Firsthand limited report of some activities on the third day of the Minuteman Project

Today was Sunday, the Sabbath, so I was not supposed to be involved with Minuteman Project activities. This evening at about 5pm I decided to take the family for a ride in the area that the project was operating. I headed south of my house and didn't get a mile before I saw my first Minuteman Project patrol area. They were stationed just off of the main highway on a dirt frontage road and near some culverts where illegal aliens are often seen.

I passed the first group to see another just a few hundred yards up the highway on the same frontage road. The other side of the highway included some residential properties. I went a little further and saw the same thing. I saw an easy way to get onto the frontage road and turned around and pulled onto it. I came across a group that consisted of a guy from Arizona and a couple from Georgia. The husband was an older guy that I had seen the previous two days on an oxygen tank. His wife was younger and had a nasty cut just above her chin. She said that they had just seen and reported a group of 5 illegals trying to move through their area. Upon seeing them she promptly tripped and slammed her chin on the ground.

Casey Wian from CNN - Lou Dobbs Tonight - was there interviewing the couple. I took a quick picture and left.

I went a little further South and saw another group. I stopped to talk to them too. There was a black guy and a white guy and a gray dog. They were being interviewed by a reporter from the Orange County Register.

About that time my camera's batteries gave out. When I left the house the battery meter said it was full, but suddenly it was dead. I hate this digital camera, it does that ALL the time.

I went home and retrieved batteries and called one of my friends who has spoken to Casey Wian many times. She wanted to meet back at the location where I had seen him. I went back and the CNN crew had already left.

My friend showed up with a bunch of other people. Now that the Georgia woman with the cut on her chin wasn't on camera being interviewed we talked to her. Her chin was now badly swollen and turning black and blue. A medically trained woman looked closer at the injury and said that she needed to report to the medic. I volunteered to drive her the ten miles to the medic's location while her husband continued monitoring his assigned area.

We headed towards the head shed and when the highway turned East we saw a number of flashing blues and reds and bright white lines down by the San Pedro River. I wanted to check out what was going on but had to get this woman to the medic.

I went to the campground where the headshed is located, showed my badge, and was directed to one of the buildings. I found the comms room and they took her in to the medic. He said he would assess her and let us know what needed to be done. I told her I would return and left.

I travelled toward the flashing lights and got as close as I could. I couldn't find the road that lead to the San Pedro River area where the vehicles were. I got close enough to see what looked like fire dept. vehicles to include a water tanker. I remembered seeing smoke in that general area when I first left the house. I didn't see any Border Patrol vehicles and determined that this was probably a response to the brushfire I'd seen earlier.

I went back to the head shed and checked on the Georgia woman. She was almost done with the assessment by the medic. I walked around a bit to see what else I could see. Not much to report - maps, comms, a bulletin board with some info on it, people hanging out and talking. I did get a picture of the Culpepper flag flying out front.

The finished assessing the woman and said that she required stitches and needed to be transported to the E.R. in Sierra Vista. I drove her back to her husband and they were going to follow me the 15 miles to the hospital in town. I had to drop my family off so I had them wait at the post office until I could do that.

Once I returned they had realized that they had left their hotel roommate in the field without a ride back to town. They had be give them directions to the hospital so that they could pick him up and then drive in to town themselves.

There was tons of media watching the most visible patrol groups like those along the highway today. They did catch groups of 4 to 5 illegal aliens a few times today, nothing like the numbers we normally see around here. There was an earlier injury but I couldn't get any info about it.

One of the Minuteman Projects patrol points was established across the street from a friend of mine who lives at the base of a canyon a few miles north of the border. This person used to be a die-hard, anti-gun, open borders liberal. She moved out into the canyon and started having problems with illegals. Load vehicles would brazenly pull into her driveway and yard and a driver would step out and wave a flag. Suddenly, dozens of illegals would swarm out of the bushes across the street, into her yard and driveway, and then into the vehicles. This would happen every night just before dark. I was informed about the problem and went to work getting something done to help her. The Border Patrol apprehended 50 illegals in her yard last week. She allowed the Minuteman Project to set up a patrol station in her yard. She has armed herself and is becoming quite outspoken about the border situation. Nothing like a dose of reality to turn a liberal into a conservative real quick. She's on her way.

I heard a number of the Minuteman Project airplanes flying around my house today. Since I live in a medium to high illegal traffic area they were patrolling near my house. I'm still working on getting on some of the planes to help out. I found out that they are looking for volunteers who know the area and some of the high traffic illegal alien areas to help the pilots patrol those areas. I can certainly help there and will be getting with the right people tomorrow to volunteer.

