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"U.S. tipping Mexico to Minuteman patrols" -- Two sides to the story? (Updated with Papa Ray's thoughts, bumped)
Well, sometimes you decide to sleep on a post and the whole world jumps on it by the time you get back to it. AzPatriot sent me a link to this about 4:00 this morning and I was too tired to do anything with it. By the time I'd had some sleep Drudge had posted a link to it and Michelle and her friends were all over it. So much for my exclusive ;-).
Post details: U.S. tipping Mexico to Minuteman patrols
U.S. tipping Mexico to Minuteman patrols
Sara Carter, a reporter with the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, reports today that she found documentation on Mexican government websites that show higher ups in the United States Border Patrol have been tipping off the corrupt Mexican government as to the locations of the Minutemen along the border.
This article does not report information told to the MCDC media offices that the Border Patrol chiefs have also been passing along intelligence reports to the government of Mexico on the activities of Minutemen not only at the borders, but in locations such as Utah, Nevada, Illinois, Massachusetts and Tennessee. Perhaps a follow-up story is coming tomorrow or an over zealous editor took the info out?
Part of a report distributed last August to the Mexican government from Border Patrol bureaucrats read over the phone to the MCDC media offices contained not only numbers (estimated chapter membership) of Minutemen in Illinois, but a statement on their activities and that they didn't seem to know any politicians there, indicating that the Illinois Minutemen didn't yet have any political clout.
[Read on here.]
Bryan Preston has an excellent related post here and Michelle Malkin has two here and here. Confederate Yankee writes:
... I’ll never support impeachment proceedings brought against President for going to war with Iraq based on flawed intelligence, not will I fault him overmuch for an executive order that authorized the NSA to try to close intelligence gaps using targeted intercepts of suspected terrorist communications. In both instances, a plausible, if not strong case could be made that he was trying to act in this nation’s best interests.
[...]
Bush's border policies? Those are what I consider impeachable offenses. ...
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Bill Quick: Mr. President: Have You No Shame?
President George W. Bush: The man who saved our nation from the jihadis so he could give it to the Mexicans.
I'm waiting for permission to quote a trusted friend -- someone at least as far to the right as I am on immigration -- who thinks this thing is being blown all out of proportion. I'll update this post later if/when he gives me his OK.
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An important update at Hot Air: CYA from DHS over CBP
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Michelle Malkin: DHS: Deny, Hedge, Spin 2006-05-09
2006.05.10
DO NOT miss Michelle's latest Vent. While you're at it, read her latest related post here.
La Shawn Barber has an interesting question: Should George Bush Be Impeached?
Papa Ray has the OK from his friend to publish the information he sent me earlier. I still need to massage a couple of emails into one coherent sub-post, which I'll add here as soon as I can.
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Almost as soon as my "email circle" got wind of the "Border Control Spying" thing Papa Ray, whom some of you may know from other things he's contributed here or from his comments on other blogs, sent me an "other side of the story" email, which I'm reproducing here with some modifications based on a follow-up exchange.
As a person who lives in the general area of the Border in question, I have a different viewpoint than most. Also, I know that fighting the "Man" and the Wetbacks can only be done from a position of strength and common sense.
First, let me tell you something you might not know. I just joined (this month), the Texas Chapter of the Minutemen. I had been putting it off, using the $50.00 fee for an [easy] excuse (the fee is for a criminal background check on the applicant). But after my visit last month with a bud that owns a ranch on the Border I decided to go ahead and join.
I have been in phone and email contact with my rancher bud for years. He is one of the few that still is alive from my previous life. He has told me, it has never been an issue with him or with any of the law enforcement agencies or Border Patrol that he has talked to or with any of the the new " Minuteman association" volunteers that he has talked to. He stated also that the coyotes and illegals knew of and kept track of their locations. This is mainly because its impossible to keep it a secret in the first place. The news media and the trails of dust going hundreds of feet in the air make movement and placement of observers impossible to keep secret. Plus, the coyotes have their own intelligence systems; they have been doing this for decades and are experts.
Yes, it is a requirement that any and all border activities be shared with Mexico, has always been and will be until we are in a state of war with them (which I believe we should be at this time.)
The Minuteman Mission is not to sneak up on the illegals and capture them.
That would only result in getting people injured or killed. The mission is to Observe and Report and that is all...end of Mission Statement.
Oh, and if you're a Border Patrol Officer, you follow orders or you stop being one. They don't brook corruption or lone rangers in the Border Patrol. They have not only fired hundreds of officers but arrested many and put them in jail for infractions and corruption.
The Texas Sheriffs Assoc. is trying to form a Sheriffs Assoc comprising all of the Sheriffs in the Border states. This is not just for tactical purposes but for political purposes. If successful they could become a driving force for law enforcement and border security.
He stated also, that even though Americans are getting "mighty upset about the illegals situation, that we still have to live and work with those already here and need to work out new laws that won't start a war, which will hurt us just as much as it will them." We also discussed the many latino gangs that are in all the large cities. We agreed that they will have to be not only faced soon but that it will be more than the local law enforcement will be able to handle safely alone.
This issue about illegals is not going to go away. But we need not bite off more than we need to to start off with. The border must be closed NOW and take the other issues one at a time. If the results are not satisfactory, we have to vote out those that won't vote the will of the people and vote in those that will.
That is the way that it is supposed to work in a Republic.
This sorry situation took years to develop into what it is today and will take years to completely straighten out.
Papa Ray
Papa Ray also wrote, while we were waiting on permission to quote his rancher friend:
Reference the "reporting of Minuteman activities in areas outside the border" I had heard of that sometime last year and I believe that that information is being passed at the highest levels from within the Homeland Security Dept. But is it being ordered to be passed on from even higher up? Who knows, maybe a "leaker" will tell us later.
This is what needs to be done: "The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps media offices will contact the reporter to inquire about copies of the documents and the timing on a follow-up story with the reports to the Mexican Government of activities of Minutemen in INTERIOR states, as if reports of our locations in the border states weren't bad enough."
If this is true (I won't worry about it until its proven to be true), then I do believe that whoever did this, should be called out for an explanation.
But the media making this whole thing sound like it is something new (the cooperation at the border) and like they are breaking the code, or that cooperation between law and border officers is something that has been secret is not only nonsense but pandering to those who want to see our government to be shown as something it is not. Or at the very least to just to damage the Bush Administration.
You have to remember whenever you read something from the MSM, what their political leanings and aspirations are.
And it appears that "the right" is going right along with it. They neglect to say that cooperation on the border is necessary and without it, makes law enforcement harder and more dangerous.
Everyone is for closing the Border, but those that live along the border understand that without cooperation between Mexico and the United States, it will soon turn into a war zone.
No sane person wants that.
Papa Ray
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Allahpundit: Border patrol says they’ve asked for a retraction
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Don't miss Greyhawk's latest Open Post.
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Promoted from the comments:
In the Declaration of Independence, amongst the particular items of grievance two stand out in this context. One was the complaint that George III had failed to provide adequate and appropriate means for attracting immigrants to the colonies and naturalizing them, and that he was doing nothing to protect the borders of the Colonies from the incursions of hostile Indian tribes. To collate and interpret these two points - he's keeping out useful immigrants and failing to protect us from bad. Seems evocative of what our modern day George III is doing. (Washington was George I, HW was George II). Other grievances involved taxation and loosing upon the colonies a swarm of officials. And he didn't much like the original Minutemen either.
-- Rurik
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Andrew C. McCarthy: Is the U.S. Giving Mexico Intelligence about Americans?
Sara A. Carter: Officials disclaim Bulletin 'tipping' report
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