New Editor at The Latin Americanist

It is now official—I am going to be the new editor of an academic journal, The Latin Americanist, which is a small but growing journal associated with the Southeastern Council of Latin American Studies. The outgoing editor, Bruce Wilson at the University of Central Florida, has done a lot with it in the past 5-6 years, so that now it has a solid and international readership, and a competitive acceptance rate.

I’m really looking forward to it, and I’ll be very interested to see how it is on the other side, being the person who ultimately decides what will be published. Thus far, like most everyone else, I’ve been in a position of complaining about editors of journals when my own article submissions not been accepted…

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Senate Development

More developments in the Senate, which is now discussing whether to put illegal immigrants into three different categories:

1. Been in the U.S. five years or more: pay fine, learn English, get a background check, and various other requirements, and you can become a legal worker
2. Been in the U.S. between two and five years: go to designated point of entry and apply for temporary worker permit
3. Less than two years: still being debated, but likely you would go back to your home country, then be at the end of the line for a temporary work permit.

There are all sorts of rumors about other possible compromises, but nothing is entirely clear. Frist wants a vote this week, but it is also unclear whether that will happen. If not, senators are leaving this weekend for a two week spring recess, during which time both sides will rally their supporters and try to influence the vote.

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Our Brand is Crisis by Rachel Boynton

Yesterday on campus I had the opportunity to see the documentary Our Brand is Crisis and talk to the director, Rachel Boynton. The timing was perfect, because it was exactly when I teach U.S.-Latin American Relations, so I just had my entire class go. It was a great movie—anyone interested in Latin American politics would find it fascinating. It follows the 2002 presidential campaign of Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada (known as Goni) in Bolivia, and specifically how he used the same James Carville team of consultants that became famous from the Clinton years.

It is a very balanced movie, which lets everyone speak for themselves, but the theme was to question whether it is feasible to bring the U.S.-style of politics to a very poor, politically unstable country. In fact, the consultants did get Goni the victory, but he was forced out soon thereafter, as massive protests would pave the way for Evo Morales to be elected. Anyhow, there was a good Q&A with Rachel Boynton after the screening—she said that when she conceived of the movie, she wondered how to get access to everyone, and a friend recommended just printing up business cards. She did so, which made her look official, and started getting green lights. Not a bad research tip.

Anyone who reads this blog knows I talk a lot about how U.S. actions and words in Latin America (though elsewhere too) often end up having the opposite effect than intended. The movie had a perfect example, from the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia. At one point, the U.S. said that Evo Morales claimed that the U.S. government was trying to kill him. The ambassador reacted by reading a statement, which had the following logic (and I am not making this up).

1. Evo Morales thinks the U.S. wants to assassinate him
2. The only person the U.S. wants to assassinate is Osama bin Laden
3. Evo Morales is thus equating himself with bin Laden
4. Therefore Evo Morales is just like bin Laden

Apparently that statement alone boosted Evo’s numbers, and he said that he hoped the ambassador would keep saying such things.

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More Senate Debate on Immigration

Debate in the Senate continues, certainly more smoothly than I would’ve guessed. Even Frist is differentiating between illegal immigrants who are recently arrived and those who have lived in the U.S. a long time, arguing that the latter deserve to be made legal (thus invoking the buzzword “amnesty”). The sticky point is that he would offer nothing to the former, but there is still much to be decided. Frist wants a vote this week, though there have consistently been delays.

Best quote comes from Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) who says:

"I don't think you need a professor to understand that when you import substantial cheap labor, it displaces American workers.”

I’m still not sure whether to take that as an insult…

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Adding to the blogroll

Bit by bit, I am adding to my blogroll. At some point I will figure out how to organize them by category, of which currently there are three—Latin America, general academia, and baseball. Today I add three in the second category: Signifying Nothing, Poliblog, and vegreville. The first two are political scientists, while the third is anonymous.

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AP-Ipsos Poll on Immigration

Here is another poll (from AP-Ipsos) about American reactions to immigration:

56% favor or somewhat favor allowing illegal immigrants to apply for legal, temporary work status
51% believe illegal immigrants contribute to society
42% believe they are mostly a drain
67% are not confident that a wall would reduce illegal immigration
65% believe that illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans don’t want

This really reiterates the Pew Hispanic Center's poll results, which I discussed a few days ago.

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Opening Day

It’s baseball’s opening day, and the winter wait is finally over. I can’t help but comment on MLB’s newly hatched investigation of steroids. Even Commissioner Selig admits it is largely in response to the book Game of Shadows, which I recently ordered but haven’t received yet (yes, I have the right to read trashy books every once in a while). But last year, I read a very good book called Juicing the Game, by Howard Bryant, which colors my view of the current situation.

Bryant’s main thesis is that MLB—and even Selig himself—launched the steroid era by consciously looking the other way as the massively bulked up Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa made baseball popular again with their home run race in 1998. MLB knew what was going on, but loved the PR boost. Now things have soured, so MLB is suddenly shocked to learn that the steroids issue hasn’t gone away (despite new punishments imposed last year) and launched an investigation headed by George Mitchell, a respected former politician, but someone very close to the owners. The bottom line is that the “holier than thou” line coming from Selig is tough to swallow. As sportswriter Buster Olney writes, “Summon the hounds. Sound the horn. Let the hunt for scapegoats begin.”

