Issue 75: May 23, 2001

Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
Ed Abbey

+== TIME OUT PROJECT ==+

Last December, in a Los Angeles Times story, reporter Robin Wright asked Bangladeshi President Sheika Hasina:

"At independence, Bangladeshi women averaged six to seven children. Today, that rate has been halved by a strong family planning program. Yet, Bangladesh still has 120 million people and by the year 2050 will have at least twice that number, according to the U.S. State Department. How will Bangladesh feed, educate, employ and house those kinds of numbers?"

"We’ll send them to America!" President Hasina replied, laughing.

In light of recent Census Bureau projections showing immigration doubling US population within the lifetimes of today’s children, the American people might ask President Bush a similar question about one of our fastest-growing states:

"With the population of California already at 34 million and expected to reach 60 million by 2050, overwhelmingly because of mass immigration, how will we provide energy for all those people?"

Our president would likely respond with his stock immigration campaign answer, "Family values don’t stop at the Rio Grande," — a response only slightly less flippant than President Hasina’s. Or he might borrow a page from the Hasina Plan, and offer to send excess Californians to Colorado.

More reading:

California’s population growth rate increases — now almost 50 percent higher than that of Bangladesh
http://www.cap-s.org/pressreleases.html#NEWS RELEASE 5 16

People ‘longage,’ power shortage
Rick Oberlink in the San Diego Union
http://www.cap-s.org/sdutoberlink.html
Now (California’s) No. 1 concern, energy is shaping views on immigration and politics.
The Christian Science Monitor, May 21, 2001
http://www.csmonitor.com/durable/2001/05/21/fp10s1-csm.shtml

+== TAKE POSITIVE ACTION ==+

Unless Congress acts soon, California’s relentless immigration-driven growth will mean more power plants and grids; more subdivisions, strip malls, traffic and pollution; and tighter water supplies — with no relief in sight for the already over-developed state.

Since the world adds another U.S. in population (net) every four years — 99% percent of which growth occurs in developing countries like Bangladesh — there is an almost limitless supply of those who will come seeking higher levels of consumption. (http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/wp98001.html)

(And they will continue to come until one of two things happens: either 1) Congress finally adopts a responsible immigration policy, or 2) quality of life in California and the rest of the nation deteriorates to the point that America is no longer a desirable place to live.)

This kind of growth, and the development it will spawn, is a serious environmental issue, to be sure. So what is our country’s premier environmental organization doing to address this clear and looming population disaster? The well-funded, 600,000-member Sierra Club is standing on the sidelines impotently advocating for the PC fantasy of "global population solutions."

So weak and environmentally useless is the Sierra Club on growth, that even the pro-development National Association of Home Builders recently endorsed the Sierra Club’s position on development. (http://www.nahb.com/news/sierraresponse.htm)

Meanwhile, public debate on the California power crisis has become a red herring, pitting conservation against development. While conservation should be a part of any environmental agenda, it is clearly only a part of the solution — growth and its causes must be addressed.

You can call the Sierra Club and encourage them to think globally, but ACT LOCALLY on the serious issue of population growth and immigration.

Email: environmental911@sierraclub.org
Phone: 415 977 5500

And a short polite letter to your local newspaper noticing immigration is not being discussed in the debate on California’s energy shortage would be an important and helpful action to take. www.newsdirectory.com

+== QUOTE OF THE WEEK ==+

Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe.
H. G. Wells (1866 - 1946)

+==EMAIL OF THE WEEK==+

I think most of the pro-mass immigrationalists have forgotten that immigration is a privilege and not a right. I can’t imagine where we would be today without quality organizations like ProjectUSA, FAIR, and NumbersUSA making such a positive impact on this issue by enlightening us on the flagrant abuses and fraud in the system as well as communicating the vital importance of a stable and sustainable population.

Paul Francis
Cary, North Carolina

Tags:   Bangladesh · Bush · California · Ed Abbey · immigration · population growth · Sierra ClubNo Comments