news story on cnn last night about the border crossing in minnesota? it is an unmanned crossing with a camera phone to report that you are entering the country, most locals admitted that they do not even stop most of the time and to make it worse a border agent confessed to the same thing. the reasoning is that the crossing is so remote most terrorist don’t even know about it or where it is. but thanks to cnn that will no longer be true. can you believe this? but i will feel better when they finish the 700 mile wall won’t you?
I hope Canada has a better handle on who enters their country than we do here.
Hey Ken, I think that 700 mile fence was planned a little further south.
Kenneth,
The US Government chooses not to spend our tax dollars to protect the citizens of this country. Instead those tax dollars are used to support big business initiatives and the many less than ethical politicians.
Grant it your story is a scary one of an unmanned crossing ripe for terrorist entry. But here is another example of our tax dollars at work. The border crossing in El Paso was modified to allow a fast lane for Mexican children to quickly cross into the US to attend US public schools.
This is another example of the failure of our own government!!
We are protecting our selves against KIDS – give me a break
Correction the local school board is to check addresses
This is not a US government problem it is a local elected school board problem
Give us a break – how many kids are we giving a quality education to at what cost per student??
One school bus costs more money
These kids will probably be US tax payers and voters in a few years – a good education is not a problem
rlb
they did not even have a shack on their side, it scares me to think that they spend millions at other places and just ignore problems like this. a border is a border no matter where it is, and i think a place like the one on cnn is more dangerous than any of the main crossings. there were no x-ray machines or nuclear detection devices. not even a stinking $10 an hour security guard! :shock: :shock: :shock: :mad: :mad: :roll:
Richard,
It is not the children that are a threat, nor was this reference meant to infer that. The threat is the significant erosion of our own infrastructure from the failure of the Federal Government to fulfill its own responsibilities.
Before you make a correction, take a little initiative to research the issue. Obviously you are unable to obtain the full picture from this one article. NBC news continuously runs a series called “Who’s America?”. This one item was the full topic on one evening’s broadcast. Within that broadcast they did interview the local school district personnel. The local school district is doing all it can to weed these people out short of surveillance on the border crossing to see which children are comming across. However, many are resorting to fraud to make sure their children are placed in US public schools.
If I understand you correctly, you are stating that you believe it is quite alright for the US Government, who runs the border crossings, to construct a special addition to the border crossing (which this article did not discuss but the NBC news reports did) to allow foreign citizens quickly into this country so they can bring non resident children to school fraudulently?
Actually you are very wrong here!! The US Government has created this problem for the local school board and the taxpayers whose property taxes are used to fund those schools. At these special border crossings (there is more than one) these children with their supposed parents are quickly waived through with little checking of papers nor ID’s. They have been instructed not to delay them so that these children make it to school on time.
If you take just one minute to think there is a very simple solution to significantly reduce this problem. Do not have a special crossing for them. Make them stand in line just like everyone else and wait extensive amounts of time to cross. Eventually these children will be discovered by the school board due to consistent tardiness and absences. Not only will the school board find them easier but they will have a valid reason to question them.
Instead of you creating a flaming post with absolutely no thought process behind it I would suggest you research the answer to your own question. That is if you even care about your own country?
More money than what? That was an unqualified statement.
This is a classic display of apathy! It is so unfortunate that the US people show so much apathy about any major issue occurring today. The trend appears to be “If it does not affect me why should I care?”. Unfortunately by the time it does affect them it is much to late to do anything about it!
The problem we face today are not illegal immigrants, for the most part, but instead it is illegal immigration. It is the Federal Governments responsibility to control illegal immigration and not the local governments. Illegal immigration is a crime. Do you think we should allow a crime to go unpunished? If so then why do we bother prosecuting legal citizens and legal immigrants for violating laws here?
mexican kids do not scare me, muslim fanatics with nukes do, i do not want to watch what used to be minneapolis or chicago smoldering in a pile while someone plays lee greenwood songs. know what i mean.
