quote:U.S. wants to build fences at border Decision to consider 'physical barriers' to escalate tense relations between Canada, U.S.
Randy Boswell, The Ottawa Citizen Published: Saturday, December 17, 2005
[...]
The U.S. House of Representatives voted late Thursday night to consider erecting "physical barriers" along the American border with Canada, the firmest step yet toward building the kinds of fences now in place on the Mexican frontier to stop the northward flow of illegal aliens and smuggled goods.
The directive to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was passed by a strong majority of the House and was contained in an amendment to a controversial immigration bill working its way through Congress. The motion cleared the way for about 1,100 kilometres of new fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, but also urged the agency to "conduct a study on the use of physical barriers along the northern border."
[...]
I was absolutely dumbstruck when I read this headline this morning. Fences between Canada and the U.S.? Why? There is no problem of illegal immigration between the two countries. There is no problem with terrorists entering the U.S. from Canada ; the only ones who ever tried were promptly caught. What on earth is this for? This has got to be about twenty-four different shades of stupid.
EDIT for punctuation.
Posts: 609 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Maybe it's a coping strategy to deal with Martin's criticism
More seriously, I don't really see how such a fence would save more money in whatever it is they're trying to prevent than the cost of building such a wall.
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Well, gee, I can understand wanting to keep Martin out. Even I want to keep him out. What about the rest of us? If this is political retaliation, I can only repeat how monumentally a stupid move this is, and one that I find personally offensive.
Posts: 609 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
I'm beginning to think that the reps in Congress are in no way working for the people anymore. That or the majority of american's need to be shot...
I think at this point I'm completely in favor of moving to Mars and starting over. Cause the world is just going downhill.
Posts: 3295 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
How do you know the only ones who tried were promptly caught? I've known people who've repeatedly wandered back and forth across the border while hiking.
I also find it sort of funny that, out of the many counterterrorism efforts Bush has advocated, many of which you've supported, you choose this one to oppose enough to start a thread over. After all, the President has access to security information you don't, perhaps the US has repeatedly caught terrorists who entered through Canada but the public just hasn't been told.
I also think the fence a bad idea, but for reasons I suspect different from your own.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Fugu, the whole "terrorists entering the US from Canada" theory has been debunked so many times it isn't even funny. The only terrorists known to have crossed the border from Canada were, in fact, caught. No terrorist attacks on US soil have ever been perpetrated by terrorists coming from Canada. This is pure isolationist paranoia.
Posts: 609 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Yes, I was just going to point that out, Dagonee. From the article:
quote:The motion cleared the way for about 1,100 kilometres of new fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, but also urged the agency to "conduct a study on the use of physical barriers along the northern border."
That sounds to me that the motion was mostly about adding fences on the southern border, which we desperately need. Asking if we need to build a fence on the US/Canadian border is not the same thing as deciding to do so.
posted
Again you go with asserting things you can't possibly know.
quote:The only terrorists known to have crossed the border from Canada were, in fact, caught.
How do you know this? We already know there are many potential terrorists caught whom we don't hear about. Also, I would hardly expect a government discovering some weren't caught would tell people about it.
Then we come to another amusing statement:
quote:No terrorist attacks on US soil have ever been perpetrated by terrorists coming from Canada.
Coincidentally, the number of terrorist attacks on US soil are extremely few. I imagine I could name dozens of countries from which terrorists entering the US have not come. Clearly that means there is no threat of terrorists coming from that country . . . oh wait.
Not to mention there are plenty of reasons for terrorists to enter the US that are plenty illegal that are not conducting terrorist attacks (or perhaps not conducting terrorist attacks yet). Effective terrorism relies on a support network, and you can bet terrorist organizations are working to create support networks in the US. What makes Canada magically not a potential avenue for their entry into the US?
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Heh heh. I think they should build a Hadrian Wall type fence. Or a Great Wall of China! A great, stretching tourist attraction that several hundred years down the line the Amernadians can wander.
Or a hedge, so Canada and America can argue constantly about what height it should be and whose job it is to trim it.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I still maintain that the border is incredibly long which would make such a fence rather expensive to create -- nevermind the difficulties of building it through the mountains. Although I suppose one might skip areas of that as a natural fence. There are probably more cost-effective solutions for the amount of necessity.
