Thread: MINUTEMEN ARE HEROES

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Today's Column

MINUTEMEN ARE HEROES

I think they’re heroes.

The Minutemen. The guys who’ve gone down to Arizona to watch the border.

I think they’re heroes and I think most Americans feel that way.

Moreover, I think the federal government, instead of condemning them, should be thanking them. It should be thanking them for doing its job.

And it should be apologizing for failing to protect our borders and for destroying our immigration system. If the government was doing its job, there wouldn’t be any Minutemen.

If the government was doing its job, there wouldn’t be any illegal immigrants. But there are. There are almost 12 million of them, and the number grows by several hundred thousand a year.

You’ve heard about them, no doubt. About 200 men and women from across the country have converged on a 20-mile stretch of the Mexican border. It is a sieve, an area controlled by illegal aliens and abandoned by the Border Patrol.

At least that’s what the numbers show.

It is an area where, based on the number of aliens coming across the border, the laws and law enforcers of the United States mean nothing.

So regular Americans came to do something about it. The citizens employ and empower the government to do their bidding, and when the government fails, the citizens have to do it themselves.

So it’s like Neighborhood Watch.

The Minutemen get out their folding chairs and binoculars and sit on the American side of the border. And they watch for illegals coming over from Mexico. When they see somebody, they call the Border Patrol.

They don’t intercept or interfere. They don’t challenge or accost anybody. They just call the authorities.

And for that they’re being treated like trash. George W. Bush, the American president, called them vigilantes. Vicente Fox, the American co-president, called them vigilantes.

And here’s what the “objective� Reuters “news service" called them: “A right-wing militia.�

Militia?

No one associated with the Minutemen has used that word or even hinted at it. Instead, what’s supposed to be journalism is purposeful defamation. Reuters went on to report that some of the Minutemen’s pick-up trucks have had gun racks.

And, of course, Reuters called them “vigilantes.�

But that’s ok. Because the Minutemen are playing the press like a fish.

And that’s the real beauty of what the Minutemen are doing. This is about putting an issue front and center on the public agenda. It’s about getting as many stories as possible and overthrowing the government’s desire to continue to ignore illegal immigration.

Thus far, in one week, the Minutemen have done more to stop illegal immigration across the Mexican border than has been done ever.

Not by watching out for some aliens, but by watching out for this country’s interests, and serving as a focus and expression of the American public’s nervous anxiety over illegal immigration.

There are 200 reporters in Bisbee, Arizona, which is about 200 times the usual number. And they are talking about one thing. Though they largely want to mock the Minutemen, the people watching and reading their reports are not so hostile.

I believe they are supportive.

But it’s not just reporters the Minutemen have manipulated. They’ve also put the screws to the governments of the United States and Mexico.

The American Border Patrol was dramatically reinforced just hours before the Minutemen arrived. It was a somewhat disingenuous move – the increase in agents was only a quarter of what Congress had called for – but the Administration blinked.

And so did its counterpart to the south.

After years of policies that seem to actively encourage its citizens to illegally sneak into the United States, the Mexican government has moved, just this month, to stop the flow across the border patrolled by the Minutemen.

Mexican army units have been positioned on their side of the border to shoo wannabe illegals away from Arizona. That is a first. An astounding first. The Mexican government, of course, does not want the full and normal flow of its citizens into America to be documented by either the Minutemen or the media. The Mexican government does not want the full scope of the incursions to be known.

So right now the Minutemen are in the catbird seat.

And they need to milk it for all it’s worth.

Because they’re doing it for the rest of us.

They are heroes.

And I think most Americans would agree.

MINUTEMEN ARE HEROES

They certainly are!!!!!!!

MINUTEMEN ARE HEROES

Yes they are!!!!!

Acidrain