Kenneth,
The 700 miles of fence you speak of is along the Mexico/US border. The estimate made by the Congressional Budget Office for its cost was less than $3 Billion ( http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,225337,00.html ). Since the start of the Iraq war the US has spent nearly one trillion dollars and over 3000 servicemen and women’s lives in a conflict that not only has no clear end but one our government should never have initiated.
At least with the school children crossing the border they hopefully are not able to sneak in the nukes you are referring to. The US/Mexican border has long been a smuggling grounds, and very successful one at that!! There is an estimated 10+ million illegal aliens in this country now with the vast majority of them coming across the US/Mexican border. Mexican nationals are not the only ones coming across that border. If it is that easy to sneak in so many illegal aliens then how are we to believe that we are safe from the very thing you fear?
You can read a great deal about many of these issues at The Center For Immigration Studies ( http://www.cis.org/ ). Before you think this is a crackpot group of people they do make reference to valid studies, articles, government information sites, etc.
Food for thought! How much good could our government have done right here in our own country with 1 trillion dollars??
Emmanuel
Let me think a little on your post
I still think that you are wrong but you live in TX and I live in FL where we are very happy to to have the boys and girls from the across the border (oranges and construction)
later
rlb
What is the big deal. I have spent many years along the Northern borders of Washington, Idaho, Montana and Canada on fishing and hunting trips. No border crossings. In fact most of the time when we were in the remote areas (before gps) around the Kootenai River, the Pend Oreille River or Lake Roosevelt, we didn’t know if we were in the US or Canada.
If the terrorists are going to come across with WMD, they aren’t going to come in at a border crossing, no matter how remote.
We always need an enemy in this country.
One trillion dollars is enough for heath care.You know if we invaded Mexico the war would have been over in a couple days with everyone cheering in the streets.cold war ,drug war,and terrorist war.War and rumors of war.
Wrong. That’s most likely exactly where they’ll come in. Because of exactly your sentiments here.
CNN are such subversive idiots! Showing something like that on TV should be considered high treason! So stupid to give away a location like that, and could be miscontrued as deliberate in my opinion.
please don’t talk about waste when it comes to the war, would you rather fight them over there or in texas? you see how they blow up their own, do you think they would fight fair over here? Food for thought! How much damage do you think a IED could do in D.C., N.Y. or Dallas? How many kids would we see being beheaded on cnn every night? How many trillions do you think it would cost us to fight them here over a 4 year period? (keeping in mind how much better our infrastructure is in the statescompared to the middle east) Do you think Saddam should have been allowed to kill millions more of his own people?
Some times many get excited when they do not have the full information . There are towns in Vermont and Main that have homes 1/2 in Canada and the other half in the USA. People by their gas in the USA and go to school in Canada. I think their is a town in Washington they have they have to drive the school bus every day into Canada and back to washington to take the kids to schools . Lots of farms in the prairies straddle the border. Some I think share fire departments.
The USA is slowly closing it self off from the rest of the world .
When Canada the largest trading partner both ways is starting to look elswhere to sell and buy ,because of the back up at the border.
When 200 trucks have to wait up too 8 or more hours to get through the border it is you and me who has to pay more for what we buy.
Many in our governments can see the problem and others want the border even tighter.
Many border towns are hurting big time .
Just ask the stores in any like ( Watertown NY or Buffalo NY)
Todays news ? is another fine example .
----------------------------------------------------------------------------Jul 06, 2007 04:30 AM
WASHINGTON–The United States has lost billions of dollars and an immeasurable amount of goodwill since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorism attacks because of a decline in the number of foreign tourists.
Several senators are now trying to get the government involved in bringing those visitors back.
The Senate commerce committee has approved a bill to establish a non-profit public-private corporation to promote the United States as a tourist destination and clear up misperceptions about U.S. travel policies. It also would create a new office in the commerce department to work with other agencies on fixing visa policies and entry processes that discourage visits.
Visits to the United States from countries outside Canada and Mexico totalled 21.7 million in 2006, down 17 per cent from a peak of 26 million in 2000, according to commerce department figures. In the same period, cross-border travel around the world rose 20 per cent.
