The Real News Network has the interview New Senate Bill Fails To Address Root Causes of Central American Migration of David Bacon.

DESVARIEUX: But, David, if you do agree with that premise that you propose, you know, people deserve a decent life, what should we as Americans be focusing our attention on if we really want to deal with this influx of children from Central America? What specific policy should we be pushing our lawmakers to be fighting for?

BACON: Well, I think that we need to stop, for instance, negotiating trade treaties which basically deepen the poverty that exists in Mexico, Central America, and other countries. You know, this administration has negotiated and put into effect three trade treaties. We could go all the way back to the North American Free Trade Agreement that was negotiated by the first president Bush and then signed by Clinton, as a result of which 8 million people came from Mexico to the United States because people really had no alternative if they needed to survive. So that’s one thing that we could do is we could have a much fairer trade regime that existed for the benefit of ordinary people, little people on the ground, rather than for large U.S. corporations.

But I think also that we have to decriminalize migration, decriminalize the movement of people. Instead of seeing that or instead of thinking that the answer to people crossing borders is to put people in prison or to fire them from their jobs or deport them, we need to treat people as we would ourselves expect to be treated as human beings. So I think both of those things are the real alternatives: the decriminalization of migration, and also taking a look at root causes and at least trying to stop doing–do the things that are causing people to lack any alternatives to leaving home in order to survive.

The previous post Three Questions to Ask During a War (and During Peacetime, Too) is apropos here. I think this is all about asking the right questions.

I just wonder when will we start to ask of proposed free trade treaties what is the cost in increased immigration to this county of refugees from the countries with which we sign these treaties?

Yes, a treaty may improve trade so that corporations (that are not people) will prosper, but what is the impact on people (who seek refuge)?