Immigration is a human right!

Today is UN designated World Refugee Day ostensibly established to bring attention to the over 200 million refugees & internally displaced people around the world. (The UN estimates the numbers as just under 44 million people.)  Basically it’s a day to work pity up to a fever pitch to raise funds for the UN agency.

This is also the 50th anniversary of John Kennedy’s 1963 address at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin where he famously said, “Ich bin ein Berliner.” The translation is, "I am one with the people of Berlin,” but more accurately means, “Standing under this triumphal arch is a good place to distract from the Vietnam War & to pretend an elitist like myself gives a rat’s ass about human solidarity.”

Kennedy was followed in 1987 by Ronald Reagan who was notorious for confusing political realities with his old B-movies. He challenged Gorbachev to “tear down this wall,” but it was later learned he thought he was standing at the Kremlin in Moscow since it was so much like one of his films. He couldn’t remember which one since he’d long had early onset derangement. We can’t remember either since they’re all so forgettable.

In 1994, the masterful dissembler Bill Clinton--speaking triumphal after the fall of the Berlin Wall--praised free markets & blithered on about international security “based on building bridges, not walls”--by which he meant bridges transporting tariff-free products out of Eastern European sweatshops into the coffers of western bankers & corporations.

Now in 2013, Barack Obama made his appearance at the Brandenburg Gate. He wants  to see Russia & the US cut down their nuclear arsenals by up to one-third. Admirable, but of course, Russia has to go first. "We no longer live in fear of global annihilation." Easy for him to say; he doesn’t live in any of the several countries he’s besieging with drone aircraft! He spoke in English but Pepe Escobar has translated the meaning into accurate Russian & German: “Ich bin ein bullshitter.”

And that about sums up all the empty presidential blither at the Brandenburg Gate as well as UN fund-raising pity mongering. Let’s move on to the US-Mexican border & challenge Obama to “tear down this wall” to “build bridges not walls,” & cut the crap! The US-Mexican barrier wall is one of the most hideous & politically monstrous structures in the western hemisphere. Not only is it ugly as sin & violates nearly 50 environmental & human rights laws, but it has led to the denial of freedom & deaths of thousands of undocumented working people from around the world--though mostly from Mexico & Central America. The audacity of US presidents going to the Brandenburg Gate like liberators! They should hang their ugly mugs in shame. The audacity of the UN asking for dough when they haven’t raised a single objection to the many walls going up against immigrants all over this globe!

Immigration is a human right! Open the damn borders!

(Photo from Tacoma, WA Immigration Prison, from wanet, org)