“The global pie of international travel is steadily increasing, while the U.S. share has been slowly decreasing,” said Roger Dow, president and CEO of the Travel Industry Association.
Visits from the six countries that provide the most tourists – Britain, Japan, Germany, France, South Korea and Australia – have dropped 15 per cent since 2000 while travel from those six to other countries was up a robust 39 per cent. There were 4.2 million arrivals from Britain, last year, down 11 per cent from 2000, and 3.7 million visits from Japan, down 27 per cent.
“It’s a situation that really is disastrous when you take into account the overall global trends in international travel, and the fact that the U.S. currency makes travel to the country so attractive,” said Adam Sacks, managing director for tourism economics at Oxford Economics. The weak dollar makes the money of tourists go further.
Oxford Economics, in a recent analysis of travel policies written with former Homeland Security Department Secretary Tom Ridge, said the 17 per cent drop in visits since 2000 has cost the United States $100 billion (U.S.) in lost visitor spending, almost 200,000 jobs and $16 billion in lost tax receipts.
It noted the United States is the only global destination without an ongoing promotion program. Greece spends $150 million a year.
“We have lacked a co-ordinated program to promote travel to our country,” said Sen. Byron Dorgan, a Democrat and a sponsor of the bill.
The new corporation envisioned by the bill would be funded by industry contributions and a $10 fee levied on travelers from the 27 countries involved in a visa waiver program with the United States.
Industry experts also stressed increased advertising must be accompanied by changes in visa systems.
Associated press
Richard,
Right or wrong, you or me, everyone is entitled to their opinion. Not sure what you were referring to as again you have made an unqualified statement. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with legal immigration. If you were referring to illegal immigration as the supply for workers in the orange fields and construction sites then it would qualify as another apathetic statement.
Robert,
Although I would not agree with a war with Mexico you have absolutely made a good point. There has been a great deal of US taxpayer money helping the Mexican government. What has it reaped so far? Not much of any benefit has been seen with that wasted money. I do not believe that the Mexican government would even flinch if an invasion was launched. Why bother as they will then be absorbed into our country and will have a near immediate benefits. Yes, we could then take care of the drug issues directly without constantly having to clear everyhing with the Mexican government.
Of course there is no need to launch any invasion. There has already been extensive talk and efforts to create a “North American Union” similar to “The European Union”.
Kenneth,
**
Four jets did quite a bit of damage on Sept 11, 2001. Were these not IED’s? How much security for our own soil would $1 Trillion dollars have provided? Why did the US Government not take security precautions prior to this incident to prevent this? Terrorism was not a new problem when the incident of Sept 11, 2001 occurred. Why is the US Government so intent on being “The World’s Policemen” when they can not even secure their own soil? If Iraq was so much of a problem why did their Arab neighbors not handle it?
**
If our government did its job to protect US citizens here in the US then we would not see this at all. Have there been any beheadings here in the US so far that we have not been told of?
**
It would not cost us anything to fight them here if the “Trillions of dollars” were properly spent securing our own soil. The countries of the Middle East have borders without fences or adequate security. Sounds pretty much like what we have here.
**
If our soil was properly secured and our own citizens were properly treated (that has many meanings and connotations) then I would have no problems with helping other nations solve these issues. Do you believe that Saddam has killed any more people than some of the heinous leaders in African countries? Which do you think are more deserving of a US led invasion, Iraq whose people choose to arm themselves and kill each other off in the name of religious fanaticism or the women and children of Africa who do not have the means to arm themselves just to protect themselves and who only want to live their lives in peaceful coexistence with others? ********
Roy,
Please correct me if I am wrong. From what I have seen, read and heard the Canadian government has a great deal better control over their national security than the US has at this point in time. Canada certainly has their share of problem citizens but their ills and evils are far less than in the US. For any threat to come from the Canadian side would first require the Canadian government to seriously fail in their own security efforts to keep the threats out of Canada to begin with. Canada seems to be doing that job very well.
Honestly I am surprised that the Canadian government is not significantly concerned about threats coming into their country, through the US which has significantly failed in its own efforts of security.