Posted on 08/20/2005 10:52:05 PM PDT by joanie-f
Something happened in Boston in the winter of 1773 that served as evidence that the final straw had been laid on the camels back and the spark for a revolution against tyranny and aristocracy was ignited.
What happened in Boston spread, and other colonial seaports defiantly followed the example set by Sam Adams (It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in peoples minds). When the news spread of what Sam Adams and a handful of Boston patriots had done, other seaports all down the Atlantic coastline followed the example and staged similar acts of defiance of their own.
Of all of the signers of our Declaration of Independence, Sam Adams probably best embodies those character traits found in colonial American patriots. He was an eloquent man, determined to keep himself informed regarding the abuses of power that continued to be heaped upon the colonies, and, in addition to sharing his insight and stirring eloquence, he was not afraid to act when it appeared that words would no longer suffice.
In spite of the education garnered, and knowledge shared, on this forum, I believe that most adult Americans could not even tell you who Sam Adams was. And, of those who are aware of his role in the revolution and beyond I believe most know him through his most famous declaration, If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.
Powerful words indeed and perhaps more powerful now than then.
But another of Adams statements may even prove to be more pertinent and providential in America 2005:
Among the natural rights of the colonists are there: First a right to life, second to liberty, and thirdly to property. Together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.
Life, liberty and property were the three sanctified entities that our Founders sought, and sacrifice beyond our comprehension, to guarantee each and every American not only their eighteenth century contemporaries, but every one of us who has followed in their footsteps.
Yet during our lifetimes alone, there have been countless examples of government gone awry that have represented a direct and destructive assault upon the sanctity of those three God-given human rights that our Founders sought to ensure for us. The government-sponsored murders at Waco, the Supreme Court decision in Roe vs. Wade, the passage of the McCain-Feingold assault on the First Amendment, the court-ordered murder of Terri Schiavo, and the government land grab upheld two months ago in Kelo vs. New London come to mind. And in between each of those travesties, there occurred dozens more.
What happened in Douglas, Arizona this week deserves to be added to the growing list of what our Founders would have called grievances against the King.
In America 2005, we are experiencing a growing arrogance on the part of government at all levels represented by the passing of liberty-restrictive laws and by judicial rulings that all but declare the Constitution a nuisance, and the American citizen a slave of the state.
But not only is government pro-actively trampling on our three most precious God-given rights, it is also accomplishing the same result by simply refusing to defend them when their sanctity is threatened by outsiders.
The illegal immigration travesty is the prime example of death through neglect.. We are pro-actively fighting a war on terrorism six thousand miles from our shore, and yet an onslaught that is threatening to destroy us, both physically and economically, and that also affords terrorists the ability to find a home and a breeding ground from which to proselytize on our own soil, and in our own neighborhoods, is being allowed to continue unabated. Government efforts to stop illegal immigration have been half-hearted, at best and entirely unsuccessful.
Alexander Hamilton (and Washington and Jefferson as well) vehemently opposed granting immediate citizenship to new immigrants, writing, To admit foreigners indiscriminately to the rights of citizens, the moment they foot in our country, would be nothing less than to admit the Grecian horse into the citadel of our liberty and sovereignty. And he repeatedly warned against allowing masses of immigrants to cross our borders, because he believed that our safety and sovereignty would be threatened by such reckless policy.
The Founders concerns were focused on the deadly threats to our republic represented by failing to limit legal immigration. Its difficult to imagine what they would think of laws and court rulings that hold the American citizen/taxpayer hostage to the rights of illegal immigrants. The fact that the American legal/judicial system would go so far as to seize the property of an American citizen and lawfully convey it to an illegal immigrant would surely be beyond their ability to comprehend, let alone condone.
The dollar cost of illegal immigration is rising exponentially, and consists of (among other considerations), the cost to the American taxpayer of:
All of the above expenses, and more, have resulted in estimates ranging from $10 billion to $40 billion a year pilfered from the American taxpayers pockets as a result of our governments unwillingness to address the immigration issue.
I can think of much better ways to spend our money, one of which would put a major dent in the cause of the US/Mexico border immigration crisis.
Simplistically, here is a laymans partial solution a very rough and non-expert draft which would, of course require significant fine tuning
Lets use the average of the $10 to $40 billion estimates, and assume that illegal immigrants cost the taxpayer $25 billion annually.
The length of the US (CA, AZ, NM, TX)-Mexico border is approximately 2,000 miles.
Many nuts-and-bolts conservatives (yours truly included) have suggested building a wall and/or stationing armed guards as a reasonable solution to the illegal immigration problem occurring across our southern border.
Lets look at the potential cost of doing both:
The extraordinarily effective protective wall that Israel has built in the West Bank in order to prevent the infiltration of Palestinian suicide bombers cost them $1.6 million per mile.
Using that figure, the construction of a similar wall along our entire southern land border, would cost $1.6 million/mile x 2,000 miles = $3.2 billion.
Now, if we were to build small guard stations and assign an armed guard at each station every half-mile along that wall, we would require 2,000 x 2 = 4,000 guard stations.
Lets liberally assume that each small station (something along the lines of this or this ) would cost $100,000 each to install (including wiring for air conditioning and a set of outside floodlights, plumbing, communications equipment, etc.). The total cost for all 4,000 stations would be $400 million.
If we were to station guards at each station so that each worked an 8-hour shift, five days a week and hired a sufficient number of guards so as to have a guard on duty 24 hour a day, seven days a week -- we would require 21 eight-hour shifts (totaling 168 hours) per week with each guard working a 40 hour week. Therefore we would require 4.2 guards per station.
4.2 guards per station x 4,000 stations = a total of 16,800 guards needed to patrol the border.
Lets assume a cost of training each guard (in the procedures to be followed and in firearms training, both of which would be done in classes of 100 or more guards per class), and the providing of each guard with a firearm, to amount to $2,500/guard. Then the cost of training 16,800 would be $42 million.
Assume that each guard is paid an annual salary and benefits totaling $75,000. The total annual salary/benefits cost for all 16,800 guards would amount to $1.26 billion.
Now take the estimated $25 billion dollar per year to the taxpayer cost of illegal immigration and subtract the $3.2 billion cost of an Israeli-like security wall running along the entire border and the $400 million cost of guard stations positioned every half mile along that wall, the $42 million training costs, and the $1.26 billion in guard salaries and we are left with $20.1 billion dollars (a full 80% of the figure with which we started) which could be used for maintenance purposes, insurance, utility costs, additional equipment, etc, with a sizeable surplus left over.
The large portion of the outlay described above is a one-time as opposed to annual -- cost (the construction of the wall itself, especially). The construction of the wall would surrely employ thousands of Americans in the process. As would the guard positions, which would presumably be permanent, unless and until the exodus were to subside.
Of course, all of the above are simply the estimates of a layperson, who has no expert knowledge in the costs of the physical items involved. But I believe those estimates to be not unrealistic. Neither do I suggest that I have covered all financial considerations that would be involved.
My entire purpose in creating this hypothetical example is to suggest simply that I believe there is a fundamental, nuts-and-bolts solution to the crisis represented by the exodus of illegals coming across our southern border. And I also believe that the financial cost of such a common sense solution would be nowhere near as prohibitive as the financial cost of continuing to support (and now actually cater to, at the cost of our own freedoms) non-citizens who have committed a crime simply by being here in the first place.
How to address the problems cause by those illegals who are already here is an entirely different issue. But I believe that stemming the source of the problem now is entirely within our power and entirely possible, dollar-wise.
As for the ramifications of the Douglas, Arizona Ranch decision
I cant help but wonder when we citizens of America 2005 will declare that the last straw has been placed on the camels back. Are we more tolerant of the tyranny of government than Sam Adams and his fellow patriots were? Are we more of a mindset that we will not take action until the abuse occurs in our own backyard? Are we more willing to wear the chains to which Adams referred, because we love the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom?
Back in 1999, Claire Wolfe observed in her book, 101 Things To Do Til The Revolution:
America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards. '
Considering the atrocities (both by neglect and by overt action) committed by our government in the six years since Claire penned that thought, I cant help but wonder whether we have been pushed significantly closer to the revolution she envisioned in those last three words.
~ joanie ..
And thanks to several fellow FReepers (especially ForGod'sSake, squantos and tet68) for a correction and especially kind comments on the original post. :)
OK, works for me.
