[idjeff]

From what I understand, they are exercising their right to create a militia to resist the illegal immigration of people from a foreign nation. I say...RIGHT ON!!! Since our own government won't do anything about it (in a successful way), I'm happy to see that concerned US citizens are taking an interest. Comments?

[roberto blanco]

i am fairly certain that they are called "minutemen" not only in regards to politics.

[bubblewrap]

It's not just about illegal immegrants. It's about stopping drug runners. I guess this will cut the competition from Canada.
Whatever happened to homegrown Kentucky Bluegrass or California Gold?

[OreoCookie]

Depends on how far they go. If they start taking over functions reserved for the police and the judiciary, they cross the line. There are other ways to make yourself useful in a democratic society.

(I take it that you refer to the Mexican border when you talk about illegal immigration ...)

[SimpleLife]

Aren't there Laws regarding vigilantes?

[bubblewrap]

It's only vigilante when they attack accused.

[SVass]

Why don't these "minutemen" surround all of the bars every night and arrest all of the drunks attempting to drive out of the parking lots? Those "criminals" will actually endanger someone! Smugglers have crossed every human invented border ever made and it is no big deal. Or why don't we return all of the stolen land to the indians? We illegally crossed their borders and in many cases violated lawful treaties. (A little more history, in Europe both "knights" and "religious orders" established fortresses/inns at river crossings and collected tolls from passersby. Maybe our modern minutemen can reinstitute that practice and make money.) sam

[bubblewrap]

We have our most effective police departments for that.(for drunks)
Besides our laws are obeyed perfectly. That's why we have them.

[analogika]

Originally posted by bubblewrap:
Besides our laws are obeyed perfectly. That's why we have them.

That's either sarcasm, or the dumbest thing I've read all weekend.

-s*

[James L]

Unless the "minutemen" are all of North American native indian decent then they are nothing more than hypocrites really.

[Chuckit]

Originally posted by James L:
Unless the "minutemen" are all of North American native indian decent then they are nothing more than hypocrites really.

They were born here just as much as anybody else. And quite frankly, I doubt you'll find any American Indian tribes on your side on this one. They lost the land a long time ago. It ain't theirs. And the minutemen certainly aren't arguing that Mexico doesn't have the legal right to beat us in a war and take our land, so I don't see how that's relevant.

As far as I can tell, the minutemen rock. It's nice to see the authorities getting shown up by a bunch of Joes at the border.

[bubblewrap]

Originally posted by analogika:


That's either sarcasm, or the dumbest thing I've read all weekend.

-s*

[budster101]

I'm all for them.

[bubblewrap]

It's working.

[SVass]

http://www.pacificnet.net/jue/goodst...sroutklan.html

read some history before you claim victory. sam

[OldManMac]

Originally posted by bubblewrap:
It's working.

Apparently, it's not.

[Myriad]

I always thought this thing had died when all the white supremacist groups latched on to it.

[CRASH HARDDRIVE]

I�m all for it. That they�ve already helped in apprehending 18 illegals is an accomplishment. Shame someone can�t get the same type of effort going on the California, New Mexico and Texas borders as well.

The fact that the usual suspects on the far left are going out of their way to discredit the effort with the usual grasping at straws desperation non-arguments and race-baiting, makes no difference.

It�s no secret, we all know the left�s agenda is the promotion of illegals (which they won�t even acknowledge as such) streaming across the border. So it�s no surprise that the usual suspects are deathly afraid of anything they fear may serve as a step toward better protected borders, and OF COURSE they will go out of their way to pull all their usual tired, done-to-death tricks out of their worn-out playbook to mischaracterize this effort, or any other ever proposed.

[Millennium]

Well, I guess it's too late to keep them from doing anything stupid: the project itself qualifies. I suppose as long as they don't do anything really stupid, though, there isn't really much harm in it.

[iLikebeer]

Originally posted by SVass:
Why don't these "minutemen" surround all of the bars every night and arrest all of the drunks attempting to drive out of the parking lots? Those "criminals" will actually endanger someone!

