Submission: Misinformed accusations prevent reasoned discussion on immigration

For the second time in less than two months, the Daily Bruin Opinion page has seen fit to print a personal attack on me. Once again, the submission, this time written by Justino Mora, an alumnus, is a diatribe full of factual errors and guilt-by-association arguments. The errors in the earlier piece were so blatant, The Bruin was forced to correct them in the online version.

The title of my response to the first submission about me was “Demonizing opposition does not solve issue of excessive immigration.” I noted that essentially all of California’s rapid population growth is due to immigrants and their U.S.-born offspring. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, California already contains the four most densely populated urban areas in the entire U.S., with Los Angeles standing at the very top. Indeed, seven of the top 10 such areas are located in California. California contains one of the world’s biodiversity hot spots, but this biodiversity is being overrun by more and more people flooding into our state.

The position of Californians For Population Stabilization on legal immigration levels is similar to those of two distinguished national commissions. The first was The Commission on Population Growth and the American Future, chaired by John D. Rockefeller III in 1972, which recommended immigration levels not exceed 400,000 per year. The second was the report from the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired in 1995 by Barbara Jordan, a Democratic, African-American congresswoman, which proposed a core immigration admissions level of 550,000 per year. An immigration level of around 500,000 per year would still be the most generous of any country on earth.

Californians For Population Stabilization is concerned that the leadership of both major political parties want to increase legal immigration levels while not seemingly caring about illegal immigration. Such policies are driving the U.S. toward a projected population of 500 million and beyond, a disaster for the U.S. environment and that of the entire world, given the large per capita environmental impact of a typical American.

It is appropriate to recall Winston Churchill’s comment from his 1959 “Memoirs of the Second World War” about British politics before World War II.

“The left and the right joined forces with fatuity at a terrible price to be paid later,” Churchill said.

Rather than addressing these real issues, Mora’s submission mainly uses the old guilt-by-association technique that former-disgraced U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy used when he suggested that if you know a communist, then you must be a communist too.

One example of this is the absurd link Mora draws between me and Michael Hart who, according to Mora, is a “white nationalist” based on a 2007 book Hart authored. The purported link is that Hart and I co-edited a book titled “Extraterrestrials, Where Are They?”

But our book was the outcome of a meeting we organized in 1979 on prospects for finding extraterrestrial intelligence. The two editions of our book were published by Pergamon Press in 1982 and by Cambridge University Press in 1995. In other words, Mora is holding me responsible for views expressed by Hart 28 years after our initial collaboration. Moreover, contributors to our book included some of the outstanding scientists of the latter half of the 20th century, such as physicist Freeman Dyson, biologist Ernst Mayr and UCLA’s own Jared Diamond, a biologist.

Does Mr. Mora propose that these and other contributors are tainted by a book Hart wrote decades after the 1979 meeting?

Another absurd example of guilt by association involves John Tanton. Contrary to Mora’s claim, Tanton is no friend of mine; we have met exactly once. Mora claims Tanton was involved with me in an internal Sierra Club battle over U.S. population growth. The Sierra Club is the oldest and, arguably, the best-known environmental advocacy organization in the U.S. In 1996, when the club’s board of directors took a position that effectively ignored continuing U.S. population growth, I co-founded Sierrans for U.S. Population Stabilization, composed of Sierra Club members who believe U.S. overpopulation is a serious environmental issue that must be addressed. Tanton was not a member of SUSPS and, for all I know, may not even have been a Sierra Club member during those years. He played no role in the decade-long battle I took part in.

And, finally, to answer Mora’s claims at the end of his submission: Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals is of interest to many UCLA students. Californians For Population Stabilization currently has no official position on DACA legalization – this “no position” was affirmed at a meeting of the board of directors in early October. DACA legalization is embedded in a suite of proposed bills currently being considered in Congress. One such bill would involve E-Verify, a program that requires employers to verify that a prospective employee is eligible to work in the United States.

My personal opinion is if Congress passes appropriate bills – including, for example, a mandatory nationwide E-Verify that would discourage adults with small children from illegally entering the U.S. in the future – I would be happy to see current DACA immigrants put on some path to naturalization.

Demonization of one’s opponents engenders hate and negates any chance for reasoned discussions. Social justice advocates and environmentalists must find a way to abandon adversarial positions.

