Border Boogie

by Ben Small

Now that the elections are over, there's not much attention paid by the national media to the ongoing border invasion in our Southwest, unless stories leak out from U.S. local presses about the ongoing horrors or from our federal government about the Mexican government deserving some credit. And the Federales deserve some applause. They've made some successful raids on cartel leaders, and one cartel reportedly asked for a deal -- seeking protection from other cartels.

But more stories aren't told. Reporters in Mexico fear the cartels. And rightfully so. The cartels are targeting those who report their atrocities, their corruption of Mexican police and city governments. Mexico City's largest newspaper promised a few weeks ago not to cover these activities further after several of its reporters covering a massacre of seventy-some human captives were themselves kidnapped and murdered. Likewise, the largest newspaper in Ciudad Jurarez, Mexico's most violent city. That newspaper publicly asked the cartels what they want it to print.

And in the U.S., for the most part, the national media has moved on; drug and human trafficking no longer hot topics. They'd rather focus on Brett Favre's weiner, Lindsay Lohan's horrific parents, the Fed bloating our currency, Beck's crusade against Soros, Bush vs. Obama in book sales, Mel Gibson's rants or what Michelle Obama or the cast of Glee might be wearing tonight.

Such is the talking-head, Internet-fed 24/7 news cycle, and the clarion call for entertainment news.

But the flow of death and drug and human smuggling through our Southwest borders hasn't stopped; it's not even slowed.

In the last two weeks, we who live in the Southwest have seen the following:

• the American Consulate in Mexico issuing instructions to its employees not to travel unless in armored carriers.
• a gigantic Guatemalan human sex-trafficking bust in Phoenix.
• Three southern Arizona sheriffs state that Mexican cartel snipers dot the hills, carrying high-powered rifles equipped with scopes and night vision.
• Several tunnels from Nogales, Sonora to Nogales, AZ, one which featured electricity, lights, air conditioning and rail tracks, along with thirty tons of weed.
• Janet Napolitano, Homeland Security Secretary and former governor of Arizona, cutting off funding for the electronic fence project, leaving much of Arizona's border with Mexico with either no fence at all or fencing a paraplegic could cross...unassisted.
• National Forest lands abutting the border closed to Americans, the Border Patrol and ICE.
• Three separate inspections along Arizona's highways yielding $12 million in cocaine...in one day.
• The discovery of over a ton of marijuana daily no longer constituting  "News."
• Untold numbers of traffic deaths in human trafficking accidents. Sorry, they're on the local News almost every night, and I've simply lost headcount.
• Replacement of the orange warning signs throughout Southern Arizona with yellow caution signs, still advising those who witness illegal smuggling activities to call 911, which of course, is the Sheriff's Office, the same guys Eric Holder is suing and harassing -- for enforcing federal immigration laws the Feds ignore.
• Southwest officials attending a London Kidnapping seminar, and release of statistics that through July, 2010, Phoenix police -- not the whole of Maricopa County, mind you, but Phoenix alone -- registered one hundred forty-one kidnappings, contrasted to two hundred seventy-three average for all of 2008 and 2009.
• U.S. bound produce inspections terminated until the product reaches the U.S., because of cartel vengeance-risk to U.S. inspection agents -- resulting in massive delays in produce deliveries... and spoilage.
• The Mexican Consul in Tucson saying he's seen no evidence whatsoever of the claimed hundred thousand Mexicans who returned home from Arizona, despite U.S. government statements to the contrary. In fact, he admitted, no such statistics exist.
• A Tucson television news program entitled "How Safe Is Sierra Vista?" Sierra Vista, about forty miles south of Tucson, is just north of the major drug and human trafficking trails through the southern Arizona national forests, and ironically, is home to Fort Huachuca, the Army's Intel Center.
• The Pima County (Tucson) coroner reporting a backlog of eighty unidentified bodies awaiting processing, perhaps necessitating the purchase of a third refrigerated body-truck. The second one was just ordered and delivered this summer.
• A movement of the Mexican drug cartels into software piracy on a national scale.
• The seizure of one hundred five tons of marijuana in one Northern Mexico raid.

Yes, border agents are making progress, and yes, Mexico too has scored against the cartels. But much more drug and human cargo passes through our border defenses than is blocked.

Ask yourself this question: How hard is it to get reefer today? 

Better yet: Ask your kids.

And the National Guard's presence? An election ploy, a photo-op. Guardsmen instructions: Do nothing but report violations; defend yourself only if attacked. 

Don't get me started on cargo ships, on the millions of containers flowing through our ports each and every day. Even our federal government admits it inspects only about ten percent of these containers.

Feel safe? Ask yourself this question: If our borders are so insecure we cannot stop human or drug smuggling, how hard would it be to smuggle in a suitcase bomb?

Goodbye Chicago. Or San Diego. Or Phoenix. Take your pick.

Maybe our president should actually come down and see our southern border with Mexico...once. Michelle can find ice cream there, and Arizona has golf courses. Maybe our president should leaf through some of the Qurans left on Southern Arizona smuggling trails. Or if he's short on time, how about a fly-over? Even Bush buzzed New Orleans after Katrina.

