The day's best quote from a politician

Mexican president Felipe Calderon called Arizona's new law discriminatory and warned that Mexico would reject any effort to "criminalize migration."

Evidently the President of Mexico is completely unfamiliar with Mexican law (along with the President of the United States, as far as I can tell).

The following description of Mexican immigration law quotes from the right wing newspaper Washington Times and Wikipedia, but it gibes with other sources & I believe it's accurate.

Mexico's "Ley General de Poblacion" (General Law on Population) mandates that federal, local and municipal police cooperate with Mexican federal immigration authorities in the arrests of illegal immigrants--as the Arizona law seeks to do voluntarily.

Illegal immigration is a felony punishable by up to 2 years in prison. Immigrants who try to re-enter Mexico after being deported face up to 10 years in prison. Visa violators can get 6 years. And it's a crime to assist illegals. How's that for "criminalizing migration"?

Mexican law provides for deporting foreigners deemed detrimental to "economic or national interests," and/or who violate Mexican law, aren't "physically or mentally healthy" or lack the "necessary funds for their sustenance" and for their dependents. This law's details are also designed to:

1. Distribute immigrants across Mexico to prevent foreign enclaves from forming.
2. Restrict immigration to urban population centers if deemed good for the country.
3. Restrict immigration to foreigners with the "potential to contribute to national progress."
4. Restrict immigration to those with the income needed for themselves and their dependents.
5. Enable authorities to ban immigration of particular ethnicities/nationalities if "the national demographic balances is altered."
6. Enable authorities to ban immigrants deemed harmful to the national economic interests.

All this means that either President Calderon is an imbecile--which I know he's not--or he believes we're a combination of imbeciles, tribalists and amoral pols eager to sell out our nation's interests for votes from Mexicans with American citizenship.

Mexican laws were crafted to combat a serious problem Mexico has with illegals trying to enter from poorer nations to the south.

As far as I can tell, it's perfectly sensible and would serve as an excellent model for our own "comprehensive immigration reform," with the addition of e-Verify and universal biometric ID (well, and other high tech items like armed UAV border patrols).