Zuckerman is a research professor and professor emeritus at UCLA’s department of physics and astronomy.

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79 Comments

  1. I would go so far as to say I disagree with this statement: “I would be happy to see current DACA immigrants put on some path to naturalization.” I would not be happy to see this action taken. Time to stop the bleeding of non-Americans in this country. Time to CARE for ONLY the natural born and current legal immigrants that were not handed citizenship but earned it.

  2. Immigration is Great…JUST DO IT THE LEGAL WAY AND WE’RE ALL GOOD …OTHERWISE….

    BUILD THE WALL
    AND
    BUILD IT TALL !

    1. Walls and barriers can indeed be effective. Look at Berlin, the White House, Israel, or any penitentiary. It is our right as a sovereign nation to defend our borders. Build it.

        1. Well said. I would also add that legal immigration — inasmuch as it currently involves huge numbers of people — will ultimately create the same problems caused by illegal immigration.

    2. The wall is an ineffective and overly expensive means of stopping illegal immigration. It’s incredibly destructive to the bio-environment as well.

      For that much money, we can improve education and jobs in Mexico, which can arguably keep more people staying there and not coming to the U.S. than any wall. It’s more humane and less destructive as well.

      1. Have you seen all the garbage, trash, and God only knows what else, the illegal invaders create and discard on their treks to the border, as well as the interior of the U.S. That is incredibly destructive to the entirety of the environment. The haven’t placed any trash/recycle containers for them to deposit their used debris, junk, and/or refuse into in every half mile.
        As for the cost for the wall; that price is a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of taxpayer funds the illegal invaders receive every year, which an estimated total is $390 billion/year. Mexico has been the beneficiaries (the corrupt government officials and cartels-one and the same) of billions of financial gratuitous windfalls of U.S. taxpayer funds to help improve not only the education, but overall standard of living, of their populations. Mexico has had more job opportunities for the past 30 or so years, thanks to NAFTA. So, do not believe for one second the U.S. owes those leeches anything, they have bled us dry as it is.

      2. For a liberal, the most honest excuse for not building a wall is that it will stop illegal border crossings cold, but you will never hear them say that..

        1. But it won’t stop them. As long as the jobs magnet is here, they will find a way to come. Mandate E-Verify and jail illegal employers and this problem is 95% solved at almost no cost.

      3. Yes, not very cost-efficient relative to other immigration controls, except over certain stretches of the border. But Trump’s wall talk has always been metaphorical and used primarily to get across the idea that he was going to be tough on enforcement.

        The criticism of the wall by environmental organizations on the grounds of potential damage to flora and fauna in the vicinity of the border has always been hypocritical to the max. Organizations like the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club have become de facto supporters of mass amnesties and mass legal immigration, and the tens and hundreds of million of people those add to the US population causes orders of magnitude more environmental degradation than would even a wall the full length of the US-Mexico border. Sometimes environmentalists are as pro-environment as is the building industry.

        For a good article on that hypocrisy, see:

        Immigration, Population Growth, and Environmentalist Hypocrisy on the Border Fence
        by Leon Kolankiewicz
        Californians for Population Stabilization, CAPS News, Fall 2009, vol. 50, no. 2, p 3
        https://www.capsweb.org/opinion-releases/immigration-population-growth-and-environmentalist-hypocrisy-border-fence

          1. Thanks, Vince. I’ve always wondered about that. This makes perfect sense. It’s really all about the money, isn’t it?

    3. Something like 40% of illegal immigrants arrive on visa overstays. We need E-Verify more than we need a wall.
      Secondly, over 1 million immigrants arrive legally every year, far more than arrive illegally. Although we of course prefer legal immigrants, we will still break the 500 million person mark even if we stopped all illegal immigration. Legal immigrants also drive down wages for working class Americans, many of them minorities.
      Overall immigration must be reduced.

      1. Of course, we need both e-Verify and a wall, if we’re serious about stopping illegal immigration. One doesn’t preclude the other.

  3. I will also disagree with any amnesty for DACA recipients. We have granted amnesty after amnesty and that has sent a message to would be illegal migrants to pack their bags and come our way because another amnesty will surely come.

