Proposition 8's defeat in California isn't the only thing making headlines for the gay rights movement as of late. According to the Washington Post, gay Mexican citizens who seek asylum in the United States are facing an increasingly uphill battle. Changes to the general asylum policy and a few rejected cases have resulted in what many fear is the end of a practice that provided safety for dozens since the mid-1990s. 

Persecution based on sexuality, in a country where machismo and conservative Catholic ideals run deep, once made a strong enough case for gay Mexicans seeking refuge up north. But liberalized laws on homosexuality and an increase in gay pride efforts have made the case a harder sell. Mexico City now recognizes civil unions, and the city's gay pride parade draws more than a million people each year. 

So why should the United States leave open the possibility of asylum? Despite the gains, negative attitudes in Mexico about homosexuality persist, leading to workplace discrimination and brutality against gays. Between 1995 and 2006, more than 1,200 Mexicans were killed because of their sexual orientation. And for all the good they might have done for the country's gay rights movement, liberalized laws have provoked a backlash from homophobic parts of society -- including some members of the Mexican police force.

Another reason to leave the asylum option? Consider the impact these homophobic attitudes and actions have on the spread of HIV/AIDS. Men who have sex with men in Mexico are over 100 times more likely to contract HIV than the general population. Says Martin Martinez Sanchez, a Mexico City hospital employee, of gay men in the capital city:

They have sexual encounters in clandestine areas, and in parts of the city that are just horrible and dangerous... Later they go home and have unprotected sex with their wives. Many gays feel they have to have a wife for appearances."

For many, asylum might not just mean escaping discrimination -- it can mean a lifeline to better care. Mexico's routine medication shortages mean inconsistent treatment for the disease, which usually requires daily pill dosages. As long as prevention and treatment measures for AIDS lag, the United States ought to think twice before closing its doors.

Small island nations have been one of history's consistent political losers. Precisely because they are so small, they lack the power to resist domination by larger powers.

After seizing the Marshall Islands from Japan during World War II, the United States proceeded to use the the islands as a site for over 100 atmospheric nuclear tests. Decades of litigation resulted in only paltry compensation for the disposessed islanders.

The British expelled thousands of Chagos islanders from their homeland in the 1960s to make way for a military base and recently refused them the right to return to their tiny island in the Indian Ocean. The grounds? It would be too expensive to relocate them.

Nowadays, it is through pollution and global warming that world powers most threaten small island nations. If current trends hold, many inhabited islands will be submerged completely due to rising sea levels. Assuming large states are unwilling to reverse this trend by implementing drastic pollution controls, we have to ask: Will they compensate islanders for eliminating their territories altogether, and how?

Mathias Risse, a political philosopher at Harvard, supports a radical proposition made by Anote Tong, president of the island nation of Kiribati:

[S]catter his people of about 100,000 through the nations of the world as rising sea levels swallow up their native island.

Risse justifies this solution by invoking the 17th-century ideas of Hugo Grotius, who argued that the Earth should be viewed as owned collectively by humanity. If we take this view, states are obligated to accept immigrants whose ownership rights have been infringed upon because their home territories no longer exist. This raises the further question: Are states that contribute more to global warming more obligated to accept the resulting refugees?

This is all abstract, normative philosophy that rests on a contestable assumption; Risse theorizes about about what governments should think and do rather than what they in reality do think and do. But these issues might end up in court. Such philosophical arguments would then play an important role in determining the fate of the many islanders soon-to-be made homeless by global warming.

Photo: TORSTEN BLACKWOOD/AFP/Getty Images, Wikipedia

Just in case you were worried that Congress was neglecting other pressing issues during the ongoing financial meltdown, Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo is working diligently to prevent the imposition of Sharia law in the U.S.

The "Jihad Prevention Act," which he introduced last week would make it a deportable offense for immigrants to advocate Sharia and require that all immigrants pledge not to do so when they are admitted to the country. I'll give Tancredo the benefit of the doubt and assume that he actually sees this as a threat, though it's a bit dodgy that the statistics he cites are from the U.K.

