If we can successfully absorb that number into our economy and safety net, then we could have taken that many more legal immigrants instead - and we would have decided who. My impression is that people who lived under communism have been good additions to our culture when they come here. Poles, Czechs, and Balts especially.
I have spoken of Dr. An, who was a Korean who fought the Communists before coming here and becoming a citizen. But it may be that Soviet Communism in particular produces good American immigrants, as you suggest; there have been plenty of Communists in Latin America, and yet Socialism/Communism continues to be taken seriously there. The Soviet experience in Eastern Europe seems to have been thorough enough to disabuse everyone of the idea that it could be done right, or done better, or that government could be trusted enough to do it at all.
If we can successfully absorb that number into our economy and safety net, then we could have taken that many more legal immigrants instead - and we would have decided who. My impression is that people who lived under communism have been good additions to our culture when they come here. Poles, Czechs, and Balts especially.
ReplyDeleteI have spoken of Dr. An, who was a Korean who fought the Communists before coming here and becoming a citizen. But it may be that Soviet Communism in particular produces good American immigrants, as you suggest; there have been plenty of Communists in Latin America, and yet Socialism/Communism continues to be taken seriously there. The Soviet experience in Eastern Europe seems to have been thorough enough to disabuse everyone of the idea that it could be done right, or done better, or that government could be trusted enough to do it at all.
ReplyDelete