Here in Northern Arizona, there's usually police hanging out near the bars when they close. Last time I checked, the police actually enforced DUI and DWI laws. Anyone is free to call the police and report drunk drivers, and I've seen people outside doing just that before.

As long as these people don't start shooting at people, this is great. They might even save some lives. Hundreds if not thousands of illegals die here every year trying to cross the desert. 120F in the summer with no water can make people do crazy things. Especially if there are 30 of them packed like sardines into a van with no air conditioning or other similar situations.

Hopefully, all this attention will mean that either the border will be protected or the laws will be changed in some meaningful way wrt immigration.

[christ]

Originally posted by budster101:
I'm all for them.

Whoah! A policy schism!

Some Arizona News Outlet (Tucson Citizen):
"President Bush criticized the Minutemen, the estimated 1,000 citizens who are gathering on the Arizona-Mexico border today to protest the government's failure to secure our borders.

Bush called these patriots "vigilantes" and offered his alternative to citizen protest: "rational enforcement of our laws.""

Interestingly the editorial line here called them "patriots" though - you can tell where the journalist's sympathies lie - so much for unbiased reporting.

[Chuckit]

Originally posted by christ:
Interestingly the editorial line here called them "patriots" though - you can tell where the journalist's sympathies lie - so much for unbiased reporting.

Look at the section heading.

[christ]

Originally posted by Chuckit:
Look at the section heading.

Oops - I stand corrected.

but the Bush/ budster policy schism is still evident - maybe the honeymoon is over.

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by iLikebeer:
Hundreds if not thousands of illegals die here every year trying to cross the desert.

You mean they chance death to get to lil ol America that EVERYONE hates?

[typoon]

I'm all for this as noted by my post here
I mean it's about time the citizens in that area are doing something about it if the Gov't isn't going to. Bush needs to stop pandering to his Buddy Vincente Fox and get serious about tightening up our southern border.

[budster101]

Fox Sucks. I can't believe I said Fox sucks!

[spacefreak]

Originally posted by KarlG:
Apparently, it's not.

Bwahahaha! A far-left liberal site taking it's slant from a UK rag on what's going on at the Mexican border.

Check this out...

The number of Mexican migrants trying to sneak into the United States through the Arizona border has dropped by half since hundreds of American civilians began guarding the area earlier this week, say Mexican officials assigned to protect their citizens.

But that doesn't mean the migrants have given up. Most remain determined to enter the United States and say they will simply find other places to cross.

Before Minuteman Project volunteers began patrolling, Mexican officials encountered at least 400 undocumented migrants daily. On Monday, the second day Minutemen were present, they spotted just 198, said Bertha de la Rosa of Grupo Beta, a Mexican government-sponsored group that discourages people from crossing illegally and aids those stranded in the desert.

[Moderator]

..its thier right good for them...even if their intolerance for the basic rights of other human beings to make a decent living for thier family is personally repulsive.

If any of us had the misfotune of being born in a 3rd world environment where a way out is right next door....we'd all seriously consider going.

So much for do unto others...

[spacefreak]

There's no need to misportray the issue. It's not immigration that most are opposed to. It's the ILLEGAL immigration that is the problem.

I know plenty of Mexicans who are here legally, and they didn't have a problem obtaining legal status.

[budster101]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
There's no need to misportray the issue. It's not immigration that most are opposed to. It's the ILLEGAL immigration that is the problem.

I know plenty of Mexicans who are here legally, and they didn't have a problem obtaining legal status.

In addition to that, most, and I say most, because I can't say all, legal mexicans hate illegal immigration.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
There's no need to misportray the issue. It's not immigration that most are opposed to. It's the ILLEGAL immigration that is the problem.

I know plenty of Mexicans who are here legally, and they didn't have a problem obtaining legal status.

The problem is, there are many people who don't believe that there should be any kind of 'legal' versus 'illegal' status; we should simply throw our borders wide open. They tend to cite a moving poem engraved on the base of the Statue of Liberty, which ends as follows:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

It's a very pleasant and happy viewpoint, but full of practical problems which no one really wants to discuss. It's not a viewpoint I agree with, but this is what you're up against whenever you try and argue about illegal immigration.