Yes, the election drums bang no more. But along the Mexico-U.S. border, unheard by Washington, the Border Boogie beats on.

Border Report, August, 2010

by Ben Small


The death and destruction -- and yes, drug flow -- continue along our Southwest border because the Obama Administration refuses to secure our border, focusing its intentions instead on blocking enforcement of our immigration laws and finding ways to implement policies of back-door amnesty, ignoring the cost in terms of lives and dollars.

While this report suggests I'm commenting on activities during the month of August, the truth is many of the events described below occurred just in the last week.

You probably read in the papers about the mass grave site discovered just outside Ciudad Juarez. Seventy-two bodies, men women and children, slaughtered by Mexican drug lords engaged in human and drug smuggling. Weapons from the ranch where the bodies were found are shown above. No one knows how many women and children escaped the machine guns only to be sold into sexual slavery, torture and snuff films for deviant pleasures. It's believed most of these poor people couldn't come up with the added cash demands their coyote transporters extorted from them. Or maybe they failed to pass whatever acceptability standards their smugglers required.  Border Massacre    Dead Folks Pile

How many other mass grave sites are there? Nobody knows. Car bombs and Dead Cop

But you can bet more mass grave sites will be found. And the cop who was investigating the murders was himself murdered, along with several investigative journalists who nosed into the matter. But the gangs weren't done yet: The mayor of a nearby city was also murdered. And Sunday...another one. 2nd Mexican Mayor Slain

And now car bombs. Two this week alone.

Yup, the drug lords have been busy. 28,000 total known dead so far.

I won't recount the tons of drugs seized this week. I can't keep up with the daily total in Arizona alone. But Border Patrol Agents suggest it's less than ten percent of what's getting through. Nor can I advise the number of those who died from the elements in our southwestern deserts. Temperatures have been in the hundreds all month, and heavy rains south of Tucson this week have caused flash flooding on a wide scale. Walls of water rushing down narrow washes -- the path of choice for illegals -- at speeds approaching thirty miles per hour. We may never have accurate statistics on these dead. Those who aren't eaten by animals or buried may lie underneath the hard-pack clay, a component of concrete.

So, it's fair to ask yet again what our federal government is doing to secure our still porous border. Yes, they've sent a few hundred National Guard troops as sentries, about one per mile, but those troops have been instructed not to enforce our federal immigration laws but to just tell somebody if they see something.

Whom do they tell? ICE, the agency charged with border law enforcement? The Feds instructed ICE not to take illegal border crossers captured by Arizona state authorities, and Janet Napolitano announced a new policy this week: They're dropping deportation measures against those who haven't been convicted of a crime. Back-door amnesty so to speak. So ICE has a morale problem. Their agents this week gave the elected officials -- Janet Napolitano -- governing them a vote of No Confidence. Which raises an interesting question: Why did Napolitano, who was so ardent in demanding the Feds secure our border when she was Arizona's governor, back off from that position after she joined the Obama Administration?

Do you think someone whispered in her ear?

Obama has yet to travel to the border region. Seems he has more pressing matters. Tee times, you know. Doesn't he know Arizona has golf courses?

And what about Eric Holder, our esteemed attorney general? Sorry. He's too busy figuring out what to do with Gitmo detainees and where to try or jail 9/11 planners, not to mention filing lawsuits to block Arizona from enforcing federal immigration laws and filing civil rights lawsuits against Sheriff Joe. Indeed, Holder's Justice Department just filed a massive document demand against Sheriff Joe's office, asking for everything but Joe's secret barbeque recipe. Okay, the recipe may have been requested, too. Hard to tell: small print, many sub-parts,.too many pages to digest.  It might take most state agencies years to satisfy such a demand. Holder wants everything yesterday.

Yes, the federal government has more money than Arizona. An unlimited budget. And Holder is using that bottomless pit to his purposes. Most folks would call such tactics "harassment." Holder calls it "policy." Holder Harassment

Don't Eric Holder and Janet Napolitano have the same boss?

If you can believe it, there are unguarded pedestrian bridges across the Mexican/American border. Don't the Feds know these bridges exist?  Unguarded Pedestrian Bridges.
Here's one of them.

Border agents requested Department of Interior permission to cross onto federal border lands in Arizona to look for illegals and illegal smuggling activities. These federal lands lie in the area that's known as Smuggler's Alley, south and west of Tucson.

Permission denied.

To whom does the Department of Interior report...?

Do you see a pattern here? Doesn't all this anti-enforcement seem a bit...well... orchestrated? Go ahead: Connect the dots.

Politics. Getting elected or re-elected. That's what counts.

What about the bucks, assuming one doesn't care about the human toll? The cost of crime, free health care, Holder's lawsuits and tax revenues lost. Smuggling and the fruits of it are a cash-only trade. No witholding tax, no income tax. And illegal immigrants often operate on a cash basis, too. So not only do we lose tax revenues from many of them; we add to our tax burdens by providing illegals free health care. Have you been to an Arizona Emergency Room lately? Good luck getting in. Doctors in Tucson advise citizens not to even think about doing so.

Considering all this prompts one to ask: Have we lost our understanding of what citizenship means?