Posted on 04/30/2008 5:15:30 AM PDT by fweingart
OUR OPINION: NO OFFICIAL SHOULD HAVE SUCH POWER TO IGNORE U.S. LAW
In the poem, Mending Wall, Robert Frost questions whether ''Good fences make good neighbors.'' In the Department of Homeland Security's push to complete a 670-mile fence along the Mexican border, it's bullying and intrusiveness that are making us a bad neighbor. By disregarding more than 30 U.S. laws, not to mention common sense, DHS will damage the environment and violate property rights in the region. Already the fence has raised hackles among U.S. residents and Mexicans along the border. And it has drawn deserved constitutional challenges.
And for what? There are signs that, no matter how high and thick the wall, determined immigrants will find the means to breach it.
470 miles to go
This month, DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff invoked the power that Congress gave him in 2005 to waive any federal law that deters completing the fence. He wants to finish the 470 miles left to build before the year ends. To do so, he suspended laws that protect endangered species, migrating birds and specific habitats.
This puts at risk fence areas such as the Lower Rio Grande Valley in Texas, home to 17 federally endangered or threatened species. Among them is the ocelot, a small wild cat. Only 80 to 100 ocelots remain in South Texas. Their survival depends on crossing into Mexico to breed. Also threatened in an Arizona refuge are 70 Sonoran pronghorn antelopes, the swiftest mammal in North America.
The fence has provoked the ire of many border communities, and DHS has had to take property owners to court just to survey land. No one government entity should have such sweeping authority to ignore laws that protect individual or collective rights.
DHS Secretary Chertoff defends the waiver of the laws in the name of national security. Yet national security does not exist in a vacuum, nor does it justify the potential environmental damage and human ill-will this fence poses. What is the point of national security if the nation's ideals and laws are destroyed in the process?
More work visas
Even the national-security argument is specious. Keeping out farmworkers, dishwashers and wait staff does little to make our country safer. If anything, it serves to drive up the price of food. As long as U.S. employers have jobs that Americans won't fill, needy immigrants will find a way to enter this country. Congress could better address the labor demand by increasing the number of legal work visas.
Whether Congress had the authority to cede so much power to the DHS may be considered by the Supreme Court. Better yet, Congress should repeal the DHS secretary's unwarranted waiver power, thus allowing the rule of law to govern the fence project.
“...this scum of society ...”
I joined freerepublic not too long ago though I’d been lurking here for years ...thanks to the recommendation of a good friend who is a retired Air Force pilot. I have always appreciated the sound conservative logic and good humor that I usually find here. I also like the fact that several members here have the time and the skills to do excellent research.
I am 100% in favor of whatever it takes to REALLY secure our borders. I do not favor illegal immigration of any sort. The Hispanics whom I know do not favor it either. They tell me that one of the things they most admired about THIS country was the fact that we actually FOLLOW the LAW....because in most of their countries, though they have good laws, they are seldom followed....and many of their public officials can be bribed. They have great love for this country and they follow the legal processes with pride. (I’m speaking of those I personally know.)
I understand that many illegal immigrants who come here are not educated and that some are criminals but that does not make them the “scum of the earth.” It makes them lawbreakers and the proper consequences of the law MUST be applied...but let us please remember that they are people created by God who were not blessed to be born in the United States. The vast majority who come here do so for economic survival.
I think we are all frustrated with the way we have let this problem get WAY out of hand. However, I do think that it was a problem that we all ignored UNTIL it got out of hand. Many ‘good’ citizens were more than pleased to hire illegals because they did not need to be paid much (this applied to private individuals as much as certain businesses).
I hope that Mexico can be a friend of ours since this is sound policy for our national interests (especially those that deal with security and the economy).
We are NOT a nation of immigrants, we are a nation of Americans - legal, assimilated and proud.
If the staff of the Miami Herald thinks that fences don’t work then I’ll personally pay to have every one of those people have the locks removed from the doors on their houses. They can lead by example.
Heck, they should remove the doors to facilitate the movement of wildlife too.
“As long as U.S. employers have jobs that Americans won’t fill at third-world wages. That’s better!,”
As long as U.S. employers have jobs that Americans won’t fill rather than be on wellfare. That’s even better...
There is abolutely no need for restaurant workers, dishwashers, landscapers, etc. to be brought into the nation. These are zero value-added occupations. If the lawn remains uncut, too bad. Clean your own pool or pay a citizen to do it for you.
This guy thinks we should be willing to give up our nation and our freedom to save a few ocelots and keep the socialists in Mexico happy? What happened to “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” ??
I was with you til that last statement. Mexico will never really be a friend of ours as long as the status quo remains there.
I liked Pope Benedict’s answer to the problem. Mexico must become a nation that it’s population won’t want to leave.
I agree with you and Pope Benedict completely on this! ;-)
Mexico never was a friend; the chaos there never stops and we inevitably provide mop-up.
SO DOES THAT INCLUDE US IMMIGRATION LAWS ??????
ah, the irony. Leftists use sweeping government power all the time to violate individual rights.
Flushed your toilet lately? And how about that banning of incandescent bulbs?
“... it’s bullying and intrusiveness that are making us a bad neighbor.”
.....said Mexico (If they told the truth)
That is a very accurate and quick description. "Chaos."
And where those individuals balk, leave that part open and step up BP...a few miles from the border so those individual landowners and sanctuary towns can truly enjoy being the mouth of the funnel.
When hordes of invaders start crossing their lawns and schoolyards day and night to avoid the fence in other places, I think there'll be a change of tune
Chertoff is deliberately choosing the most contentious places in order to try to kill the fence entirely.
Good point!
I guess in a journalist's mind, actual real life success with a fence near San Diego just can't compare to the "signs" in their own minds.
I wonder if they hear voices as well.
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