My guess is that it's a sense of total, abject resignation -- and we can thank the Bush administration for this one.
A government that sends 130,000+ troops halfway around the world to wage a so-called "war on terror" -- while at the same time calling for an unfettered invasion of this country across our southern border -- clearly has something other than the safety and security of its citizenry in mind.
I see Afghanistan and Iraq as only battles in a bigger struggle against Islamists/jihadists. I don’t think we ever had a choice of acting versus not acting, but acting now versus acting later. In this bloody cold calculation I agree that it was better to act now then later (mistakes and miscalculations and all).
That said, I am puzzled and angered by this inexcusable stupidity of not closing the border. It always was number 1 on my to do list after the 9/11. When the administration failed to do this, they opened themselves to all kind of speculations about their sincerity. I am not going to defend Bush on this, because he is simply wrong.