Border Patrol About Face?

[Moondoggie]

Fox News is reporting that the U. S. Border Patrol is thinking of forming citizen volunteer groups similar to the MinuteMen Project to help watch the border with Mexico.

The quoted statement from the USBP went something like "We welcome the eyes and ears of concerned citizens."

Dang! Seems like just a few weeks ago the MinuteMen were unwelcome vigilantes who were gumming up the works of our professional and highly effective (sarcasm here) border patrol.

Methinks at long last somebody inside the beltway has been reading the polls regarding attitudes towards illegal immigration.

[Modifiedbrowning]

I hope that it is true, it might actually help get a handle on the illegal immigration problem. It will only work as long as the BP actually has the ability to follow up on the citizen's reports, though.

[The Rabbi]

I would hate to get into another meaningless debate over immigration of the kind that crop up on THR,
That said, the US has increased spending on border patrol over the last 20 years by some phenomenal amount.  At the same time illegal immigration has increased by about an equal amount.  That suggests spending more money on the problem will not solve it, but actually make it worse.  THe WSJ had an interesting idea that increased patrol actually increased residency of illegals since when going back and forth was relatively risk free people tended to come north just for jobs and then go back home.  When the risk increased people decided to minimize that and stay put north of the border.
More spending on law enforcement will not solve this problem.  People have no trouble aknowledging that on the drug issue but seem unable to grasp this on the immigation issue.

[El Tejon]

Brilliant move.  Don't know why they did not do this from the beginning.

Co-opt them and score political points and lobby for bigger budgets!

[stevelyn]

Beware of the BP's warm embrace of citizen volunteers. It's not about being allies, it's about exercizing control and dictating rules to the volunteers such as no armed volunteers.

[Moondoggie]

Now the Dept of Homeland Security says "Never mind, we'll stick with trained professional law enforcement personnel."

Reading between the lines, and knowing how things work inside the gov't, the clown who made the original statement in favor of civilian assistance got to do a major rug dance most likely above a trap door.  His boss undoubtedly whacked his peepee before pulling the lever and dropping him into oblivion.  I hope he enjoys his new assignment in the Aleutians.

[Standing Wolf]

...the US has increased spending on border patrol over the last 20 years by some phenomenal amount.

What counts isn't squandering, but results. The sad, sorry, simple fact of the matter is that we have no borders.

[JAlexander]

Reading between the lines, and knowing how things work inside the gov't, the clown who made the original statement in favor of civilian assistance got to do a major rug dance most likely above a trap door.

I bet it was the Mexican Hat Dance.

James

[DustinD]

Is this the same border patrol that stood down during the time period that the Minute Men where watching the boarder to make them seem less effective?

I am not surprised to see them cancel the idea.

[RevDisk]

...the US has increased spending on border patrol over the last 20 years by some phenomenal amount.

What counts is not the amount of money, but how it is spent.  Spending more money on plush offices, and less on cell blocks and officers...    Get the picture?

[RadioFreeSeaLab]

It's about the Border Patrol controlling those pesky citizens, not about securing the border.