    Besides, a big part of our problem is that Mexico’s elites control the wealth there. Mexico needs major change and we will have a border as long as Mexico is a failed state. Sending back a few million American educated Mexican citizens might be a very positive move as these folks might push for positive change in Mexico.

    As for the nonsense that it is somehow cruel to deport people, that is nonsense. People choose to change countries legally all the time, they adapt and do well. The DACAns have their American education paid for by American tax payers, that is quite a gift and one that will serve them well in their home country.

    1. Yes and yes.

      In 1986, we did a mass amnesty of illegal aliens that was supposed to fix the problem and, thus, was never to be repeated. It was expected to legalize about a million illegal aliens. Turned out to be 2.7 million, and fraud was enormous, especially in the Special Agricultural Worker component that Chuck Schumer (at that time a New York City congressman) cooked up.

      Since then, Congress has passed six more mass amnesties, aggregating to another 3 million illegal aliens getting their status laundered to legal. See https://www.numbersusa.com/content/learn/illegal-immigration/seven-amnesties-passed-congress.html

      (Plus, there’s a steady drip, drip, drip of individual illegal akiens getting legal status via marriage to citizens and green-card holders … and similar maneuvers. This is surely in the hundreds of thousands.)

      Yet we now have somewhere between 10 and 20 million illegal aliens in the country, waaaaaay more than when we started.

      SO WHY WOULD WE DO IT AGAIN???

      Further, we don’t owe these DACA-ites **anything**. They’re already into us taxpayers for **easily** half a trillion dollars for education and other public services. (No, their illegal-alien parents didn’t pay taxes that were significant compared to $500 billion.) See http://www.vdare.com/articles/national-data-why-let-dreamers-steal-750-billion-from-americans

  4. I wish that I had known about SUSPS when I dropped out of the Sierra Club for refusing to take a stand on immigration and overpopulation.

    1. I departed from it also. They won’t even take a critical stance against illegal immigration. And if illegal aliens are merely “undocumented immigrants,” as the Media pretends, then burglars are merely uninvited houseguests. Malibu, anyone?

  5. They send their “Children” on an 800 Mile Journey without their Parents….
    BUT, WE’RE SEPARATING THEM FROM THEIR FAMILIES !

  6. From the article I read back in the summer Mexico is very wiling to give all the help to the DACA groups they can. They were taking bus loads of them to show them around towns in Mexico offering to place them in jobs where English needs to taught in schools which they have done for the few DACA’s that Ice deported, all this simply because of their speaking English. Mexico thinks these young people would be excellent ambassadors as a strong link between the two countries.

    1. That article must have been withdrawn. I did a search and so no such information. If you have the link please share.

      1. Sandie, I looked for the link too so it must have been removed but I would suggest contacting any Mexican consulate in your state they would have all of the information concerning this.

        1. Thank you, Barb. I will check it out but prefer that they teach English in Mexico and then legally have them come to this country as exchange students legally and so on. We are a country outgrowing itself and that is a concern to me.

    2. Excellent point, Barb.

      Illegal alien returnees who are not habitual or violent criminals will partially mitigate or compensate for the ongoing and hopefully increasing deportation of just such illegal alien criminals to those same countries. The Mexican government seems happy to welcome the former as it has no say regarding the latter. See this article:

      Should DACA Recipients Become ‘Cultural Ambassadors’ to Their Home Countries?
      By Andrew R. Arthur
      CIS Immigration Blog, October 18, 2017
      https://cis.org/Arthur/Should-DACA-Recipients-Become-Cultural-Ambassadors-Their-Home-Countries

      EXCERPT: “The international relations aspects of the SWT program are easy to understand. In essence, the argument goes, foreign nationals are able to come to the United States, be exposed to our culture and our values, and return home to spread a positive view of the United States, while utilizing the skills that they gained in this country to benefit their home country. For example, the State Department website for the J-1 program includes the following…..”

      Other articles have pointed out how lots of Mexican deportees with long experience in the U.S. are finding good employment at call centers. Watch out, Bangalore!

    3. Sending back a few million Mexicans with their American educations is EXACTLY what Mexico needs. Not so sure the Mexican elites would like it, but Mexico needs change, the DACAns could be the answer .

