When someone mentioned Italy much earlier, I did not know it was leading to a discussion of the number of foreigners locked up in Italian jails.

My first thought was of an entirely different consideration, something I read about in the New York Times Magazine a couple of weeks ago. Italy has the lowest birth rate among all the world's nations; Europe as a whole is not reproducing its current native population, and Italy is the most extreme example.

I don't know where to begin discussing the many ways this pertains to the subject at hand, but I'll simply ask you to consider it as food for thought.

The best-educated and most privileged demographic groups on the planet are fading away into self-selected extinction, employing various means including contrception, abortion, and techniques that might be considered one or the other.

Meanwhile, the wretched of the earth are multiplying like there's no tomorrow. There is work that needs to be done everywhere in the developed world, some of it poorly paid and requiring little or no training.

What else could possibly be expected except the general trend of migration that seems to scare the shit out of our most xenophobic fellow citizens?