meantime, we had wrought important changes among thennative populations we did not eliminate. We introducednmodern medicine and improved agricultural methods asnwell as the political innovations associated with the modernnstate. The results, as inevitable as our loss of nerve, havenbeen burgeoning Third World populations, followed bynplagues and famines that for all our efforts we can onlynameliorate without actually preventing or suppressing.nWhat a mess we Europeans made of things in Asia andnAfrica, and what a mess we are still making by propping upnthugs and subsidizing the population expansion of poorncountries while attempting (without success) to modernizentheir economic systems. Our ultimate solution for the crisisnwe have created is to throw open the doors to Third Worldnimmigrants and invite them to reduce our own level ofncivilization to that of Nigeria. Ethnic strife in the UnitednStates is already at painful levels. What can we expect whennthe conflict among Asians, blacks, and Hispanics is fueled bynmassive immigration and a competition for increasinglynscarce resources?nWorldwide population growth results in a complicated setnof problems for which we must find solutions simple enoughnfor the U.S. Congress to understand. I would like to presentna few basic principles (none of them new) to light our waynthrough the labyrinth.nThe main principle is to put the needs of America firstnand Europe second. Humanitarian policies that threaten thenvitality of the West are the worst kind of treason. In foreignnpolicy, this should mean a rapid withdrawal of all forms ofneconomic and development assistance to poor nations,nparticularly those with high rates of population growth. (Fornthis point I am obviously indebted to Garrett Hardin’s classicnessay on lifeboat ethics as well as to Dr. Tristram Engelhardt’snresponse.)nWestern aid, private as well as governmental, has been thencrudest sort of kindness. Most of the money spent has beennlapped up by the bureaucrats who make good livings helpingnthe poor and by the corrupt politicians who run nearly everynThird World government. What supplies actually reachnAfrica often turn out to be warm blankets and canned foodnyears past the expiration date. When our medical and foodnrelief does score a success, the only effect is to increase thenpopulation of, for example, Ethiopia well beyond thencarrying capacity of the environment.nIn passing one might ask how a country that can’t repairnits bridges and roads can afford to subsidize any foreignngovernment, rich or poor. It should also be our nationalnpolicy to exert as much pressure as we can to discouragenforeign governments and international agencies from practicingntheir lethal charities upon the Third World.nAt home, we should give our own people the benefit ofnthis policy, by cutting off all forms of welfare that discouragenproductivity and encourage irresponsible procreation. Thenleft, which is so fond of handing out other people’s moneynin the form of food stamps, AFDC payments, and subsidizednhousing, wants to handle the consequences of theirnfolly by encouraging subsidized abortions. But if we quitnpaying poor women to get pregnant, perhaps we won’t havento bribe them to kill their babies.nA little candor on this point would go a long way. I havenmet many rich Republicans who would be horrified if anmember of their family even contemplated an abortion, butnwho continue to give donations to Planned Parenthood. Isnthere any grown person in America who claims not tonunderstand? Quite apart from the moral evil of abortion, thenrich are missing the point. Planned Parenthood and thenother anti-life organizations can do little to stop the populationngrowth of the poor — there is too much counterpressurencoming from the government. Where they arensuccessful is in teaching the contraceptive mentality of safenpromiscuity to middle-class teenagers, who hear the messagenof hedonism but forget all the other, more complicated partsnabout birth control, except the bit about abortion being thensafe (to say nothing of effective) birth control of last resort.nThe very people in America who ought to be forming stablenmarriages and having two or three children are growing upnperverse, selfish, and unwilling to assume the burdens ofnfamily life. For the Julian Simons, this presents no problem, ^nbecause the Third World is like a factory mass-producingncheap labor to be imported to the United States. But thosenwho understand the law of competitive exclusion will haventheir doubts.nSince the native-born American population is not growing,nthe main domestic effort should be directed to immigrationnreform. This is doubly important, since Third Worldnimmigrants not only add to the general population pressurenbut also exacerbate the ethnic rivalries that are alreadyntearing the country apart. A few years ago I took a drive withnmy family up to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where somendistant relatives of mine used to have a place. We stopped atna state park and wondered why the signs were mostly innSpanish. When we got to the beach, we understood. Wenwere virtually the only Americans there. Most of the Latinosnappeared to be having a good time, doing no harm. Viewednin the abstract, it was a colorful scene. But I’ve been tonMexico, and as much as I like and admire the people there, ^nmost of them are not ready for life in the United States, atnleast not in clean, Germanic Wisconsin. Some of the youngnmen looked at me and my small son as if to say, “What thenhell are you doing here? This is our park.”nThey’re right, but internationalization is a two-way street.nPuerto Rican nationalists say (so I’m told) that they nonlonger feel at home in their own country; there are so manynsigns in English. I understand their point and deplore then”cocacolization” of Europe more than most Europeans do,nbut we can only work on our own problems, not the world’s.n(We could start by giving Puerto Rico its independence,nwhether the Puerto Ricans want it or not.)nBut here in the great 48, we can already see the end. AsnChicago and Los Angeles and Miami all turn into largescalenversions of Tijuana (or Shanghai or Lagos), and thengentle suburbanites run farther and farther into the countrysidenthey are destroying, there will no longer be even anmemory of the kind of Americans who built this countrynand made it, for a time, a refuge from the historicalnprocesses. “Lo, all our pomp of yesterday is one withnNineveh and Tyre.” <^nnnOCTOBER 1991/17n