DHS scraps "Virtual Fence" along AZ-Mexico border
The good news is, they're finally scrapping that silly collection of high-tech whiz-bang sensors, cameras, radars, and satellite-communications equipment, that did everything except stop illegal aliens from crossing the border.
The bad news? They're replacing it with more high-tech whiz-bang sensors, cameras, radars, and satellite-communications equipment. And they're still not putting in a simple fence to stop illegal aliens from crossing the border.
Hey, Michael! I thought the idea was to put in a fairly tough double fence with trenches and patrol it properly. This would stop most illegals (people on foot with nothing but backpacks and water bottles) and slow down the few well-equipped ones (people with vehicles, grading equipment, cutting torches etc.) long enough for the patrol to get there and collar them. Wasn't it? No fence is completely impenetrable, of course, but this would have slowed the torrent to a trickle - a vast improvement.
Perhaps you set up the whizbang "virtual fence" as a test, to see if it would work. Well, you have your answer, don't you?
Isn't it time to put in something that WILL work for a change?
Or are you going to wait until all the emails you get are in Spanish?
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,352213,00.html
Homeland Security Scrapping, Replacing Sub-Par Virtual Fence Along Arizona-Mexico Border
AP/Arizona Daily Star, David Sanders
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
A 98-foot 'virtual fence' tower laden with radar, sensors and sophisticated cameras west of Arivaca, Ariz.
TUCSON, Arizona — The government will replace its highly touted "virtual fence" on the Arizona-Mexico border with new towers, radars, cameras and computer software, scrapping the brand-new $20 million system because it doesn't work sufficiently, officials said.
The move comes just two months after Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff officially accepted the completed fence from The Boeing Co.
With the decision, Customs and Border Protection officials are acknowledging that the pilot program to detect illegal immigrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border doesn't work well enough to keep or to continue tweaking.
Chertoff accepted the program on Feb. 22 after Boeing apparently resolved software glitches. But less than a week later, the Government Accountability Office told Congress it "did not fully meet user needs and the project's design will not be used as the basis for future" developments.
The project is made up of nine towers along a 28-mile (45-kilometer) section of border straddling the border crossing at Sasabe, southwest of Tucson.
DHS will put in about 17 new towers, some holding just communications gear, others featuring new cameras or new radars, at an undetermined cost. The department also is spending at least $45 million to have a customized computer program written so the collected data is more quickly and efficiently fed to Border Patrol agents.
Although the system is operating today, it hasn't come close to meeting the Border Patrol's goals, said Kelly Good, deputy director of the Secure Border Initiative program office in Washington. "Probably not to the level that Border Patrol agents on the ground thought that they were going to get. So it didn't meet their expectations."
Agents began using the virtual fence last December, and the towers have resulted in more than 3,000 detentions since, said Greg Giddens, executive director of the SBI program office in Washington.
But that's just a fraction of the several hundred illegal immigrants believed to cross through the Sasabe corridor daily.
The Constitution isn't perfect, but it's better than the system we're using now.
I’m learning Spanish. It’s good for your brain to learn new languages, and God knows you can use the help. Don’t fear things, rather, use them to your advantage. Being bilingual will be a huge plus in the job market, or in the business world if you are in your own business. Plus it’s just cool.
You R’s are all about fear. It’s like you’re in love with it. It’s a drug to you. Gotta have that fear pumping. Whatever dude. I don’t have time for that nonsense.
I wonder how much virtual money we spent on the virtual fence before we scrapped it ?
A fence is not the answer..............
I worked the Mexican Border from 1975-1979...between San Luis Az,and Nogales Az...a fence has never stopeed Illegal Border crossings and never will it is just a waste of money and window dressing!
The only solution to Illegal Border crossings is to eliminate the draw..that being Jobs provided for Illegal Aleins by US companies...and cutting off all the free welfare benefits to Illegals...they would go home on their own without any cost to US taxpayers...this would free up Border Agents to concentrate on Illegal Drugs crossing the border as well as potential terrorist!
Police the employers and fine them big time and hire enough people to patrol the border for real.
That is what would have worked. It would have added to the economy too because you would have people spending the money back into the economy and paying taxes. Fenses and cameras dont pay taxes. I wonder who got the contracts to build the fences and set up the cameras?
I learned a new language Darla, it's called the International Language...Originally Posted by Darla
Um, love or money? With you republicans I can’t be sure!
Love of money.
You were just one letter off Darla.
Figures you wouldn't know citizen (though I believe money would be second). The international language is d...I...c...k
I think it would be funny watching poor Mexicans crying on the border with only backpacks and waterbottles as they're stopped by the fence and forced to eat each other to have enough food to get back home where they'll probably die anyway. We should make this into a reality TV show, but only whites/Americans can watch it.
"Women hold up half the sky." - Mao Zedong
You missed what I wrote. Build a double fence with trenches and patrol it properly.
I agree that a fence alone, is useless. I have patrolled the fences here in San Diego with the Minutemen, and have watched people go over, under, around, and through them. Mostly because they were incomplete, and nobody was there to stop them cutting through the existing sections. Even a good fence won't stop everybody, but will slow them down as they work their way through it.
But if the fence is well designed (see http://www.worldnetdaily.com/images2/borderfence33.jpg), it WILL stop many while slowing down the rest... and that will let a greatly-expanded border patrol concentrate on the few that do make it through.
And you are right, getting rid of the draw by cracking down on people who employ illegal aliens, is the third leg of the stool. All three legs (a GOOD fence, adequate patrolling, and elimination of employment oportunities for illegals) will result in a complete solution to the problem of the illegal-alien invasion we have been getting for years now.
The Constitution isn't perfect, but it's better than the system we're using now.
Really? You've taught it to speak? Do you have this on dvd?
Do we get our $20 million back?
Nope. I figure some of it went into campaign coffers though.
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