We will pay for the wall. For every American that loses a job to an illegal criminal, they paid for their portion of the wall. For every American that loses a loved one to the illegal drugs that stream across the Mexican border, they paid for their portion of the wall. For every American that is murdered by an illegal criminal, they paid for their portion of the wall. Oh yes, we are paying for the wall in full.
Hi HIR,
You do know, don't you, that the lion's share of illegal drugs coming from Mexico don't come across at some wilderness point of the border, right? They are smuggled through in vehicles that cross the border at regular border crossings. The wall won't have any effect on this trade. Most people crossing the border at some wilderness point have a tough enough time bringing a backpack with water and a change of clothes. When you watch the documentaries, of which there are plenty, of people being stopped illegally crossing the border in the wilderness, they aren't carrying bales of drugs.
So, the part of your comment dealing with the illegal drugs won't be effected. If we're really serious about stopping the illegal drug trade, then we need to stop the demand. There are people who, if there is a need for any product, will find a way to fill that need for profit. So, the only way to stop such people from trading on our territory is to rid ourselves of the need for their product.
How many 8 track tape players were sold last year? There was a time that our cargo container ships were awash with 8 track tape players. Stereo units made for the home had them. Cars had them. There was a need for 8 track tape players. Today you'd be hard pressed to find a new one in any store anywhere. Nobody needs one. If South American cocaine producers sent 100 kilos of cocaine into America and nobody bought any, then they wouldn't do it again. Meth, heroin, other illegal psychotropic drugs, if there wasn't an illegal demand for them, there wouldn't be anyone going to all the trouble to bring them to America.
The Breaking Bad series was a perfect example of this. The character needed fast money. What did he do? He began trading in illegal narcotics. Why did this get him so much fast money? There was a big demand for his product. Narcos in South America see the population of the world, especially the U.S. market, as just one big market in which they know that if they can get their product to people, they'll get rich. So, the biggest part of the business is getting the drugs to the people. Some wall isn't going to stop them. They'll just figure out better ways to ship them in on container ships or fly them in to wilderness points where people will be ready to pick them up when dropped off.
If you've ever watched some of these new shows that document packages being mailed in from overseas, drug dealers have become very keen at creating ways in which to just mail drugs in. They will hollow out other products and fill them with their contraband. They have even made other products out of the contraband to be broken down by some processor over here.
Of all things that the wall is being touted as stopping, trust me, drugs isn't one of them. It may reduce the number of people who come across, but there are much easier and cheaper ways to stop people these days. Motion sensors and cameras and more staff will do that. It would be much cheaper to build small outposts of border agents every 50 miles along the border with drones to follow the illegal crossers until an agent can be on scene to apprehend them.
A good system of pole mounted cameras and motion sensors every half mile that are connected to a central observation office with the ability to send out a camera carrying drone to follow perpetrators as they cross the border should do the trick nicely. Such a system would be much cheaper and when no longer needed could be dismantled or abandoned leaving the land in pretty much the same shape it has always been. No wildlife is affected adversely and we don't have to look like we're building a prison wall around ourselves.
Once a pole station was activated, then someone in the central monitoring office would check out the cause of the activation, after all animals might also trigger the motion sensors. This could be done by a pole mounted camera or by sending out the drone stationed with the pole mounted system. A pole mount system might have 4 or 5 drones stationed with it so that there are extras if needed or one breaks down or crashes. If human movement is determined to be the cause of the activation, then the drone could get a zoom in picture of what's going on from a pretty far distance to keep it from being shot down or otherwise destroyed by the perpetrators. At this point the central monitoring station would notify the nearest border agent post to dispatch someone to apprehend while the drone continued to monitor their progress. The central monitoring station, through GPS tracking could actually send the coordinates of the activity to the navigation system in the vehicle and the agent could drive to within 10' or so of the exact location where the central monitoring station is watching the people make their way across the border. If there are border agent posts every 50 miles, then the most an agent would have to drive would be 25 miles and even accounting for rough terrain, shouldn't take more than an hour to get to where the activity is happening. At an average walking speed of say 3 mph that means that the perpetrator can be apprehended within 3 miles of the first motion sensor activation with a drone produced picture on his vehicle's navigation screen showing him exactly where they are and how they are progressing.
It's even possible that after the first 10 or 20 times this happens, when illegal crossers hear the drone, they'll just turn back. Knowing that their chances of spending the next several hours or days of their life in a deportation loop just shot up to 100%. We could even put speakers on the pole, that once the activity had been determined to be human movement, would call out, "Turn back now. You have been identified and you will be apprehended." All done for a lot less money and as the drones and speaker system began to be realized as a pretty effective tool in this battle. We could close down every other agent post as their post became less and less necessary. As things improved further, we could even drop back to an agent station every 200 miles with a helicopter to provide transportation to a hot spot.
Moving and pouring concrete or some panel system with all the foundation work required is just way more than we need to put into this operation.
I believe it's a workable plan and will not scar the landscape for generations to come.
