The Great Fence of Texas
by Bryan Curtis
June 25, 2009 | 1:49am


Eric Gay / AP Photo

Turning his attention briefly from Iran, health care, and the economy, the president takes on immigration Thursday. To get an understanding of the debate, The Daily Beast’s Bryan Curtis took a drive along the still-unfinished Texas border fence.

As President Obama convenes his first major White House meeting Thursday to talk about immigration, it’s worth turning your eyes to Texas. That’s where the final 40 miles of the U.S.-Mexico Border Fence, the object of much controversy three years ago, are being constructed. I went to Texas not long ago to see how the fence was working and what clues it offered for what figures to be one of the fiercest political debates in the Obama presidency.

The fence certainly looked impenetrable—that is, until I took a couple steps to the east, where it ended abruptly.

Two things stand out about the border fence. First, after two years of construction, no one has any idea whether it’s a success. And, in an ironic twist, it’s the Democrats, rather than pro-fence Republicans, who now have an incentive to call it one.

Obama’s White House immigration meeting is a mysterious affair. “I don’t know what to expect, exactly,â€