Mexifornia: A State of Becoming (Hardcover)

by Victor Davis Hanson (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist
*Starred Review* Classics professor Hanson is also, like generations of his family before him, a fruit farmer in California's central valley. He has employed immigrants, seen them flood his community during the last 30 years of mass flight from Mexico, and endured the crime associated with illegal immigrants. Hanson is immensely sympathetic to poor Mexicans, however, and the most powerful chapter here outlines the harried life of the illegal alien. But he hates to see the ordered culture in which he grew up drowned by an alien inundation whose undeserving beneficiaries are Mexico's kleptocratic rulers, for whom an open border is a safety valve expelling the potential for democratic change. The four solutions to the mess that Hanson enumerates include continuing de facto open borders but insisting on rapid acculturation; patrolling the border effectively and reducing legal immigration; imposing "sweeping restrictions on immigration" and ending Mexican chauvinism in the U.S.; and allowing present policies to make California increasingly mirror an unreformed Mexico. Hanson thinks that the U.S. "still need not do everything right" to prevent social collapse in the Southwest and that the totalitarian uniformity of valueless mass culture may soften that collapse. He also sees very clearly what has brought this crisis on: the American globalist ideology's lust for cheap labor and emphasis on "raw inclusiveness" instead of "standards and taste." Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"Hanson's 'Mexifornia' is that rare book that combines scholarship with personal experience to provide genuine insight into a complex issue." -- Linda Chavez, author of An Unlikely Conservative

"Victor Davis Hanson brings a lifetime of experience in California's Central Valley to this indictment of multiculturalism and mass immigration." -- Mark Krikorian, Center for Immigration Studies

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 150 pages
• Publisher: Encounter Books; 1 edition (July 25, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1893554732
• ISBN-13: 978-1893554733
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (86 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #430,654 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

138 of 156 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Someone who sees it as it is!, October 21, 2003

By	Sally Quick (Salem, MA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book shows how Mexico sends their poor to America to work, so they don't have to improve their own country, and how we use these people for cheap labor so that we can sell things for less. It's a deal made between the two countries. The trouble is, it's not what American citizens want. The "servants of the people", the representatives, are not listening to us, so it's always exciting to read something that really tells it like it is.

This book is written from the viewpoint of someone who actually lives with these Mexican immigrants. The rich people who want to use them in their businesses for cheap labor don't live with them; the liberal elites who push for them to get amnesty don't live with them. This guy lives among them, and knows the problems first hand, and as I suspected, there are many, and they're not pretty.

He writes very bluntly about the problems, but not without sympathy for the Mexican immigrants whose own country won't take care of them. With all the new books out and the discussions going on about legal and illegal immigration, and what the American people want, I'm hoping that these problems will be solved. This book is one of the best on the subject, because it is written from a viewpoint of personal experience.

47 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Well written, well researched, well balanced, August 1, 2003

By A Customer

As one who shares the author's ethnic,cultural and geographical heritage, I thought Hanson did a marvelous job of assessing California's major social issue, and one of America's primary problems. Like Hanson, I was born and reared in Fresno County, albeit some 25 miles from his native Selma. I can attest to the accuracy of his description of Selma and the Central Valley in the 1950's.

As a child, my associates included Hispanics; as a teenager working in the fig and peach orchards, my fellow workers were Hispanic. During my professional career, I have hired and promoted many Hispanics.

Hanson's Scandinavian ancestors (from Sweden) and mine (from Denmark) came to America legally and without speaking English, but they succeeded--without bilingual classes, welfare, government subsidies, or that phenomenon known as "affirmative action", which is being rapidly unmasked as nothing, more or less, than "reverse discrimination". Hanson deftly exposes the race industry as an amalgam of organizations and individuals who are quick to attack the Anglo for any slight, either real or imagined, but who, in the long run, seem not to do much for those whom they purport to serve.

As a criminologist, I am well aware of the violence committed by Hispanic Gangs, and the fact that those gangsters who do not wind up in the morgue soon become expensive inmates in our overcrowded prison system, costing taxpayers some $25k per year each. I am equally aware of the many outstanding Hispanic officers, prosecutors, and judges with whom I've worked.

Hanson has eloquently described the failure of our educational programs to work toward an assimilated America, as well as the failure of the "separatists" in the race industry.

The one failure which, to my surprise, he did not identify is that of our elected officials who establish public policy. When Hanson and I were youngsters/young men in the Central Valley, the politicians seemed to act in the best interests of their constituencies. Today,by and large, our politicians have little integrity, but rather pander incessantly to special interests which, in turn, provide them with campaign funds, endorsements,and precinct workers.It is common knowledge that, in Sacramento, legislative votes are "for sale" almost daily. Until we can restore some integrity among our public officials, we will not move toward a better California--better for Hispanics, Anglos, African Americans, Asians, and all others!

Except for his failure to discuss the lack of integrity among many of our elected officials, Hanson has done an admirable job. Mexifornia should be on the "must read" list of all who are concerned about the future of Californians, nothwithstanding the color of their skins!

51 of 56 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This wave is different., September 2, 2003

By	Peter Lacerda (New Jersey) - See all my reviews

Victor Hanson combines scholarship (Professor at Cal State) with personal experience (life long resident and farmer in central CA. who has Mexican-American family and friends) to present a thoughtful look at the illegal Mexican immigration crisis. Hanson argues that the reason for this crisis is that both ends of the political spectrum have vested interests in continuing the unabated entry of illegal Mexicans. Republicans wish to placate business interests with cheap labor and Democrats hope for a future electoral base. Hanson further explains that this wave is not like the earlier waves of Polish, Jewish, or Italian immigration which was of a fixed duration and where the connection of the new immigrant to the Homeland was more thoroughly severed.
This book is well written and to the point (approx. 140 pages). I have also seen Victor Hanson on several political talk shows. He is well spoken and mild mannered which is a welcome relief from the cacophonous diatribe we too often get on cable news channels.