  7. It is time for them to get out NOW. They have been here too long and taken too much advantage of our country, federal benefits and welfare programs. Circumstance and age have nothing to do with it. Current law does not make any exceptions. I am sick and tired of their arrogance, flaunting of the law, sick and tired on not understanding them on the phone, sick and tired of seeing them take over our jobs, sick and tired of pressing 1 for English, 2 for Spanish, sick and tired of hearing their gibberish everywhere I go. The soon they leave the better. ENOUGH IS MORE THAN ENOUGH!

  8. One hopes Justino Mora’s lack of integrity and good judgment is atypical of UCLA graduates, but knowing what goes on in some classrooms……

  9. No path for amnesty for DACA individuals is one step in the United States gaining control of its own immigration.
    E-Verify is so easy to do, but the power elites, who live in gated communities, have kept E-Verify from becoming law. How does anyone know what is being said by the illegals when they are allowed to speak their language? How many innocent American Citizens have been killed by illegals? If common sense would prevail border security and E-Verify would be already working.

  10. Even as a second generation American, I can see that the immigration issue must be addressed in the U.S. in a reasonable manner, and that it is absurd to denounce as “xenophobic” anyone who disagrees with the notion that our lawless and easily trespassed borders are a civil rights necessity. Immigration is like water: a certain amount is good and energizing, but taken to extremes, it is also a resource that may cause America to drown.

  11. Mora is an illegal alien who acquired an education from 9 years old onward at California taxpayers expense. His ethnic identity politics makes it impossible to look at the substance of Zuckerman’s opinion piece: mass immigration is driving massive and unsustainable population growth in California. He must attack the messenger instead of looking in the mirror.

    UCLA students need to go beyond blind sympathy and ask the simple question: ‘Do I want to live in a California of 50, 60 … 100 million people?” Unless immigration levels are reduced that is their future.

    1. Yes. The “Bladerunner” movies are close to the truth. The California of the future will be unrecognizable.

    2. Good detective work. Mora is symbolic of a large social cost that the media tries to play down. There are currently about 4000 illegal aliens enrolled in the UC system and about 8000 in the CSU system. They account for an equal number of qualified citizen and legal immigrant applicants to those institutions being rejected. To rub salt in the wound, these illegal alien admittees pay lower tuition fees than do citizen admittees from other states.

      And there will be a few thousand more illegal alien admittees next year.

      Unfortunately, many citizens prefer to keep the utopian, rose-colored glasses on until it is their child who is forced to go to a private or out-of-state university.

      In the California community college system, there were over 20,000 illegal alien students registered a few years ago; doubtless that number has grown.

      1. Thee illegals serve as a fifth column for the Mexican invasion. Give them the vote and see what happens! DEPORT NOW!

  12. Professor, those social justice warriors do not really work for any kind of justice at all, nornwill they abandon their adversarial positions. You see, they are all following a tactics ‘book’ developed by the Frankfurt School of communist thought – whether by intention or through ignorance is immaterial. They simply don’t want to talk facts because they will lose every time. A few of the tactics are:

    1) Criticize everything but don’t probide any ‘solutions’ – make everybody dissatisfied
    2) Lie, obfuscate and make extreme emotional appeals – if you cancel Obamacare people will die!
    3) Provoke violence, it will incense your opponents and you can blame them for the riots and assaults.
    4) Destroy every ability of the government to govern or protect citizens – that way ‘the masses’ (as they call us working stiffs) will revolt and accept a ‘strongman’ usurper of the prior government.

    1. Correct. Little of this is actually about social justice. Much of it is about destabilizing the status quo, so as to create social change more in line with their own political thinking. They manipulate popular notions of morality in order to promote what is actually a political agenda. The immigration issue is a powerful weapon in their arsenal.

      1. That weapon backfired when Eric Cantor lost his primary. Then Trump, now Flake is throwing in the towel. Immigration is the straw that is breaking the liberal’s back.

        1. I hope so liberals just want votes! They do not think about the US Citizen who is working two jobs to make ends meet. College students want to work but they have to compete with illegals who drive wages down!

  13. Dr. Z, Thank you for stating the facts so clearly. I am amazed that so many, like this young writer, are quick to repeat horrific and defamatory allegations without carefully checking the facts.