On the merits though, this is a phenomenally dumb idea. It not only singles out Muslim immigrants for suspicion, needlessly inconveniences the vast majority of U.S. immigrants who aren't Muslim, and violates the very constitution that it's meant to protect. It also, as Cato's Jim Harper points out, displays a disturbing lack of faith in the strength of American institutions to stand up to the ranting of a few extremists.

It's also inaccurately named since, as far as I can tell, non-Sharia-related Jihad activities would still be allowed.

Paula Bronstein/Getty Images

Nineteen-year-old Mehboba Ahdyar, an Afghan runner featured in FP's photo essay "The Olympians of Afghanistan," has decided to seek political asylum in Europe due to the threats she has received in her home country. Ahdyar, who runs wearing a head scarf and full-length track suit, competes in events ranging from 800 to 3,000 meters and has been a poster child for the Olympics.

Earlier this month, though, Ahdyar went missing from a training facility in Italy. Several days later, she called her parents and told them she was seeking asylum in Europe because of fears for her life. She has received death threats on her mobile phone from Muslim extremists who object to a Muslim woman participating in sports. Earlier this year, her neighbors called the police, claiming she was a prostitute -- a charge that landed her father in jail until the matter was cleared up.

This whole incident is such a shame. This young woman simply wants to run in the Olympics, not run for her life.

David McNew/Getty Images

Illegal immigration is in the news again. The L.A. Times reports today that U.S. prosecutions of illegal immigrants, most of whom have come across the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas and Southern California, are at an all-time high. In March, 9,350 illegal immigrants reportedly faced federal charges, up from 3,746 a year ago. Most of those convicted have been put in the pen for about a month.

The prosecutions are part of a broader attempt to crack down on illegal immigration -- including other measures such as work-site raids-- in light of Congress's failed attempts last summer to pass a comprehensive immigration bill. But has the increase in prosecutions actually done anything to stem the immigrant wave? Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff thinks so:

The reason this works is because these illegal migrants come to realize that violating the law will not simply send them back to try over again but will require them to actually serve some short period of time in a jail or prison setting, and will brand them as having been violators of the law... That has a very significant deterrent impact." 

It seems the thousands of immigrants still trying to come across the border haven't gotten Chertoff's message. If miles of treacherous desert and the threat of being kidnapped by notorious coyote smugglers aren't enough to deter folks seeking a better economic future, why would a month in jail make much difference? The prosecutions seem like just another punitive measure that, along with beefed-up border patrols and increased border fence construction, hasn't had much impact thus far.

What the prosecution efforts have done is overburden an already overstretched federal court system. Immigration cases accounted for more than half of the 16,298 federal criminal prosecutions recorded nationwide in March. Public defenders are overwhelmed by the volume of immigration cases and the challenges they present, including language barriers and the sad state their clients are often in after having spent days sweltering in the desert. So far, it looks like Chertoff's plan is deterring one thing -- the ability of more important federal cases to take priority in court.

DAMIEN MEYER/AFP/Getty Images

Polish-born soccer player Lukas Podolski (left) scored the two goals that gave Germany a 2-0 win over Poland last Sunday in the Euro 2008 tournament.

That has enraged far-right Polish politician Miroslaw Orzechowski of the League of Polish Families. He told Polish newspaper Dziennik:

If someone performs in the colors of a foreign state, there's already a desire there to renounce citizenship.

Going a step further, he also told a Polish radio station that Podolski should be stripped of his Polish citizenship and that he would take legal action if the country's president didn't follow through, according to German media reports.

Podolski emigrated from Poland when he was 2 and has Polish and German passports, so he wasn't exactly playing in the colors of a "foreign state." Moreover, he bent over backward to show respect for his country of birth by refraining from cheering exuberantly when he scored his two goals.

The entire incident is an example of the complicated transnational identities that arise in a mobile, globalized, and interconnected world. I have friends who were born to immigrant parents in one country, married someone from another country, and moved to a third country -- mother, father, and child were born on separate continents. "Where are you from?" is no longer a simple question for such people.