[Edit]Teshi: and whether we should trim it at 9' or 3m Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
It would be far more productive to try and establish a common security perimeter, whilst leaving internal borders as they are now, or even more open. Economically this would only be beneficial, since NAFTA has already begun the process of integrating economies of Canada, the US and Mexico. Also, it seems to me to be much easier to control people trying to get on the continent than trying to restrict their movements once they have already arrived. But it seems that Republicans and Democrats alike have gone into turtle-shell mode instead.
EDIT : Or, Teshi's idea. But we should call them Canericans.
Posts: 609 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
And if that's really the truth, then a good study will report that.
Not that we're guaranteed to get a good study, of course. But with something like security I'd much rather have my government think about it before doing it.
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posted
Unfortunately, studies are rarely conducted to actually find the best ideas. They are usually approached from the perspective of wanting to justify a preconceived idea, and everything in the study is biased to reflect that idea and arrive at the preordained conclusion. That's why there are so often studies on the same thing that arrive at exactly opposite results.
Posts: 609 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
Silly Royalist, thinking we'll have a coat of arms.
For the flag, I'm thinking white, blue and green stripes with a red maple leave over them, and then three white stars inside that for the three original countries.
Oh, did I mention I've decided to add Mexico and call us Mexinadicans? Or, for convenience sake, we could just go with "North Americans." Posts: 7954 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
On the main, the proposal to study fencing off Canada is a political(ly correct) smokescreen to counter charges of "You just hate MexicanAmericans." arising from the House of Representative's directive to fence off Mexico. Secondarily, it balances protests from Mexico with protests from Canada. Since LatinoAmericans* have become a substantial and, more importantly, the fastest-growing segment of the US population, it's politically expedient to tick off a few Canadians who don't get the joke than to tick off a major US voting bloc, or to tick off the major bloc-heads who actually favor Festung Amerika.
* And yes, I am aware that most LatinoAmericans also favor tighter restrictions on illegal labor. Hence appearance comes to the forefront: ie whether a measure seems to be directed at illegality, or at ancestry.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
How on earth is a fence going to stop anyone if nobody is watching it? Are they going to hire security guards too? Because the ways to get past a fence are many. I mean, how many movies are there of people getting out of communist East Germany and that fence had automated machine guns or whatever guarding it. (ok, I don't know what I'm talking about, but I just can't believe a fence will do anything but be a good way to keep a fence company in business and a nice way to waste tax money).
Oh, wasn't there a story a while back on some people trying to build an underground tunnel from Canada to US to smuggle stuff? And it was discovered rather easily or something.
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This is a thread full of outrage that there should be some effort at enforcing national borders? The outrage should be that it has not yet been done.
Posts: 218 | Registered: Mar 2005
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This is a thread full of outrage that there should be some effort at enforcing national borders? The outrage should be that it has not yet been done.
You make it sound like there is absolutely no security at all. The outrage isn't that we are opposed to your country having a solidly protected border. It's that we feel that: first, such a fence is likely not necessary; second, it's impractical; third, it implies that Canadian and American border security really is so bad that not only increased secuity but a physical barrier as well is necessary (and I do believe if a study is necessary for a fence not being needed, this would fall under that). I'm sure there are many other reasons as well, however those are the first to come to my mind at the moment.
quote:I am aware that most LatinoAmericans also favor tighter restrictions on illegal labor.
Really? That's news to me. Do you happen to have a link that backs that up? (I'll check too, but maybe you remember where you saw that.)
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
This article about Mexicans favoring tighter restrictions seems to say that they are atypical of Mexicans (and presumably Latinos) in general.
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posted
I think I lived in Texas for too long because I couldn't care less about immigration across the southern border.
I'm all about stopping the transport of illegal goods and drugs, but if people wanna come over...fine. Let 'em over.
Posts: 1733 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I'd not heard about this. I just read a story in the news about how pissed Mexico was over the US building a wall over some parts of the southern border. I thought it was a little strange that they were calling it a new Berlin Wall, claiming that it was illegal for us to build in an attempt to halt ILLEGAL immigration. But, whatever.
