By now, thanks to the good work of Donald Trump and others in the Republican presidential primary, we’re finally able to understand the danger America faces from illegal immigrants pouring across our borders. There’s Spanish on TV shows. The color of the country is changing. And intruders are taking all the low-skill, low-pay jobs that we might want some day.

Well, we’ve had enough, and we want our country back!

Here’s the problem. We’ve been focusing on the wrong target. While we’ve been obsessing about building a wall along the Mexican border, it turns out the real immigration problem is to our north and east, and that’s where we really need a wall.

I know you’ll be shocked to learn this, just as I was. You’re probably asking yourself, what is this Caron fella smoking? Well folks, I’m not going to sugarcoat it for you. It’s bad and getting worse. Here’s what we know.

Seismic shocks were felt up and down the East Coast as the United States Congress finally did something. They ordered the Homeland Security people to investigate where all our illegal alien people are coming from. The Homeland people took a hard look at this leaky border problem and came up with some startling data.

By counting the number of visas we’ve handed out to so-called “visitors” and then subtracting the number that never made the return trip home, they produced some of the few reliable facts we have on the problem. The results are shocking. Before I share them I want to remind you not to blame the messenger. I’m just doing my small part to save our country by giving you information you deserve to have.

Advertisement

About 45 million people visited the Land of the Free last year, which was great for hotels and amusement parks, and for us here in Maine. But 416,500 never left. They just dissolved into the American melting pot without a trace. We’re not talking about people who missed their plane. We’re talking about bona fide criminals who broke our laws and who are here to change our country into something more like theirs.

A fist-clenching 42,114 of those people came from Mexico. Like you, that makes my blood boil. I wanted to rush right down there to start building that wall along the Rio Grande stream. Fortunately, I kept reading before I grabbed my coat and put on my Bean boots.

Here’s what I learned. Canadian illegals numbered 93,035, or more than twice the Mexicans! How could we have been so stupid? While we’ve been waving our arms at Mexicans we were stabbed in the back by those gentle Canadians to our north. That hurts, folks, especially for a Franco-American guy like me with roots in Quebec. But it gets worse. So bad, in fact, that before I go on you might want to put your coffee down.

It turns out that while we were worrying about the plight of the Syrian refugees in Turkey and Europe, our so-called friends in the European Union were taking us for a ride, too. Europe just snuck 123,729 people into the good ol’ USA. That’s three times the number from Mexico!

Not to rub salt in the wounds, but remember all the worrying we’ve been doing about people from the Middle East and Africa flooding into the country? Peanuts. Just 15,597 from Africa and a hardly-worth-getting-up-in-the-morning 13,766 from the Middle East.

Don’t take my word for it. See for yourself at the Pew Research Center website.

Advertisement

It’s time to act. We’ve got to stop Canada and Europe before it’s too late. Enough with the empty promises from a do-almost-nothing Congress and president. We need to take matters into our own hands, as true citizens and patriots, before this country we love becomes nothing more than a place with a confusing mix of people in it, all from just about anywhere but here.

Here’s the plan. First, we build a wall along the Canadian border from the Atlantic to the Pacific, with just a few entry points and some holes for pipelines. The whole thing’s got to be electrified, with enough power to stun any crawling miscreant senseless, or at least give him one heck of a memorable headache. That’ll help ward off others.

Then, it’s time to restore the string of perfectly good forts along the Atlantic from the Revolutionary, 1812 and Civil wars. Places like Fort Knox and Fort Popham, and others from here to the Florida Keys. They’re made of solid granite and once they’re bristling with modern guns the Europeans won’t dare tread on us again.

Of course, we might want to check in with the Chinese, just to see how that whole Great Wall thing worked out for them. We wouldn’t want to do anything stupid like build a wall that doesn’t work.

Alan Caron is the owner of Caron Communications and the author of “Maine’s Next Economy” and “Reinventing Maine Government.” He can be reached at:

alancaroninmaine@gmail.com


Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.

Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.

filed under: