Moby Dick was written in 1851, and it is interesting to see the parallels of the talks now and then in the United States related to immigration reform and energy concerns. It is remarkable how they are still the same. For Example, in Moby Dick, Herman Melville writes:

As for the residue of the Pequod's company, be it said, that at the present day not one in two of the many thousand men before the mast employed in the American whale fishery, are Americans born, though pretty nearly all the officers are. Herein it is the same with the American whale fishery as with the American army and military and merchant navies, and the engineering forces employed in the construction of the American Canals and Railroads.

He then goes on saying how the American born people are usually the brains... although this might not be true anymore. Given the fact that I am a Ph.D. student, I am witness of how America is hiring more and more brains from overseas. Then again this is not new either. We all know what happened for example with von Braun.

The other parallel is with respect to oil consumption and how we should keep it to a minimum:

For God's sake, be economical with your lamps and candles! not a gallon you burn, but at least one drop of man's blood was spilled for it.

Of course in the novel he is talking about men being killed by the whaling industry (they got oil from Whales). Now the blood spilled is due to wars, social inequality and terrorism, all related to a different kind of oil.