I've got a handful of pics I snapped today, but not much. I won't be reporting every day as I can't be involved every day. I work full time and must attend to that and family requirements. I'll get with the MMP when I can, help out here and there, and I do plan to do some patrols and will report my experiences later.

My point, typos aside, is this.

A)Positioning a group of weekend warriors on a single spot along the border will inevitably prove ineffective in actually stopping many illegals who would quite sensibly cross at another location or by other means.

B)As a protest, it sends the message that the issue is one embraced only by those on the border, i.e. a small minority of the folks in the S.W.

C)Since putting weekenders on the border isn't going to stem the tide of illegals coming into the country, we should figure out what will prove effective. That means understanding who is crossing, why they are crossing and what awaits them on the other side.

D) Assuming they are crossing for jobs and not to visit Disneyland, we should figure out who is hiring them and why? Are they being hired in clusters for construction jobs or singly as housekeepers? Secondly, who is providing housing, transportation and the necessary "infrastructure" to live in the U.S.? That is to say, what is the support network like?

E)I would suggest that laws -- federal, state, and local -- aimed at removing the wage incentive to hire and eliminating the infratructure would prove more effective.

" Todays politicians have forgotten what 'word of honor' means. Lying is in abundance, not mistakingly spoken, straight out lying. Deception is another common occurance that is too common."

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All sad, but true.

Someone said the normal citizen is like a helpless woman being raped - from the front by the GOP and the back by the DNC.

Time to put a stop to this nonsense. The Constitution and each state constitution has provisions for impeachment of elected officials who do not uphold those constitutions and do not carry out the duties of their oath by protecting the rights and interests of American citizens.

A perfect example was when (then) Governor Jim Guy Tucker was impeached for breaking the law by embezzling public funds. Unfortunately, his predecessor is now just as guilty of not looking out for the public interest by advocating the same level of rights for illegal immigrants that American citizens are eligible for (higher education, welfare, jobs, driver's license, home purchases, etc.). Essentially, both are crimes because both used public monies in a manner not authorized by legal means. These kind of tactics are exactly what has brought California to the brink of financial ruin and it is a crime to use high office to perpetrate such sweeping social and economic change without the consent of the citizenry.

And the people say - NO!

Yes, absolutely. I don't think anyone involved with the project thinks otherwise.

The point to be made, though, is that with sufficient enforcement you can take a crossing point that sees 1500 per day caught and reduce it to 118. That was the take on Sunday.

The next step is for Congress and the Administration to step up to the plate and do their consititutional duty to protect the States from invasion as it is stated in Article 4, Section 4. It ain't only Mexicans coming across the border, my FRiend.

Could it be that the Mexican Army is directing people away from this area, telling them to cross elswhere?

That is very possible. In the past you've been able to observe Mexican Army directing the illegals just across the border. There's a compound of buildings just across the border that we call "The Corrals" where we see Mexican Army and illegals all the time. I've been shown video tape of armed soldiers in the Mexican Army shepherding illegals right up near the border road and then motioning them to get down and shushing them when Border Patrol vehicles were approaching on the road. They would get them up and moving when the vehicle passed and back down again when another vehicle would approach. They did not know they were being observed.

It is quite possible that some of the illegals picked up yesterday have been in the mountains or camping on the trails and entered before the project's operations started. I predict that the numbers will dwindle throughout the month.

The first rule to solving any problem (and I agree illegal immigration is a major problem) is to ask "why?" Until people start asking why, the problem won't get solved?

Most people don't even thing about the problem very much, let alone ask "why?" One of the primary purposes of the Minuteman Project is to raise awareness across the U.S. so that people will ask "why?" A one-day rally or protest here or in Washington would not have achieved that. A month-long protest/neighborhood watch/FReep of the border very well may accomplish that and the "why?" will be asked of President Bush and Congress. Why are so many illegals pouring across the border? Why do the residents of Arizona and other border states have to put up with the intolerable mess this invasion causes? Why are our bordersnot secure after the terror attacks of 9/11 and during a time of war where a terrorist threat still exists? Why is Border Patrol so mismanaged? Why isn't Border Patrol given the budget, staffing, and resources necessary to do their job? Why isn't the President living up to his obligation as defined in Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution? Why aren't our laws being enforced? Why are no employers punished who break the law and hire illegal aliens? Why is there no interior enforcement? Why aren't illegal aliens being deported? Why are we giving government benefits to illegal aliens? Why isn't local law enforcement allowed to determine citizen status and report illegal aliens to the proper authorities? Why!?