Personally, I think such a wall has some major drawbacks. For example, when this happens, a wall is going to be a major obstacle in getting the hell out of Dodge. If we going to be so cavalier about global warming, I think we need to be a bit more realistic about building walls across our borders. Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote: 42 percent of Hispanics consider U.S. immigration “too open.” Wall Street Journal, March 2000
75 percent of California Latinos think that illegal immigration from Mexico to California has been a “big problem” or “somewhat of a problem.” Public Policy Institute of California, Jan. 1999
Two-thirds of likely Latino voters in California support the governor's veto of a bill that would have allowed illegal aliens to get driver's licenses. Los Angeles Times, Oct. 2002
89 percent of Hispanics strongly support an immediate moratorium on immigration. Hispanic USA Research Group, June 1993
75 percent of Mexican-Americans, 79 percent of Puerto Ricans, and 65 percent of Cuban-Americans agree that there are too many immigrants in this country. Latino National Political Survey, Dec. 1992
61 percent of Hispanics favor increasing money spent on patrolling the border. The Tarrance Group, August 1983
Attitudes Towards Immigrants And Immigration Policy Surveys Among US Latinos And In Mexico Grantee Press Releases Grantee Contact: Vidya Krishnamurthy, 202.419.4328 Pew Contact: Cindy L. Jobbins, 215.575.4812
Washington, D.C. -- August 16, 2005 -- Although an overwhelming majority of Hispanics expresses positive attitudes toward immigrants, relatively few Hispanics favor increasing the flow of legal immigration from Latin America and a significant minority, concentrated among native-born Latinos, is concerned that unauthorized migrants are hurting the economy. One hotly-debated means to discourage unauthorized migration -- laws that deny drivers licenses to people who are in the country illegally -- draws support from a majority of the native born, according to a survey of the Latino population in the United States conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center (PHC).
From the study:
quote: Major findings include: • An overwhelming majority of Latinos (80%) say that immigrants today strengthen the United States because of their hard work and talents while only a small share (14%) say they are a burden because they take jobs, housing and health care. The breadth of this positive assessment differs according to respondents’ nativity. The foreign born are nearly unanimous (89% vs. 5%) in taking a positive view of immigrants while the native born are somewhat more divided (65% vs. 28%). Asked specifically about undocumented or illegal migrants, most Latinos (68%) say they help the economy by providing low-cost labor rather than hurt the economy by driving wages down (23%). The foreign born are again more positive (76% vs. 15%) than the native born (55% vs. 34%). Hispanics are divided in their views of laws that deny drivers’ licenses to unauthorized migrants with 41% saying they approve of measures that prohibit licenses to anyone who is here illegally or without authorization while 55% disapprove. Among the native born 60% approve of such laws while 29% disapprove. The foreign born split the other way with 29% approving and 66% disapproving. A slight majority (53%) of Latino registered voters said they approve of such measures. Most Hispanics think that the number of legal immigrants coming to the United States from Latin America should stay the same (43%) or be reduced (13%). A little less than a third (31%) believe the number should be increased. A slight majority (56%) of Hispanics favors proposals to create a temporary worker program that would allow currently illegal migrants to live and work in the United States legally for a number of years before obliging them to return home. A much larger majority (84%) favors proposals that would give unauthorized migrants permanent legal status here and eventually allow them to become U.S. citizens.
posted
When the "known terrorists" are caught, that is great! It is the "unknown terrorists" (that is, the ones that we do not know about) that seem to be the ones that everyone (including yours truly) is worried about.
Sometimes citizens wonder about whether or not these "unknown types" of terrorists brought any backpacks with them. Sometimes citizens wonder what was in those backpacks, if they were brought in with the "unknown types" of terrorists. When you have an avowed enemy whose widely stated goal is the complete destruction of your society and the murder of as many of your citizens as they can manage, you tend to take notice--even of the supposedly "unknown types" of these terrorists. Even though the powers that be have been very slow to do anything about protecting the porus borders up until very lately, they have started to at least talk about it. This talk seems to have bothered people who don't consider terrorists, both the "known" and the "unknown" types thereof, to be much of a threat.
When you consider that after several cities of the citizens of this country are smouldering and glowing in ruin that these "unknown types" of terrorists will turn their attention to other cities of other citizens in other couintries that are very similar to what they consider the "Great Satan," I find it interesting that some people would not want these "unknown types" of terrorists to become "known" and thereby stopped by capture, photography, or other means. There is a very famous quote about what happens when you don't stop evil when it is happening to those around you (not just to yourself) that I won't quote here as I am sure you know what it is and/or how to find it.
Some people have postulated that terrorists are only "freedom fighters." Maybe some here feel this way also. I do not know. I do know that if they are trying to kill my family members and destroy my society by any means that they can find, and that they openly state and advocate this policy, I say that the fence that we seem to be dicussing here is not such a great big deal at all. Build it already! While it is being built, bring back the Minutemen to watch the border until it gets completed.
Just my two cents worth--from a concerned citizen who worries about the "unknown types" of terrorists as well as the "known types" also.
Posts: 101 | Registered: Nov 2005
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