Hola, Amigo

My personal opinion holds that our policies toward illegal Mexican immigrants are in the main destructive to many aspects of our national life. However, there are some aspects of it that may not be as bad as I usually perceive.

This Knight Ridder article by Frank Greve has allowed me to mellow some of my opinions to a degree-- It could be worse. Excerpts:

"Predicted wave of crime by brutal teens never came..."

"A new generation of brutal and remorseless teens was about to savage the nation, leading authorities on juvenile crime warned a decade ago. Millions believed them."

"Conservative criminologist John DiIulio called them "super-predators." He estimated that they'd number nearly 200,000 by now. Even [The normally level-headed Progressive- ed.] Attorney General Janet Reno foresaw violent crime by youths doubling."

"It never happened. Instead, Americans are seeing the sharpest decline in teen crime in modern history. Schools today are as safe as they were in the 1960s, according to Justice Department figures."

One factor listed:

"• Population shifts. The Latino population in central cities swelled as teen crime declined, according to Jeff Roth, a University of Pennsylvania criminologist. Their influx, Roth said, brought more intact families, stronger values, higher religious participation -- and lower crime rates. At the same time, many of the black families they replaced moved to suburbs where poverty was less concentrated. "Kids once confined to the inner city started seeing lifestyles other than the street," Roth said."

Considering the immigration policies and their results in many European countries, ours doesn't seem so bad. It needs a lot of work, but is quite salvageable.