Amerika

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has rejected calls for a multibillion-euro bailout plan for eastern European Union member states.

Eastern states, led by Hungary, are pushing for richer EU members to provide more financial aid to help them out of their economic troubles.

FOX

Eastern Europe lags behind Western Europe in every way. So they play a definitions game: since we’re all Europeans now, don’t you richer people owe us something? Germany told them to take a hike because Germany created its wealth, and Eastern Europe in similar circumstances did not, suggesting a problem more long-term than immediate poverty.

The struggle by outgunned Mexican authorities to contain the violence was highlighted for Arizona state police last November, when Mexican police officers pinned down in a raging gun battle in Nogales, Sonora, reached out to them with an urgent request for more bullets.

While U.S. authorities stress they have not seen anything like the kind of street battles and horrific beheadings that are now common in Mexico, they are already taking action to curb was has become known as “overspill”.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry says he wants 1,000 troops to guard the border. The state’s Attorney General Greg Abbott is backing legislation to crack down on money laundering and human, drug and weapons trafficking through the state by the warring Gulf and Sinaloa cartels.

NM

Mexico was originally a Spanish colony. Then mass revolt occurred, and the people there, who were descended from the slave peoples of the Aztec and Maya that the Spanish used to overthrow those empires, took over.

Since then it has been a slow downward progression of the kind of third-world disorder we expect from Iraq, Brazil or Russia. Corruption is endemic. Crime is rife. Pollution is massive. The people are numb and interested in self-amusement only.

Every rich nation builds up parasites at its borders. Every smart person builds up parasites in their friend group. But how much power can be had from cutting them free.

Returning to a land left behind poses challenges for returning migrants. In a city like Morelia, where many locals still wear traditional indigenous dress and some even wear cowboy hats, a Mexican who has lived in the United States can be spotted a mile away. The returnees wear clothes from stores like Urban Outfitters (and not the knockoff versions that are popular among ordinary Mexicans), sport new sneakers, and don baseball caps of U.S. teams (again, not the fakes). They’ll shun straws that aren’t pre-wrapped, and according to some local policemen, they are clueless about the “code” — in other words, when to pay a bribe in order to avoid the laborious process of paying a traffic ticket.

Although the Calderón administration is investing heavily in infrastructure, the jobs created will only be temporary. Local governments, like that of Michoacán, are appealing for federal subsidies to help spur growth of sectors such as agriculture and generate more jobs. They also want federal funding to help returnees set up small businesses. But officials throughout Mexico acknowledge how difficult it will be to absorb those who once left. Some experts and Mexican columnists warn that if the massive southbound flood of migrants does occur in the coming months, resentment could boil to the surface.

Juana Patiño, an engineering consultant who has been working in Houston for 10 years, came back this past holiday season to sniff out opportunities in Mexico for a qualified professional like herself. She was disappointed to find that the pay is either too low or the possibility of advancement nearly nonexistent. So Patiño is returning to her adopted home. “I don’t really like living there, but I’m going back,” she says. “There are always more opportunities there.”

FP

What a disaster immigration is.

Populations swell in the nation of origin and the nation of destination.

Economies are unraveled and people displaced.

And for what? Ah, profit. Good thinking.