You can duplicate ping me anytime. I might miss something good otherwise.
Sounds like a plan. And since it is a workable plan you can rest assured that it'll never be accepted or approved of by the PTB in DC.
Apologies for any duplicate pings. On the suggestion of several fellow FReepers I am posting this as a thread of its own, after having posted it on another thread.
And thanks to several fellow FReepers (especially ForGod'sSake, squantos and tet68) for a correction and especially kind comments on the original post. :)
But that's exactly why our so-called leaders will not build such a simple and effective fence system. It would work, and would run counter to their goal of integrating the USA into the "North American Union," with one common border.
"The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government,
1. The act of invading; the act of encroaching upon the rights or possessions of another; encroachment; trespass.
One has to realize that the Bush family is intent on making half-Mexican George P. Bush (W's nephew) the Governor of Texas. The border will stay open through '08...and may be the issue that puts the Hildabeast into the Oval Office.
You all know that I agree with you...
Crosslinked:
For "Thunder on the Border," click the picture:
And thanks to several fellow FReepers (especially ForGod'sSake, squantos and tet68) for a correction and especially kind comments on the original post. :)
The cost of such a fence is what we spend on illegal aliens every month in prisons, education, medical care etc.
It truly does boggle the mind. After 9/11 all immigration from 25 or 26 Muslim countries should have been halted, all non-citizens from those countries returned to their homelands and the borders secured. It's been done in the past. Unfortunately, the fear of being labeled a racist or unfair to a particular group of people by liberal America is stronger than the fear of terrorist bombings by Muslim immigrants legal or illegal. Incredibly, I see more burkas (and I see them often) now then before 9/11 (when I encountered NONE).
Excellent article, joanie, and well written!
BTW, if your facts are correct, your idea sounds perfectly workable to me.
I agree 100%. It is estimated that illegal aliens here in CA cost us 10 billion dollars every year. We must all demand action from our congressional "leaders" who are traitors to America, and if they won't take action, vote them out next year.
I wanted to make sure you didn't miss this post from over on the other thread. He makes some great points:
To: joanie-f
Tremendous! Well said! And I agree fully!
An investment less than the annual cost of the problem which would alleviate the problem makes good sense. Even though I get images of the Berlin Wall, we do need to do something, and in contrast to that series of structures, this is not to keep people in, but to keep them out.
If enogh Mexicans (and others) were to be forced to remain in Mexico (and elsewhere), perhaps they would change the government which oppresses them, instead of coming here illegally and subverting ours.
Unfortunately, as those of us who work in the oil industry get our first real raises in a decade, people wail and gnash their teeth over the cost of fuel.
I am no defeatist, but the outcry over the increase in cost of goods and services in the niches filled by illegals would probably be greater than the outcry over the the current illegal immigrant problem.
By and large, Americans have become a self-centered and short-sighted lot.
Sadly, there are few of Sam Adams' fervor present in our modern society; people are too caught up in the acquisition of immaterial material wealth to pay attention to their own families, much less the dangers to our Liberty.
I would wager that even many of the members of Congress, themselves, in some way benefit, whether it be the gardener, housekeeper, or the guy who cleans the pool, directly or indirectly, by the presence of illegal immigrants in the labor force.
That is bad enough, but the theft of Nethercott's Ranch is being done, not just as a "damage" award to the "victims", but a way of definitively punishing someone who has been an outspoken thorn in the side of official agencies on this issue for some time. If Nethercott's ranch forfieture is intended as an 'object lesson' to those who would "take the law into their own hands", I fear that turf battle has only just begun.
Sadly, the man has been roundly demonized in the media, deservedly or not, and will garner little sympathy from those who refuse to see the greater issue at hand. DOubtless, that is no accident.
For starters, we need protection against the award of damages to someone who is injured in the commission of a criminal act by someone seeking to halt or hinder that act, not just to protect landowners in the border areas, but any and every citizen who choses to defend themselves, their property, or their family against criminals.
The ramifications of this would be broad indeed, as it would ensure that the average citizen can uphold the law using reasonable (including lethal) force without fear of civil recrimination by those allegedly injured doing their particular criminal act.
