# Bush's Mexico Border Fence



## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

Interesting that Bush, a few days before an election that his party is likely to lose, desperately signs a bill that would build a 700-mile fence along the border between the US and Mexico. This after completely ignoring the issue for almost six years (and five years after a major domestic attack supposedly committed by foreigners).

Unfortunately, there are three other major problems:

1. Bush didn't learn to count very well whilst getting his MBA ('on his own merits' [sic]) from Harvard, since the US-Mexican border is actually 2,100 miles long.

2. Bush and Republicans in the congress, presumably in their roles as 'fiscal conservatives' [sic], haven't funded the project (which is estimated to cost as much as 2.4 Billions USD) Speaking of which, from another internet message board, someone posted:



> Lets see.... 700 miles of fencing at 1.5 billion.. how much is that a foot for fencing? I know most fencing contractors put up a nice fence for $10 a foot. So 700 miles times 5285 feet per mile is 3,699,500 feet times $10 a foot is $36,995,000. Not quite $1,500,000,000, is it? Lets see.. $1,500,000,000. divided by 3,699,500 feet is $404.46 a foot. Wow. That is expensive fence. And Only 40 times the regular price. Not bad for goverment math.


3. The fence is only proposed to be ten feet high, and made of wire.


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

Map of proposed fence, from CNN:


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## Spence (Feb 28, 2006)

I believe the 1.5B figure is just what has been funded. Another 6.5B or 7B is required to complete the 700 mile project...to protect 1/3 of the border.

I think it's a sick joke...

-spence


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## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

Apparently this decision was not uncontroversial within the Republican Party. At least some of the business interests want to keep the flow of illegal employees coming, so there was speculation that either Bush wouldn't sign it or would do it on the QT.



From a left-wing perspective I'm not 100% sure how to think about it. I think Paul Krugman makes a good point, and it should be pretty obvious, that the continued availability of illegal aliens as employees has an inevitable depressing influence on citizen workers.

In addition, I'm not entirely sure that I understand the opposition to the fence. It seems to be mainly because the idea seems distasteful (this seems to be Bob Wright's objection), since I don't think that most of the fence opponents will come out and say we should open the border, or that we can only have immigration controls that won't work. Still, I wouldn't discount this proposition as part of the motivation of fence opponents.


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## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

By the way, somebody is a little confused over the length of a mile. It's 5280 feet.


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

jackmccullough said:


> Apparently this decision was not uncontroversial within the Republican Party. At least some of the business interests want to keep the flow of illegal employees coming, so there was speculation that either Bush wouldn't sign it or would do it on the QT.
> 
> From a left-wing perspective I'm not 100% sure how to think about it. I think Paul Krugman makes a good point, and it should be pretty obvious, that the continued availability of illegal aliens as employees has an inevitable depressing influence on citizen workers.
> 
> In addition, I'm not entirely sure that I understand the opposition to the fence. It seems to be mainly because the idea seems distasteful (this seems to be Bob Wright's objection), since I don't think that most of the fence opponents will come out and say we should open the border, or that we can only have immigration controls that won't work. Still, I wouldn't discount this proposition as part of the motivation of fence opponents.


It seems good sense, in light of the illegal immigration problem, to have a barrier of some sort to aid the border police. This plan, however, seems too little, too late, and at a ridiculous price.


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## jbmcb (Sep 7, 2005)

A better way to handle the problem, if one wishes, if one had a $1,500,000,000 wallet:

1. Crack down on businesses hiring illegal immigrants. Hard. Nail the people who hire them, not just the company. 

2. Beef up border patrols. Use unmanned recon planes along with an increased border patrol. Pull the national guard out of there, this is a police matter.

3. Build a detention facility for those who are caught. Make it nice and clean, and hold those caught for 30 or 60 days on a provisional basis. This puts a crimp in their primary reason for entering the US, namely, sending cash back home.


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## jackmccullough (May 10, 2006)

Too little, too late? Sure, but instead of being a case of shutting the barn door after the horse ran out this may be a matter of shutting the barn door after some of the horses ran out but you still have a lot more to lose if you leave the door open.

I remember the last time they passed amnesty legislation, my reaction was that it seemed obvious that people who wanted to immigrate and didn't qualify for the amnesty would look at the fact that we were adopting an amnesty and conclude that it was bound to happen again, so the amnesty actually created an incentive for more illegal immigration. If that's correct, and I think it is, then it seems to me that the strategy of enforcement first, then thinking about what happens to the people already here only after we know that border enforcement is working is a good one.

As for the cost, I don't know. It costs what it costs, and it's going to be more than the initial estimate, whatever the initial estimate is. What are we supposed to compare the cost to: some other civil engineering project, or the cost to the United States of not having a controlled border?


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

jackmccullough said:


> Too little, too late? Sure, but instead of being a case of shutting the barn door after the horse ran out this may be a matter of shutting the barn door after some of the horses ran out but you still have a lot more to lose if you leave the door open.


That's my point. Something ought to be done, but this plan is just a farce.


