True North

....you might get it.

For years, the American public has made a very simple request....build the damn fence. For years, the federal government has resisted. Then they were "delayed" by bureaucracy, red tape and environmental restrictions. Now finally the federal government is claiming it will wave all red tape and just go forward with the construction.

The problem is that when the federal government says it's going to build a fence, they like to keep it to that very very vague term. Many many things fall within that classification. For instance, they like to include vehicle barriers in that description. Vehicle barriers are nice, but they bar only vehicles and are easy to walk through. So drug dealers and coyotes can, for instance, drive a vehicle up to one side of the barriers, get out and take their illegal cargo to the other side of the barriers, put it in a waiting vehicle and drive on. And they are known to do exactly that.

Also fitting the classification of a fence, is the single strand barbed wire that wouldn't keep my dog out. You've all seen it before at the edge of farm fields throughout the midwest. Sure it'll keep domesticated cattle in, but swarms of illegal aliens?? Hardly.

When proponents of border enforcement talk about a fence, they talk about the "Israeli style" double layer fencing that has proven to be a huge success by San Diego. And this style of fencing has been authorized by legislation.

Unfortunately, the federal government uses a slightly different definition for fencing. For instance, DHS claims they've completed 309 miles of fencing. However, at least 134 of that is actually "vehicle barriers", and the rest of it is labeled as "pedestrian fencing". What is pedestrian fencing.....well, it's the single layer barbed ware more suitable for herded cattle than keeping out foreign invaders.

I think the American people have learned to be a little jaded when it comes to government programs. We don't expect excellence, we usually don't even expect competence. But we usually at least ask for the bare minimum. When you build a fence to keep out, or at least delay illegals we would like it to at least make a decent attempt at that. Unfortunately, the DHS has never really wanted to build the fence but they are being forced to do so, so they'll half-ass it so they can check off a box on a little form and claim they've done their job.

So while I applaud the DHS for trying to bypass red tape and bureaucracy, I know that doesn't actually mean anything. We'll get the same half-assed results we've come to expect from our Department of Homeland Security.

[Crossposted at EckerNet.Com, comments welcome]