America used to be a great labor pool.  Our nation was founded not on but via cheap labor- look in an original draft of the Constitution and you'll see that slaves were, if not fully American, at least worth two thirds of one.  As citizens slowly woke up to that terrible math, we opened our doors (or, er, ports) to Germans, Jews, Italians, Irish (begrudgingly), Chinese (till 1882), and so on.  We constantly refilled our labor coffers and bred prosperity, if not in the most recent arrivals, at least in the 2nd or third most recent newbies.

Check out this article about labor in agriculture right now, courtesy of the NYT.  It's a fascinating dissection of the breakdown in the US when it comes to dealing with labor woes.  Just how is it that orchard owners in California's Central Valley have come to be so nervous about China's Jiangxi province?  And why should this have SO much to do with kooks like the Minutemen?

By stopping the flow of "illegal" immigration from Mexico, we are indeed upholding the letter of the law.  But by not dealing with the real issue of what those immigrants offer to our workforce, we're shooting ourselves in the foot.  Would you like to pick pears for $100 a day?  If you said yes, then why don't you?  Would you be upset if someone that said "yes" really got an opportunity to do so?

China's might right now lies not in its military or its scientific infrastructure, but rather in its labor force.  They've 4 times the number of citizens that we do, and their political/economic systems allows them to do what they will with said workforce.  It's sad and frustrating to me that we're willing to outsource everything to China, rather than actually compete with it.  But that sure seems to be what's going down...