Perhaps that's why U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama -- born in Hawaii to an American mother and Kenyan father, and raised for a while in Indonesia -- appeals to so many worldwide. We're entering an era of people with borders.

After its surprisingly strong showing in Italian parliamentary elections last week, the quasi-separatist, anti-immigrant Northern League Party is likely to take over several key posts in Silvio Berlusconi's cabinet including the interior, reforms, and agriculture ministries. The League's control of the Interior Ministry puts Italy's immigration policy is in the hands of a party whose leaders have suggested that the navy fire on rafts carrying illegal immigrants.

Italy's new deputy prime minister is likely to be Roberto Calderoli, a guy who proudly wears T-shirts emblazoned with the Danish Mohammed cartoons, promoted a "pig day" protest in a Muslim neighborhood, and, after the Italian team's World Cup victory, dismissed their French opponents as "negroes, communists and Muslims."

Berlusconi, who mocked his Spanish counterpart for appointing too many women to top posts, may want to watch his words considering the classy fellows in his own cabinet.

PACO SERINELLI/AFP/Getty Images

Within the fragile coalition that has brought Silvio Berlusconi back to power, the big winner appears to be the Lega Nord, a separatist party that advocates federalism or even complete independence for Northern Italy (or Padania, as they call it.) The Lega won about 8.3 percent of the vote out of a total of 47 percent for Berlusconi's center-right coalition.

There's already speculation that the Lega will use its new influence to push for tougher immigration laws. The Lega has become known for its extreme anti-immigrant sentiment in recent years due to neighborhood patrols aimed at intimidating immigrant communities, racist campaign posters, and the inflammatory rhetoric of party leader Umberto Bossi, who once said that the Italian navy should open fire on boats carrying illegal immigrants. The party has already used its influence over Berlusconi to nix an idea he had hinted at during the campaign for giving immigrants the right to vote.

The Lega's position in Italy's governing coalition means that it will probably have to soften its Padanian separatist stance, but the party might still push to give regional governments more autonomy and budgetary control. That will be a tough pill for Berlusconi to swallow, but with all the challenges he's facing, he'll need all the help he can get. After all, a defection by the Lega brought down another Berlusconi government in 1994. He's not likely to cross them this time.

This week’s Tuesday map comes to us from a billboard controversy south of the border.

Created by advertising agency Teran/TBWA and launched a few weeks ago in Mexico, the Absolut billboard ad depicted pre-1848 North America -– before the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo turned Mexican territories into what is now the American South West.

The campaign was obviously intended for a Mexican audience, as Favio Ucedo, creative director of a top Latino advertising firm, explained:

Many (Americans) aren’t going to understand it. Americans in the East and the North or in the center of the county -- I don’t know if they know much about the history… Probably Americans in Texas and California understand perfectly, and I don’t know how they’d take it.”

But Absolut quickly learned just how some Americans would take it: not well.  Although the ad never appeared in the U.S., it was picked up by American media outlets, causing a flurry of complaint from U.S. citizens (some more creative than others).

As of Friday, Absolut’s maker Vin & Spirits had decided to withdraw the apparently offensive advertisement even though it "was based upon historical perspectives and was created with a Mexican sensibility... [and was] in no way was meant to offend or disparage, nor...advocate an altering of borders..."

The Department of Homeland Security has quietly eased restrictions on U.S. companies looking to hire looking to hire non-immigrant science and technology students. It's probably a step in the right direction for immigration policy, since there's always more demand for these visas than supply. But it's unfortunate that that DHS had to use administrative procedures that are normally reserved for emergencies in order to get around Congress.