[SVass]

Why don't you study history? Originally, kings sold the right to import goods and knights/abbeys established citadels to collect tariffs. People were allowed to travel. Then, groups complained about competition for jobs so non fellow believers were thrown out of some trades and some towns (European history), grades of citizenship were created (some belonged to the land [serfs], some to cities [Russian Jews], and some were in charge [aristocrats]. Even our US colonies had passports and separate citizenship to keep those of a different religion and riffraff out. Now we have working rules allowing corporations to import engineers to work as employees at lower wages; but, the poor are barred from coming on their own. Those opposed to "illegal" immigration are fighting to export their own jobs as the goods will merely be made there instead of here. Try an educational test question? Is there anyone who does NOT believe that Social Security will be in deficit in 2042 who opposes "illegal" immigration? Remember that illegal immigration is paying a surplus into the trust fund! sam

[budster101]

Originally posted by SVass:
<boiled down> Remember that illegal immigration is paying a surplus into the trust fund! sam

Are you kidding?

[SVass]

Originally posted by budster101:
Are you kidding?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/bu...migration.html

"Starting in the late 1980's, the Social Security Administration received a flood of W-2 earnings reports with incorrect - sometimes simply fictitious - Social Security numbers. It stashed them in what it calls the "earnings suspense file" in the hope that someday it would figure out whom they belonged to.

The file has been mushrooming ever since: $189 billion worth of wages ended up recorded in the suspense file over the 1990's, two and a half times the amount of the 1980's.

In the current decade, the file is growing, on average, by more than $50 billion a year, generating $6 billion to $7 billion in Social Security tax revenue and about $1.5 billion in Medicare taxes. "

sam

[budster101]

Originally posted by SVass:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/bu...migration.html

"Starting in the late 1980's, the Social Security Administration received a flood of W-2 earnings reports with incorrect - sometimes simply fictitious - Social Security numbers. It stashed them in what it calls the "earnings suspense file" in the hope that someday it would figure out whom they belonged to.

The file has been mushrooming ever since: $189 billion worth of wages ended up recorded in the suspense file over the 1990's, two and a half times the amount of the 1980's.

In the current decade, the file is growing, on average, by more than $50 billion a year, generating $6 billion to $7 billion in Social Security tax revenue and about $1.5 billion in Medicare taxes. "

sam

"NYTIMES"...

How about this?

Stop illegal immigration. Force US companies to then raise wages for that work, and I'll happily pick fruit, vegetables for $25 / hour.

[SVass]

Originally posted by budster101:
"NYTIMES"...

How about this?

Stop illegal immigration. Force US companies to then raise wages for that work, and I'll happily pick fruit, vegetables for $25 / hour.

You are typical! While they are robbing you, the demagogues are diverting your attention. Their engineers get $20 per hour while these corporations with government contracts get $100 per hour for their time citing "overhead" expenses. They won't pay you $20 because they can't lie about your resume. They want you to guard the border while they fly them in to our airports. You don't believe the NY Times. Obviously you believe the opinions of Fox News instead. Remember, once they claimed that the N***s were taking your job, and before that the Jews, and before that the Irish, Italians, the Papists, etc. They are LIARS and THIEVES. The few poor who enter this country are no more a problem than the Japanese legal immigrants who were imprisoned during WWII by the same morons. sam

[budster101]

Originally posted by SVass:
You are typical! While they are robbing you, the demagogues are diverting your attention. Their engineers get $20 per hour while these corporations with government contracts get $100 per hour for their time citing "overhead" expenses. They won't pay you $20 because they can't lie about your resume. They want you to guard the border while they fly them in to our airports. You don't believe the NY Times. Obviously you believe the opinions of Fox News instead. Remember, once they claimed that the N***s were taking your job, and before that the Jews, and before that the Irish, Italians, the Papists, etc. They are LIARS and THIEVES. The few poor who enter this country are no more a problem than the Japanese legal immigrants who were imprisoned during WWII by the same morons. sam

I'm typical? Typical what?

