but conservative media, and the Republicans in office, hammer this simple message all the time.
2
"Rather, it’s fear mongering. Scholars have found that reminding people of dangers makes them temporarily more conservative, so this kind of manipulation can be an effective campaign tactic."
It worked for Bush/Cheney and even got them a second term. Now, Trump and his followers are using the same strategy. There is no longer a "loyal opposition" in this country. Mindless obedience to the Master of the 'Master Race' has taken them. And, it may yet take the rest of us into oblivion.
Trump lies and speaks in broken sentences that make no sense. Is he mad? Do the Republicans care?
With all the talk about Trumps base and what “appeals” to the base I wonder what in God’s name is wrong with the base? Is it an ignorance question does it say something about American society that promotes this bizarre unquestioning ignorance? Why does the media avoid dissecting this question like the plague. It is really the reason why Trump is so successful and Fox News has viewers.
2
The accompanying photo clearly explains the president's angst, fear and racism about immigration and his desire to seal America's southern borders from "rapists, animals and MS-13 criminals".
Yes, Mr. Kristof, it's about bigotry. It's images like this one that the president and Republicans use to stoke fear in America that brown invaders are coming for them.
The real national emergency is an administration that has run amok and a a political party that has enabled their dictator and turned their backs on the Constitution, common decency and civil discourse. A blue wave in November can be the first responder to the GOP menace that is intent on destroying America.
1
As a globalist, Kristoff should have a better understanding of interrelated systems of cause and effect. The massive annual influxes of desperately poor, minimally educated people exacerbates existing crises around affordable housing and drives down wages while further straining under-resourced schools. This directly contributes to homelessness.
The drugs he's so concerned about are primarily trafficked by the cartels - which are overwhelmingly Latino and who overwhelmingly work with other Latino street gangs in the US to distribute these drugs. Many of these Latino street gangs like MS-13 are compromised primarily of young Latino men from the Central American countries of El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala.
The majority of gun violence that Kristoff laments is actually not committed in mass random shootings but rather in targeted neighborhood violence in primarily minority neighborhoods where migrants often live as well. And this is going way out on a limb here, but maybe, just maybe the people who come from violent cultures and countries with some of the highest murder rates in the world just might have a little something to do with that.
So here's the real question: does Kristoff really care about these issues or is he just grandstanding to push a pro-immigration agenda?
4
Mr. Kristof, first, the last paragraph is the essential one. See, part of media’s Trump syndrome is waltzing around and around the main points, trying to serve up too much information. Just cut to the chase - Trump has more than demonstrated his proclivities for lying, bigotry, ignorance and egoism. Stop assuming you had to prove it in every paragraph.
Second, the mass migrations occurring around the world are a story at least as big as the others you mention. Why? Because, like the caravan, they must be viewed as a cry for help, as tests of the humanity and ingenuity of the developed world. The US has an outsized share of the blame for the horrible conditions driving Central Americans from their homelands. Many decades of bad policy and exploitation have left rascals and gangs in charge all over the continent. The caravan asks: “Does the US also have a capacilty to alleviate the suffering it has created. So far the answer is a resounding “No.”
The media keep talking about how they should stop talking about the things they are talking about, that aren't real things. Then they do it all over again.
2
According to the American people, Nick, immigration and economy are the top two issues in hierarchy of importance.
3
"I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda."
Absolutely.
1
Perhaps there's another perspective? Perhaps it's reasonable to ask why, after decades of war in Afghanistan and secret "bases" with over 5,000 American soldiers now stationed in Africa, we cannot defend our own borders? Perhaps it's reasonable to ask why kind of nation is so intent on "projecting power" around the globe that millions of illegal humans creep across its borders each year? Perhaps it's reasonable to ask why on 9/11 our trillion dollar Air Force had no planes in the air defending the country? Just asking.
2
What about how Facebook and twitter have been used by the Russians and the Republicans to organize theses caravans right before the mid-terms? It’s obvious this particular emergy is more than just good luck.
1
Points here are well-made. The real question is how to address them. Forget Trump. He's a self-made bigoted blowhard, a failed businessman with ties to Russian mobsters. The challenges require bipartisan cooperation. But, how? One of the parties has ceased to exist as a governable body. The elephant has left the room. Without responsible Republican participation the U.S. is unable to meet its challenges and serve the national and international good.
Thank you, Mr. Kristof, for your thoughtful and calm perspective on this latest Republican media effort to distract and terrify the nation. Perhaps, we could mention, too, how the president’s response to (as you point out) this relatively small number of people creeping across Mexico makes us look like a country of cowards.
I can only surmise that the multiple deliberate daily attacks on every institution and the shambles created in foreign policy are done with the intent to wear the majority down to the point of exhaustion and submission.
The desire for one party rule, to reshape and revise US policies globally and nationally through voter depression, manipulation, lies has been both blatant and insiduous.
4
Think of the media as an 'Apprentice' contestant.
Mr. Kristof is way, way too easy on the media when he says, "I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda."
Trump is a media master. He has ALWAYS used the newspapers, FOX, CNN et al. and he knows these megaphones have been willingly ignorant as long as readership, ratings and profits go up.
The media has unwittingly supported Trump's dystopian views by broadcasting every ten seconds 24/7 for years now the red meat messages with which that same media purports to disagree.
I respect Mr. Kristof. Thus, I find it very hard to believe that Mr. Kristof is only now deducing and fearing a Trumpian media manipulation that anyone can clearly see has been occuring for decades.
2
Nick:
The “drug problem” is, for the most part, a political game first created by the Prohibition movement, who made the mistake of targeting the country’s favorite (and still by farbmost deadly) intoxicant. Alcohol kills many times the number opoids do.
Opoid deaths are way up - but this is a symptom of social problems generating massive anxiety and depression - people uninsured, in places without enough psychiatrists or any willing to accept insurance, taught there is a stigma of admitting mental crisis and seeking treatment for same; told that seeking relief from chronic pain, somehow against our work ethic, or ignorant of available treatment, are condemned to use powerful street drugs ...
And dope dealers are unprepared to divide illegally produced synthetics up to a thousand times stronger than heroin, when the contents of a single easily smuggled capsule must be cut perfectly with a kilogram of whatever’s handy to fake a street-standard “bag” of heroin ...
Yet politicians are focusing their control efforts on legitimate physicians and patients, in the case of oxycodone (when properly used on a dosage geared to individuals, whose pain, sensitivity to same, rate of metabolism) has been stripped from them, requiring half the dose s time-release meds, guaranteeing addiction, and requires patients see one doctor for pain relief and a second for associated anxiety: a pain physician cannot prescribe Valium.
Stop blaming patients and those trying to help.
1
If you're talking about fear-mongering before elections, what about the "Threat Index" manipulation by the Bush White House in 2004? The "threat level" of a terrorist attack was raised to Orange or Red, I forget which, for about a month before the election - well-publicized, of course. Immediately after the election, it went down to Green. Coincidence? No threats were ever uncovered.
2
The problem is that Donnie "Boy" doesn't care about drugs, homelessness, gun deaths or lack of health insurance because these problems don't affect him or his family or people like him or his family. So nothing will be done about these problems until we're rid of him.
Let's face it : the US does not have an immigration problem . Except in the psyche of trump and his denizens, it is generally accepted that immigrants, legal and otherwise, do not impose a particular burden on the country, it society, its economy or its criminality . Quite to the contrary, as mountains of statistics have repeatedly shown .
The issue raised by the so-called Caravan, however, is of a different nature . Some of the people in it are fleeing violence and mayhem either aimed directly at them personally or at their immediate environment . These could and should justifiably be considered as asylum seekers and treated as such, in accord with well established policies and procedures (or at least policies and procedures that were well established before the advent of trumpism) .
Others are simply trying to escape poverty . That does not mean that they should be barred from entering this country , but they actually live in a legislative, regulatory and procedural wilderness . Economic migrants have no legal status . The conditions under which they are welcomed into this country - or any country for that matter - are subject to the whims of this or that government, as recent events in Europe have shown .
I must confess to being stymied by this conundrum . There is the trump doctrine (fewer a..hole country citizens, more Norwegians) or the Merkel doctrine (let them all in, we'll figure it out later) . Neither is appropriate . But is there a viable middle ground ?
2
“I fear that we in the media have become Trump’s puppets, letting him manipulate us to project issues like the caravan onto the agenda.” Yes, Mr. Kristof. If the media stopped reporting on his lies, who but Fox, the people at his rally, and some conservative online outlets would share his nonsense? The media plays into his hand. And is destroying our democracy in its complicity with him.
3
You may be right about bigotry as Trump's issue. But doesn't it bother you that Central American governments and societies are so malevolent that people walk out en masse with no sure prospect of where to land safely? Doesn't it also bother you that every needy group simply takes for granted that the USA is the answer to their problems? Why not also write about that?