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Peru

The Peruvian presidential elections are coming right up (April 9) and Marcela Sanchez at the Washington Post offers a very sobering look. For example:

18% of Peruvians say they live in a democracy
60% say they do not care about democracy or know how to define it

Such disgust leads to presidents like Fujimori, and could potentially lead to Ollanta Humala, who has a Chávez-style background in terms of having led a military rebellion (albeit much smaller) having no political experience, and offering populist-leftist rhetoric. How he would actually govern is anyone’s guess—presidents like Gutierrez in Ecuador and Lula in Brazil were viewed a potentially problematic leftists, then shifted once in office (though the former was forced out) while Chávez, of course, did not shift. The jury remains out on Evo.

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Senate Debate

A quick follow-up to my previous post on the results of the Pew Hispanic Center study, which showed very clearly that Americans do not see building a wall as an effective way of stemming illegal immigration, and tend to view immigration as less pressing than many other issues. These quotes are from yesterday’s senate debate (or, rather, the senate "statements" since there was no real debate).

From Senator Kyl (R-AZ): "So everybody pretends the law can be enforced when they know it can't. The Government doesn't do anything about it, the employers don't do anything about it. America sees that and Americans say: What happens to a country that isn't enforcing its laws and apparently doesn't have the will to do so?

The American people want serious action. I believe that illustrates how concerned they are that we have not been able to control the borders so far.

They favor a proposal to build a 2,000-mile security fence by a 51-to-37 percent margin. That is a Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll. "

From Senator Cornyn (R-TX), who actually has been pilloried by the right for his support of a guest worker program: “But I believe with all my heart that what has brought us to this day and this debate on the Senate floor is because Americans are terribly concerned that in a post-9/11 world, we simply do not have control of our borders.”

Perhaps it all comes back to the basics of precisely how surveys are worded. Yesterday, Senators spewed out all kinds of poll results to make their cases--whether they believe them with all their hearts is hard to tell.

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Pew Hispanic Center Poll

Some interesting poll numbers from the Pew Hispanic Center:

Only 9% of Americans believe a wall is the best way to reduce illegal immigration
80% believe Latin American immigrants work very hard
80% believe Latin American immigrants have strong family values
37% believe they often go on welfare
65% believe they do not take jobs Americans want (24% say they do)

The public is very much split on what to do about illegal immigrants already here:

32% say they should be allowed to stay permanently
32% believe they should be granted temporary work status
27% say they should be required to return home
9% didn’t know
There was no option for “return home, then become eligible for temporary work,” which is currently part of the Senate debate.

61% of Americans come across people who do not speak English, but it does not bother them (it bothers 38%).

42% believe President Bush will do the right thing regarding immigration (Republican Party gets 45%, while Democratic Party gets 53%). Local leaders (56%) get even more confidence, even though they have no influence at all on immigration policy (which is federal).

It’s a fascinating report, and these only represent a small fraction of the polling data. I’ll finish with one more, that only 3% of Americans see immigration issues as “the most important problem facing your community.” It ranks tied for last out of 10 potential issues (crime/violence and unemployment rank first). In other words, we’re getting all whipped up over something that the public is not especially concerned about.

I hope to get some of the Senate debate from yesterday—it’s not up on the Senate website yet.

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Blogroll

Thanks to Matthew Shugart, a political scientist at UCSD, for introducing my blog on his own, Fruits and Votes. And he is forgiven for living in San Diego while not becoming a Padres fan.

It occurred to me that I have yet to master the etiquette of the blogosphere, so as I have added things to my own blog, such as the blogroll (just recently, in fact) I have just done so without comment or explaining why. I'll try to start making introductions now as I add more.

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Olive Branch on Immigration?

Speaker of the House Hastert has extended what seems to be an olive branch, saying that the country does need a guest worker program:

“We're not going to discount anything right now. Our first priority is to protect the border. And we also know there is a need in some sections of the economy for a guest-worker program."

That is new, and is the precise opposite of what many House Republicans believe (I’ve seen numbers ranging from 50 to 70 of hard core opponents of the senate bill). So will Hastert be willing to twist the arms of moderate Republicans, join with many (if not most) Democrats, and thereby force the issue? I’ve been pessimistic, but this appears to be a real change. Meanwhile, even George Will is arguing in favor of a guest worker program.

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FARC Indictments

In my U.S.-Latin American Relations class, we had spent some time trying to figure out the reasons why the U.S. government indicted 50 members of the FARC, and the significance of the timing (in other words, why now?). Adam Isacson has a great analysis in Plan Colombia and Beyond, including surprise at how the U.S. alleges that the FARC's control of and profit from the cocaine trade has greatly increased.