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Last year, FP's "Top 10 Stories You Missed" highlighted an issue that hadn't yet gotten a lot of attention in the press -- the fact that nearly half of the 700 miles of fence being built along the U.S.-Mexico border was actually slated to be "virtual" fence. Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have said they prefer virtual to more conventional fencing. But it might be time for both campaigns to go back to the drawing board. After evaluating a virtual fence pilot project, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has thrown cold water on the notion that such fences can be relied upon to secure the border any time soon:

The pilot virtual fence included nine mobile towers, radar, cameras, and vehicles retrofitted with laptops and satellite phones or handheld devices. They were to be linked to a near-real-time, maplike projection of the frontier that agents could use to track targets and direct law enforcement resources. GAO investigators said that [the virtual fence] could not process large amounts of sensor data. The resulting delays made it hard for operators in a Tucson command center 65 miles to the north to lock cameras on targets. Radar systems were also triggered inadvertently by rain and other environmental factors. Cameras had trouble resolving images at five kilometers when they were expected to work at twice that distance...."

The initial phase of the virtual fence -- covering approximately 100 miles near Yuma, Arizona, and El Paso, Texas -- was supposed to be completed by the end of 2008. But the GAO now estimates that it will take until the end of 2011 to complete that initial 100 miles of virtual fence. That means it will take until nearly the end of the next president's first term to deploy a virtual fence along a tiny 100-mile stretch of the border. After that, friends, there's just 1,900 miles to go. I figure we can get the whole thing "virtually secured" sometime around the turn of the century.

Listening to the Democrats talk about using science to secure the southern border is like listening to Republicans talk about using technology to solve climate change. Technology, we are assured, will solve all of America's problems without us having to make any real changes. Sadly, in both cases, that's just cover for not having a real policy to address the problem.

The Public Policy Institute of California has just issued a surprising new report finding that immigrants to the Golden State are far less likely to commit serious crimes than those who are native-born. The study finds that even though foreign-born residents make up 35 percent of California's population, they make up only 17 percent of those incarcerated. Among men aged 18-40, the most likely to commit crimes, immigrants make up an even lower percentage. Native-born Americans in that age group who were born in the Untied States are 10 times more likely to be in county or state prison than immigrants. Hopefully, the study will put some xenophobia to rest.

LUIS ACOSTA/AFP/Getty Images

If you were were looking for a hard number to sum up the state of Cuba's political leadership, try 70. That's the average age of Raúl Castro and the six vice presidents appointed this past weekend. The acension of these longtime Raúlistas to the top spots in Cuba's government is as good an indication of any that Raúl has no immediate plans for major reform. In a conference call organized by the University of Miami's Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American studies, Senior Research Associate Brian Latell characterized Cuba's new government as a "gerontocracy... old men dealing with the possibility of an upheaval and instability among the younger generation of Cubans."

His colleague, University of Miami Assistant Provost Andy Gomez, said his interviews with young Cubans in recent days indicated a disturbing trend of authorities arresting youths on trumped up charges, possibly to prevent major demonstrations. Gomez worries that unless major reforms are undertaken soon, we might soon see a major outward migration of young Cubans to the United States and elsewhere:

I do think that we might see a movement of this young generation trying to leave the island in any possible direction. My concerns here are multiple. First, the United States is in the process of a presidential election. I don't think that this administration or any of the candidates want to deal with a mass migration… The current infrastructure in the state of Florida is not prepared to deal with such a large migration. The state of Florida and the Miami-Dade public schools have [budget] shortfalls. We are just not prepared. This could be a problem for the United States like we haven't seen before.  

It's also unlikely to help alleviate the already toxic state of the U.S. immigration debate. 

If you've seen the recent Irish film Once -- which just won an Oscar for best song -- you may understand how much the social fabric of Ireland has been changing over the last 10 years. In the film, an Irish street performer falls for a young Czech immigrant, who lives with her mother and daughter in a small flat, shares one TV set with her entire building in a poor Dublin neighborhood, and sells flowers in the street to make ends meet. Although living in difficult circumstances, the immigrant family still manages a happy ending. According to the New York Times, however, such characters typify the new Irish identity, and not everyone in Ireland is thrilled about it.

In the last decade, Ireland has seen an explosion in immigration equal to that experienced in Britain over the last 50 years, and from over 150 different nations. For over a century before that, Ireland was better known for its emigration rate, which may be partly why no thoughtful immigration laws were ever put in place. And although FP put the country on a list of the world's most immigrant-friendly countries, some on the Emerald Isle fear a threat to Irish culture and history.