2
@John
Does it bother you that Central American governments have much less power than US corporate and government influences -- even in their own countries? Many conditions in Central American countries are the direct result of US government policies. Does it bother you that Trump, the Congress, and the mainstream media never talk about that? America has been a major bully in the world sandbox since WWII (see Vietnam, for instance). And the bullying has only increased under the current so-called administration. (I say "so-called" because I don't see much being actually administered, more like a mash-up of chaotic rhetoric and activity.)
Mr. Kristoff, you don't have to wonder if Jesus may very well be in the caravan, because he surely is. Any Chrsitian should easily recall Jesus' words in Matthew 25, that when you give aid "one of the least of these... you did it to me." The imperative of Jesus is clear that we are to care for those in need, not turn them away.
2
Unfortunately, you are speaking to the choir here. The great "uneducated" that Trump loves and who vote, are the ones who need to be informed.
I also heard ,that it could very well be that Santa Claus was in the middle of the caravan,but was being protected by his elves,that were being paid by George Soros.
2
This morning, a block from my house, two derelict RVs were parked and drug users were coming and going from them. A man was yelling in the woods, clearly high, mentally ill or both. Two blocks in the other direction, a homeless mom with a 5 year old son is living in another derelict rv. Last year, we lost a beloved family member who could not afford health insurance for a few years before qualifying for Medicare, ignored symptoms and died from cancer within months of diagnosis shortly after qualifying for Medicare coverage. Meanwhile we have a deeply immoral and divisive president who claims success in making America Great Again. It is far from great for millions of struggling Americans. The caravan is a tool to call the Trump cult members to arms. Preying on fearful, weak minded Americans who apparently can’t read a map, refuse to think critically for themselves, or find any empathy for their fellow humans. Nothing more. Media need to stop covering the caravan and focus on the issues that really matter and that are harming all of us.
12
It is time for me to eat humble pie. Donald Trump will go down in history as the greatest president ever. I hate the racism and xenophobia but I have long argued that the biggest problem was an economy that had grown way beyond sustainability and needed to start shrinking.
Yesterday the market was where it was in early January and GDP growth in the fourth quarter will bring annual growth to where it was under the younger Bush.
The sector of the American will be celebrating even as their new trucks will come in small boxes from Walmart's toy department. Your debt and deficit is exploding, interest rates are rising and most Americans will be happy to live with much less.
Trump's war on terrorism sees the world's number one terrorist state lose any pretense of being civilized and a realization that fixing the nations of Central America is the only way of solving the refugee crisis and Mexico's middle class economy has already seen the end of its emigration to the USA.
Trump has lost none of his appeal with the segment of society that threatened peace and stability with their guns and their call for anarchy. Trump's end of America's command of a global economy has worked miracles as just keeping what we have is impossible.
It matters not if this was or wasn't Trump intention, what is happening is a shrinking global economy and a chance for our civilization to survive.
Nothing exposes the depth of the GOP's disdain for the common citizen, for truth, for science, for women, and for the kinship of humankind than their shenanigans re: the "healthcare issue".
In that signature issue they display their mendacity and their elitist, selfish, theocratic Plutocratic, self-righteous demagoguery.
Not only do they prove they are not Progressive they demonstratively prove they are not really Conservative!
Further they display a disconnect to the central tenets of the religion to which they piously genuflect at every propaganda opportunity!
I state above with confidence - it's objectively verifiable beyond a reasonable doubt and any intellectually honest thoughtful jury would have to rule such.
To the most important point for America.
Today's GOP is counter-productive to the advancement of society in general.
Their models and actions don't comport with reality. They are purposely meant to destroy for ideological purposes - without offering cogent alternatives.
Their models wastefully address made-up problems mostly to fire up their base and/or bolster the Plutocracy.
I do not discount true Conservative models - but the GOP's duplicitous ones are not useful to any purposes most American's hold valuable.
I know 42% disagree with me - and too often they rule election days.
But now it's existential - that 58% (conservatives, progressives) must abandon apathy/cynicism/differences - to vote and vote to remove this real cancer upon us!
Many of the afflictions like drug addiction, unemployment, and homelessness were once considered the exclusive purview of minorities and therefore worthy of society's neglect. Now our egalitarian capitalist system, which regards everyone of any color as an expendable cog, has extended the franchise to all races. The question is, can disenfranchised white voters still act as if they are immune to these forces while their towns and families crumble around them and go down fighting in a last gasp of denial, or will they at last wake up to the common enemy? The fact that hundreds of thousands of their ancestors died pointlessly during the Civil War for the right of a few aristocrats to own slaves does not give me hope.
1
I respectfully disagree with you Nicholas. The gun deaths you cite are almost all black on black gang violence or suicides, yes, suicides, the leading cause of gun deaths., and there is very little that can be done about that. Drug overdoses and resulting deaths are Darwinian and will eventually subside when all the weak die off. Preventing illegals from entering our country, and deporting those already here, are paramount issues, and will serve to eventually raise wages.
2
It is so cliche to jump to the bigotry card and call all of us kind and reasonable Americans who disagree with you on immigration, bigots! All of your points in this article; drugs, homelessness, guns and lack of health insurance are just some of the reasons we need to stop this caravan. There are confirmed gang members among these people who would love nothing but to bring more problems to our country. While I feel badly for the majority of these people, they are blatantly breaking our laws. They need to get in line behind the many others who are awaiting legal citizenship. By accepting this caravan of people we are going to have to house them, when that money should go to homeless Americans, we are also going to have to provide health care, again, something that should be provided to those in this country without, and there are some who undoubtedly will bring drugs and guns and all of the problems associated with them. You, quite eloquently, made my point for me.
6
This nation has lots of problems.
Selfish, self-unaware, divisive, appalling, and ignorant political leadership — on both sides of the aisle! — is just one of them.
People need to realize that our grossly imperfect politicians reflect and represent the people that we are quite well. With apologies to Commodore Perry, ‘We have met the enemy and they are (us).’
Unsure if we are willing or able to fix that anytime soon.
1
and please stop talking about his statements on TV unless there is a huge banner over your faces stating the actual facts. A visual may be helpful for folks who dont read and dont know how to critically listen. How about a big fat "LIE" banner when you repeat his statements. Whether you mean to or not, you amplify his misinformation and lies, and stoke the partisan fires. Please talk about the actual facts of his policies being enacted. You know, the ones that quietly slip past the media and allow environmental degradation. While this problem resides in the USA it affects all of us.
1
The vital need for free speech became an amendement protected right.It was implemented with the understanding that speech is a vector for new ideas ,and in a free society,ideas with some merit get debated in public fora.
Productive debates resulting in improved governance precludes sound education and an openness to conflicting points of views.
We must ask ourselves if our modern ways of debating are still conducive to the formation of better policies and innovative ways of moving ahead.Twitter? Instagram? Facebook? WhatsApp? to spell these names is to answer NO ,NO NO !!!! emphatically and unequivocally.
On the media front we must ask ourselves if the likes of Stephen Colbert ,Bill Maher, Wolf Blitzer, Cooper,Tapper or the wordsy Joe Scarborough are adding anything useful. These narcissistic news-courtjests have creative writing staff and excellent delivery pace.They bring no constructive new elements to the national conversation. They just fan the exasperation of President Trump,making him ever more dangerous to the world.
Unfortunately when such low quality dominates the public debate, sound thinking like mr Kristof's in his columns,become cannon fodder for further insults and name calling. Unless we demand higher standards in the national debate,we waste the gifts of the 2nd Amendment.
@Marcelo Brito message to myself and obviously a huge apology to any American reader of my earlier pompous drivel.I meant of course the first amemdment,and I blew it big time in my conclusion. Please forget and forgive.Thank you,I got a C for trying.
Excellent points in this column making the argument that no matter who, when and certainly where these migrants reach any part of the porous border Mexico has with the US, their numbers are but a pittance compared to the real numbers in this country who immigrate annually; 1.4 million. During the same period, 16,800 Americans will die from drugs; Kristof continues in the article. Most striking. No surprise that POTUS simply makes noises and the frightening part is that no one know/hears the real facts and the mid-terms are upon us. I've voted and encourage all who have not to keep reading columists like Nicholas Kristof. Think and read and then vote. What is the real "National emergy?" Start with the top and then I'd suggest in addition to Kristof's list: economic dispariy--the infamous "tax cut."
1
If the border is not sealed and the army puts up a strong response against the current army of 14,000 illegal aliens coming up to invade our country, but instead they succeed in getting in, then future waves of Central Americans illegal alies will number in the 100,000's, just like the millions of Syrian and other migrants who invaded Europe. This must not be allowed to occur.
