15 Minutemen round up
The Minutemen project has been, at least to me, interesting. Below is some interesting reading on them.
It resulted in drop in illegal border crossing and the Confederate Yankee notes:
The drop in attempted illegal border crossings and number of volunteer-related apprehensions speaks volumes of the success of the MinuteMan Project, but perhaps the best testimony so far was this two-way radio conversation in Spanish overheard by MMP volunteers between drug dealers in the mountains near Sierra Vista, AZ:
“We’ve got to get down, to get our loads down!” [Meaning drug loads]
Reply: “We can’t, man – those f***ers are everywhere!”.Obviously, Minuteman Project volunteers are not only succeeding in helping an underappreciated and underfunded Border Patrol, but a besieged Drug Enforcement Agency as well.
Additionally, the government is after the Minutemen:
I have received word via E-Mail from Sandra Miller that The Miracle Valley Bible College in Hereford, Arizona has just been fined $750 per day by James E. Vlahovich (Director, Cochise County Planning Department) for offering and providing housing/camping facilities to volunteers of The Minuteman Project. I am sure this will break soon on more familiar news sites, as MMP Director Jim Gilchrist will surely be discussing this in press interviews today.
The program has been successful but a few incidents have tarnished the effort, such as making a border crosser pose for a picture and some guy pointing a gun at some other border crossers.
There’s other alleged law breaking going on, but not the kind you think:
American Civil Liberties Union activists shadowing the Minuteman Project at the U.S.-Mexican border in Arizona are actively aiding and abetting aliens attempting to enter the country illegally, said a spokesman for the volunteer civilian force.
Grey Deacon told Joseph Farah’s nationally syndicated “WorldNetDaily RadioActive” audience yesterday that ACLU monitors sent to the border to watch Minuteman activity and report civil-liberties abuses to authorities have begun flashing lights, sounding horns and warning off illegals and their “coyote” human smugglers from entering territory patrolled by the volunteers.
And, of course, the pictures of the ACLU volunteers smoking weed.
If the Democrats want an issue for 2008, the lax border security under the Bush administration is it. And Schiavo. And federalism. And big spending. And big government. And the creepy, almost surreal seriousness with which the right is sucking up to those that are farther to the right and ignoring the moderate right (and libertarian right). Ask Der Commissar.
April 19th, 2005 at 10:11 am
“The Miracle Valley Bible College”
That sounds a little fishy to me. If it is a bible college, they probably own the land (if they are run well and have been around any time at all), though they might be leasing some parts of it from someone.
They could be breaking some zoning laws, but if they own it, I see no reason why they cannot provide a home to who ever they want. I wonder if they are fined when they allow illeagals to stay there.
April 19th, 2005 at 5:46 pm
Ah yes. But to truly capitalize on any of the issues, the Democrats will have to stop ignoring it’s own moderates and come back towards the center.
Border security is something neither party has shown any inclination to changing in decades. Neither wants to piss off the latin vote. I think that the public will think the left using for Schiavo for political points later just as distasteful and off putting as they did the right when they did it. And I’d love to see the day a Democrat in Washington actually argues against big govenment, big spending and means it. But that’s right up there with other such rarities as righties for peta.
April 22nd, 2005 at 6:26 am
and give up on all that cheap labor? Are you all kidding? the moment those minute men provide the kind of campaign re$ource$ to the national parties that those benefiting form the cheap labor do, then you might see some action. This issue is truly a bi-partisan travesty.