Recently, Enda Kenny, leader of the Irish parliamentary party Fine Gael, released a statement calling for a "genuine national debate" on immigration and for immigrants to acknowledge that they have both rights and responsibilities -- not least of which to realize that Ireland is a "Christian celtic" state. He has since been forced to defend those comments, which were characterized by commentators as highly xenophobic. While the debate has not yet reached the levels of rancor found in other European countries, Ireland is clearly reaching a threshold, and films like Once may have very different endings in this uncertain Irish future. 

iStockphoto.com

Ireland may be one of the best places to be an immigrant, and now there are so many newcomers from right-hand-traffic countries that an Irish senator has proposed that the Emerald Isle switch to driving on the right, too.

Such a change would be "not even remotely feasible," the country's Automobile Association told the Independent. But the senator, Donnie Cassidy, cited the case of Sweden. It switched from left to right in 1967 after spending $120 million in preparations, and it was two entire days before a fatality ensued.

Senator Cassidy isn't all about changing the country's ways to accomodate foreigners' driving habits, however. He has also proposed a special lower speed limit of 80 kmh (50 mph) for noncitizens, compared with speed limits up to 120 kmh (75 mph) for the Irish.

But perhaps it's the senator who needs to slow down and think things through. He admitted to Reuters:

I know when I go to America it takes me five or six days to adjust.

To our U.S. readers: If you happen to see an Irish politician barrelling at you head-on at 75 miles an hour, please e-mail Passport.

Following Mitt Romney's withdrawal speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, presumptive Republican nominee John McCain had this to say about the topic that has gotten him into such hot water with conservative activists and voters:

On the issue of illegal immigration, a position which provoked the outspoken opposition of many conservatives, I stood my ground aware that my position would imperil my campaign. I respect your opposition for I know that the vast majority of critics to the bill based their opposition in a principled defense of the rule of law. And while I and other Republican supporters of the bill were genuine in our intention to restore control of our borders, we failed, for various and understandable reasons, to convince Americans that we were. I accept that, and have pledged that it would be among my highest priorities to secure our borders first, and only after we achieved widespread consensus that our borders are secure, would we address other aspects of the problem in a way that defends the rule of law and does not encourage another wave of illegal immigration. [UPDATE: Watch McCain getting booed here.]

That's pretty much what he's been saying on the campaign trail thus far, and it's been a good enough fudge to net him the nomination. Will conservatives be satisfied with this answer? Probably not, but it seems McCain may have smoothed over some rough patches today. David Freddoso of the National Review writes, "I think the proper reaction to McCain's victory is: Don't Panic. The world has not been destroyed just yet." Mission accomplished?

UPDATE: Ramesh Ponnuru chimes in— 

I'd prefer it if McCain took one more small step. It isn't enough that the border be secure; the illegal population has to start shrinking. (A lot of illegal immigrants came here legally and overstayed their visas, so securing the borders doesn't solve the problem.)

Personally, I think it's wrong to look at illegal immigration as a law-enforcement problem rather than a black-market problem. You can build all the walls you want, but you won't dry up illegal immigration until you drastically raise the number of legal immigrants you let in. But that is for another post and another day.

The Times of London has a great story on how Hamas secretly brought down the border wall between Gaza and Egypt:

[A] Hamas border guard interviewed by The Times at the border today admitted that the Islamist group was responsible and had been involved for months in slicing through the heavy metal wall using oxy-acetylene cutting torches.

That meant that when the explosive charges were set off in 17 different locations after midnight last night the 40ft wall came tumbling down, leaving it lying like a broken concertina down the middle of no-man's land as an estimated 350,000 Gazans flooded into Egypt.

I was watching footage on Al Jazeera today, and it was like nothing I've ever seen—thousands of Gazans streaming across the border in search of Egyptian bargains and a little breathing room.

I'm sure Lou Dobbs has already thought of this, but I wonder how this kind of imagery is going to play in the immigration debate in the United States. I'll be on the lookout for statements from the candidates on this, if they haven't made them already.