My Solution:
Short term- declare martial law at our southern border, suspend all asylum regulations during martial law, set up a "no-man's land" buffer zone 1 mile wide where military rules of engagement permit them to shoot anyone crossing it.
Long Term: President Trump to allocate 20 Billion dollars from the current and next years's defense budget to build a was as a National Security measure, bypassing democratic senator's filibuster obstructions.
1
This illustrates the epitome of the wave of ignorance that is drowning America
For the so-called "land of the free" and the "home of the brave", and for a country so heavily armed, you Americans seemed to be running scared most of the time. Very odd.
1
Here is why there is little interest in aid to help quell gang violence in Central America, there is little to no money to quell the gang problem here in the US. Instead we get discriminatory Stop, Frisk, Arrest. Why are Americans not willing to help 7000 people from Honduras? Because they are sick and cannot afford care but refugees will get free care, same goes for housing, food, education.
Americans are willing to help everyone that is not an American. The attitude is similar to Right-to-Life where the right to all the essentials of life being provided by taxpayers ends once you get legal residency or citizenship.
Nick rarely writes about the violence Americans live with every day. He seems to not care about the plight of poor Americans and American gang violence. I am not sure how he convinces himself that US gangs are like those on Happy Days.
We need to start taking care of our own the way the Liberals want the people breaking immigrations laws to be treated. Our kids need secure food, shelter, and health care. They need to attend schools that are structurally safe and have safe water to drink and waste water treatment plant that work.
How much longer are we going to ignore the branch in our own eye?
4
Nick, Thanks again for talking plain sense, in a (Trump) time of nonsense. Each day we lament the spiraling demise of reason in our country, and the rise of brutishness and naked cynicism. One man, and one party, own this mess. And every news outlet
(not just the NYT) in the nation should now advocate voting them out.
I would put health insurance and unaffordable higher education in the first place.
5
Thank you for writing this article. The march from Central America is a huge humanitarian issue, loaded with bigotry & fear! Kristof, you're right, we're being distracted, once again, and Trump is leading all of us down a path that is completely distracting. When will journalists stop focusing on the "sexy" articles that distract us from more critical issues? When will this cycle stop? Your voice and those like it need to raise their voices as well.
3
Mr. Kristoff never once addresses the fact that these migrants have no right to immigrate to the US. They don’t qualify for asylum because they are only economic migrants. He doesn’t care. It’s apparent that he believes in open borders but lacks the courage to say so.
5
It's smoke and mirrors, the same 35+ years Lee Atwater GOP divide and conquer game... Divide us along wedge issues (immigration, LGBTQ rights, abortion, health insurance as a right or privilege etc.) and steal the middle class' economic future...Same old playbook but now w/Trump it's having DEADLY consequences...
The fact that there are other problems besides immigration in this country is undeniable. The opinion that some of these other problems are more important to the country's future is understandable and a good point can be made for that opinion. Most of us, however, are capable of concerning ourselves with more than one problem at a time. We can be concerned with the drug problem, the health care issue, and with this large group of potentially illegal immigrants all at the same time, and devote our energies to solving the most important problem or the one that can be solved most immediately.
Health care, drug addiction, and the larger problems of illegal immigration are problems with a long term solution. This mass migration is a problem which requires an immediate short term response. Is Mr. Trump's solution the correct one? Opinions can differ. Is the Democrat's solution the correct one? One cannot say since they have offered none.
3
We can all be obsessed by the many problems facing us, and perplexed by this administration’s propensity for increasing their destructiveness, but nothing is as dire as the looming climate catastrophe. Trump doesn’t believe in it, his acolytes don’t want to face it, and we all are too distracted by bombs and violence to muster any useful countermeasures.
But it is there, and it is coming. We have been warned.
Every nation needs to protect its sovereignty, Nicholas.
The citizens of every nation have every right to demand that their government defend their nation's borders. What nations don't defend their borders and their sovereignty, Mr. Kristof? Please...tell us. Which ones DON'T do that?
What am I...and MOST U.S. citizens missing in the argument?
6
Yes, we must (and do) defend our borders.
I don't think Mr. Kristof's point is that we should open the gates because there's a "caravan" this time.
I think his point is that our nation is well-equipped to handle this situation. We have well-guarded borders, and we can handle people who seek refuge. We have the means and the processes to grant or deny refuge. A few thousand people are not, somehow, going to slip in undetected and go on a rampage.
Mr. Kristof's point is that Mr. Trump is playing to people's fear and hysteria, and that he is diverting our attention away from genuine problems.
2
Trump does not think, he does not act, mostly he does not understand therefore does not care.
If it isn't on Fox&Friends, it does not exists.
There may or may not be Middle Eastern men in this caravan, but that is irrelevant, that is just an excuse.
Some of Trump's team have been around for a while, so they know some of the old papers from the days of George W. Bush.
In 2003 or 2004 a Republican think tank, Pew Research (?), wrote a strategic paper for the GOP in which it outlined an effective way to weaken and destabilize the European Union by directing a large number of refugees there and make certain the EU was "morally required" to accept them all, despite the huge cultural differences.
This would overburden the EU's social systems and thus weaken the bloc to the advantage of the US.
It has worked from day one in 2015, the EU took in millions of such illegal migrants and overburdened its social systems, had, and still has, a huge discussion about the best way to integrate them - blocking itself.
The US has had an advantage from this situation over the EU and the US also has seen the cost of such large number of immigrants into a social security system.
The US does not even have the kind of social security system the EU has and thus the impact of such a large group of illegal migrants would be more of a problem than anything else.
And that would weaken the US which is something Trump cannot sell.
And that is why Trump rejects BAD migrants for any excuse there is.
1
While I agree with your message, I think it's only proper to point out a significant flaw. Of course the actual number of migrants in this caravan won't matter much in the overall scheme of things. But you leave out a very real aspect that does have some validity: the possible deterrent effect of very visibly and dramatically preventing their entry. If the world sees that desperate and determined people can make it in, even in the face of intense scrutiny of their motives and circumstances, it signals that you have nothing to lose by trying. In the final analysis, how do we draw the line with sufficient clarity to make it seem like an unfavorable option? I confess to not know the answer, but some kind of effort must be made, and we have to realistically start from where we are. Maybe a good start would be to acknowledge the rampant hypocrisy on all sides about the extent to which our society actually likes having an endless supply of cheap labor.
5
@John: Agreed. It's the optics of the thing and the affect it will have on others who want to come to the border and apply.
"...how do we draw the line with sufficient clarity to make it seem like an unfavorable option?"
Maybe we could issue a statement that no one, not a single person who arrives with that caravan will be granted asylum.
2
Nick and readers point out lots of problems that will likely not be fully addressed by the current crop of politicians that primarily pander to the extremes of their base in order to gain favor and burnish their credentials. If solutions and consensus is ever going to emerge for any of these stubborn issues, we need a different breed of people in government that are willing to spend most of their time talking to academics and other experts in their respective fields instead of lobbyists and co-inhabitants of their party's echo chamber.
6
I think the media will create a red wave in the midterms and a Trump election in 2020. I accuse them because media coverage is all Trump all the time.
Even on MSNBC,( and on the networks) I rarely see speeches from the midterm Democratic candidates. I understand Obama is on the stump, but I haven't seen him either. Only thing I see is Trump in rally after rally in front of adoring crowds spewing untruth after untruth. Sometimes commented on by pundits, sometimes not. Which, when uncommented upon, leads one to conclude what he's saying could be fact. MSNBC gives as much air time to Trump as FOX.
There used to be something called "equal time." I guess no more. Have the networks in constant pursuit of ratings fallen prey to a media- grabbing charlatan who'll say anything to get attention?
24
@david altschiller
Republicans got rid of equal time a long time ago, in fact right before FOX news became a thing, not coincidentally.
2
It's not that "reminding people of dangers makes them temporarily more conservative." Your choice of words implies that all of their fears are real. Some fears are real, some are exaggerated, and some are just constructed out of whole cloth. It's that last category that's most dangerous.
5
All true and logical.
Unfortunately, none of this is about truth or logic.
2
and it's likely that less than half of eligible voters will turn out for the Midterm election
1
He's not so much ignoring our real nation emergencies as creating them.
5
Mr Kristof your editorial of our present situation is magnificent.
The only problem is the people who could turn this ship around will never read it. Republican's presently in Congress don't seen to care. Perhaps the next generation will see the light and vote them out.
VOTE VOTE VOTE!!!
3
Well written. It is mind boggling that anyone could believe the lies that come from Trump and the GOP. We have a choice everyday to not live in fear, yet millions of Americans choose to watch Fox and believe the GOP.
