"Checkpoint No Consent, Warrantless Vehicle Search, Right to Remain Silent, US Border Patrol " - V

reply to post by windword


Very good point and I appreciate your personal experience added to things. I've been following a couple high level corruption stories for awhile now that involve Border Patrol command officers as well as field agents either taking cash for immigrant smuggling or the old stand-by, drugs. It's a nasty business.

I suppose you're right in so far as the interior checkpoints being necessary. I have to say though...I always shook my head and actually felt sorry for the poor SOB's manning the checkpoint outside Alamogordo, New Mexico. What a boring...boring...painfully boring place to work it and nothing but sage brush for miles in every direction. They were always nice at that one...but then, why shouldn't they be? It's 'Retired On Active Duty'

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


That post has absolutely nothing to do with illegal immigration at all. Not one bit. The only reason there is so much violence between the drug cartels is because their product they are importing into the United States is illegal

Do I have to make the comparison between the prohibition gangsters and the current drug cartels?

That violence has everything to do with the illegality of the product these people are pushing and not because of immigration. If Americans didn't want those products, the drug cartels wouldn't be in business.

reply to post by HauntWok


I guess you've missed how human smuggling, sex trafficking, gun running and assorted other contraband has come to play equal if not greater roles than the original drug issue which largely formed them. Cars being smuggled down there is a pretty active thing as well as trucks and trailers (18 wheel type).

It is an apt comparisons with the Mafia or Colombian Cartels for that matter. The Mafia diversified as well and into the modern era, is as legitimate and based within politics as it is street crime of any sort. Depends on the example of course. The Colombian cartels kinda folded right on into FARC and diversified right into a revolutionary guerilla operation handling pretty much anything on Earth now.

The Mexican Cartels and MS-13 types are far far beyond just the original drug origins, unfortunately. Human smuggling is the next biggest revenue producer and it's a whopper, too. Prostitution and exploitation would be next, I'd think. To see the human cost, it's useful to learn about the Rape Trees though. That's as much the side of illegal immigration I want to see end as anything to do with workers in the fields.

Heck, I WANT to see a far more workable visitor/migrant worker program. I just don't think handing out citizenship papers like a consolation prize at a carnival game is exactly necessary to get our agriculture worked and see those workers build quite a nice life for family back home in the process.

A couple of things to consider on the matter. Officially, via federal law (if such things matter anymore) Immigration Officers have No jurisdiction over an American Citizen - none, none, nada. This means, they have no authority to ask for anything from an American Citizen, regardless of what issues they think are in play. They have jurisdiction over folks who are not here legally. So the red herring of "drugs" or "prostitutes" etc. is out of order, as there are dozens of other agencies who DO have jurisdiction over American Citizens. They are not cops, if they are used a such, this is another matter.

Another key point, alerting this fact to those thugs will accomplish NOTHING. They don't care, they were hired because the are immoral, ignorant and this is the only job they could get that doesn't carry a walmart stigma, so pointing out the law to them is like pointing out the leash laws to a stray dog. They drink cheap beer, they live and work in packs, they wear uniforms they hope will give them super powers, like they see on teeee veeee, over the hundreds of millions of bad guys they are charged with taking down.

Final point. There are those who feel, even truly believe, that standing up to this kind of totalitarian insanity is the only way to change things. This does not change a thing, in the history of institutionalized control, there has never been a controlling force that has willingly given up power it has achieved - never. So there is no way, none, that the government folks are suddenly going to say, "gee, you're all right, we are abusing you and misusing our power, we'll change." No matter the error, the illegal, the immoral the action, it will never happen.

It was pointed out by most of the planet that the NSA actions were clearly immoral and clearly wrong on every level except by the one goofy law they used as a dried up fig leaf to cover their actions. What happened?: The person half the country put in office to speak to such matters said, in essence, "so what?" Has any congressman put forth a law to abolish the practice? Has any law passed? Has anything at all happened to rescind the power attained?

Pick and choose your fights. Fighting Constitutional Law with dumbass high school dropouts wearing badges and carrying guns is only going to get your car window knocked out or worse.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


Again, all a problem with cartels and not illegal immigrants. There is a difference.

Illegal immigrants are here to try and make a better life for themselves. Drug cartels are in business because of Americans insatiable need for their products.

Cartels didn't create the immigration problem in this country. Corporations seeking cheap slave wage labor did. Why keep protecting companies that exploit human beings for cheap labor? Oh that's right, cause companies can do no wrong is that it? Gotta keep those vegetable prices cheap, gotta keep that lawn care cheap, gotta keep those hotel rooms clean for the lowest prices possible.

