Timing Is Everything

Follow the bouncing ball...

1.  On Wednesday of last week Dept. of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano proposed a “border security index” to measure enforcement progress along the Southwest border.

2. The next day, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee called the new plan “nothing short of inflated facts and figures to give them an excuse to say the border is secure.”

Miss Napolitano said the new yardstick would better reflect the improvements the administration says it has made along the border, adding that the agency’s longtime mantra of gaining “operational control” of U.S. borders had become obsolete. She said the new index would include crime, immigration and economic data.

During the hearing, the committee’s ranking Republican, Susan M. Collins of Maine, noted that some 300 bodies had been discovered in mass graves just 90 miles from Brownsville, Texas, and last month FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III reported that drug cartels constituted a threat “to the security of the entire country.”

“This backdrop explains why many were perplexed to hear Secretary Napolitano state in late March that security on the southern U.S. border is ‘better now than it ever has been’ and that violence from neighboring Mexico has not edged north,” she said.

With the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congress chief watchdog, saying less than half of the southern border is under “operational control,” the Obama administration has been distancing itself from that measure for more than a year.

If you can't fix the problem, change how it is defined...

“The Government Accountability Office and Border Patrol agents on the ground know the truth,” said Mr. Smith. “According to a recent GAO report, only 44 percent of the southwest border is under the ‘operational control’ of the Border Patrol. Mexican drug cartels are out of control and the violence threatens to spill over into the United States. And each year, millions of illegal immigrants enter the U.S.”

In February, the GAO said the U.S. had operational control along 873 miles of the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico  border. Of those miles, just 15 percent were designated as “controlled,” while the rest were designated a slightly lesser category of “managed.”

"Operational control" ... "managed" ... what the hell difference does it make? The fact is that the U.S. - Mexico border is a sieve. Granted, illegal immigration is a concern. But the real threat is from narco and islamic terrorists crossing the border with impunity.

3. obama is heading to El Paso this week to make a major speech on immigration reform.

4. Today, 13 people were killed in a drug cartel-related shootout on an island in the middle of a lake between Texas and Mexico. This is the same lake where a U.S. citizen was killed by cartel members and his wife pursued and shot at as she fled. (For first-hand stories from Texas ranchers along the border go to http://protectyourtexasborder.com/Home.aspx. For my previous posts on the earlier Falcon Lake shooting go here and here.)

Okay, asshole, explain that away in your speech.

obama and the rest of the morons on his team don't seem to be able to differentiate between immigration and border security. If you've got a hole in your boat, the first thing you do is patch it. Then you worry about who's on board and where you're going.

I've posted about this before until I'm blue in the face. For a couple of the more recent and relevant posts go here and here.

Whether or not you're a Ron Paul supporter, it's time to give his plan some serious scrutiny.

Ron Paul’s six point plan puts a stop to illegal immigration:

1. Physically secure our borders and coastlines. We must do whatever it takes to control entry into our country before we undertake complicated immigration reform proposals.

I work and live on the border part time. I've heard the shots, seen the explosions and smoke, seen LEO actions and arrests first hand. I've also seen the shock and terror in the eyes of ordinary, innocent people who are just trying to live their lives peacefully, but who get sucked into the maelstrom of violence. I can't imagine what it is like to raise a family under these conditions - on either side of the border.

I have nothing but disgust and contempt for politicians of either party who try to score political points off this, without making a sincere effort to solve the problem.

And how on God's Green Earth can someone who lives in New York or Washington D.C. even begin to comprehend what it's like down here? 

I don't know whether to sigh heavily and open another Shiner or break out my XD and go postal.

(Just kidding, DHS. I have nothing but love and respect for my fellow human beings...)