1
Discussing issues on the merits is no longer possible in American politics.
1
Nick, I almost always agree with you, but the American people have made it abundantly clear that we don't want to exacerbate our homelessness problem by bringing in 7,000 more homeless people (every month). We don't want to complicate our health care reform debate by bringing in 7,000 more uninsured (every month).
And we don't want to hand the midterms to the Republicans by having people on our team call for enormously unpopular policies.
7
Nicholas, I agree in principle with all you said. But could you share how you arrived at your rough calculation that during the migration 9,000 Americans might die due to lack of health insurance? I do know that a Harvard study concluded (before the Affordable Care Act) that an estimated 44,900 die each year due to lack of health insurance. Numbers need to be as accurate as we can make them.
In any case, there is no reason why the U.S. cannot join the rest of the developed world and be sure that all our citizens can get the medical care that they need.
1
I like the things you say Mr. Kristof but mostly what you say does not translate to most people. They look at the caravan as people desperate to take their jobs and move into their poor neighborhoods because they know they will not be moving into the better neighborhoods. I agree that if people could understand truly understand the poverty and violence that the people of the caravan face they would applaud their courage for leaving.
1
You forgot our crumbling infrastructure (Think lead-poisoned drinking water in Flint, Michigan), the meaningless war in Afghanistan (which we will eventually lose, just as we did in Vietname, because "our side" is so corrupt), inequality (which Trump's tax cuts made notably worse), and, of course, climate change (which will be such a big deal in a few decades that nothing else will matter).
94
I simply do not understand how fear-mongering and hate are embraced by normal human beings. I do not deny it happens. I just do not have a strong “belief” system and rely on facts and evidence, to accept strong evidence and to reject evidence that is weak. I think all people are the same species and deserve to be treated like human beings, including refugees seeking asylum. I do not think kidnapping children from asylum-seeking parents is humane. I do not think there are Mideasterners embedded in the “caravan” because there is no evidence.
When I was born, America was not a real democracy. Oh, it was a democracy on paper for white males, but an “exclusive” democracy is an oxymoron. Democracy is inherently inclusive. Some people have fought very hard to be treated as equal citizens and this fight has made America a more perfect Union. It is now being threatened by nationalism, an ingrained hateful, exclusive, anti-democratic movement Americans fought two World Wars against.
Nationalism is something to fight against once again. Republicans have embraced it and I will vote against them, their hate, their fear-mongering, their menace, their vengeance.
77
It was reported in yesterday's Mexico News Daily that The United Nation’s Refugee Agency (UNHRC) has 45 people on the ground in Mexico helping the more than 7,000 people who are marching from Central America to the United States border with Mexico.
It was reported in yesterday's NYT that the Red Cross is helping the 7,000+ illegal immigrants who are marching to invade the USA. It is widely acknowledged that most of these marchers are not actually refugees but persons seeking better economic conditions, which does not qualify them as refugees.
The U.S. spends millions of dollars every year supporting the UN and the Red Cross. Perhaps these expenditures should be reviewed in light of the fact that both agencies are acting against the interests of the U.S. in this matter.
13
@Mon Ray Please remember Gandhi's words, that "All humanity is one undivided and indivisible family."
5
@Mon Ray Nobody is "marching". Nobody is "invading". As you acknowledge, these people are seeking better economic conditions. The Red Cross exists to help those in need. Helping others is entirely in the US interest.
2
There is enough money in this country to produce solutions to most of our problems. But that money is more and more being concentrated into fewer pockets and made unavailable for fixing problems.
6
LOL for the left it's never about immigration and only ever about bigotry...
Kristof is being disingenuous about the caravan, as for such a highly visible organized phalanx to receive accommodation on demand sets a terrible precedent and effectively nullifies the rule of law for all future such phalanxes, and also reverses the will of the electorate as expressed in the last election.
(Kristof might also confer with The Economist, which conducted a recent poll that showed 3:1 support for stronger border enforcement. Memo: Strong border enforcement is the consensual mainstream position, not a hard-right boutique policy.)
I found the Ebola quarantine call for a few of our privileged doctors risky and ill-advised and I fail utterly to see how observing basic centuries-old principles of quarantine under such emergency conditions now constitutes invidious discrimination.
It was a gamble, perhaps a long-odds gamble, but a gamble that turned on social cachet and narcissism (of both the doctors and the former president) and not on a hard-headed canny analysis of the risk-benefit for the larger distribution of humanity.
As with everything else rational, the left increasingly militates against even science itself when social justice is in the driver seat.
6
The only way to put drug cartels out of business is to have clean drugs produced by the pharmaceutical industry, and make them available for free on prescription, their use supervised by a docotor or nurse in neighborhood health facilities. That will also diminish drug related crimes, gangs, prostitution, and unintended overdoses. Those wanting to get off drugs can be weaned off them under medical supervision. Unattainable? Then why allow alcohol and nicotine, harddrugs themselves?
2
The caravans are us- we just haven’t been hurt as egregiously as Central Americans but Trump is determined to take us there by 2020.
If we don’t Vote them out by November 6th we will be on the caravan to Canada by 2020
4
''Good governance often turns out to be bad politics, and vice versa. '' I think America ( the ''other'' 70%) would like to go back to the Obama years of good governance that was boring and not covered by the 140 character media.
Having said that, what is unique this election is the absolute brazen ability for the President (and republicans in general) to lie about any manner of supposed threat. The Press then dutifully parrots said lies over and over again each and every day, so that more low information voters can catch up to the mob.
The best course of action to breaking the fever is to vote.
5
Excellent timely article and the estimated number of those refugees arriving at our border seeking asylum is down to around 3600 or less as some will stay in Mexico.
Trump was afraid of getting the virus, he wasn't afraid for the rest of us just himself. People may forget the term Narcissists only think of themselves 24/7. There is no 'other'. He used his own fears and is never prouder of himself then when his inflammatory remarks and hate and fear narratives go viral.
1
The president is said to have the attention span of a gnat and appears to have the empathy of a python. Real national emergencies don't interest him. Facts, as Al Gore termed them, are inconvenient truths, so Trump ignores those. Problems belong to others, so he ignores those, too.
Put it all together, and it is Trump who is the national emergency.
Unlike Lincoln's Gettysburg address, the world will, indeed, truly note and long remember what he said here, and will also never forget what he did here. Sad. Very sad.
2
Even sadder would be that future generations may have adapted to the nasty, me-first Trumpian style of campaigning and governing. And we will have returned to the Stone Age.
1
"Here are two: First, the Caravan won’t make a bit of difference to America." Not if you live in a million dollar coop with a country house in Garrison. If you live among the people, illegals make a huge difference. For one thing, it means more overcrowding in schools and hospitals, more demands placed on local services beginning with bilingual education and special education services. Schools in LA built for 1000 students now house up to 4,000 students who are placed on year round schedules on rotation. Many are not criminals in their own countries but become criminals here as they drive cars without licenses and insurance, flee scenes of accidents, resort to shoplifting when they can't find work. and are often themselves victims of predators of their own nationality who take advantage of their weakness and desperation. You enjoy the good life, Mr. Kristof, but towns and cities saturated with illegals change character and become less livable.
8
“Maybe the real “National Emergy” is drugs, homelessness, gun deaths and lack of health insurance?”
Thank you for one of the few editorials that uses statistically relevant examples of the challenges within the borders of this country to contrast the claim of dangers from without.
Unfortunately, such rational analysis is nowhere to be seen in any political messaging or ads, so once again, the choir agrees but the congregants remain uninformed.
Please - take these examples to the next level. Use them politically until 2020, and begin acting on them starting now!
17
Given our current president's inability to use the English language, it appears that a law must be passed to require presidential candidates to take an English language test.
With that out of the way, I focus on two national emergencies, one named by NK, one not.
1) Health care: Yesterday, a reader who has had more than his share of health problems wrote a comment in which he explained that he must leave the USA to spend the rest of his retirement in a country where being given the health care he needs will not bankrupt him. I replied, expressing my hope that he could find a way to move to such a country, a country such as the one to which I retired, Sweden. He was kind enough to communicate with me, so I want to note here that any reader who does communicate with me can rest assured that his or her information will never be passed on to anyone else.
I will not be moving back to the USA so I am assured of totally free health care for the rest of my life, since Swedish UHC has a provision that grants all of us who reach age 86 health care for which we do not even have to pay a check-in fee, often about $12 USD.
2) Climate change-The USA's continuing failure to take the steps needed to become fossil-fuel free represents a problem so much more serious than the arrival of a few thousand asylum seekers that even to have to point this out shows the absurdity of Trump's views on emergencies.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Citizen US SE
16
Lot of words to hide that Trump ignores anything that doesn't help with his conquest of full power, even over his supporters.