(In this instance, the lesson is that Nethercott would have been better off taking his chances and burying these people, rather than giving them water and a blanket.)
I can not understand why such liability protection is so freely tendered to those who act in an official capacity, but generally withheld from the average person. There is no 'equal protection' under these laws eliminating liability for officials only, which may be a Constitutional issue in and of itself.
As for securing the border, this is one of the Constitutional empowerments of the Federal Government, unfortunately abdicated by the Congress in the aim of securing votes from the numerically increasing and increasingly anti-American groups which espouse thwarting that objective.
Even in the face of the threat (and in some instances, the reality--MS 13 comes to mind) of terrorists infiltrating our nation through the highly permeable arrangement on our borders, these legislators lack the intestinal fortitude to uphold this mandate from the very document they are sworn to protect and defend, the very essence of our government.
For now, the battle is primarily within the system. There are credible attempts to sieze the property of judges who voted for Kelo, which I hope succeed, or at least come close enough to cause the Court to reconsider and overturn the decision. There is an outcry over the City of New London attempting to charge back rent to those whose property they have siezed, a real abombination, and again, a punitive measure, undertaken through the courts, with no doubt the objective of establishing precedent which is intended to intimidate any who would resist such property siezures.
These acts are not only in violation of the spirit of the Constitution, they are arguably criminal racketeering.
I cannot be convinced that those who have pushed these actions to sieze property and redistribute it to other private entities "for the purpose of increasing tax revenues" do not stand to receive some personal gain, whether through increasing the funding for their tenure in their present position through "contributions" or more directly.
Were this 1773, they would likely be tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail.
153 posted on 08/21/2005 2:32:45 AM EDT by Smokin' Joe (God save us from the fury of the do-gooders!)
Several options could lessen the cost--a double-fenced barrier and landmines, or windmills to produce enough juice to electrify the fence...
I guess you don't realize how quixotic and out of step with 2005 America that line of thinking is. Hence your frustration.
Maybe I can help...
Are we more tolerant of the tyranny of government than Sam Adams and his fellow patriots were? Are we more of a mindset that we will not take action until the abuse occurs in our own backyard? Are we more willing to wear the chains to which Adams referred, because we love the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom?
In three words, yes, yes, and yes. Blame it on affluence. Which in turn breeds decadence. 18th century Americans led short, brutal lives for the most part. They simply couldn't afford to be generous with any trespassers.
But there's more to it than that. The original post is eloquent but doesn't cut to the chase.
Were this 1773, they would likely be tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail.
But it's not 1773. Let's connect the dots:
America's elites are now de-racinated, de-culturalized and de-nationalized...which is largely in line with the public's state of mind. In this climate the main border concern is economic. And the only reason to "secure" a border is to deter crime. Yet we know that democracies are reactive and not proactive when it comes to crime. Therefore the border will only be secured after a great crime is committed that can be traced back to an unsecured border: Detonation of a nuke etc. The felonies committed by individual illegals on U.S. soil obviously don't count. They have been occurring for decades. We are affluent enough to be able to afford such nuisances.
The frustration seems authentic, but I wonder if most here aren't in line with modern American attitudes about immigration and borders at the end of the day. There are tons of "conservatives" out there who desire secure borders, but at the same time they reflexively embrace foreign peoples and cultures as exotic equals. You can't have it both ways.
Ask yourself: Who among our political elite - of any persuasion - is willing to stand up and say that Mexican culture is a backward culture? That it is inferior to our own? Let alone the other barbarous locales around the world. Think about it. Who will compare and contrast?
The reason even a non-violent Mexican invasion was never tolerated in the past was psychological - and not the result of police work or border vigilance. The American public was until circa 1965 unafraid of asserting its superiority as a people, a culture, a nation.
Let me say that again loudly:
The American public was unafraid of asserting its superiority.
There. Did I make you wince? To all the "conservatives" on this website: If you winced that means you're not a conservative but a multicultural drone i.e. a marxist.
The fact is a nation's borders are as much a psychological border as physical. Any body politic that has adopted tolerance of the "other" and pursuit of the almight dollar as greater virtues than preserving one's own way of life is destined to stop enforcing their own borders.
So, OK, let's all wait patiently for the nationalist revolution. But it didn't ever happen in California, did it?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.