Volunteers set to monitor Arizona border crossings

[Rose Siding]

A retired California businessman has 240 volunteers ready for a 30-day aerial and ground surveillance campaign on the Arizona-Mexico border to highlight what he calls the government's failure to control illegal immigration.

But law enforcement authorities warn they may be putting themselves in danger.

James Gilchrist, a combat-wounded U.S. Marine and Vietnam veteran, said the "Minuteman Project" will field volunteers from 37 states, many of them ex-military and law enforcement personnel, to man observation posts and a communications center, along with seven pilots from Arizona who will provide aerial surveillance.
...
"We're looking for this nation to again be guided by the rule of law, not a nation ruled by an endless mob of illegal aliens streaming across our borders like a tsunami, a culture shock that someday — perhaps soon — we will have neither the manpower nor the will to stop," he said.

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20050124-121305-5647r.htm

[TahitiNut]

1. Vigilantism.

:scared:

[Torque67]

3. Thats not vigilantism.

They are just watching, and counting.

Ranch Rescue are vigilantes http://www.ranchrescue.com/

I really do think you have to know facts, like how many folks are coming, and where they are coming from in order to make decisions.

Let's hope these guys just count, as they say they are planning to do.

[ugarte]

7. And I assume they won't be armed?

Somehow I think they're ready to do more than watch.

[Igel]

13. I don't care if they're armed, as long as they don't shoot first. n/t

[Occulus]

25. I heard about this group some time ago

they seem very reactionary. And potentially violent.

[ugarte]

26. All I can say is, the first time they mess with legal Mexicans

these cowboys had better be sue-proof because the lawyers will be all over them.

[Solly Mack]

2. and when they are killed?

which could happen for any number of reasons...

and while I understand he said they made an effort to weed out the "white sheet" type, I'm sure some got in under the radar...

what happens when the shooting starts?

this has the potential for being truly ugly.

I don't like this at all.

[DoNotRefill]

20. If they are killed....

I think it'll show that there's a real problem...

[found object]

4. White People Afraid of Brown People Syndrome

The latest case.

[Bridget Burke]

5. So, what is a "retired California businessman" doing in Arizona?

These vigilante groups are generally made up of newcomers to the area.

Why don't these guys just join the Border Patrol? Hiring standards?

[yellowcanine]

9. Have to be less than 37, physically and mentally fit.

I suspect most of these guys would fail on all three counts.

[readmylips]

6. Old gunslingers...

Someone has to be paying their weekly expenses. Piloting an airplane, they claim 7, is a very expensive deal. I like how these gunslingers are taking action in the name of the nation. I'm part of this nation and I don't approve of gunslingers. I pay taxes for my government to do their job, of course which they are not doing.

[signmike]

8. Back in the days when Calif. wanted Colo river water

Arizona installed a militia along the CA-AZ border with machine guns to keep the Californicators out. I guess the pen was mightier than the .30 calibers...

[GoldenOldie]

12. Wannabee Marshall's - Tombstone players

These guys mentally live in "Neverland." I don't care if they were battlefield hero's, law enforcement officers of NYC or Timbucktu sherrif's, they have no more knowledge of what occurs along the Arizona border than George W. Bush or Condi Rice. These men would have to be well armed in order to protect themselves, not from illegal Mexicans simply looking for work, but from drug runners who would have no problem killing them. Just what Arizona needs are border wars. Much of the Arizona border is not flat desert but rugged and mountainous. Ranchers who are familiar with the areas must use horses and even for them it is extremely dangerous.

Why not have the Governor call back the Arizona National Guard from Iraq, afterall that is the purpose of a National Guard.....to protect our Nation.

[Leilani]

24. Governor Napolitano has asked the Feds

repeatedly for help with the border issues.

That's the problem...the Feds have laws they don't enforce, & the states are left to fix the mess.

Arizona is having trouble keeping up with the costs, both financially & socially, of the huge migration into the state.