  14. I use race as an easy way to identify the players here. My city was 100% Europeans in 1965. Now it’s 20% Europeans. How is it possible this benefitted the citizens’ families who were living there in 1965? Unless traffic congestion, incredible housing cost increases, crammed schools, lower wages, etc. are a benefit. I haven’t even mention fractured social cohesion and Balkanization. Yeah Yeah Yeah Hitler Hitler Hitler

    1. Mr.Holden, I agree with your comment above all a person has to do is look at the millions of cars on the streets of every large city, our national parks have millions of visitors every year it didn’t used to be that way. There should be a complete halt to all immigration into the US for at least 10 years or longer an then only for the legal immigrants that we need. I wanted to add to, that everyone should watch how your senators /reps in your district vote when it comes to the new tax bill along with E-Verify if you find out that they look like they will try undercut E-Verify call their offices tell them your a voter in their district and you will hold them accountable if E-Verify fails to pass into law.

      1. My “representatives” in California are total Open Borders traitors. I might as well talk to the wall. I till write them but it’s a waste of time. Trump was a desperate plea for SOMEONE to do something about unfettered immigration, it’s suicide.

  15. One can sympathize to some degree with Zuckerman’s instinct to offer some sort of DACA amnesty in combination with major improvements in immigration law enforcement. However, the lack of candor in all pro-DACA amnesty politicians and organizations about their intentions re the total numbers of persons they hope to get permanent residency for are grounds for distrust.

    One set of potential numbers is given in this document:
    Differing DREAMs: Estimating the Unauthorized Populations that Could Benefit under Different Legalization Bills, By Jeanne Batalova, Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, Sarah Pierce, and Randy Capps
    MIGRATION POLICY INSTITUTE Fact Sheet
    https://www.migrationpolicy.org/research/differing-dreams-estimating-unauthorized-populations-could-benefit-under-different

    BUT those numbers, all in the low millions, do not include the illegal alien parents and illegal alien siblings of the potential amnesty recipients, let alone all the relatives in the home country they would attempt to bring in as soon as possible. So it’s not “just 700,00 to 800,000,” legalizations the pro-DACA amnesty folks are hoping for, it is something on the order of 5,000,000. Count on the LA Times and the rest of the mainstream media to try to keep the electorate in the dark on that for as long as possible.

    1. We gave a massive amnesty in 1986, the enforcement promises were broken. we must NEVER trade amnesty for enforcement again as the open borders crew and “Cheap Labor Lobby” will gut enforcement every chance they get.

  16. America first, law and order. Deport all non-citizens/illegals, no matter who they are, how old they are, how long they have been here. Nothing else will work.
    We don’t need immigrants, 300 million Americans, if we can’t make it on our own then so be it.

  17. It’s really the perfect storm working against the well-being of the more affluent, less over-populuated nations. This guilt-tripping on the part of the alleged intellectuals from poorer nations, from our own limo-liberal press, and from the religious fundamentalists, Catholics, and left-leaning Reform Judaism, along with potent lobbying from various social welfare groups / case workers / lock-step academics. It’s so obvious that allowing heavy immigration from any other country – regardless of the primary ethnicities involved – works against environmental protection, habitat preservation, endangered species protection, and resource conservation. So much of the U.S., in the west in particular, is short on water. And short on funding to attempt to assimilate incoming hordes. The source countries generally have no programs encouraging/rewarding contraception and smaller family size…after all, corrupt governments thrive on barefoot, ignorant, pregnant masses. Their superstition and lack of political sophistication along with deep-seated prejudices against those different from their own faith, lifestyle, sexual orientation make them anything but ideal additions to the U.S., where there is already a hefty minority of the population poorly educated, wildly prejudiced, and ecologically/scientifically illiterate. Anyone who cares about environmental protection, conservation of wildlife habitat, endangered species, and downright quality of life has to oppose amnesties and the further encouragement of yet more illegal immigration they engender, and be in favor of the very wise E-verify approach to ensuring that jobs go to those entitled to legally live and work in our country – such enforcement would surely discourage a goodly % of those aiming to come here. Also amended should be chain migration and an end to birthright citizenship, very dated approaches that meld poorly with what is needed in the more educated and healthy societies of the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Western Europe. Of course, big biz loves cheap labor, knows having endless labor ensures no strong unions, low wages, and lots of human capital and consumers to buy its vast inventory of goods and services, most of which being of questionable worth. So, as I said, it’s a perfect storm of adversity harming those of us who’d like a modest human population made up of well-housed, well-fed, decently-clothed and medically-secure individuals with encouragement to obtain and continue high and further education, embrace tolerance of the admittedly very small but not without value percentage of the population that is ‘different,’ and vitally concerned with that greatest of all forms of diversity – SPECIES DIVERSITY. So sad that a good professor is walloped by intolerant and low-consciousness lock-step reactionaries who care not a whit for the well-being of the planet’s health, preservation of our remaining array of species of plants and animals, and protection of safe, health-enabling resources like water and air. Ever-larger population is a recipe for loss of all our well-being over time, and is at the root of all human problems, enabling the greedy to exploit, the power-hungry to abuse, and the viciously carnivorous, war-like primate that we quickly revert to when under great stress to wreak havoc on all other lifeforms on earth as well as on one another.

