Your compassion is not exactly over-whelming when it comes to lawmen, is it? Few of your Arizona posts have indicated you have any trust or respect for any of them - from the city traffic cop to the Border Patrol Officers.
Compassion for lawmen? Sure. I have compassion for lawmen. I have no compassion for idiots who pass laws that don't do a thing for the real problem. If you note what I wrote, it wasn't a slam against those who enforce- it was a slam against those politicians who wrote the law that good lawmen now have to go out and enforce.
You seem to be educating everyone how to be primed & ready for a stop.... You need to be able to `Show Those Guys a thing or two...'
No- I am defending the rights of human beings in the United States. The rights under the Constitution. That are more and more being taken away in the name of "security".
Do you think it's ok for a law enforcement officer to pull you over for no reason? I don't. I don't think DUI roadblocks are within Constitutional boundaries either. Luckily, in my state, neither does my government. In other states it's not the same. That's not right. Either it's within, or not within, the guidelines of the Constitution. I can speak my mind, and in my state, thank goodness, the courts agree with my position. I won't be traveling to Arizona anymore. I was last there last year. I will do what I can to choose to go elsewhere, when I can.
And you know darn good & well, the pot is the least of the problems coming across the border.
But why then post in this thread, about a law enforcement officer being shot? He was shot because he found someone smuggling pot. This thread was about the Arizona law on immigration. That's chumming, if I ever saw it.
And maybe, the runners will ease back while the Whole of our nation gets behind the BP with a bit more energy & determination -
- oh, wait (tactic learned from you, phil, fwm) - that would exclude you and those you chum with......... work unit, politico's, after-work fun timers ...
How much is "enough" border patrol? 50,000? 500,000? No one has said what they think it will take to close the border.
My point is that much of the problems faced by our border patrol is because of the laws we now have.
People flood across the border in hopes to find a better life. Now, we can do one of three things here.
1. We can try and block the border- in which case it may take 500,000 border patrol agents to do. That has a price tag. Are you prepared to pay that kind of price tag? If so, then we need to get serious about it. If not, then it's all for show, not for real. There is nothing as senseless as putting lives on the line for political posturing and show. Our law enforcement officers deserve far better. No officer should be asked to do a job, and then not given the resources to do it with. Same as our military. If you want them to accomplish a mission, you better be prepared to give them every resource needed to fulfill the mission. That's not being done now for our Border Patrol and law enforcement officer community. Something about the price tag, I hear.
2. Or we can pass immigration reform legislation, that includes temporary worker visas, that allow people to come in and work. Costs far less that option #1. But you can't even bring that up in Congress without critics screaming.
3. Or you can try and raise the standard of living in other countries, so that not as many people want to come here. That was supposed to be one of the great benefits of free trade under NAFTA. Central American countries and Mexico wages were supposed to rise, and give less reason for folks to come here. That's how it was sold by the politicians at the time, anyway. How's that working out, anyway? Oh yea- Mexico's wages didn't rise. They went down.
Do you want to end smuggling of drugs across the border? It's easy to do. Simply legalize and tax it here, and the crime and violence will disappear. It won't cost taxpayers a dime. It will greatly enhance revenue for the government. But that solution isn't being talked about seriously. Why not? Why is pot illegal, anyway? Think about that.
Do you want to end people coming across the border in the dead of night? With no papers? How do you do that? Easy- give them a way to get legal papers. But that solution isn't being talked about seriously. Why is that?
No- I'm not about to give up Constitutional rights easily. I spent way too much time leaning them, thinking about them, and understanding them to simply turn them off in the name of law enforcement stops.
Law enforcement officers are people just like you and me. They have a job to do. So do I. I just hope they can do theirs within the bounds of the Constitution. When laws are passed which cross that line, I am going to speak up against it. That's just who I am.
You got a better idea on how to solve the problem of illegal immigrants? I'm all ears. But simply saying you should pass laws to arrest them if they have cars up on blocks in their yard, or if too many of them are crammed into an apartment, is nothing more than
profiling, racism, and it's wrong.
