My grandparents are from the candy making region of Alicante. Have you been there? I was in Mardris and Barcelona for about 9 months (a long time ago). Anyway, you might be a Republican and I a Democrat, but your writings are incredibly poignant and “lazer” precise.

Joel Chavez Cobos

Eventhough I diasgree with a few of the things you espoused, I think that you were right on the money on quite a good number of them.

Hope you dont think I’m trying to skirt the argument, but I’m actually writing to you for another reason, and I’m not trying to be fake or an a-hole; this is for real.

Have you ever thought of writing for a living, not on a blog, but maybe a movie script ot even a screen play? You are possibly the most naturally gifted comedic / dramatic writer I’ve encountered in a long long time. Please know Im not trying to kid you abour your political blog (thats all fine and dandy), but, you do seem to posses a raw talent, or possibly even a somewhat refined one. There are several ways to get your scripts to the right folks nowadays, as opposed to what the folks before the internet used to have to do to get in front of a respectable agent. Do it man!!!! You are worth it.

By the way, if you want to stay in touch, you can just email me at joel.chavez@verizonwireless.com (no bad words or bad pictures please, its my work email).

Also, I’m now an Erik Norvelle fan as well. Who is he? I consider myself a right of center democrat, but after reading the intelligent entries of some conservatives, I get where you all are coming from.

Ok, now for your political Blog:

Oh, and by the way, I wouldnt attribute too much to these kinds of folks, they dont deserve the credit of a spy in my view. They are just petty and ridiculous. By the way, I think Calderon is doing a great job. Have you noticed that in the last couple of weeks, thinsg are calming down, well at least in TJ. Maybe too soon to tell, but, lets see if this Army offensive has worked. Kender, remember that Calderon was given a country in shambles, and before he can address illegal immigration and everything else, he has to get the country back from the narcos; this is after 20 years of the past administrations giving into to (blind eye theory, and money these narco animals redistributed throughout the country for their own ourposes), it takes time to get the country back…Be patient, and also I recommend more diverse reading in your part. Its important to read the liberal blogs and or books as well as the conservative one’s; we all lear and understand both sides a tad better. You seem WAY too intelligent to believe some of the things you write sometimes. I know that you sometimes look at what you wrote and question your own beliefs. You would not be human otherwise.

Anyway, cheers. DOnt forget to look into a publisher man.

Joel

Yep, that’s right. Reality doesn’t happen on the border. Nope. Reality is when news reports on it. Perception = reality.

I’ve lived on the TX/Mexico border for a number of years, and still have family, friends, and business associates who live *on* the border. Property against the river. And funny thing is, there are no illegals crossing there, but they feds still want to claim much of it by emmanent domain for a fence where no one crosses. The fact that you think news represents reality on the border is very funny. I’ll bet you spend the rest of your time telling people how biased most news is, and you’d be right.

The litany of crime perpetrated by your “emergent Mexican peoples” is sickening. Mexican immigrants are not criminal if they come here legally and honor the written code of law. But all who live here illegally are all ready criminals ipso facto.

Perhaps Norvelle is just a PR agent in absentia for our do-nothing State Department!

The Chinese wall refers to several walls that failed, though they tried and tried to perfect it so it would not. The failure at the walls strongest time did not stop the invasion of the Mongols who conquered the whole country and set up the Yuan Dynasty in 1270.

But sure, walls stop all sorts of things. Like trade. I grew up in Indiana a stone’s throw from I-69, and various states are colaborating to extend that highway all the way down the the tip of Texas. They are spending zillions of dollars to shave off 20 minutes of the trip to/from the midwest.

But oh, you say “No problem, ’seal the border’ but trade will cross as always”. This assumes a neutron bomb type of security where all illegals and illegal traffic are magically distinguishable. But in reality, the just make it much slower for the 95% of legal traffic to try to get the 5% illegal that is trying to slip through declared points of entry. That’s right. Surprise! Illegal traffic flows over legal pints of entry. Traffic slows to a certain point, and companies leave for elsewhere to do business. China generally. I’ve worked on the border with import/export facilities and I can tell you that the 80’s and 90’s were spent building just-in-time inventories.

But you know what is the kicker, Kender? Even if your perfect security scenario worked, did you know that 50% of illegals cross legally? I’ll bet you didn’t. So you’ll make everyone wait longer to go over the border, and businesses will relocate overseas. And to top it off, you finally discover the obvious truth that most illegals arrive here legally. So why don’t you go master plan someone else’s universe that you understand. Deal?

Oh, and by the way, to build a fence in TX (half of the border is in TX), unlike Arizona and CA generally, the government has to claim a lot of private property to build the fence. Emmanent domain. You’re opposed to that right? Well you aren’t anymore, because the feds are suing ranches, families, and small business out the ying-yang to grab that land for a fence that Texans think is a joke for all the reasons I mentioned.

So you want to screw much of TX business (typical Angelino), kill NAFTA (typical Paleo), screw TX private land owners, and then …. When you discover that half of illegals cross legally, then you’ll want an additional army (not including the one you hired to patrol the new fence) to track down visa violations. That’s a big plan you got there. Better get more friends in Congress than you got. Because the Paleos don’t tend to win elections, and the Secure Fence Act was a rider on the Iraq War emergency spending bill, and it wasn’t debated at all so our legislators are getting a little worried.

> As for giving mexico military hardware, here’s another difference between them and columbia. …. there is nothing to stop [Mexicans] from sliding over our border (as they do right now) and using it to aid the drug dealers.