4
Trump ignores our real needs such as health care and lifting the poor out of poverty because his entire approach is to put on his television show --his version of reality--intended not to inform or to discuss but to distract, distract. There are no barriers to what he can say, but whatever occurs to him tends to become national policy. He declares a tax cut of 10% before the elections. Of course this is impossible, so his loyal lying press secretary will amend it, that he actually said after the elections or he said before the next elections. She follows his pattern of telling lies easily. Distract. Put on your reality show. Keep saying how brilliant you are and avoid the real topics because you have not the foggiest notion how to solve them.
9
Trump is a salesman and a showman and people love what he's selling and are dazzled by his display. He showcases bigotry, fear, and the fantasy of America as a mash-up of Leave it to Beaver and Petticoat Junction. While the president profits in myriad ways our democracy is weakened, animosity grows and the powers who are supposed to check him count their votes and watch their polls instead.
3
Kristof wants universal health care and open borders the same time. One excludes the other. Kristof wants national wealth to be distributed more evenly. Uncontrolled immigration from poor countries like Honduras put the hope for that to rest. Same is drug problem: immigrants from Central America with connections to local drug producers provide an established supply chain.
9
@Crow
You hit on a core contradiction that Milton Friedman first mentioned.
A large socialistic vision fused with "Who gives a heck about sovereignty?"
It's insane, schizophrenic, and shows utterly no respect for the laws of economics, different standards of living, different modes of government, different histories, etc...
3
@Crow
Sir, respectfully you are ignoring the data provided by Mr Kristof and countless other sources.
The caravan does not present as big a threat to us as the other real emergencies that you describe.
I won't die, or become bankrupt or homeless from a migrant entering the country, but because I have a pre existing condition and the Trump administration has allowed insurance companies to refuse us, I and many others might.
22
The pictures, videos, news coverage all make the caravan look scary, it plays right to the fears of most Americans. Yet, here is your report that calms those fears and puts the caravan in perspective.
My fear, The Democratic leadership will not take your stance and continue to allow the Republican Party to induce fear to the public, especially the voting public. There seems to be no fight left in the leadership, that is scary.
7
Nick, cutting off humanitarian aid is exactly the wrong approach.
Right wingers may not want to hear this, but the only way we are curtailing these migrations any time soon is by adopting a comprehensive hemispheric approach to stemming these tides.
That means more humanitarian aid to countries in need in the region, a laser focus on climate change so that Central America does not become even more uninhabitable due to either drought or the continual devastation wrought by a succession of tropical storms, etc.
That also means ending the war on drugs, which should more correctly be labeled the Latin American Organized Crime Empowerment Act - a war that only makes drug trafficking one of the most profitable businesses in the region, and thus makes it impossible for the governments in the region to either stem corruption or effectively fight the bad hombres who profit from supplying Americans' seemingly insatiable demand for narcotics.
Our Central American immigration crisis is not getting fixed until we address the underlying dynamics driving these migrations.
10
@Matthew Carnicelli, what you’re saying is right out of the Democrat playbook give more aide on top of the millions to these countries that use it for other things. The way to stop it is nobody gets in unless you do it legally. If you think I’m wrong stand up for what you believe in “open Borders” and quit being a chump and the big hearted liberal. It’s not playing to the public. You look like Weasles.
2
When The Wall has been built, when the 1% own the vast majority of the nation's wealth, when healthcare is unaffordable to any but the well off, when the water is once again unfit to drink and the air unfit to breathe, when the nation is once again mired in unwinnable wars, when our infrastructure has rotted, when the under-educated still cannot find living wage employment - who will then be the target of The Base's anger? Will they suddenly realize then that the GOP has been in complete control of the federal government for a decade? Not a chance.
11
If nothing else Trump is a master manipulator of the old media via the new media. He can spell 'emergencies' just as well as the rest of us, but spelling everything correctly wouldn't generate anywhere near the media attention, from newspapers through to the late night talkshows, that misspelling generates.
Trump would rather have you make a bit of fun at his expense than not to be talked about at all. It is just another weapon to continually dominate the airwaves.
4
This article was written by a man whose February 18, 2017 column was entitled, "How Can We Get Rid of Trump?" So, consider the source.
Moving on to the arguments espoused by the author this morning:
1. The Caravan is of course not in and of itself a direct threat to America; it's what it represent that is the threat, because it constitutes the premise that leads to the conclusion. The premise is that any and all who show up at the U.S. border must be welcomed and accepted. Thus, the premise of 7,000 leads to the conclusion of 700,000 or 70,000,000.
2. The criticism of Trump for threatening to cut off aid to Central America is disingenuous. Trump is not threatening to cut off aid so that Honduras will get worse to lead to more problems; rather, Trump is threatening to cut off aid until those to the South of us stop exporting their people to us without our permission. Mr. Kristof has put the cart before the horse, and he knows it.
3. At least, unlike virtually every article on immigration from the anti-Trump side of things, this one has a scintilla of an immigration policy in it, to which reference is made again to aid to Central America. That can and should surely be part of any policy.
3. But a scintilla is not a policy. Mr. Kristof, please. Lay out YOUR entire policy so that it can be analyzed and criticized. What is your SOLUTION. Until you become more than a Trump-basher, you are just hot air. And, if your policy became law, would it include enforcement provisions?
8
@keevan d. morgan
"The premise is that any and all who show up at the U.S. border must be welcomed and accepted."
No, the premise is that if someone shows up at the border and requests refugee status, their request must be considered. That's required by U.S. law.
"the premise of 7,000 leads to the conclusion of 700,000 or 70,000,000".
This is reductio ad absurdum.
"Trump is threatening to cut off aid until those to the South of us stop exporting their people to us"
If we cut off aid, things will get worse, and more people will try to seek asylum in our country. This is obvious.
"reference is made again to aid to Central America. That can and should surely be part of any policy."
So is it part of our policy? Do we even have a coherent immigration policy?
"Mr. Kristof, please. Lay out YOUR entire policy so that it can be analyzed and criticized."
Oh, so now it's the job of a newspaper columnist to come up with an immigration policy for our country? Silly me, I though that was the job of our elected officials.
Republicans have controlled the White House and both houses of Congress for years now. It's clear they have decided that keeping immigration a mess works to their advantage.
1
@T
Since we already have 11-20 million "walk-ins" in the country, it is hardly reductio ad absurdum. There is no upside number to those who oppose Trump. Even your own response says that anyone showing up must be considered, and therefore your own number is without limit.
Moreover, the real reductio ad absurdum is that a law meant to protect a limited number of people from anti-U.S. killer dictators is now interpreted (by you included) as anyone asking for refugee status on account of their being poor or any other reason. As usual, a helping hand is being turned into an entitlement--this time by any "citizen of the world." Reasonable limits are not bigotry.
Things will not get worse if Trump cuts off aid so long as we enforce our borders.
Yes, we do have a coherent immigration policy. It is in the United States Code. but the 11-20 million aforementioned immigrants ignored it with the willing cooperation of the Democratic Party and Republican big business. You agree that it is the purview of Congress to make the law--well, it did, but it was then ignored.
And, yes, it is up to a columnist to come up with an immigration policy if he wants to criticize one. Or, at least he should conclude his column with a disclaimer that he doesn't know what he's talking about since he can't figure it out. At least then his own limitations would be exposed when considering what he is presently advocating.
We should welcome a ton of immigrants--who follow our law and Constitution.
"Maybe the real “National Emergy” is drugs, homelessness, gun deaths and lack of health insurance?"
And the emergency not mentioned, but which will intensify all the others, is the unaddressed evolution of global warming to climate change to climate chaos to climate catastrophe. And it will bring a host of new emergencies as well, the like of which we've never seen before.
Vote. Vote for reason and for the future the grandkids will inherit.
10
@JessiePearl,yup run that program and we will run the country.
While you point out some real issues, any discussion of the most important issues facing America must put climate change front and center. Not doing so would be akin to failing to mention WWII in 1942.
4
Thank you for concentrating on the real issues in this country and not Trump's latest tweet or rally attendance.
It is much more useful to the Country.
4
It's also true that Trump "could very well be" a multi-billionaire.
2
Was the caravan possibly orchestrated by those supporting Trump, either national or foreign? The timing just before the election is suspect.
2
Every problem listed in this editorial needs attention from our government. Band aids and small amounts of money won't fix these problems. But what Nicholas Kristof is overlooking is that drugs, homelessness, gun deaths, and a lack of health insurance are used by our politicians as examples of irresponsibility rather than the signs of real problems that America needs to fix. Until our president and his minions consider these real problems nothing will be done at the federal level. Or worse, what will be done will exacerbate the problems.