ADEK BERRY/AFP/Getty Images

It's no secret that Japan has traditionally been averse to immigration. Many long-term immigrants wait eternally for Japanese citizenship. The Japanese parliament also recently approved a plan to fingerprint and photograph all adult foreigners entering Japan.

But is the tide against foreigners turning in Japan? Possibly. According to a recent Mainichi newspaper telephone survey, 63 percent of respondents favored allowing the immigration of unskilled foreign laborers, even though the Japanese government generally opposes such measures—opting instead for a "cautious" approach toward unskilled workers. Out of the 63 percent, 58 percent supported accepting unskilled foreign workers in fields facing worker shortages, and 5 percent believed that entry-level foreign workers should be accepted without conditions.

Hidenori Sakanaka, head of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute, believes the shift in favor of foreigners may be due to Japan's enormous demographic challenge associated with its rapidly aging society. He also suggests the Japanese may gradually be appreciating the work already done in Japan by entry-level foreign workers in fields from nursing to agriculture, forestry and fisheries. Necessity may be the mother of invention—or in this case, acceptance—but it remains to be seen whether this is really a cultural shift toward embracing immigration. If legislation follows, I may be convinced.

ANDREAS SOLARO/AFP/Getty Images

European attitudes toward immigrants from outside of the continent are well known — they're generally not liked. But in recent months, a new hostile sentiment has been growing toward Europe's internal immigrants. Under the EU's free movement policy, any citizen of an EU member state can pick up and move to any other member state. National borders don't matter. Anyone who lives in an EU country is a citizen of Europe. So as the EU has grown, older member states like England and Italy have seen a large influx of people from former Soviet bloc countries. These immigrants generally only speak their native language, so assimilation has been difficult.

The debate over how to deal with these immigrants, until recently, was mainly civil. Now, in Italy, it's openly hostile. Following the October murder of an Italian woman by a Romanian immigrant, Italy's Senate approved a law on Thursday that would allow them to deport non-native EU citizens. The bill still has to be approved by the lower house, but if it passes, it would give Italy the power to expel anyone, thus contradicting the free movement policy.

The English haven't gone that far, but their patience with non-native speakers is waning. Local councils are being instructed to spend less on translating signs and other materials into the languages of local immigrants. Instead, they are being advised to spend on English classes — a stance that is not openly hostile, yet not exactly welcoming.

Controversies over internal immigration raise an important issue regarding the future of the EU: the fear that national identities could be lost. What does it mean to be Italian if anyone can live in Italy? Do you have to speak English to be English? A common currency and trade policy and open borders are great, but they aren't conducive to preserving how individual nations define themselves.

GERARD CERLES/AFP/Getty Images

It was only a matter of time: The European Commission today unveiled its new "Blue Card," modeled on the United States Green Card, in a bid to attract more skilled workers to the European Union. For several years now, the EU has been facing an increasingly serious labor shortage, which has spread to "new" EU member countries in Eastern Europe. The EU believes it will face a shortfall of 20 million workers in the next two decades, a problem exacerbated by declining birth rates and an aging population. "The EU as a whole ... seems not to be considered attractive by highly qualified professionals in a context of very high international competition," according to the European Commission. But with easier access to jobs, and with the United States' H1B visa quota restrictions, this is likely to change.

So what benefits can prospective recipients of a Blue Card expect? Aside from being covered by a common set of standards across the EU, Blue Card holders would be able to live, work, and travel in the EU without additional restrictions; they could have their families join them within six months; and they would be treated in the same way as EU nationals in terms of tax benefits and many social-security benefits. After five years, card holders would automatically become eligible for permanent residency where they are working. In order to qualify for the card, applicants will need to have an EU job contract lasting at least a year that guarantees a salary of at least three times the minimum wage (or twice for applications under 30), plus health insurance—quite typical demands for working visas around the world.

It seems like a win-win situation for prospective skilled migrants and their European host countries. Nonetheless, I'll bet the Blue Card scheme won't have an easy passage once trade unions and immigration opponents in Europe inevitably start to voice their complaints.