    1. Like the Russians give a hoot about U.S. immigration policy, libtard. You have a swimming pool and a hot tub and cable. I’m going to come live in your house, and I don’t expect you to bother me about it. After all, I’m only seeking a better life. So what if you’re going to have to subsidize it? You got a problem with that?

  18. This article does open the gates to a reasoned discussion. Over population is devastating our ecology. Immigration, both legal and illegal, is devastating areas that were previously untrammeled. I agree that one does need to consider the human aspect of it as well. We must consider those children who have no say in where they are when traveling with parents and have no knowledge of any other country. We must consider the health of those who are escaping persecution and possible death in other countries. At the same time, we must consider those who are affected by the influx of low paid workers who will not fight for their rights and will not join unions looking to better their fare as citizens. A compromise must be reached between these two far flung ideals. We must keep our eyes open to both sides of the coin when considering this argument. Thank you, Mr. Zuckerman, for making your case.

    1. Perhaps we should say that “the human aspect of it” needs to come in primarily when immigration laws and policies are defined but not when we decide how to fairly, firmly and consistently enforce those laws and policies.

      And another dimension is the ethics of richly rewarding the illegal alien parents who brought the DACA recipients as children into the U.S. All the forces pushing for amnesty for the DACA recipients are also covertly pushing for amnesty for their parents — and will soon be doing so overtly.

      1. I agree. An carefully worded amnesty could be considered while making new laws regarding immigration, but enforcement should happen no matter what the law is. I also agree that the parents should pay full price for their illegal action while we consider some leeway for the children. I wonder if a law could be written banning DACA recipients from acting as a sponsor for other aliens; thereby allowing them citizenship while restricting their ability to speak for their parents, cousins, and other relatives.

  19. The Demographic facts are these: 1) if immigration in America had remained at pre-1965 levels (1965 was the year liberal Democrats greatly expanded legal immigration in Congress), the American population would now be approaching population stability at around 240 to 250 million people. Instead we already have 330 million people. 2) If illegal immigration and legal Mass Immigration continue at current levels or increase to levels contemplated in the passed 2013 Senate “Comprehensive” Immigration “Reform” bill–nearly all Illegal Aliens given Amnesty and Legal Immigration increased to over two million foreign workers per year–the American Human Population will grow to between 500 and 800 billion people by 2100. Such levels of Human Overpopulation in America would be an ecological nightmare in our Country unless Human consumption levels in terms of natural resources and land were drastically reduced to Third World standards. America today because of its high average consumption of natural resources and land is the most overpopulated Country on Earth. We are far above the ecological carrying capacity of America.

    We need to end Illegal Immigration now and reduce legal Mass Immigration to population neutral levels if we are to behave in a long-term ecologically responsible way as a Country.

  20. It’s really not about compassion, but more about having a cheap supply of labor constantly coming into the country. The rich get richer, by exploiting the cheap labor. The middle class and working classes get stretched thin financially, subsidizing the education costs, housing costs, and medical costs of the in-flowing crowds. We’re also subsidizing them through the wage stagnation that the cheap labor creates. Indirectly, we are thus subsidizing the growth of the wealth of our elites. And it is absurd.