The GOP and Democrats have never really bothered to look at life from the bottom. They both push the illusion that hard work will solve every problem. They both refuse to fund programs that can work. And both sides are unable to refuse the money and endorsements they get when whichever industry is involved offers them.
Then there are the citizens who don't understand how quickly a life can unravel. They "know" it's all due to bad character or a lack of God in one's life. On a personal note, I know that character and God have very little to do with the unravelling of a life. A less than robust social safety net, racism, bigotry, misogyny, and other forms of hatred play a much larger role in this country's refusal to help others when they need it most. It's easier to point to migrants or terrorists because we don't know them. We do occasionally know our neighbors.
10
About 62,100 of those experiencing homelessness are military veterans. Something to consider when we are a couple of weeks away from Veterans' Day, and we all want to thank our veterans for their service.
Helping your local transition center or shelter caring for veterans is an excellent way to say thank-you in a meaningful way. If you are in NE FL, Five Star Veterans Center does outstanding work.
Thank you, Mr. Kristof, for reminding us we don't have to go far from our own homes to help with national emergencies.
8
The Donor Class cares not one whit about any of these "problems" (their quotes, not mine). They will remain safely behind their heavily-fortified gated communities which by now are largely outside the United States (again, so these aren't their problems). Ah, but Mother Nature may have other plans for them in the end... and we can still VOTE in NOVEMBER.
4
In South Pacific, Lieutenant Cable has a song about being carefully taught into bigotry and bias. We have an educational system that models hierarchy, conformity and performance orientation. Research has shown that children are less creative in high school than they were in kindergarten. Schools force thinking on our children instead the independence of their own thinking. Our children are confronted daily with history books and reading narratives that reinforce a culture of hierarchy and biases. The list is too long for this space. As a result, we have a people that follows, accepts bias, seeks reward for performance, has difficulty finding or accepting creative ideation or solutions and can’t understand the demands of democracy. This list can also be longer. Trump is merely a manifestation of an ersatz democracy stuck in a mire without the foresight or will to find a democratic social order.
5
I agree, and if you want to look at scale, the real global emergency is climate change and pollution, and the real scale of death is the extinction of species after species, including giraffes and blue whales. For those who believe animals are inferior and don't matter, fear not: humans will eventually drive themselves to extinction too if we do not STOP, TURN AROUND, and deal with climate change, pollution, and habitat destruction. But we will have a nice decent into the new Dark Ages with starvation, drought, fires, diseases, and loss of civilization first. If that sounds horrible, it is: because we have ignored the decades we have had to do something better, instead having politicians squabble over nonsense while the world burns.
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So much easier to pretend that the toughest problems are from the outside than to admit that they are right here, inside our country.
It would take honesty and deep thinking to admit that dire crises can't be solved with a fantastical wall or cruel immigration policy.
Small wonder that the same man who won't even write out "emergency" wouldn't trouble himself to name, let alone address, a true one.
14
Climate change and other dire environmental problems are just not in our heads yet. Whenever we list problems we seldom include the environment--but if asked directly about climate change we all agree, "Yes, isn't it terrible". Climate change is the priority. It's the one ring that rules them all.
10
And maybe, maybe we can just agree that unfettered illegal immigration is not a net benefit for the country, that the resources used to deal with it could be put to better use, including to address some of the issues cited in this article, and that the immediate caravan issue has potentially large implications by inviting bigger and bigger groups of people to violate our border and our laws and overwhelming the resources we have to deal with it.
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@Allen
Everyone agrees unfettered illegal immigration is bad. Everyone. You can’t find anybody, in either Party, that doesn’t agree, and doesn’t want to stop it from happening. Think about why the Republicans are telling people people Democrats want “open borders.” Maybe we can agree that nobody benefits from our messed up immigration system more than Republican politicians, and they are more interested in exploiting it than fixing it.
7
@Allen
And maybe, maybe we can agree that the question of "net benefit" for our country is a complex question; that our immigration policies require comprehensive revision; that humanitarian issues (you know, those human rights violations we chastise all those other countries for) are an integral part of us as a people; that perhaps assisting Central American countries will abate the conditions impelling people to undertake the dangerous and difficult trek north into the unknown; that this course may be more of a "net benefit" than building a silly wall and/or militarizing an 1,800 mile border in perpetuity.
2
@Allen
Seeking asylum is not illegal immigration. We have laws (and international norms) surrounding asylum. By all accounts, these folks are going to walk up to the door and knock, and ASK for refuge, because their home is uninhabitable.
2
The real national emergency is climate change, if we do not address it all the other concerns will be moot.
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@John Stroughair, we have heard about the world getting hotter and cooler and dates when it will be over. We can’t drive anymore we have to start living like we did 100 years ago and spend trillions. Even if we spent trillions it would turn back the numbers you came up with only a tiny percentage. So as you’re living a life of frustration that you cannot get everyone on the bandwagon will continue. That’s why we live in this country because I can have a different opinion than you, but just here lately o get shouted down for having a different opinion. Do a better job of convincing me we can turn it back. But you can’t.
2
@John Stroughair
Thanik you, John, for calling attention to an emergency that threatens the extinction of life on earth within the current century and yet is almost completely ignored by the media.
Income inequality.
It takes money to buy representation. It's our lack of representation that has us breaking down in all the areas you describe.
All of our problems will be lessened and in some cases disappear if we can get on a better economic foot.
The drugs, the homelessness, lack of health care... all of it, gets better if we make more.
12
Drug prices. Having insurance does not mean you can afford the treatment. Negotiate drug prices to levels on a par with the rest of the modern world. Stop the pharma PACs from donating money to candidates.
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@poslug US drug prices are higher because we make it easy to sue drug manufacturers..
1
Thank you for calling attention to the real issues we face. Unfortunately, we do not have a leader (and that includes most in the political party he leads) , we have a celebrity performer whose greatest strength is his ability to lie and distract.
The job for the rest of us...and especially the press...is to ignore the distractions and call him on the issues.
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@Jane, it’s an issue you lost on and you’ve pulled it out of the garage to run on it again, because that’s all you know about moving this country forward. That’s why Donald Trump is president because all you could come up with was the smooth talking do nothing President .
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Thank you Nicholas Kristof. We also need to expose corporations' and our own government's complicity in these problems. Watch this segment on Democracy Now please https://www.democracynow.org/2018/10/24/whos_behind_ice_how_amazon_palantir
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Mr. Kristof reminds us that the world is a small place. And its getting smaller.
Troubles in one part of the globe, even seemingly remote parts like West Africa, are really just a few hours away by air. The notion that we can build walls, surround the castle with a moat, and stock the water with alligators to protect ourselves is naive in the extreme. Walls no longer work, if they ever did. (Just ask an historically literate citizen of China.)
Poverty, disease, and strife in one place affect all places. These problems are like water on pavement, they will find every crack and seep through.
A better response is to address the issues where they begin, which is not just in Honduras but in our backyards as we consume lots of illegal drugs from Central America—just to name one obvious connection. If the GOP wants to help Americans, they can focus on the drug problems here by looking at their own families. It’s a lucky extended family today that does not have someone addicted to opioids and in need of treatment.
Yes, the opioid legislation passed this week will help, but it’s not enough. We still have a low-wage jobs crisis, lack universal health care, and face systemic barriers to personal advancement. Solutions exist and have proven effective to address even these seemingly intractable issues. Our leaders need to listen, learn, and respond based on evidence rather than ramping up fear.
If we work on our problems here, we will help the problems there. What goes around...
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If the 11 to 20 million illegal immigrants living in the United States were deported many of Americans problems would be solved. There would be no housing shortage. There would be no unemployment. There would be no school overcrowding. Maybe when offered jobs which paid a living wage, those people involved in gun violence would instead choose to work in conventional jobs. Pollution would be reduced and water shortages mitigated. We would have to make some hard choices on health care especially for the old people with chronic conditions. Why is Mr. Kristof incapable of understanding immigration, both legal and illegal, is the cause of many of our "National Emergencies."
16
@Mike -
Not sure how you’re drawing your conclusions or what data you’re using other than wishful thinking. There’s no evidence, beyond your numbers, that immigrants of any sort, let alone “illegal” ones, are driving housing development rates, school construction, pollution, or water shortages.
People “involved in gun violence” don’t do so because they’re denied employment due to immigrants. I’ll grant you that perhaps if we paid living wages, they might seek jobs, but until that occurs, apparently crime does pay better. Your argument seems wildly disconnected from any basis in fact.
Lastly, making hard choices in healthcare for “old people with chronic conditions” is far different from providing necessary healthcare to ANYONE, regardless of citizenship status. I’m not old and i have chronic cancer, and I’m both a citizen and a son and grandson of citizens.
