The Incredible Disappearing Border Fence

[Terri]

By Michelle Malkin
December 19, 2007

Do you know the story of the Incredible Disappearing Border Fence? It's an object lesson in gesture politics and homeland insecurity. It's a tale of hollow rhetoric, meaningless legislation and bipartisan betrayal. And in the run-up to the Iowa caucuses, it's a helpful learning tool as you assess the promises of immigration enforcement converts now running for president.

Last fall, Democrats and Republicans in Washington responded to continued public outrage over border chaos by passing the "Secure Fence Act." Did you question the timing? You should have. It's no coincidence they finally got off their duffs to respond just before the 2006 midterm elections. Lawmakers vowed grandiosely to keep America safe. The law specifically called for "at least 2 layers of reinforced fencing, the installation of additional physical barriers, roads, lighting, cameras and sensors" at five specific stretches of border totaling approximately 700 miles.

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[Cynical Pete]

A very excellent article. We went from a Do Nothing Congress to a Do Worse Than Nothing Congress. I often wonder why Congress hates Americans so much and are bent on the destruction of the USA as we used to know it.
Several members of the tyrants in Congress voted against English as the official language of an English speaking nation costing the taxpayers millions in duplicate papers. Oh well, it's not their money wasted. A measure must be placed on the ballot putting Congressional salaries on a commission basis. When the do evil, a deduction, when they do good, an addition or at least a severe reduction in pay and retirements. This would be a good start.

[crawlars]

*******s, all of them

[Terri]

crawlars, family friendly forum here. Please remember that.

[jack virtus]

What is it our elected IDIOT'S (this includes both parties) in the congress don't understand? The American voter overwhelmingly wants the fence built, aid to illegals cut off, santcuary cities cut off from funding etc, etc. Americans must vote these lawmakers who ignore our wishes out of office. Enough is Enough!

[RGSchmidt]

Please, folks, come on. Please tell me no one in this forum is surprised. Please tell me no one here actually expected Congress to build this fence, or do anything else constructive to protect the USA.

Don't make me lose confidence in your collective smarts; Say it ain't so, Joe.

RG

[chubmanjoe]

As we weather the interminable "election season" (better termed the election eon), it's disheartening to see the Business Lobby in cahoots with the Soros gang on the illegal immigration issue - two unlikely allies, on opposite ends of the spectrum, meeting in the middle for a ludicrous short-term fix that, in the mid- and long-run is completely and inarguably self-destructive. The exciting prospect of having a $5/hour gardener and buying lettuce at half the 1970 price has completely deluded many people into believing that this is a "supply-and-demand" issue - nothing could be further from the truth.

Context is essential, but decidedly absent - when Con Agra says that "Americans will not work in the fields", they deliberately and self-servingly omit the rest of the sentence - "for 10 hours per day and $5 per hour, with no benefits, so that Americans can buy tomatoes for $1/pound". When your local custom home builder complains that he can't afford to pay a decent wage to skilled Americans, he means he wants to be able to troll "down by the tracks" and pick up day labor to whom he will pay cash - he's saying he can't afford to pay the payroll taxes for legal labor, which is a whole other subject. Illegals are not doing labor that Americans will not do - they are doing labor for wages that Americans only sneer at, given the alternatives available to us. And they are doing it while, in overwhelming numbers, not paying taxes. In turn, overall wages are depressed and standards of living - for everyone - decline. That is not the answer - our Nation was founded on the idea that everyone contributes - such is not the case with illegals.

Studies have shown that doubling farm wages would result in a $0.17 increase in the price for a head of lettuce. We can pay that extra seventeen cents once a week, and see it transeferred directly to the farm worker in the form of a living wage, and decent benefits. And from that paycheck, he will pay taxes and social security, just as legal immigrants and native Americans are doing. Or we can pay an exponentially high amount in taxes, watch it trickle down through the inefficient and expensive bureaucracy, and arrive in the form of welfare and medical care for illegals who, with the collusion of their employers, work "off-the-books" and have made no contribution to the fund from which they draw. It is, in fact, a "pay-me-now-or pay-me later" issue that we have not yet begun to comprehend - when the Piper invoices us, we will indeed have to pay, and the due - mountainous health and welfare costs, enormous educational liabilities, ruinous crime and life-or-death competition for scarce resources - will fall squarely on the young people of our Nation. If we need proof, we need only look at North Carolina's recent edict to the Universities and Community Colleges, mandating admission of children of illegals. What's next? You can bet it will be a push for in-state tuition...just one example...besides, what part of "illegal" do we not get?

[Irember911]

Not surprized, but damn mad, How do we make a informed pick when we elect these morons? They tell us what we want to hear, then when the get into office they do just what they want to do, So are they all liers, dumb question. We need some way to make sure they do what we want a contract something so that once in office they have to keep the promises they made, I am so frustrated and I am sure willing to vote these idiots out of office but the uninformed just keep putting them right back in Anyone hear of TERM LIMITS, its time to do it now.

[bob1947]

Some people actually thought the fence would be built?? HA! To much money to be made. I think we need to check MORE freezers.
When you got presidental cantidates pandering to the (illegal) ALIEN VOTE. What do you expect. Through all the bums out.

[RamingtonStall]

Great Article, Michelle,

Meanwhile, the Republican candidates can't understand why they are not receiving financial support from their former supporters. Duh ...

It appears that Ron Paul is the only Republican who is getting lots of donations, and is there anybody on this forum that does not believe that the money is coming from George Soros? It seems to me that Soros and his Moveon.org buddies want to convince Ron Paul that he is the Ross Perot that can put Hillary in the White House in 2008.

Meanwhile, the Drive-By media doesn't care about the Illegal Alien Invasion or the Islam Jihad on the West in general and the USA in particular. The Drive by's are much more focused on the color of the bookcase in a Huckabee ad. Sigh .....

RamS