…for the Immigration Policy Center…
It is not surprising that Victor Davis Hanson’s latest book, Mexifornia: A State of Becoming, has transformed him into the new darling of the anti-immigrant movement. Unencumbered by the references, footnotes, facts and figures which clutter most books about immigration, Hanson relies largely upon personal anecdotes and emotional tirades to create a pastiche of fearful imagery: unassimilated Mexican hordes overrunning California, rampantly breeding entire generations of gang bangers and welfare recipients, goaded on by corrupt Mexican elites and U.S. multiculturalists awaiting the rise of a new Chicano nation in the southwestern United States. In general, Hanson’s arguments are wildly inconsistent, informed more by stereotype than substance, and characterized by a remarkable unfamiliarity with Mexican history and culture…