Americans drug problem is the reason for the Cartels. American corporate greed is the reason for the illegal immigrant problem.

Instead of trying to cure the symptom of the illness, why not go after the illness itself?

reply to post by MDDoxs


Freedom is like a muscle that needs to be flexed, if you don't challenge your boundaries your muscle becomes weak and limp.

reply to post by HauntWok


Okay, I'm not understanding where the miscommunication is. Human Smuggling. That, for clarification, is the smuggling of illegal immigrants. This behavior comes from Organized Crime we call Cartels in the nation of Mexico. They don't operate inbound smuggling from Canada, by the way, just to get that out of the way up front.

These Organized Crime groups in Mexico smuggle these illegals immigrants using them as mules at times for other contraband to pack in with them. It's terribly exploitative and again, requires security....

Or perhaps you're among the people who think they were just kidding when they made these signs and so... golly... Border Security is just xenophobic. :shk:



Now, please, tell me again how we don't need border security and the problem is all some imaginative issue? Those signs came under the Obama Administration, by the way...so while he sure didn't start the problem, nor did the Cartels..BOTH have done absolutely nothing to make things better and a great deal to make them worse.

This is getting silly. You're essentially telling me a problem doesn't exist which I've seen with my own eyes. Wow...

reply to post by Wrabbit2000

Dear Wrabbit2000,

(Give this post a chance, I think it'll make sense by the end.)

I was looking at a little commentary on Aristotle yesterday, and ran across something that stuck in my head. Let me paraphrase.

"The goal of earlier peoples was to conform their thoughts and desires to reality. The goal of modern man is to conform reality to his thoughts and desires."

You've pointed out that that may be happening in HauntWok's posts, and I agree, but doesn't it also happen throughout ATS and the world?

"How can you support Policy X when you can see the data on the terrible effects it has had?" "Oh, those are just biased statements, I'm sure Policy X is fine. I trust so and so. Besides the other side is wrong sometimes, too."

Or, in religious discussions. "But your Book says X, Y, and Z" "Well maybe, but it actually means "A, B, and C. And no, I can't explain why they do, they just do."

End of rant.

Boy, they sure don't make reality like they used to.

With respect,
Charles1952

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


The cartels exist, this is true, and illegal immigration exists, this is also true. But, they aren't the same problem.

The illegal immigrants who come to this country via the drug cartels are abusing these people just like the businesses that hire illegals are.

Don't you get the difference? Illegals would still come to this country without the cartels, but if it weren't for Americans insatiable appetite for the cartel's products there wouldn't be cartels at all.

I get your point, but the reason that it's xenophobic is because you aren't screaming about the northern boarder too. If you are going to protect the boarder, do both boarders. Don't pretend that the northern boarder isn't a problem, Celine Dion is a prime example of the horrors that come down from our neighbors to the north.

reply to post by HauntWok

Don't you get the difference? Illegals would still come to this country without the cartels, but if it weren't for Americans insatiable appetite for the cartel's products there wouldn't be cartels at all.

I'm surprised at how many people don't seem to get the scam running here. Nothing is going to change much on the border, just as it didn't in 1986. This looked promising at first but hopes went to the crapper as compromise gutted what looked good for milestones and requirements to be met.

The thing is ....... When you've made all these millions of criminal migrants into legal citizens? Dole and Del Monte aren't suddenly going to pay 3x's the current rate for their heads of lettuce or broccoli. They'll be supporting the NEXT wave of illegals to come up behind this batch ...as business goes marching on and another batch gets processed. Going by pattern? I guess we'll see this done again around 2030.

The cartels won't be lacking business and if you think they STILL rely on drugs as their lifeblood, you're a bit behind following the news. Did the Mafia vanish when Prohibition was lifted? Nope.... The beast had been born and become too strong to depend on any ONE 'product', as history shows so very clearly. It's more so with some of the larger cartels and documentation shows that pretty definitively.

Border security is still an absolute survival requirement for our national security whether you deport all the migrant workers or legalize 100 million. The CRIME element is still there and still very much alive and running across many lines of effort now.

Oh.... By the way... If you can show me the big crime cartels running prostitution, human smuggling, exotic animal smuggling and various other contraband over the Northern land crossings?



I won't call the argument a big red herring. Until then? Well... I'll keep my eye on the fox in this debate. It's on our Southern Border where a multi-year, near open Civil War has claimed the lives of 10's of thousands of people and is still raging right over a line on a map.