rumitoid

The United States government is currently in a shutdown because President Donald Trump wants to build a wall — a “big, beautiful wall” along the United States’ border with Mexico. But a v***l video posted by Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Tex.) illustrates exactly why Trump’s beloved wall is completely unfeasible.

First of all, if you’re going to build a wall along the Mexican border, that means building it alongside the Rio Grande, America’s fourth longest river which, as Think Progress points out, has been flooding more frequently and with increasing severity. So if the government can’t build the wall right along the river, that would mean it would have to use eminent domain to seize land from Americans who currently own land where Trump wants to put the wall. As an article in the libertarian publication Reason noted, most of the land along the border is owned by private citizens, Native American tribes, and the state of Texas.

Furthermore, O’Rourke’s video points out, building a wall would create hundreds of thousands of acres of a “no man’s land” between the river and the wall. It would also destroy important wildlife corridors and federally-preserved lands.

The video also mentions that since 2007, most undocumented immigration is occurring because people are overstaying their visas, not because they are crossing the border illegally. Therefore, a wall would do little to deter this type of immigration.

But, of course, none of the reasons outlined above will stop President Trump from holding the government — and the paychecks of 800,000 federal workers — hostage while he demands funding for his pet project.

Canuckus Deploracus Loc: North of the wall

"The video also mentions that since 2007, most undocumented immigration is occurring because people are overstaying their visas, not because they are crossing the border illegally. Therefore, a wall would do little to deter this type of immigration."

Premise: If the measure is not completely effective it is therefore entirely futile?

rumitoid

It is not just how effective it may be, which the article I posted addresses.

Canuckus Deploracus Loc: North of the wall

So we are in agreement that 'the wall' would be effective in stemming the numbers of i*****l i*******ts crossing the border from Mexico?

It is simply the cost? ecological factors? social factors? that you has/have made you an opponent of 'the wall'?

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

Herding cats! The current method does not work! You round them up, get them a court date, release them. IF they show up for immigration court and are deported, they simply enter through a different part of the desert. Then you catch them, get them to court, release them.... over and over and over again!

rumitoid

Of course "the wall" will act as something of a deterrent in stemming the numbers of "undocumented immigrants" crossing the border from Mexico. The cost, ecological factors, and social factors are vital points and not secondary to the discussion. If you want to reduce the argument about "the wall" to some effectiveness as a deterrent, you are missing most of what makes it a silliness. It's clear that 'the wall" is not without formidable limitations. Border agents told the New York Times that they found at least one tunnel a month from 2007 to 2010 as more fencing went up. Also, a wall wouldn't deter asylum seekers, who present themselves to border agents at legal ports of entry and currently make up a large number of those apprehended at the border. Nor would it stop immigrants who fly into the country and overstay legal visas. The Department of Homeland Security said almost 530,000 people overstayed in fiscal 2015, about 200,000 more than were apprehended at the border that same year.

Trump calls technological detection methods just "bells and whistles." Yet these technologies have a wider and more accurate coverage of the border, and with more research and better trained agents in this area, we would be more secure than the tallest wall. It would tend to make "the wall" the least way to fund a secure border.


By Will Hurd, a Republican, who represents Texas’s 23rd Congressional District in the House:

"I agree with Secretary John Kelly’s comments during his confirmation hearing that a wall does not solve our security problems. In fact, building a wall from sea to shining sea would be the most expensive and least effective way to secure the border. For the past eight years, we had an administration with a one-size-fits-all approach to border security. We must change the strategy, not simply adopt a different one-size-fits-all solution. Each sector of the border faces unique geographical, cultural and technological challenges that would be best addressed with a flexible, sector-by-sector approach that empowers the Border Patrol agents on the ground with the resources they need. What you need in San Diego is very different from what you need in Eagle Pass, Tex.

"The Rio Grande serves as the international boundary for 1,200 miles of the Texas-Mexico border — including more than 800 miles in my district — and the majestic Big Bend National Park runs along more than 100 miles of it. The tallest peak in the park is almost 8,000 feet. Building a wall in the middle of a river or at the top of a mountain would be a waste of taxpayer money. The Texas-Mexico border is also home to a significant part of the largest desert in North America — the Chihuahuan Desert. Building a barrier through hundreds of miles of desert on the border is useless if you do not have Border Patrol agents available to respond to challenges to the barrier. Furthermore, much of the property along the Texas-Mexico border is privately owned, and seizing land to build a wall is not popular among these landowners."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/gop-congressman-a-wall-is-the-least-effective-way-to-secure-the-border/2017/01/30/091e77d6-e639-11e6-b82f-687d6e6a3e7c_story.html?utm_term=.9e440cff7aae

Seth

Nonsense.

Ferdinand de Lessops, who'd previously dug the Suez Canal, was frustrated when he couldn't accomplish the same feat in Panama, a very daunting project at best, so the Panama Canal was dug by a can-do outfit called the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

They could build a Wall We Can Be Proud Of©, despite Beto "The Loser®" O'Rourke's whining and snivelling.

kankune Loc: Iowa

BUILD THE DAMN WALL!!!!!

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

Why is it that on American (citizen, is questionable) oppose the wall? When the President of Mexico agrees that it is a very big problem. So big that he is instituting laws to encourage, not only Mexicans but Central Americans to stay home... and that home is not the USA. The only people who disagree are i******s and their children living off our government and people like you. Manuel López Obrador — just announced a dramatic new plan for the border region his nation shares with the United States that actually supports and coincides with President Donald Trump’s overall agenda on border security and immigration. You actually should read more than CNN and other Trump bashing outlets... Try a Mexican paper... see what they think of the caravans and i******s.

rumitoid

Not that it matters that much but I never watch or "read" CNN. Can't stand Jake and a few others. Pompous puffery. Our increased aid to Central America may help obviate such caravans, or significantly reduce them. I am sure that your are aware of the state of peril in these countries for its citizens. Working with these governments, doing the humanitarian right thing and not ignoring their plight, will be far better for the ideals of America and what we stand for than be openly hostile to their immigration. We made permanent enemies in the Middle East the same way.

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

It is not just our aid, Mexico also sees a problem and has set aside funds to divert new caravans. Your point is taken about the problems in those nations. But, they are sovereign nations and we have no right or obligation to step in and solve their problems. However, we have a right and obligation to feed our hungry, house our homeless, and educate our children.

Seth

They definitely reversed their former position on i******s coming here when they found that particular problem backed up into their own border towns.

rumitoid

Diverting Caravans is sentencing many to death in their home countries and keeping true asylum seekers from the lawful--lawful!--right to seek asylum here.

Giving aid is not overtaking or diminishing their sovereignty. Funds to aid in the abject poverty of these countries as well as infrastructure, programs for kids, greater healthcare, better equipment and training and numbers for their police forces, and so on. To make America great again, a woefully sorry misnomer of this fine country if you embrace it, is not all about us, which is why America has always been great.

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

How can I get you to understand... WE SHOULD NOT BE THE POLICE OR MOMMA AND POPPA FOR THE WORLD. Changes in Latin America has to start and end with its people..
I would like to see asylum provisions removed from our laws. It does not serve anyone....except smugglers.

rumitoid

That is exactly what I told them back in the Forties about the Marshall Plan. Let Europe re-build itself and Germany be damned. Would they listen to me? No. We both know how badly that worked out. Not!