Nothing to stop them? Not even common sense and self-preservation? You’re question begging; assuming the truth of your argument. They can’t fight corruption because they’re corrupt? …. and the Iraqis just don’t want freedom do they? They are incorrigible. It’s a silly argument. They turned back a leftist in the last election and elected a man who promised a get tough policy with corruption and narcos. And you say it all means nothing. Again, Iraq is to the libs and Mexico is to the Paleos. Iraq will always be a quagmire to the libs, and Mexico will always be a quagmire to the Paleos. Mexico can advance rapidly to 12th in GDP in the world (as they have), but it doesn’t matter to them. Mexico is far better positioned to win against the narcos than Colombia ever was, and Colombia is winning.

< Mexicans expect corruption. They expect to pay bribes. In fact, in 2007 they paid 2.5 billion in bribes.

Mexicans love corruption as much as we loved it during Al Capone’s heyday and decades thereafter in our large cities. “They are corrupt so they can’t fight corruption” blah blah blah circular arguments. People that suffer corruption love it? That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. It hurts everyone, and they know it. They have a 1.4 trillion dollar economy so your figure isn’t shocking as you’d like to think. And if you think the U.S has little bribery, how do you think Marijuana got to be our largest cash crop? Wanna guess how much bribery there is in the U.S.? Hint: it’s more than 2.5 billion, though small as a percent.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=2735017

My point is how do you think you’ll get that many legal crossings of people and trucks while still stopping illegal traffic? Because you squeeze so hard the legal traffic will slow so much people would stop crossing altogether. We say this after 9/11 though I fully supported the extra security. Relaxing it had to be done to get business done and legal traffic across. You build a wall it won’t help unless you squeeze the points of entry hard. The way you cross quickly is to get registered ahead of time as legit so you can go through quickly without being checked. That is the way all security works. The lines are backed up for two hours now with nothing to declare and a bicycle (or on foot) so some guy can ask you two questions and wave you through.

> On many military areas where there are signs that say USE OF DEADLY FORCE AUTHORISED. In Dreamland where any plane that strays into that restricted airspace is likely to be shot down without warning. Where trespassers can be shot on sight.

You can authorize whatever you want, but you won’t get US troops shooting at US citizens. The police and private security are a different matter. You can’t use US troops unless you can convince the american people that it is a matter of high national security, and the problem is your Paleo brethren keep losing elections. Soldiers won’t do it, and Congress won’t let them. We had US troops on the Texas border shoot some folk in the 90’s and it caused an uproar even in Congress.

> Thank you, your liberalism is exposed at last.Thats twice you’ve invoked Iraq. The cases aren’t parallel, you know it, I know it.

They are, and why won’t you give the reason you think they aren’t? What is the relevant difference that Mexico is different than Colombia regarding military partnership? You answer is to say “nu-uh”?

Uh, how many Americans have illegally gone across the border into Mexico? How many brave the desert and pay a coyote to be smuggled INTO Mexico? Name me ONE.

<>

Yeah they do. Legally. Your point?

<>

Ah but they do. On many military areas where there are signs that say USE OF DEADLY FORCE AUTHORISED. In Dreamland where any plane that strays into that restricted airspace is likely to be shot down without warning. Where trespassers can be shot on sight.

<>

Thank you, your liberalism is exposed at last.Thats twice you’ve invoked Iraq. The cases aren’t parallel, you know it, I know it

Try again.

As for Mexico being able to look after its own affairs, as I understand it they come to the US, work illegally and send the money home because there is an unemployment problem in Mexico.

If Mexico cleans up its employment problems, the illegals wont want to come to the US.

Res ipsa loquitur.

<>

I am not that concerned with Mexican law. If I had my way, the wall would be built, the area mined and armed troops on duty.

Legal immigrants don’t come via the desert, btw, they come in airplanes.

If they want to emigrate, let them do so legally.

What part of this don’t you understand?

As for giving mexico military hardware, here’s another difference between them and columbia. If corrupt columbians get hold of said equipment they are unable to drive into the U.S. directly to use it. If corrupt mexican military members have it there is nothing to stop them from sliding over our border (as they do right now) and using it to aid the drug dealers.

What part of the following equation do you not understand?

Mexicans expect corruption. They expect to pay bribes. In fact, in 2007 they paid 2.5 billion in bribes. Maybe instead of US giving them half that amount they can simply start paying the bribes to their government, but then their economy might fall apart when everyone that wasn’t getting a bribe refused to do any actual work.

Sonnabend: Your plan is a fantasy. And ugly one. Like Kender, you think only Mexicans cross the border. But more US citizens cross it than Mexicans each day. And over a half a billion people cross each day legally. So your plan is a joke, and besides any US troops worth having aren’t going to sigh up to have a chance to shoot US citizens.

> It is not the business of the USA to help Mexico solve its internal problems.

So let’s get out of Iraq, pull our military advisors out of Colombia and their hardware, and all the other nations where we partner this way. The business of the US is wherever its interests lie, and a quelling a narco war on the border is in our interests. Just ask Brownsville, McAllen, Laredo, or El Paso.

> It is not the fault of the US if Mexico is singularly and pathologically unable to hold a simple election without it turning into a three ring circus.

You’re misinformed. The last election was closer than our 2000 debacle and they pulled it off quite well by all accounts and international standards. andthey rejected the leftist candidate who holds views your ilk claim all Mexicans hold. Obviously they don’t.

> treat them according to Mexican law on immigration. Judge them using Mexican law. Sentence them accordingly. I gaurantee you they will stop coming. Sauce for the goose, methinks?

Mexican law has changed just now. They do not treat illegal immigrants as criminals anymore.

http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/237249