... it was '83 or some year right around there when we held The Fence climbing contest. See, people talked about building The Fence back then, too. The Fence along the Mexican border. To keep Them out.Viva Terlingua!
At the time, the proposal was quite specific -- a 17-foot cyclone fence with bob wire at the top. So a test fence was built at Terlingua, and the First-Ever Terlingua Memorial Over, Under or Through Mexican Fence Climbing Contest took place. Prize: a case of Lone Star beer. Winning time: 30 seconds.I tell this story to make the one single point about the border and immigration we know to be true: The Fence will not work. No fence will work. The Great darn Wall of China will not work. Do not build a fence. It will not work. They will come anyway. Over, under or through.
Thursday, March 30, 2006
30 seconds is pretty good ...
Build the much-ballyhooed wall between Mexico and the United States and how long would it take would-be immigrants to breach it? Molly Ivins has expert testimony on the subject:
A chain link fence definitely won't do. Why risk the climbing and cuts? Just pack some wire cutters.
ReplyDeleteIf the feds are going to build a chain-link fence, I don't see what the big deal is. It's cash in the bidders' pockets. Let em do it.
"The wall costs at most 4 billion dollars"
ReplyDeleteUnless you can't use illegal immigrant labor ... then maybe $10 billion. ;-)
markm's right - if they built it as high and thick as the Great Wall of China with barbed wire on top, it would definitely have taken the Terlinguans 60 seconds to make it past. By then of course our snipers could gun them down.
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