Posted on 01/25/2005 9:56:49 AM PST by citizen
2,000 new border agents aren't part of budget, Ridge says
President Bush (news - web sites) will not ask Congress for enough money to add 2,000 agents to patrol the nation's borders in his 2006 budget, even though he signed a bill last month authorizing the increase.
Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said Monday that Bush's new budget, to be released in early February, will propose a "good incremental increase" in the number of agents. But he made it clear the number would not approach 2,000. The new agents were to be the first hires toward doubling the size of the force over five years.
As part of a sweeping intelligence bill passed in December, Congress called for nearly doubling the size of the Border Patrol by adding 10,000 agents over five years. The agency has about 11,000 agents; 90% work along the southern border with Mexico.
But in an interview with USA TODAY, Ridge scoffed at the notion of adding so many agents and said it would be an inefficient use of precious homeland security dollars.
"The notion that you're going to have 10,000 is sort of a fool's gold," Ridge said. "It's nice to say you're going to have 10,000 more Border Patrol agents in five years, but what other part of Homeland Security do you want to take the money from?"
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I'd have to explain at length the budget formation process, spread sheets, Microsoft Excel, number crunchers, etc.
I didn't take you to raise.
You should focus on what's possible/probable.
9/11 should've been the wake-up call, but it appears the sleepy fools awakened just briefly enough to slam down the "snooze" button on the alarm.
So, they don't know where they'd find the money to pay for that sort of increase in the border patrol? lol....Surely they jest.
Well your right in part, however as an American citizen it is your responsibility to help guard your nation. Would you not agree.
It's not a critical statement aimed at you. I feel it's every Americans civic duty to protect our nation.
They could have helped pay for it with the Inaugural monies ;-)
Until a guest worker program is implemented the cost of stopping all Mexican laborers would be next to impossible.
How in hell can you have a valid guest worker program if you don't even try to enforce the current immigration program?
So, if the guest worker program fails and just becomes another avenue for illegals to cheat the system, what are you going to do then? Open the borders to the world? But I guess that's what you want, to make the entire southwest into a third world barrio where laws are laughed at.
Tell Mexicans to fix their own problems, it isn't like they don't have enough natural resources. The only reason we have this program is that they are corrupt socialists. And you want to import more of their problems here? How irresponsible.
Where did you get the idea we aren't trying to enforce the present system? You are a victim of the Buchanan/Tancredo crowd's propaganda.
"Where did you get the idea we aren't trying to enforce the present system?"
Where I got the idea was down at McDonald's where most of the employees are illegals, down at Taco Cabana where most are illegals, at my office where the cleaners are illegals, at construction sites wheere I see illegals, at the mini-barrio a mile from where I live and the source of local crime, on the news last night where there were two separate illegal Mexican knifings, at my storage shed which was cleaned out by some Mexicans I'd befriended, when the local sheriff says they don't deport illegals when they break traffic laws . . . .
I could go on, but my fingers tire. If they were serious about enforcement, we could deport a thousand today.
I don't know. Is $23 million a lot of money?
http://www.minutemanproject.com/
IT IS UP TO US. THE GOVERNMENT IS IGNORING IT.
Why did you ping me?
To read the article.
To what end?
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