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

jbmcb:

from, 'Is Cheney Betting on Economic Collapse?'



> The Bush-Cheney team has racked up another $3 trillion in debt in just 6 years. The US national debt now stands at $8.4 trillion dollars while the trade deficit has ballooned to $800 billion - nearly 7% of GDP.
> 
> This is lunacy. No country, however powerful, can maintain these staggering numbers. The country is in hock up to its neck and has to borrow $2.5 billion per day just to stay above water. Presently, the Fed is expanding the money supply and buying back its own treasuries to hide the hemorrhaging from the public. It's utter madness.
> 
> Last month the trade deficit climbed to $70 billion. More importantly, foreign central banks only purchased a meager $47 billion in treasuries to shore up our ravenous appetite for cheap junk from China.


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## crazyquik (Jun 8, 2005)

I was hoping for something a little more like this. We could outsource the work to China, and it would help keep the Mongolians out too. 

FWIW, Mexico has gotten 27 other Central and South American countries to sign a piece of paper saying that we are being mean to put up a fence, and that they are going to take us to the UN over this. 

Fining businesses that hire illegals isn't the right course, because the federal govt isn't even supposed to allow them to be here. I wonder what Mexico would say if we treated our illegal immigrants (often thier citizens) the way they treat thier illegal immigrants? I can hear the howls of protest now. What a world we live in, the feds shrug off the duties they are supposed to uphold but are all too eager to intrude in all other affairs that should be left to states.


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## Liberty Ship (Jan 26, 2006)

It is my understanding that our balance of trade has become so pathetically unbalanced that we are accumulating a huge surplus of shipping containers, each about the size of a semi truck trailer. It is cheaper to make new ones in China than it is for the companies to ship "empties" back. In the pre-WalMart economy stuff would get shipped in, the containers unloaded, then refilled with our stuff to ship out. Since we are shipping nothing back except jobs, we are accumulating empties at an incomprehensible rate.

Stacked two high and connected end to end along the border, we would have a solid, double-walled steel wall.

The only problem is that since all the citizens of the United States have decided that they are too good for any kind of labor short of parking themselves in a cube all day, we will probably have to hire Mexican labor to construct whatever obstacle we decide is needed. 

I think that there is a misconception that these are unskilled people sneaking in. In my experience, they are more experienced in actually doing something constructive than our indigenous population. This is not good, this is bad, we should never have allowed this to develop. I don't know what the solution is but, honestly, if we "sent them all back," I don't think you could find anybody who would, or even could, paint a house or build a deck anymore without totally screwing it up.

It seems as if everyone who used to do that kind of work has been convinced by the Pollyannas in our educational bureaucracies that they are "better than that," and, as a result, took jobs in various government bureaucracies where they gain weight and contribute nothing to the economy.


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

Liberty Ship said:


> It is my understanding that our balance of trade has become so pathetically unbalanced that we are accumulating a huge surplus of shipping containers, each about the size of a semi truck trailer. It is cheaper to make new ones in China than it is for the companies to ship "empties" back. In the pre-WalMart economy stuff would get shipped in, the containers unloaded, then refilled with our stuff to ship out. Since we are shipping nothing back except jobs, we are accumulating empties at an incomprehensible rate.
> 
> Stacked two high and connected end to end along the border, we would have a solid, double-walled steel wall.
> 
> ...


Haha! I doubt that anyone will better this post.


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## Wayfarer (Mar 19, 2006)

JLPWCXIII said:


> That's my point. Something ought to be done, but this plan is just a farce.


You have posted many nice pictures but no solutions. Since you find all current efforts fruitless, what would you suggest the US (have you ever visited here let alone lived along the border?) do?

Cheers


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## odoreater (Feb 27, 2005)

Spence said:


> I believe the 1.5B figure is just what has been funded. Another 6.5B or 7B is required to complete the 700 mile project...to protect 1/3 of the border.
> 
> I think it's a sick joke...
> 
> -spence


We could probably save some money on the project if we hired some illegal to do the work. If they're talking about hiring union workers, they have to pay them, what, $25 an hour, and those guys spend have the day sitting around bs-ing instead of working. Illegals could do the same job at half the price (per day) and twice the speed - thereby costing the taxpayer only 1/4 of what is being proposed for this project.


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## JLibourel (Jun 13, 2004)

I am strongly against this border fence and hope the plan founders for a reason unrelated to the matter of the illegals (which I see as a lost cause anyway). I don't want to see it impede the movement of wildlife from Mexico into the USA. In particular, I am concerned about the jaguars. In recent years, jaguars have been coming into the USA with increasing frequency (one was even sighted north of Tucson), and I think it would be wonderful if a breeding population of these magnificent cats--certainly one of the most dramatic animals in the entire Western Hemisphere--could re-establish itself in the USA.

I always think of that great conservation pioneer Aldo Leopold's comment on the extermination of the jaguar: "Fear had been banished, but a glory had departed from the green lagoons."