[tyedyeto]

10. Hundreds of illegals die of dehydration each year...

while trying to cross into the US. There are groups, mostly organized by churches, who place bottled water on regular routes they take. There have been stories in the paper down here where anti-immigration groups want those who are being true humanitarians to be arrested for aiding and abetting illegal immigrants.
To me, it is so sad when people are so anti-immigration that they would rather have another human being face death rather than trying to solve the issues of why they are trying to come to this country in the first place.

Edit for typo

[HoosierClarkie]

11. This is scary.

"We don't want the guys in white sheets and hoods, the militants or the supremacists. Many of the applicants were told thanks, but no thanks," he said.

Are the applicants really going to say yeah I wear a white sheet on the weekends? You can't screen out crazy people when what you are asking is crazy. Geesh!

[Vincardog]

14. Group think alert

how did
man observation posts and a communications center, along with seven pilots from Arizona who will provide aerial surveillance.
...
We're looking for this nation to again be guided by the rule of law

become a KKK rally shooting Innocent Brown people who just want a chance at a decent life?

If I was going to spend a month in the desert I would have my varmint gun handy. That does not mean I was out looking to blow away me some illegals.

[Redstone]

15. Vincardog, here's how....

People interpret the statements you quoted as the "KKK rally" you mentioned, because of this statement in the original post:

"...a culture shock that someday — perhaps soon — we will have neither the manpower nor the will to stop,"

This indicates without question that the clowns behind this "volunteer" idiocy are fraidy-scared of the brown people taking over, not doing it to uphold "the rule of law."

These are not Rotary Club types volunteering to perform a public service. This is just a bunch of white-supremacist redneck assholes out looking for cheap thrills and some publicity.

Redstone

[Vincardog]

17. If you see some code words I missed more power to you

I see aWoL pushing illegal immunization to help his corporate backers drive down wages and am not happy about that. I know ranchers who have their fences cut nightly by illegals and they are not happy about that. I can believe we should have secure borders without being a 'Imperial Grand Wizard'. On the other hand if they are using code speak to get out and kill some brown people they should be jailed.

[Redstone]

18. Immigration is one of those tough subjects

On the one hand, illegal immigration does generate some costs to us as a country.

On the other hand, we don't mind being able to eat fresh vegetables in the winter, and I can't envision white Americans lining up for lettuce-picking jobs.

On the third hand, immigration is one of the things that made this country a great one.

On the fourth hand, you're 100% right about bushboy's motivation in wanting to loosen up the immigration laws. He's certainly not doing it out of the goodness of his heart, because he doesn't have a heart. Or a soul.

So we agree on a lot of points. But I don't think the text I quoted was not "code words" at all. The intention of the speaker was crystal clear.

Redstone

[w4rma]

19. Americans would have no problem doing it if the prices weren't degraded

by illegals and by folks who think that folks doing that job should not be paid very much at all. Illegals come to the US for those jobs and live minimally while here, but send the money back to Mexico where that money they made will go a very very long way since the cost of living is MUCH lower, there.

It's exactly like factory work, except it's outside.

[Vincardog]

21. When speaking about can't envision white Americans lining up for

lettuce-picking jobs you forget to add for slave wages. The part about for what the illegals will do it for is critical to the equation. The emphasis on white betrays a bit of a tone as well. I and a lot of other Americans have worked the fields in the past the fact that BIG Agribusiness can pocket more money not paying a living wage is not an argument for illegal immigration and or work.

[Redstone]

22. I'm not picking on white people!

Jesus.

Honesty time: Anyone want to consider that "big agribusiness" wouldn't be able to exploit these people if we weren't buying their products?

How many of us ate fresh winter vegetables from California in the last week? I'll admit that I did. Anyone else? So let's get off the high horse, please.

Of course the "slave wages" and "big agribusiness" factors come into play. It's a large and complex problem, I understand that.

