fredm3047@inwa.net
(I-ACK)When America wanted to build a railroad across the country, it gave away land. Then it imported huge quantities of Chinese labour. These Chinese formed actual underground cities underneath some Western towns (literally). The socio-political underpinnings of all of this form a complex tapestry... what led up to it, why our own citizens didn't do the work, who is "America", the treatment of the Chinese, and their adaptations. A lot of it isn't very pretty, but it makes an interesting read.
In light of the fact that times have changed, to set the stage as well as to bludgeon somewhat the political jamming which prevents people from speaking plainly, I need to mention a few things before making my point. You can skip it if you already know what I'm talking about.
I need to mention that an Indian mathematician played an important role in my education. I can't fault the Indians or the Chinese for investing in education: it's admirable, and something we could use more of in this country (some things never change).
There is this idiotic, oft-repeated and unexamined notion that we needed all of these foreigners to do the work (hence the H1-Bs) because we lack the talent to do the job. It's the notion that the people who helped create the technology are unqualified to work with it: Larry Wall not certified to work with Perl? Bill Gates not certified to work with Windows? Larry Ellison not certified to work with Oracle? It's so horrible, I simply can't go on with such a litany of willful ignorance! There's the notion that the only acceptable substitute for experience is a recent degree, obtained by taking courses taught by professors who have no experience because they've spent their entire careers in academia.
Well, that argument seems a little silly, doesn't it? Maybe it's the "willingness"... the willingness to spend years learning a craft and then be paid next to nothing while having common sense and ethics ignored. Oh my god: what would happen if software engineers formed a union, actually found a coherent political voice... or even developed a sense of common understanding or purpose. (Ironically, the Free Software Movement has provided the foundation for this.) Looks like the labor force is getting uppity.
Did you know that naturalized or even second-generation Americans of Indian (and I suppose Chinese) descent have as difficult a time getting work in the IT sector as Americans of the "Bungalo Bill" variety? Probably worse in the aftermath of 9/11. I need to point out that it is seasoned pros that I'm talking about, not child labor. Yes. Apparently we don't have enough child labor in this country. That's where the H1-B program is handy: foreigners are children, right? Plus by law they can be deported if they speak up (how's that for being sent to your room), and if they're on the track to getting a Green Card they're basically slave labor when evaluating the strength of their negotiating position from the "human resources" vantage of their emploiyer.
So we're back to the model which built the American Railroads, it seems; a tried-and-true model. Now I'll get to my point:
Given the nature of capitalism, and Americans being at the self-proclaimed top of the heap, somebody decided to improve on the model. What they said in their backrooms was "Look 'ere, we don't want all of these furriners digging tunnels and cooking stinky food, speaking languages we don't unnerstand, and dating our daughters. What we need to do is have 'em build the Railroad over there and just send it to us when it's done." Seemed like a good idea at the time, I suppose.
Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Yeah, right! "Sorry, we building railroad for ourselves now, hope you don't mind. We work the bugs out, then we build you yours!" But it gets better, if I'm right: "Ah. Yes. Sorry, but Romans didn't make it here with chariots, so we build railroad using our wagons as standard."
Can't say I blame them. Right about now, some of the capitalists are probably waking up to this folly. The question is what to do about it, and whether these people who squandered everybody's savings should be leading the way.
"About that problem with distance between wheels? No worry though we sell you adapters for $500 a piece; we filed patent last week." Truth be told (and it isn't), we've been in an intellectual property trade war with the rest of the world for some time now; we've got far too much protectionism already. Most of it was adopted for other reasons, but at this point and seeing the downward spiral the grab for nonexistent cattle (in the mode of Asa Mercer's Banditti Of The Plains) is in full swing. The question now is are we going to follow the British into the sunset (the aftermath of the aforementioned Wyoming fiasco) or are we different?
We gave them the railroad already. Get over it. We need to compete, so what do we do? Well if we don't want to be hoisted (and quickly) on our own neckties, what we need to do is rescind most of these software patents and curttail copyright (or at least stop exanding it without bounds), not to mention correcting a host of other insults of the intellectual imperialist sort such as giving India back the right to sell Basmati rice. Otherwise we will be paying $500 for that railroad adapter, and buying our Washington apples from France.
Not that anybody is asking me, of course. Voulez-vous des Pommes du Washington?