You can’t use numbers, drawn out of the air, to overlay on real societal problems and say they’re due to “illegal immigrants.” Immigration is a challenge. Agreed. Illegal immigration is a challenge. Agreed. But immigration is also the genesis and heart of this country. The “problems” you state didn’t stop America before, and until politicians begin to work on real solutions that exist for current citizens, immigration is not going to change the outcomes at all.
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@Mike
While I agree that illegal immigration must be addressed comprehensively and that the liberal response now seems to be blanket amnesty for those here already and open borders to one and all, the only sane, logical and workable solution is to provide a path for citizenship to those here already, truly secure the border, including building a wall which Israel has shown can work, and changing our laws to end or put real limits on chain migration and stopping immigration lotteries. Most of those who have lived here a long time work and many businesses that are already struggling to find workers would suffer more if mass deportations, again an impractical and cruel solution, were to be carried out. Of course liberals could solve the problem in a way similar to this if they would support funding the construction of a wall. They won't so long as they continue to view immigration as a wedge issue, as some on the right do as well, and believe it can help get Democrats elected.
1
@SMK NC
My vacation home in Southampton, NY gives me some direct experience. Illegal immigrants there, who provide needed labor, overwhelmed the area once laborers began bringing their families, bringing problems to schools, causing property taxes to rise and redirecting funds that should have been designated for citizens. A broader guest worker program and other programs would have helped or alleviated this problem. It comes down to both sides continuing to agree to disagree, but we now are at a place where liberals don't even acknowledge a problem exists.
I had voted for John McCain, but quickly became impressed with Obama's deliberative style of governing, where he combined facts and reasoning like no other president I remember. I also remember the punditry (including at the NY Times) whining that Obama was "cool and detached"...traits that went hand in hand with a reasoned, deliberative approach to decision making. So Mr. Kristof, if you want our political leaders to base policies on facts and reason, you might want to ask your colleagues to applaud those that do that, and stop complaining if the approach comes off as lacking emotion and connection.
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@Ken
Oh yeah, like when he promoted HC reform by reminding people that doctors were amputating the limbs of diabetics to generate income rather than treating them properly. No one remembers this or the many other ways he ignored facts and reason in favor of partisan politics or his own personal preferences. But continue to live in your bubble.
1
This is a spot on recollection of how the Times and others in the "liberal" media managed to undermine the Obama presidency and fuel the forces that gave us Trump. Even if you strip away the racism inherent in some of the griping about Obama's style (including that of some Times columnists -- even at least one from the left), the criticism was shallow and populist. Nice catch.
5
The only national emergency that our current government recognizes is the potential to lose the majority. Nothing else matters - not truth, not how policy affects individuals, not the fate of the planet, not the long term recognition that continued climate change will make marches to our border a constant.
We don't have a government that exists to improve the nation. We have a government that exists for the sole goal of continuing to exist. They are the equivalent of ragweed. Abundant and toxic in the fall.
The lives of others don't matter, because we can blame all ills on "personal responsibility" - that is the idea that if something terrible happens to you, you have the responsibility to fix it or die; we do not recognize social responsibility.
"E pluribus unum" no longer applies: we are not "out of many, one." Our national motto is "I got mine, you're on your own. Out of many, me."
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@Cathy
Excellent comment! Thank you.
3
I would like to see an objective analysis of the demographics of the caravan. By photo observation the majority of marchers are healthy younger men. I believe our economy could use their labor. There should be a mechanism to use work permits to diffuse these migrants. Then work on the cause of Central American poverty.
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@jhann1
Personally, I would rather see our businesses be forced to our young able bodied men who can work labor jobs a liveable wage rather than flood the labor pool with workers who have no rights and can be paid very low labor rates.
2
@jhann1There is a mechanism. Temporary worker permits. I have spoken with many people in Mexico who have been working in the US and been deported or left voluntarily because of fear of "la Migra". There are many parts of the country, New England included, where seasonal or temporary help is needed. Everywhere you look in northeastern Connecticut there are ads and signs looking for help. We could help local businesses and reduce the illegal immigration problem by setting up a system where Mexicans, Hondurans, etc. could apply for jobs using the internet (almost all have access to the web), work here and send money home to their families and then go home as necessary. The technology exists, but building a useless wall (ask the Israelis how effective a wall is) is a simple answer that Trump's racist base understands.
Such an important and effective analysis of what's truly important.
And yet your essay brings forth the largest problem of all: a nation full of voters who cannot intelligently assess right from wrong, truth from lies, rational policy directives from fear-based fantasies, propaganda from actual factual information.
When critical thinking dies, so too does democracy.
177
Nick's plea is powerful.
And yet... will it change a single vote?
So much of what I read is focused on a singular base of people, of one political persuasion or the other.
No matter the salience of Nick's plea, the ears that need to hear it aren't listening.
25
Thank you for a voice of common sense, rare on either side of the divide these days. One of the few reasons to continue to subscribe. Note from the photo how many migrants to the US are indigenous to this continent! It always amazes me how the descendants of European immigrants who invaded a few centuries ago act like they have more right to live in a continent they invaded, than the people who have lived here tens of thousands of years. Many of the original nations were migratory, so I don't think native people should have to go through "border control." They have more right to this country than we do.
27
This column is tragic. Kristof purports to direct our attention to the BIG issues, lists what he claims are the BIG four - and omits the BIGGEST issue, so big it makes the four he points to look like mosquito bites.
We are initiating self-sustaining processes of continuing climate change that will devastate human civilization and life on Earth.
122
Please tell that to all the redundant mothers having multiple kids and driving gas-guzzling SUVs here in town. For the first time in my memory - and I'm getting old - our main avenue and my street were under water after a flash flood. But the yuppies who keep breeding will just move to higher ground.
2
@Dick Purcell Nicholas Kristof has been one of the strongest and most vocal supporters of taking the necessary steps to prevent the devastation from global warming. This column was concerned with the "caravan."
Your criticism of him was unwarranted.
2
Nick, might I suggest that in the run-up to the election, you conduct conversations on Facebook with people who have experience on the election issues of concern to Americans, and very different ideas than Donald Trump. Such as Kevin Ryan. Rather than the foreign minister of Sweden or a foreign photo journalist. We need to focus. On putting a check on the moron-in-chief. We need all hands on deck. You have the public platform. Use it please.
30
@DebbieR curious if you believe that the minds that need changing would even reach Kristof's imagined conversations? the other side is unreachable.
21
@Terry McKenna,
As a volunteer canvasser, I spend hours knocking on dozens of doors for the sole purpose of affecting the actions of a fraction of the people who have not made up their minds. It is tedious and often seems meaningless, but I am told it makes a difference.
If Nick wants to spend 95% of his time appealing to the philanthropists and people who are passionate about international human rights, that's his right, but right now, we need to focus on what's happening here.
In the past, Nick used to bring up the fact that he was raised in Yamhill Oregaon and therefore had a different perspective than people raised in liberal enclaves. Well, I am guessing that people in Yamhill are not going to base their votes on anything the foreign minister of Sweden has to say.
Has he ever interviewed people who have been swindled/stiffed by Trump? Where are the NY Times columnists giving voice to the small folk?
Don’t send in the Clowns, Trump is here
The one the Rust Belters revere,
The Mouth without Brain
Yet vainer than vain
Announcing another bum steer.
Strong leader through thick and through thin
Stiffarms a Montanegrin,
A Putin colluder
No head-of-state ruder
Generator of Trumpian Sin.
Obama is Trump’s main homme noir,
To outrank him he does aspire
He’ll prove day and night
He’s whiter than white,
Too bad his IQ isn’t higher.
108
Great juxtaposition of the caravan and real US problems.
Personally, I think our borders should be controlled and asylum cases considered on their merits, as the law requires. If a 6 year old walks 20 miles a day with his family from Honduras to the US border to escape gang violence, we ought to keep the family together and consider their application seriously, which is not the case today.
And we ought to fund and advise efforts to address Central American gangs, many of which originated in Los Angeles and then were deported back to Central America. There might have been a better solution.
The refugee issue is almost certainly going to be far larger in the future, due to climate change. So we should be working on real solutions now, instead of arguing about a wall. Walls were OK 2,000 years ago for the Chinese and British Romans but we have these things called airplanes today, which is how 70% of those who overstay visas arrive.
Walls are so BC.
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@Look Ahead
Basically the difference between the Obama and Trump immigration policies is that Obama didn't blame anyone, for refugees, including the refugees themselves. Democratic immigration policy has never been warm and cuddly. Just not quite as ruthless and cruel. And it was never ginned up on propaganda baldly designed to incite hate and fear. That's the main difference.