But another factor is that Americans (and damn it, don't jump all over me for this, because you know it's true) by and large (not all, but a significant number--is that enough of a disclaimer? are spoiled and most of all cheap.

Hence the rise of Wal-Mart. Hence the rise of "big agribusiness."

Please think about this honestly. They couldn't do it without us. Not pointing fingers; I'll admit to being part of the problem, too.

Redstone

[w4rma]

23. Did you consider that big agribusiness wouldn't be able to exploit these

folks if the laws prohibiting illegals from working for slave wages were enforced? Or if minimum wage was increased so that illegals would have to be paid the same wage that Americans are willing to work for thereby ending the benefit in hiring illegals leaving only the disadvantage that they might get caught and fined (which also requires that fines be high enough to destroy all the profit, + punsh, made from an illegal buisness action - which they currently aren't).

And of course for all this to work, tarriffs would have to be reinstated on food imported into the US (or the exchange rate on the dollar would have to decrease to horrindous amounts) that undercuts local buisnesses' prices.

People will *always* buy the cheapest product, even when that cheap product is made in an unethical way (it is already there and made and for sale and someone else will buy it if they dont). That's why laws much be *enforced* to prohibit unethical (and often society-destructive) buisness practices.

[Redstone]

28. Of course I've condered that!

But here's why it won't happen: Let's say you're a politician (a Democrat) and you crusade to force the agribusinesses to pay a decent wage to their workers.

All of a sudden, a head of lettuce costs eight dollars. A lot of people will shriek and holler and carry on and act like it's the end of the world, just like they did when gasoline went over two bucks a gallon.

What happens next? The Republicans crucify you, and you're gone with the next election, and things go back to the old way, quietly, and the masses are quieted because their bread and circuses are cheap again.

Sorry to sound like such a pessimist, but that's the way things work around here. It's not right, but it's the way it is.

Redstone

[w4rma]

29. Raising pay a few dollars an hour isn't going to shoot the cost of lettuce

up to 8 dollars. That is an exaggeration so that you could argue that illegals are needed to provide us with labor for our food. Walmart is owned by the 8 wealthiest people in the world. Obviously there is ALOT of room for a wage increase at the expense of their inflated incomes.

[Redstone]

30. For Christ's sake, I'm not arguing that

"illegals are needed to provide us with labor for our food."

I'm saying they're needed as long as we insist on cheap food.

I got the impression that people on these forums were the types who tend to take a bit more personal responsibility for societal problems than Republicans do, but I'm seeing a lot of excuses here.

Read my prior posts. All I was doing was pointing out that we're all part of the problem.

I'll admit that I am. Don't want to add to the problem? Don't buy fresh California vegetables and fruits in the winter. Otherise, don't look for anything to change.

Redstone

[Stinky The Clown]

16. This is very scary shit

These volunteers share one common trait .... a dislike and disdain (at best) for illegals.

I can easily see this devolving into shootings and death. You know if that happens who will be the losers.

These people whould be arrested on the spot if they go ahead with this.

[superconnected]

27. I see it as a republican get together to do what they do best

persecute the weakest among us.

my republican boss has said he would close the mexican borders and shoot anyone who crosses if he were president. I've never understood his infauation with it. Of course he also says liberals and muslims should be lined up and shot and tells me it will eventually come to that because people are sick of the degradation of our society.

[bobthedrummer]

31. "WE RIDE TONIGHT!"

[AlCzervik]

32. Maybe they could "volunteer" to monitor business's

that employ these people.

[Astarho]

33. Fimbres redux?

Dec. 9, 1929
Bigger than all New England is the Mexican state of Sonora. Biggest news of the week in Sonora was a ferocious scheme, calmly announced by the great landed proprietor Francisco Fimbres to put to death a whole tribe of Apache Indians, braves, squaws and papooses. Local papers praised Ferocious Fimbres. He claimed to have every assurance that the Mexican Government would not try to stop his private massacre.

http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,738252,00.html