How much good is a damn wire fence going to be in keeping out Paco and Juan? A few minutes with a bolt cutter and they're through! And how hard is it going to be to tunnel under the thing? 

Does Haliburton have the contract for this boondoggle, pray tell? Unless we want to simulate the old Iron Curtain with concertina wire, minefields and machine gun towers, we are not going to be able to stop the flood of illegals!


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## Wayfarer (Mar 19, 2006)

JLPWCXIII said:


> Something ought to be done, but this plan is just a farce.


JLP, please do not forget this thread! I see you quite active in two others you recently started but you seem not to want to inform us exactly what ought to be done!


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## burnedandfrozen (Mar 11, 2004)

Of course Mexico opposes the fence...American dollars being sent back are a major income for Mexico even more then oil sales. As long as the corrupt government down there continues to encourage their people to cross and send money back there's no reason to change anything. God forbid should they actually have to start taking care of their impoverished masses instead of expecting the US taxpayers to do so. I just have a real problem with how political correctness and our wussy politicians have allowed this issue to grow into the problem it is now. California would not be like it is now if Prop187 was implimented like the voters obviously wanted instead of getting tied up in the courts for all eternity by self-serving pressure goups.


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## Jimmy G (Mar 23, 2006)

Ah, the brave new tomorrow...
https://imageshack.us


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## JLibourel (Jun 13, 2004)

Note that the sign bears the name of Clear Channel--a broadcasting empire that, I am sure, is not Hispanic-owned. Ah, the cynical cosmopolitanism of plutocracy!


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## Lushington (Jul 12, 2006)

JLibourel said:


> Note that the sign bears the name of Clear Channel--a broadcasting empire that, I am sure, is not Hispanic-owned. Ah, the cynical cosmopolitanism of plutocracy!


Indeed. One would think this rather important fact would begin to be noticed by the snarling masses, at least eventually. This doesn't appear likely however.


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## fenway (May 2, 2006)

Gee, do you think that the billboard was Photoshopped?


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## Wayfarer (Mar 19, 2006)

fenway said:


> Gee, do you think that the billboard was Photoshopped?


Actually, it was all over the media in the SouthWest when that billboard went up. I guess it did not make it to your part of the US? If that particular picture was Photoshopped, it was just in imitation of the real thing. That billboard was up in LA.

Edit: A very fast Google reveals:


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

If the fence is going to be this century's Maginot Line, what is the answer to illegal immigration? Seriously, any ideas?


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## Fogey (Aug 27, 2005)

KenR said:


> If the fence is going to be this century's Maginot Line, what is the answer to illegal immigration? Seriously, any ideas?


Among other things, helping Mexico to support its own citizens would be a healthy start.


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## Wayfarer (Mar 19, 2006)

JLPWCXIII said:


> Among other things, helping Mexico to support its own citizens would be a healthy start.


What form of help would this be JLP?


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## The Wife (Feb 4, 2006)

*Many Years "Afta" NAFTA*

I supported the North American Free Trade Act, because I believed that it would create more jobs in Mexico, thus mitigating the flow of illegal _desperados_ to _el norte_. There is something terrribly wrong with the system down yonder. I don't believe that a fence will be anything but a laughing- stock. A temporary worker plan made available to Mexican nationals who need jobs is a good solution, one that President Bush has mentioned.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

M-J, thank you for the thoughtful response.


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## The Wife (Feb 4, 2006)

You're most welcome, Ken! :icon_smile_big: By the way, how did you manage to have your number of posts reach "666" on Hallowe'en?


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## burnedandfrozen (Mar 11, 2004)

*Temp Worker Plan?*

Does anyone really think that illegal immigrants are just going to pack up after three years and head back to Mexico? What will they be going back to?
Any type of "guest worker program" is just another name for a blanket amnesty. This rewards people who have broken our immigration laws and is also a slap in the face of the people who are trying to get into this country legally. We don't need a fence, we need a wall, more border patrols and Mexico needs to take care of it's people. Just look around many areas of LA. It's like being in a third world country...15 people living in one bedroom apartments, high crime, hospitals having to close down ect. This is where America is headed and big business certainly doesn't care and neither do the politicians.


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## KenR (Jun 22, 2005)

The Wife said:


> You're most welcome, Ken! :icon_smile_big: By the way, how did you manage to have your number of posts reach "666" on Hallowe'en?


I carefully controlled my postings for the last few week.....oh no, I'm at 667! My moments as Damien are no more.

Happy Halloween to all! :devil:


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## Laxplayer (Apr 26, 2006)

KenR said:


> I carefully controlled my postings for the last few week.....oh no, I'm at 667! My moments as Damien are no more.
> 
> Happy Halloween to all! :devil:


668 neighbor to the Beast. :devil:


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

AJE said:


> Bush's border fence is going to be torn down for Trump's wall.


Sir,
Your posts have festooned these boards over the past 24 hours, mostly resurrecting ancient threads, this one having been put to rest some 12 years ago.

It is possible to start a new thread on a topic that interests you.


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