  21. The books that changed my mind on this issue: “Alien Nation,” by Peter Brimelow, former Forbes Magazine editor. “Into the Cannibal’s Pot, ” by Ilana Mercer, the daughter of a liberal rabbi. “The Path to National Suicide,” by Lawrence Auster, also at one time a liberal Jewish American. “Adios, America,” by Ann Coulter. “Suicide of a Superpower,” by Patrick Buchanan.

  22. Very well written. The viciousness of those who oppose immigration laws is unlimited. If you stand up and make the very reasonable case that immigration should be reduced, you will be viciously and personally attacked.

    1. So attack back! Call out the pro-Latino racists and their agenda to “take back” America for Mexico. Call out their demands for special “rights” to migrate and break our laws. Ask them what “Para La Raza toto, para los otros nada” means. Show them what they are: RACISTS.

  23. After reading all of the comments presented below, I find them, except for a very few, to state truth and common sense. However, having observed the issue of immigration, legal and illegal, since 1965, I no longer believe that peaceful actions will ever be taken to reverse course as we speed toward more and more toward the final destruction of our country and the quality of life that we once enjoyed. There are too many powerful forces , in government and out, at play that. through greed and even hatred for America. will never allow the return to a sane immigration policy. In addition, the idea of “Economic Growth” always supersedes any rational thought pertaining to overpopulation. It is only with dread that I contemplate the future for my grandchildren.

  24. The real racist position is the belief that non-white people cannot run successful societies and must therefore be rescued by immigration to America.

  25. For many decades, Ben Zuckerman has been a voice of reason in discussions about population growth and environmental protection. The simple fact is that stabilizing population is a sine qua non for ecological sustainability.

    If you want to breathe clean air, if you want to save a little habitat for other species rather than having people hog it all–hell, if you just want to drive to work without being stuck in traffic for hours–then population growth must be halted.

    In some places, that means cutting fertility levels. In California and the rest of the US, we have done that. So if we want to end population growth, we must cut back on historically high immigration levels. Not end immigration–just reduce it.

    Thanks, Ben, for your continued efforts to educate Californians in general and Bruins in particular about these matters!

  26. I have known Ben Zuckerman for more than 15 years, and it’s really disheartening to read the false statements that are being made about him. It is similar to the outrageous statements that President Trump makes using his Twitter account.

    I have been a member of the Sierra Club since 1981, and throughout the early 2000s I was very active in the effort to make the Club more active in the area of U.S. overpopulation. During that time, John Tanton was not involved in this effort at all. He was not a part of SUSPS, the group that was trying to increase Sierra Club awareness and activity in regards to U.S. population and its effect on the environment.

    John Tanton may have been active in the Sierra Club during the 1970s, as a New York Times article asserted. But he was not part of the U.S. population stabilization movement within the Sierra Club around the turn of the century. This is the guilt by association fallacy, which is doubly wrong in this case, because John Tanton wasn’t associated with SUSPS at all!

    Please don’t descend to the level of the Twitterer-in-Chief. Don’t use logical fallacies to falsely smear people.

  27. Great Response Ben. Excellent Job!!! Here is my response to Mr Mora.

    This is obviously a hit piece by this young man on an organization and it’s President which I have followed closely over the years. From everything I have been able to study CAPS is an organization which advocates for stricter immigration laws as well as stopping the lawlessness currently in full motion in our State. The environmental impacts of this are truly profound but those on the left refuse to acknowledge these simple facts. I won’t go into detail but a number of highly respected environmentalist who have ” common sense” understand this. I won’t go into all the other facts regarding the severe impacts to California by the “invasion” but suffice to say that many aspects of our economy, Schools, “Traffic Hello”, Housing, Crime etc have significant impact on everyday American Citizens and “Legal” residents, I could go on but won’t at this time. This young man attempts to scapegoat CAPS and by association Ben Zuckerman by using half truth, innuendo, hyperbole and outright lies. Let me give you one simple stat that the readers might not know and Mr Mora may find as an inconvenient truth. Where are all the people coming from. Answer: in the last 10 years 100% of all net population growth in California comes from Illegal and Legal immigration and births associated with this particular class! In the last 30 years it’s been 98%. Hows that working out for you in Southern California it seems that the effects of this are seen all over Southern California just get on a freeway and you might get a clue. As CAPS so rightly says, “it’s not who it’s how many”