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Immigration and Demography

Andres Oppenheimer has a column arguing that to understand immigration, we should forget economists and political scientists, and listen to demographers instead. He’s half right—we should listen to political scientists and demographers together. Coincidentally, the paper I presented at LASA, and which will soon be sent out to a journal, was co-written with my dad, a demographer in the Dept of Geography at San Diego State University (though unfortunately my parents couldn't make it to Puerto Rico with me) . We argue, in a similar vein to Oppenheimer, that understanding the immigration issue requires an analysis combining political science and demography. We’ve been in the middle of what we call a “demographic fit” between the U.S. and Latin America, where we had a need for labor (i.e. we had an aging population), and Latin America had more young people than their economies could sustain. The thing is, this fit is soon ending, because fertility rates are dropping in Latin America, while in the U.S. we’ve been seeing an increase in the number of young people (i.e. 15-24) so our labor needs will more likely be filled from within in the future. We argue that the political debate (and even the timing of the debate) cannot be understood without the demographic angle.

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Senate Immigration Bill

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved its version of immigration reform, which stands in stark contrast to the House version, especially in terms of whether the U.S. should have a guest worker program. I think another one of the many aspects that will spark debate is that the House bill includes construction of a wall, whereas the Senate has a “virtual wall” consisting of technology, like unmanned drones.

It only received 4 of 10 Republican votes in the Judiciary committee, and was immediately attacked by several Republican Senators (see the NYT). In addition, Majority Leader Frist hasn’t yet said whether he would allow the bill to come up for a vote, or whether he would introduce his own bill, which has no guest worker program (e.g. see the Washington Post).

Frist wants to be president, and I assume he figures such a move would resonate with the conservative Republican base, but it’s a risky move.

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Immigration Rally in Charlotte

Here’s a small bit from the local section of today’s Charlotte Observer, regarding the immigration rally held here on Saturday:

Charlotte and Mecklenburg County officials today should receive a letter and a video link showing a lack of visible police presence at the start of Saturday's immigration rally, said William Gheen, president of Americans for Legal Immigration PAC in Raleigh.

Gheen said several officers showed up only after he complained in person at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department.

CMPD spokesman Keith Bridges didn't return Observer calls for comment. Officers working Sunday said they didn't have information about the number of officers present Saturday. Observers said they saw several officers at the rally.

Between 5,000 and 7,000 people showed up at the rally, and police have said it was peaceful.

So what the group did was to film the rally, then complain that CMPD didn’t send enough cops. The guy actually went in person to the police department to demand more of a police presence. There are several things I’m trying to figure out here. First, since this rally (like all the others around the country) was peaceful, it seems that no more police were needed. Second, if they wanted illegal immigrants in the crowd arrested, then they would need federal authorities, not the CMPD, and it would mean intentionally creating a riot. Third, exactly what point are they trying to make?

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Immigration Rally

Here’s an informative article in the LA Times about the very impressive rally in Los Angeles, which drew at least 500,000 in protest of the House version of immigration reform. There have been other similar protests around the country, some with decent numbers (though nothing like a half million). I knew the rally was coming up, but I must admit I was surprised at big it was (and pleased at how peaceful it was).

I’m not sure how much it will affect politicians with very few Latinos in their districts, but it will add yet another layer of complexity to the issue for many who do not want to alienate Latino voters (or who just think enforcement alone won’t work). The NYT had previously done a profile of Sen. John Cornyn, a conservative Republican from Texas, who has a 100% rating from the American Conservative Union but is being called a “sellout” and “not a true conservative” because he supports a guest worker program.

I’ll continue following and commenting on the debate, which begins this week.

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El Salvador

The Washington Post discusses the Salvadoran contribution to the Iraq war—the last Latin American country to remain. Presidents from ARENA—El Salvador’s conservative party—have enjoyed close ties with the Bush administration. Even more relevant is the fact that El Salvador depends heavily upon remittances, and therefore needed the Bush administration to extend temporary legal status for 220,000 undocumented Salvadorans, and in general assure that Salvadoran immigration is not curtailed. The administration agreed to the extension just two weeks after President Saca announced that he would be sending another contingent of soldiers.

All the hoopla about the supposed leftward tilt in Latin America ignores Central America, where with some exceptions we often see governments that are closer ideologically to the U.S.

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Top 100 Padres

Friar Faithful is starting a very nicely done list of the top 100 San Diego Padres, with a discussion of each player and access to stats. Anyone with even a bare knowledge of the Padres knows this is a countdown to Tony Gwynn, because there is no way #1 could be anyone else. The top 10 would be tough to sort out, though I would probably go for Trevor Hoffman as #2. I’ll be curious about where my second favorite Padre shows up, namely John Kruk. I was really disappointed when he went to the Phillies in 1989.

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George Washington

I just finished listening to the unabridged version of Joseph Ellis’ His Excellency: George Washington. I like Ellis’ work on the revolutionary era, because it is well-written and accessible. His goal with Washington was to get past the popular image of the distant icon and figure out his motivations. Therefore there are times when he is making educated guesses, but it makes for interesting reading. Or in this case, listening—I often listen to books on CD when driving.

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