With the news coverage this event has received so far and despite the attempts to spin in negatively I can assure you that a great deal more Americans are asking "Why?".

My FRiend, you are absolutely correct in your assessment of how to fix the problem with one glaring error. You have a list of points A-E.

You are wrong. Your points should be B-F. Step A is to seal the gaps between the legal points of entry. Then, and only then, can you effectively begin to address the root of the problem.

You can't drain the swamp until you repair the dike that's letting the ocean rush in. If you can't see that, well...

I don't know if it can technically be defined as an invasion...

I'd love to stay and chat about this, but it's time for me to head out to work. I happen to disagree with you on that point, having read Michelle Malkin's book Immivasion.

May I suggest you do a little research? Although the war between Texas and Mexico may be a bad analogy, it's a good place to start looking.

B)As a protest, it sends the message that the issue is one embraced only by those on the border, i.e. a small minority of the folks in the S.W.

Most of the Minuteman Project participants that I met at the events of this last weekend were not residents of Arizona. Most came from other states. Look at the photos - do you see all of the flags of different states flying? The project brought together volunteers from all 50 states, not just the southwest.

I agree that the interior is where a lot of the problem actually is. So do the participants down here from all 50 states. However, a protest in Nebraska or somewhere like that would be ineffective. For one, nobody would get it. Second, what is your target? You can't just grab every hispanic or foreign looking busboy and try to report them to Border Patrol - as if there is any enforcement there to pick up the illegal aliens to do happen to somehow identify. On the border it is quite easy to identify the illegal aliens. Really, the stand out like a sore thumb. And Border Patrol is right there to grab them if you call them. Also, there's a lot more for the media to report on down here than just the project volunteers and their activities. There's trail after trail full of garbage, human feces, discarded clothing, medication, food, all kinds of trash left by the invaders. There's ranchers to interview who talk about all of the damage done to their properties, their livestock, etc. There's residents to interview who are living in fear of the massive wave of border intruders, the violent coyotes, the armed drug runners, etc. This is the best place to bring a number of required elements together to make the point that is attempting to be made. Yes, interior enforcement is one of the largest issues, but it is far more difficult to make that point effectively.

The point to be made, though, is that with sufficient enforcement you can take a crossing point that sees 1500 per day caught and reduce it to 118. That was the take on Sunday.

I'm glad you're keeping track of the numbers. I'm sure that it will be hard for Border Patrol to admit the severe drop so if you have any places for me to look that kind of stuff up, let me know.

Even if this event pushes the intruders to cross elsewhere, it is still successful. The point will have been made.

This is absolutely the worst kind of revolt that a government could face. A revolt by the middle class. No threats of violence, no boozing in the streets, no property damage, just 1500 people who have decided that, "Sir, You are doing it wrong and you need our help. We voted you into office to do this job and since you apparently didn't understand what we meant by "Seal the borders, so we've come down to show you how we want it done."

1500 people who took their vacations and decided to go down to Arizona for a few days and make sure that the border along Arizona is actually protected from terrorists and illegal aliens.

They aren't going to burn any Border Patrol vehicles or cause any other damage. After all they know it was their tax dollars that bought the equipment in the first place.

This is a slap in the face by the voters that our politicians are never going to forget. This isn't young college kids protesting, this is their Mom and Dad. You know, the ones who pay ALL the bills for our government.

It took quite a bit of malfeasance to get these folks angry enough to interrupt their busy lives. Calling them derogatory names only makes them more determined to see that the border is properly sealed.

The worst part about this is that 300 million other Americans are seeing what 1500 peaceful protesters are doing. The mass media is trying awful hard to keep this out of the news but it ain't working!

So the next time we tell the Feds that we want something done, it will either be, "Do it or get out of my way and I'll do it."

If May becomes the month for monitering employers who have hired illegal aliens, this might just be a very effective summer at teaching the politicians what we mean when we say, "I said do it and do it now."

Thanks Spiff for the post

Sas, when are you free to come down and join in the fun? Pick a Saturday and volunteer for two watch shifts or something. You can drive home when you're done and feel good that you supported this worthy cause and played a small part in securing our border. Come on down! Bring a lawn chair, some sunscreen, a big floppy hat, a bunch of water, and binoculars and you're all set.

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