A North American Afghanistan?

Not the most pleasant thought to be reading this Christmas Eve, but a couple of recent news items have reminded me of how the U.S.-Mexico border continues its descent into anarchy, courtesy not only of Mexican narcotraficantes, but also of the incompetent, self-serving, corrupt behemoth that is official Washington.  First, there is the case of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, who was shot and killed last week in Arizona near the Arizona-Mexico border in pursuit of criminals, after which the following unfolded (h/t Darleen Click at Protein Wisdom):

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano yesterday attended the funeral of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry who was fatally shot while pursuing a gang last week in Arizona. In a phone call where Napolitano offered condolences to the family, the father of the murdered agent, angry that the border is still not secure, told her “you gotta wake your man up in the White House” and she allegedly responded “he’s done more in the last two years than any other president.” However, to the Terry family such sentiment represented “empty words.”

Empty words indeed, for the violence continues apace along the Texas-Mexico border as well.  From today's San Antonio Express-News:

BROWNSVILLE — When the rattle of gunfire and pop of grenades woke Rene Cardona from his dorm bed at the University of Texas at Brownsville/Texas Southmost College, he brushed it off as another drug war battle across the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico — a short distance away but in another country.

But when he looked out to see Border Patrol, security guards and police forming a frenzied phalanx along the river, he felt fear.

“The way they were acting, the way the police were arranged all around the entrances and above the border wall, it kind of freaked me out,” said Cardona, a junior majoring in journalism. “I felt that they were scared about something bigger happening.”

In September 2009, bullets from “the other side” grazed a campus building. No one was injured, but something had changed.

Fifteen months later, the rat-tat-tat across the border has become a familiar sound.

The problem gets worse and worse, and official Washington does nothing.  Furthermore, we are told by the Obama administration and an array of lobbyist and advocacy groups that the problem really isn't that bad, the border is safer than it it has ever been, the problem is being exaggerated by anti-illegal immigration and other "extremist" groups, and on and on.  Horse baloney.  The Ruling Class (to borrow Angelo M. Codevilla's term) and their hangers on care nothing about the fate of Americans living along the border.

Regrettably, that callous attitude even includes some elected representatives from border states so affected - not just Democrats, but Republicans as well.  I've seen it first-hand.  I've long hesitated to share this story for obvious reasons, but now - sixteen years after the fact - I think it bears repeating.  Back during the summer of 1994, after I had completed my freshman year of undergraduate studies, I interned in Washington, D.C. at the office of a now-former Congressman from Texas, a Republican, who shall remain nameless.  One day, as I was answering phone calls from constituents, I received a call from a border-area rancher who was distraught about the worsening problem of illegal aliens and drug-runners trespassing upon his land.  Per office protocol, I proceeded to try to forward the call to the legislative assistant who handled such issues.  But instead of taking the call, the legislative assistant in question told me to take a message, because he was otherwise occupied washing his coffee cup.  I then had to tell the rancher that the appropriate legislative assistant couldn't help him because he was "otherwise occupied" but could leave a message.  Bitterly and dejectedly, the rancher left his contact information and the call was ended.

I felt (and still feel) horrible for having had to handle the rancher's call that way, and it was an eye-opening moment revealing just how those on Capitol Hill really think of those whom they purport to represent.  I have no idea of what became of the rancher, but I have little doubt that the staffer who rejected the call later went on to have a lucrative career as a lobbyist, which is what eventually happens with many in the employ of members of Congress.  As the above episode with Secretary Napolitano shows, little has changed in sixteen years.

Message: talk to the hand.

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On a less-unpleasant note, I'd like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas.  Again, apologies for the very slow pace of blogging, but times are busy.  Right now, though, I am managing to enjoy some down-time, visiting family in San Antonio.  For your entertainment pleasure, here is a video sent to me by Tom Kratman last year, recounting Christmas on the Western Front in 1914 during World War I.  The song is "Christmas in the Trenches" by John McCutcheon (1989):



Simply magnificent.