You're probably aware that my argument is not that immigration has "eroded the manufacturing base." Maybe, you aren't? You may or may not have noticed that I offered no Luddite arguments nor did I pine for the good ole days if a union manufacturing job for every blue-collar man. What we do need to do is to try to reduce the number of low-skilled immigrants we allow in this country, who compete with those disaffected workers in the midst of all the changes you note.
"Learn a trade." Boy, there's a new one. Move? Yeah, that's sound advice for poor people. This coming from the guy who got really sore when folks here chastised many of the poor folks in your city for not moving out of town as a hurricane was bearing down on your little sea-level hamlet.
By the way, how are we going to get all those low-skilled immigrants trained in these new jobs and with this new technology? I mean, I'm presuming given all the heartache you've displayed over their plight, that you want the best for them, if not for the hayseeds. How you gonna do that? More remedial classes at Tulane? Surely, you want them here for something more than dead-end, menial labor or political props?