Posted on 06/19/2006 7:17:51 AM PDT by ZGuy
How many illegal aliens does it take to change a light bulb? AY CHIHUAHUA! The National Guard is coming, change it yourself!!!
That pretty much summarizes what was undoubtedly the most important news story of the last week, a report that was all but buried by the mainstream media. While the press continues to pretend that the real central story in the ongoing illegal immigration debate remains in Congress, where the liberal Senate amnesty bill just had its feeding tube removed by House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R.-Ill.), a miracle has taken place in the deserts of the Southwest.
Total detentions of aliens attempting to sneak across the Mexican border have plummeted an unimaginable 21% in the first 10 days of June compared to the same period last year. This drop occurs at a time when enforcement efforts are at a recent high, due to political concerns, and reflects a precipitous drop in total attempted border crossings. According to an Associated Press report, Jorge Vazquez, a director of “Grupo Beta,” an agency funded by the Mexican government and that works to aid and abet Mexicans seeking to enter the United States illegally, his agents have seen a similar drop in traffic on his side of the border.
The shocking drop-off in human smuggling is attributed to one factor: the arrival of the National Guard on the border. That’s quite an accomplishment for just 55 guardsmen, who did not even arrive until June 3 and are working entirely in support roles with the Border Patrol. What has really stemmed the tide is just the idea that troops are coming to the border—a fact that has found widespread exaggeration in the Mexican media.
The small National Guard deployment that started as a political stunt by President Bush and the other proponents of amnesty has ended up disproving one of the most cherished myths of the open borders propaganda machine: that nothing can stop the human tide that has been allowed to flood across our borders. It seems that just the rumor that we might be getting serious about enforcement can stop thousands of aspiring illegal aliens in their literal tracks.
The AP report quoted the operator of one “shelter” for infiltrators waiting to cross the border as saying, “Some migrants have told me they heard about the troops on television and, because the U.S. Army doesn't have a very good reputation, they prefer not to cross.”
Actually, it sounds to me like the U.S. military has an ideal reputation. It must be the Border Patrol that has a poor reputation within the Mexican smuggling community.
The snipe at the military’s reputation was in reference to “reports of abuse in Iraq.” If this explanation is true, then it should forever end any claim that the war in Iraq has not made America any safer. I mean, really, we should get Lyddie England a Sombrero and new digital camera immediately. One pixelly snapshot of her pointing menacingly at some muchacho’s machismo and we may not even need to build a border fence.
But of course a better explanation might be that the fear of the military among so-called “migrants” has more to do with their own experiences with the Mexican military. The Mexican army is hypocritically stationed on the southern border of Mexico to intercept illegal aliens trying to sneak into Mexico from Central America and is reported to routinely beat, rob, bully and rape the Guatemalans and Hondurans that are just trying to do the jobs that no Mexican will do. But whatever the true source of the fear, its stark result shows just how effective it can be to declare that the “wink, wink, nudge, nudge” games are over.
Compare the chilling effect that the talk of enforcement has had on border infiltration to the opposite effect that all the previous talk of amnesty had, when border apprehensions and crossings spiked. Francisco Loureiro, apparently the same shelter operator that the AP quotes last week as saying that his shelter was nearly empty due to the fearsome reputation of the U.S. military, was credited in a separate article during the Senate’s slide toward a guest-worker amnesty last April as saying that "he has not seen such a rush of migrants since 1986, when the United States allowed 2.6 million illegal residents to get American citizenship."
The drastic change in traffic through Loureiro’s hidey-hole hotel is powerful proof that amnesty cannot be part of the solution to illegal immigration. Amnesty simply encourages illegal immigration. Enforcement, pure and simple, is the only effective solution to illegal immigration. When the law is taken seriously, it is obeyed. When it is declared optional, it is not.
The government and the media can bury it, or ignore it, or distort it, but the incredible change on the border this month demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that the illegal alien invasion has been an invited one, caused by government sending all the wrong signals about America’s commitment to border enforcement.
The only way to undo such damage is to send a new message, loudly and clearly: anonymous border infiltration is illegal and will result in summary deportation, or worse. Those who wish to immigrate will apply, be screened and wait for our permission to enter our country.
The problem is already 21% solved. Failure to follow through now would be a waste of a huge opportunity to speak through actions.
Imagine what 30,000 troops with armored vehicles in support could accomplish.
and actually being on patrol, not digging ditches and stamping paperwork.
Beautiful. Imagine if they were armed.
The government and the media can bury it, or ignore it, or distort it....
The reason that the government and media bury it is because they want the law to be optional for THEM. As one sage whose name I currently disremember put it, "If the government wants us to obey the law, it should set a better example."
(Somebody is bound to remember the source of that saying.)
Let's see how long this lasts...the illegals are holding back and studying their options and obstacles. Billy O'Reilly called his a year ago...
ping
Drudge Report..... OFFICIALS: Troops Scare Would be Illegal Immigrants Away From US Mexico Border , from June 13 2006.
Imagine a couple of minor skirmishes where a couple of illegals got themselves kilt...there would be a 90% reduction.
I want to see this type of enforcement go on for AT LEAST a year before we start talking about guest-worker type programs.
I'm a little skeptical of short term statistics, but this echoes with what I have suggested for years, that enforcement needs to start at the top.
If the President of the US would get on TV and tell everyone that we are going to vigourously enforce our Immigration laws and that illegals in the US should leave, (there will be no amnesty) and back it up with real action not just hollow words that it would have a profound effect. Just like IRS, catch, prosecute and deport a few hundred, and publicize it, repeat as needed.(look at parts of Texas how effective that has been) Go after some employers, have SS and IRS transfer info to ICE (make an Executive Order)and you can locate millions of employees and their employers for a start.
It's insane and dereliction of duty not to do these things. Yank the welcome mat out from under illegals. Right now with talk of amnesty and border enforcement we are sending a mixed message, that needs to change to a firm message of NO MAS.
Unfortunately the message we are getting from the President (and Senate)is that he wants illegals to stay here, contrary to the American Taxpayers and Citizens. Until that changes the rest is just window dressing. The buck stops at the top and I guess its up to US We the People to change his mind or get a new President who has a different agenda.
A sentence from the article that should NOT be forgotten.. but then RINOs have Already gotten it, bypassed it, ignored it, or generally don't care.... his article is prescient and important..
A little enforcement goes a long way. A lot of enforcement might even turn the tide. There was an article last week that smugglers have upped their prices for bringing in illegals which seems to me like some kind of postive.
bttt
Before getting too excited over these 'new' figures, give it 6 months and then see whether it was just a sham or actual enforcement.
The last major 'sweep' a couple of months ago was a sham. Within hours of their round-up, most of those detainees were released -- after the numbers got in the headlines.
ping
Didn't someone in Congress recently say we should just pass the exact laws that Mexico has when it comes to "immigration"?? Sounds like an excellent idea, eh?
ping
Bingo.
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