Who is robbing me? Explain who is getting $20 / hour and who is getting $100 / hour, and how do I get that $100 per hour job...

Who, what, why lie about my resume?

I'm confused...

I don't believe the NY times in general, and that is their fault. They lie often, and then print corrections in buried stories, or in the middle of a story. It's sick.

Fox? What have they said about illegals? I was just talking off the top of my head with my own thoughts. Even though they may be incorrect.. I'm just postulating here. Relax.

What has this to do with poor people? If they are illegal, then it seems logical to me, the companies that abuse them by employing them for crap wages would be forced to dip into the general workforce, and nobody is going to work for peanuts who is legal, so hence my posulations...

Again. Relax and discuss with me, exactly what you think and why. I think I elaborated a bit more so as to give you a better understanding of my thoughts.

Cool?

-

[SVass]

Originally posted by budster101:
I'm typical? Typical what? Who is robbing me? Explain who is getting $20 / hour and who is getting $100 / hour, and how do I get that $100 per hour job...
I'm confused...
I don't believe the NY times in general, and that is their fault. They lie often, and then print corrections in buried stories, or in the middle of a story. It's sick.
Again. Relax and discuss with me, exactly what you think and why. I think I elaborated a bit more so as to give you a better understanding of my thoughts. Cool?
-

\

When your were taught in school about the 1735 Zenger trial for Libel, they said that it was about newspapers right to print, they LIED! The defense was over the RIGHT of a jury to decide that a law was unjust and an ILLEGAL act was not to be punished. Just because some a*hole group passes a law does NOT make an act punishable. They have to convince a jury of twelve. That IS the law and IS our constitution. The $100/$200 per hour is paid to defense corporations for each "engineer" (read Halliburton for simplicity) on their payroll. Getting you to chase immigrants keeps you from paying attention.

[iLikebeer]

Originally posted by SVass:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/bu...migration.html

"Starting in the late 1980's, the Social Security Administration received a flood of W-2 earnings reports with incorrect - sometimes simply fictitious - Social Security numbers. It stashed them in what it calls the "earnings suspense file" in the hope that someday it would figure out whom they belonged to.

The file has been mushrooming ever since: $189 billion worth of wages ended up recorded in the suspense file over the 1990's, two and a half times the amount of the 1980's.

In the current decade, the file is growing, on average, by more than $50 billion a year, generating $6 billion to $7 billion in Social Security tax revenue and about $1.5 billion in Medicare taxes. "

sam

http://www.cairco.org/econ/econ.html
* Although they create a net drain on the federal government, the average illegal household pays more than $4,200 a year in federal taxes, for a total of nearly $16 billion.

* However, they impose annual costs of more than $26.3 billion, or about $6,950 per illegal household.

* About 43 percent, or $7 billion, of the federal taxes illegals pay go to Social Security and Medicare.

That's just part of the list. Don't forget lowered wages, remittances of $10B, lost jobs, and tons of cocaine and heroin.

[idjeff]

Look, the bottom line here is that there is a legal procedure for entering this country. Am I wrong? Am I crazy? Are our immigration laws null and void? Many if not most of our ancestors followed (I hope) the legal application procedures for entering this country. Isn't this what the minutemen trying say!!!!!

I don't give a rat's patutti about how illegals have jobs that pay less money than what Americans would be paid. That is completely beside the point.

[Moderator]

Originally posted by idjeff:
Look, the bottom line here is that there is a legal procedure for entering this country. Am I wrong? Am I crazy? Are our immigration laws null and void?

The one assumption you're making that I might disagree with is: illegal = wrong.

Of course it can't be a free for all. What bothers me is the contempt in people's voices when they talk about these illegal immigrants. Not here so much..but on the streets, in the bars, and certainly on right wing radio.

A lot of people really despise illegal immigrants...as if they are any different from you or I. Put us in that situation and we'd do the same thing.

