comments on comments about WaPo's border fence article

I went through the comments on the Washington Post border fence articleI referenced in the last post. Here are my responses to several of the comments:

Let's take a look at the logic/facts of some recent posts.

1. OpenBorders 1:51:53PM
...accurately observes that fence opponents talk about ecodamage from a fence but not about ecodamage by illegal immigrants/drug traffickers/terrorists etc.

However, we should acknowledge that some animals may have their ox gored by a fence. But there are ways to mitigate such damage. Look at how the California condor has been brought back from the brink of extinction.

I still advocate building a fence--but with mitigation efforts for threatened wildlife where it's deemed most necessary.


2. starsandstripeshaha 1:51:31 PM
...claims we're all (illegal) immigrants except for a group he/she calls "Native Americans."

This is factually inaccurate. First, most Americans are descended from legal immigrants. It's not illegal to immigrate to a place that has no immigration laws, as was the case for a long time. Then, after we did institute immigration laws, immigrants would get off the boat and be processed by immigration officials.

If you examine our history you'll see few Americans are descended from illegal immigrants except for Latinos who were anchor babies taking advantage of the loophole accidentally written into the 14th Amendment, which was intended to protect the children of slaves from Southern disenfranchisement legislation.

And as for "Native Americans." Um, their ancestors immigrated here just like everyone else's who was born here. I was born here. My spouse was born here. So we are EXACTLY as "native" as any American Indian.

In the sense of this writer's interpretation of "native" the only Native Anythings on Earth are current inhabitants of the highlands of East Africa, where our species originated. Everyone anywhere else is an immigrant or a descendant of same.

Not to mention the small irony that Mexicans who aren't Indios treat the Indios on both sides of the border like dirt. Mexico is an intensely racist society, where social status is largely equated with % of Euro blood in one's veins.

I'd guess that if you asked most American Indians (for want of a better term, since the most genetically accurate would be "Asian Americans" or perhaps "Earlier Americans") what they think of their lands being invaded by Mexican peasants and their traffickers, making it actively dangerous for the locals to be out and about at night, and blighting the landscape with their trash and feces.

And BTW calling a border fence "ludricrous" when 80% of Americans want it built immediately is just the kind of patronizing, condescending language that has parted the American Left from the working class Americans they claim to cherish so much.

4. gkam 1:49:36
...first gratuitously insults all who might dare to disagree with him/her/it/them as being scientifically unqualified to get in the ring with gkam.

Then gkam deigns to answer a point made that if the fence will be so riddled with holes doesn't that obviate concerns about wildlife? gkam's point is that the holes won't match up with animal migration trails.

Well, no doubt. However, I've had a lot of experience observing wildlife, from ants in our kitchen to coral reef ecosystems off New Guinea, and it's obvious that even ants will seek a different path if the one they'd been using gets blocked. Humans aren't the only animals capable of learning. You think they just sit down and die if they encounter an obstacle? Good grief.

Kind of ironic to be so condescending about the other side's grasp of science...& then make such an elementary error about animal ethology.

Not that I favor holes in said fence.

5. sunnyday1 1:33:54PM
...blames NAFTA.

Well, not to defend NAFTA, which needs renegotiating--or, better yet, just eliminate agricultural subsidies to huge, highly profitable agribusinesses in just a handful of crop categories--the real problem preceeds NAFTA by decades and has NOTHING to do with America:

Namely, in 1940 Mexico's population was 20 million. Now it's over 100 million, of which half or more live in poverty.

There's no way Mexico's corrupt, inefficient economy can absorb so many new Mexicans. No wonder Mexico makes illegal immigration to Mexico a felony.

And why so many Mexicans? Easy. The country is dominated by a primitive religion that calls condoms murder (I'm not exaggerating--look it up on the Catholic Church's official website; I did to make sure). Couple that to adopting some of the advanced countries' medical advances and voila--five times as many Mexicans as Mexico can handle.

Which means fence opponents believe, in effect, that Mexico's ruling elites and dominant church should get to determine America's demographic composition and overall population size--along with outsourcing Mexico's overpopulation problem here, as well as outsourcing Mexico's social welfare infrastructure here.

If you want more ways to counter partisans' arguments from either extreme, see my blog at
www.blogzu.blogspot.com