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ng: i agree with most of your post--except the first sentence. fact is that there are reverse migration stats and that if you juxtapose them with immigration stats it turns out that the inflow and outflows are not terribly far apart--i knew a guy once who was doing research on this topic==i dont remember the population he was tracking exactly--maybe germans==but i do remember that it was a long-term project (it covered about 150 years up to either the 1995 or 2000 census)--his basic claim was that reverse migration account in the aggregate for about 75-80% of the inflow for the population he was studying. that's bloody high....but thing is that this data would cover only "legals"...but from that, you can assume (i think) that the numbers for the undocumented would be much closer to the same (in other words, i would expect that the net gain of population would be close to zero in the aggregate.) so there is data out there, numbers in the census--all that is required is juxtaposing categories that normally aren't juxtaposed for some reason.
so it is not only a speculative issue, this. and it is not idealism to assume that many--if not most--people who come into the states leave again, in the aggregate at any rate. it does seem a bit idealistic to assume that the united states is some kind of nirvana such that everyone on earth wants to live here. that seems more than idealism--it seems like narcissism. but that i dont particularly impute to you--it's more an amurican kultcha thing.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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