4
When I started advocating for deeply impoverished children here in US, I was advised to look in the refrigerator as an indicator of what was happening in the home. Now there are no refrigerators. Each night families are living in cars and campers parked near school. Our kids are in trouble. Congress passes tax cuts for wealthy. US priorities.
191
Mr Kristof comes close to identifying the real problem but misses a crucial factor. Immigration is all about Climate Change. I saw it in Somalia and Egypt, I see it in Central America. Climate Change degrades the environment, wrecks the economy and ultimately destabilizes the country, resulting in chaos, war and refugees. The situation is only going to get worse.
Unfortunately, Trump's policy is denial combined with belligerence and demagoguery. It's hard to imagine a worse response but easy to see why he chose it.
147
@Drew Yes. Climate change is a critical factor in the Syrian tragedy, along with energy competition. Drought drove country farm families off their land and to the cities where there was little work for them. Add the rivalry between Shia and Sunni gas pipelines with their proxy allies and a despotic minority dictator in Assad and poof: Disaster.
12
We have to look at our own policies in causing the mass migrations in Central America, such as Honduras. Our CIA uses Central America as their playground. Any country that will not allow our corporations to plunder their resources are taken out We alway seem to back the ruthless dictators against Socialists that wish to use their countries resources for their own citizens well being.
This year Trump was given an $80 billion increase in our bloated military budget. Of course with the help of the Democrats, that have the same weapons and military contractors as donors. The military exists to provide profits to corporations, not to keep us safe. Our country can not let peace break out, because our economy depends on war. We are a wealthy country, but have been captured by the very rich. Just think if we used some of the money going towards continuous war to help those that are not wealthy and towards our Real “National Emergencies”.
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@steve
Thank you for addressing the source of the "caravan" problem: the 100-yr old American "foreign policy" fingerprints are all over the mess it created in Central America, through supporting dictators, paying corrupting bribes on behalf of corporations, bullying, in short allowing authoritarian regimes to control & persecute their citizens. Read John Perkins"s "Confessions of An Economic Hit Man" for a more detailed picture.
2
In 1945 Britain cashiered Winston Churchill. Despite the fact that he arguably saved the free world by his efforts in World War II, certainly before the U.S. entry in late 1941, he was a Tory, a Conservative … and Britain wanted a welfare state. That’s not meant as a pejorative: they actually said that they wanted a “welfare state”. So, when the Potsdam Conference occurred immediately after the end of the war in Europe, Churchill was replaced as the United Kingdom’s representative halfway through with Clement Attlee. The other major players were Joseph Stalin, representing the USSR and the new U.S. president, Harry Truman, who had just succeeded to the presidency following the death in office of FDR, and who had been kept in the dark on important matters by FDR.
In the absence of FDR and particularly of Churchill, Stalin got what he wanted in terms of the face of post-war Europe … and an Iron Curtain descended that lasted for decades and consumed truly vast resources by the West to contain – not to mention the misery inflicted on millions.
The point? The national leader of a Great Power, to say nothing of the world’s sole remaining Superpower, has to deal with MANY “emergencies”, and they’re not just those related to booting-up or maintaining a welfare state. Thankfully, we elect presidents to determine what those emergencies are, and we don’t need to rely SOLELY on the opinions of pundits as to the priorities to which a president should properly restrict himself.
6
@Richard Luettgen
We elected Obama to determine what our national priorities were, and his determination was sabotaged and trashed by Republicans under our constitutional system. So Trump's determination of our national priorities (whatever that is) should be sabotaged and trashed wherever possible by Democrats.
Personally, I trust anyone who has the mental discipline to read books more than anyone who doesnt. And an illiterate who could listen to, retain and digest information would be far better than what we have now.
The opinions of pundits vary, and the pundits of "Fox and Friends" have their opinions taken very seriously.
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@sdavidc9 (C3p0):
Obama failed because he, and Democrats generally, were SUCH clueless politicians who turned out to be SO bad at effectively making sausage. He and they had NO chance of securing their objectives in strategically viable ways. Instead of getting into the trenches and hammering out solutions with Republicans that represented compromises that neither side liked but that both could just barely live with … he and they imposed what they could and now watch as ALL of it is being erased as if it never existed.
Start a valid historical analysis with an HONEST appraisal of what really happened. Republicans aren't icky because they disagree with you guys -- as a matter of fact, they're not icky at all.
But what's definitely clear is that your guys were and, to a great extent still are … clueless.
5
Getting together with Republicans? Could that be those very same Republicans that we’re determined from day one to sabotage Obama’s presidency? The ones who denied him his constitutional right to select a Supreme Court justice?
5
Talking sense supported by facts isn't going to get far with President Fact-free, and certainly not with an entire political party that hates government so much that it is neither inclined to, nor knows how to, govern.
If the sole career motivation of our elected figures is to win at all costs, then a very low price is placed on sound public policy-formulation. Every day, our national flight from policy speeds up and deepens
The Republication Party, most visibly exemplified by its executive Head, cares and knows nothing about governance. To quote the inimitable Vince Lombardy, to the GOP "Winning isn't everything; it's the ONLY thing."
51
Mr. Kristof is correct that drugs, homelessness, gun deaths and lack of health care are major problems in the US. But he misses the point about the "real national emergency," which is the climate crisis that is not being addressed by this administration. On the contrary, President Trump seems to be doing whatever he can to denigrate the science and insure we keep burning fossil fuel off into the every heating future. Homelessness will increase with more massive weather events like recent hurricanes. Drug use goes hand in hand with hopelessness which we will see more of as droughts decimate farms and homes go up in wildfire smoke. Health care costs will accelerate with new emerging diseases following the warming of the climate, and gun deaths will go up as we get desperate about food and water. And if we think we have an immigration problem now, imagine what will happen when the tropics become uninhabitable.
Everyone with any sense of this urgent crisis needs to vote for Democrats who on the whole believe the scientists and may, I said may, be able to implement some measures to turn this juggernaut before it is absolutely too late. Scientists say we have a decade so the next congress is critical.
211
@Diane
People's gardens did not do well this year in my area. It was too wet. Rain seems to be coming in monsoon-like clumps, overwhelming the drainage capabilities of many areas.
Sooner or later, we will get a year with enough crop failures to produce noticeable results. We might have to eat less meat, and will see on TV people who have less to eat overall, and watch them try and fail to get into countries whose food supplies are still adequate, or solve the food shortage by killing enough of each other that the supply is adequate for the survivors.
God, of course, wants us to be fruitful and multiply. Such things as famines and civil wars are natural, and are much less abhorrent to him than contraception and population control.
16
@Diane perhaps you are to young or ignorant to know that these same scientists claimed in the 70's we were entering a global ice age. In the 80's and 90's, these scientists claimed it was global warming (I was in college and law school). I finished an MBA a couple of years ago while we are in the midst of climate change (necessary because all of the weather models keep turning out to be wrong / less severe than claimed). I tell you all this because if you wait just a few more years the scientists will come up with some new (and wrong) assertions about our planet.
3
@Matthew - Sheesh! At best, 10% of 1970's climate studies suggested a "global ice age". They were wrong, as were the "doctors" who used to claim that smoking was good for us.
The vast majority of 70's forecasters warned of climate change that would mainly entail warming (with some localized areas of cooling - it is "climate change" after all, not "global warming").
It is possible to actually learn a bit about a topic before opining, dontcha know?
1
Another column in today paper also discusses separation of migrating children from their parents. The headline, "Even for Trump, There Is Such a Thing as Too Far ."
I've been reading that headline and its variations for about 18 months now. The most common is, "Just when I thought that Trump couldn't go any lower...etc., etc., whatever."
Really, the man has shown himself to have no lower limit. What we see is just Donald being Donald. The writer's surprise comes across as an affectation.
47
A five year moratorium on immigration, (or at least naturalization), would see America through the next three elections, two of them for the presidency. Without the invading horde bogeyman, support for the GOP would likely collapse. What else are they going to campaign on?
It's worth a try.
11
The anger, fear, and resentment of the Trumpers have nothing to do with rational solutions. And, of course, there is always "The War on Terror", as though we can wage war on an emotion.
63
@caveman007
"what else are they going to campaign on?"
Republicans always find someone to attack to distract voters from their disastrous debt-exploding/wealthy donor enriching policies. If not migrants, they have plenty of material.
It has been migrants, commies, hippies, Muslims, Willie Horton (that was the so-called "good" Bush), "welfare Queens", blacks in general, flag burning, kneeling football players, transgenders entering bathrooms, gay marriage, uppity women, an imaginary person on food stamps who buys steaks, an unemployed Medicaid recipient .......... and, if all else fails, "liberals"
268
@caveman007--People wait years to become Green Card holders, Permanent Residents or citizens. No, we cannot harm them simply to foil the GOP.
3