    I would hope that the UCLA students, Alumni and other interested UCLA observers will see this as nothing more than Mr. Mora attempting to justify the unjustifiable which is the out of control immigration policy and lawless action of the State of California and the former President Barach Obama who Mr Mora obviously supports from my research on him! Mr Mora is advocating lawlessness which he is participating in currently. Who is the real enemy here Mr Mora or Mr Zuckerman. We all know the left and radicals, like Mr Mora, always accuse others of participating in the same crimes they accuse others of! I would hope that those reading this article would ask themselves a couple of questions. Are you held to the rule of law and do you care about the environment and other issues related to the impacts of the “invasion”. If so may I challenge you to go to CAPSWEB.ORG and learn for yourself. The “FACTS” are there for you to see, if you are not blinded by the hypocrisy and outright hate from people such as Mr Mora and his willing accomplices who apparently want to undermine our great Nation!

  28. The most critical environmental issue of the 21st century is population control, most particularly in developed countries like the U.S. Birth control, limits on immigration and access to abortion are all essential to addressing our destruction of the natural world around us. But, so is some effort to improve life in other countries, like those to the south of us. Foremost in improving the human condition is improving the quality of life of women–including access to education, birth control and economic opportunity.

  29. I agree with the author. No other issue we are dealing with at this time will impact the quality of life for future generations of Americans than immigration. Yet this most important aspect of the immigration issue is rarely discussed, partly because those who make this connection risk being smeared as a racist, bigot, xenophobe, etc.

  30. It is insane that California elites think they can house, clothe, feed, educate and employ an unlimited amount of unauthorized aliens while at the same time champion reducing carbon emissions, protecting wildlife/open spaces and safeguarding water supplies.

  31. We must, as a Nation look to the future and realize we cannot continue to allow our population to grow at this rate, especially from immigration. We have an obligation to maintain our living standards and limit our population growth accordingly. Congress, get your heads on!!!

  32. Many of those DACA’s where in their late teens or early 20s. Thank BO’s immigration officials for looking the other way. Any one of those DACA’s who is not squarely in the US’s constitutional values needs to be deported. And with them some politico’s need to be deported too.

  33. Zuckerman had his hands full in responding succinctly to vilification of himself and CAPS, and could hardly address all the other inaccuracies in Mora’s hit piece. The most egregious of these were Mora’s smearing of John Tanton as “anti-immigrant” and “white nationalist.” He was neither. I knew Tanton personally for a few years before he retired and found him a man of highest principle. His prescient, award-winning 1976 article on immigration, “International Migration as an Obstacle to Achieving World Stability“ (http://www.cairco.org/cairco-docs/Tanton-1976-International-Migration-essay-fmtsh.pdf) is even more relevant today than it was when first published. His original byline on that article read: “John H. Tanton, M.D., was Chairman of the Zero Population Growth Immigration Study Committee 1973-1975, and has been National President of Zero Population Growth since 1975. From 1971-1975 he was Chairman of the Sierra Club National Population Committee and Organiser and President of the North Michigan Planned Parenthood Association. He is a well known speaker on human population problems.” Back in the day, he would have been called a classical liberal. So it was not surprising that he became president of ZPG in 1975, an organization founded in 1968 by three liberals (two scientists, Charles Remington and Paul Ehrlich, and lawyer Richard Bowers). However, later a timid ZPG national board decided it no longer wished to have any focus on U.S. ZPG because it did not want to deal with the heat that comes with immigration issues. Leaders of the California chapter of ZPG demurred, ‘divorced’ from the national body, and in 1986 created a new organization, CAPS. True to his principles, Tanton became a big supporter of CAPS and helped it get off the ground and funded especially during its earlier years. A good sense of the man is provided by a 5 min 2006 video “John Tanton Series –Introduction” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lucNJzf2zeo) and a 15 min 2016 video: “A tribute to Dr. John H. Tanton” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cc2aMO80akQ) . For a fuller account of his life and accomplishments, buy the 2002 biography by John Rohe, “Mary Lou and John Tanton: A Journey into American Conservation.”

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