Every Mexican politician is going to be a Chavez clone on this issue, Mexico relies on the safety valve to El Norte to bleed off excess population, and the vast amounts of currency the aliens, legal and otherwise, send home to their families every payday. Mexico is not going to help us on this issue unless we make it worth their while. Mexico and the US both have each other by the cojones. It could get really ugly no matter who gets elected, here or Mexico.

I really don't think a wall will help because people can just continue to enter the US legally, as tourists, or as agricultural workers, and then vanish after they get here. Besides, they look and sound just like Mexicans who have lived in the American Southwest since before the Gringos came over on the Mayflower. I really think the only way out of this mess is simply to not make it worth their while in the first place to come here. This means no jobs AND no public assistance. Welfare, when you think about it, is just one way to subsidize their employers so they don't have to pay their illegals the true maintenance cost of living in the USA, to maintain non-working family members living here, and to make returning south in the off-season unnecessary.

It can be done gradually, to prevent the sudden shock any abrupt change has on a system that has evolved slowly over time. It may also require some hard compromises, just to get it to work at all. It's too late to be doctrinaire about this, practicality is the key.

We're also going to have to be ready to absorb the cost, Mexicans and Central Americans are cheap labor, they contribute to low prices and low inflation, and they do pay taxes. They also spend most of their income here. I think this benefit may even outweigh their cost in public assistance. Let's face it, these people are not lazy.