[SVass]

Originally posted by idjeff:
Look, the bottom line here is that there is a legal procedure for entering this country. Am I wrong? Am I crazy? Are our immigration laws null and void? Many if not most of our ancestors followed (I hope) the legal application procedures for entering this country. Isn't this what the minutemen trying say!!!!!

Strangely enough, you are wrong. The US signed a TREATY which takes precedence over law according to OUR constitution. It says that those who are politically persecuted MUST be allowed to enter our country and seek sanctuary. Thus, some Chinese immigrants, Tutsis, and others have to be allowed to enter despite our quotas, green card rules, etc. Unfortunately, our Attorney General doesn't care what the law is, he only cares what the shrub wants! sam

[Spliffdaddy]

If we simply killed the next thousand illegal immigrants, the problem would solve itself.

[frankiec]

Originally posted by SimpleLife:
Aren't there Laws regarding vigilantes?

They're Undocumented Border Patrol Agents.

Now, turn off MTV/CNN/ABC and grow your own brain.

[frankiec]

Originally posted by Moderator:
A lot of people really despise illegal immigrants...as if they are any different from you or I. Put us in that situation and we'd do the same thing.

My grandparents came legally. Do you understand this concept? You probably don't because you probably don't live on a border state. Or you do and you're one of the rich U.C. kids that parents pay for your college rent, school, Volvo, and everything else.

10% of the Mexican people live in the United States.

There are federal immigration caps on people from all sorts of countries.

There are no caps on people walking across the "border."

This is not about immigration This is about unfairness, ignorance, stupidity, and bias.

Mexico's #1 economy is dollars from the U.S., second to oil. *You* want a people to be dependent on your handouts? *You* are the problem. *I* can mow my own lawn, wash my own dishes. *You* and the big business and politicians want migrant workers for cheap labor and even cheaper votes.

You're leaving your grandchildren a third-world economy, a Balkanized culture, and a spirit of naiveness, suckerness, and apathy.

Oh, I get it. You're from Boston. I'm not talking about this topic anymore on this forum with geeks from the midwest, south, and elsewhere.

[Athens]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
Depends on how far they go. If they start taking over functions reserved for the police and the judiciary, they cross the line. There are other ways to make yourself useful in a democratic society.

(I take it that you refer to the Mexican border when you talk about illegal immigration ...)

HE should be because more Americans enter Canada illegally then Canadians enter the US.

[Athens]

Originally posted by Zimphire:
You mean they chance death to get to lil ol America that EVERYONE hates?

Every one dosent hate the American life style, what every one hates is America's actions to other countries.

[ryaxnb]

Originally posted by CRASH HARDDRIVE:
I�m all for it. That they�ve already helped in apprehending 18 illegals is an accomplishment. Shame someone can�t get the same type of effort going on the California, New Mexico and Texas borders as well.

The fact that the usual suspects on the far left are going out of their way to discredit the effort with the usual grasping at straws desperation non-arguments and race-baiting, makes no difference.

It�s no secret, we all know the left�s agenda is the promotion of illegals (which they won�t even acknowledge as such) streaming across the border. So it�s no surprise that the usual suspects are deathly afraid of anything they fear may serve as a step toward better protected borders, and OF COURSE they will go out of their way to pull all their usual tired, done-to-death tricks out of their worn-out playbook to mischaracterize this effort, or any other ever proposed.

I'm a democrat, and I fully support this effort.

[typoon]

I still like the suggestion by Michael Savage. We should tell Vincente Fox that we want 1 barrel of oil for every illegal that comes accross the border. That would help solve lessen our dependcy on Foreign oil.

[mitchell_pgh]

The real issue is, we let illegal immigrants stay in the US. We give them drivers licenses, we let receive pay checks, we let them open checking accounts, we let them buy homes, etc. etc. etc.

If we didn't permit them to drive or collect an income and imposed HARD sentences for those that hired illegal aliens, the issue would be 1/10th as bad. But our government chooses not to do that for various reasons.