Don't Call Me A Vigilante-vigilantes Hang People

Status
Not open for further replies.

2dogs

Member
Joined
Dec 25, 2002
Messages
1,865
Location
the city
http://www.etherzone.com/2003/moor020303.shtml

DON'T CALL ME A VIGILANTE
VIGILANTES HANG PEOPLE

By: Jim Moore

Living In Florida gives me no excuse for not empathizing with my fellow Americans who are going through hell at the Arizona border with Mexico I can't feel their terror and pain, but I can certainly imagine it.

* * * *

I am a successful rancher in Arizona, and facing daily danger from the illegal aliens who sneak across the border with their knives and handguns and play havoc with my family, my home, and my property.




You heard right. It's no longer just illegal aliens jumping the border and harassing us, now it's ARMED illegal aliens jumping the border and threatening me and my neighbors with pistols and knives.

At this rate, it won't be long before our border goes from a bad nightmare to a damn battlefield. And me and the other ranchers and our families are caught right in the middle of it.

Hearsay? Like hell. In fact, just a couple months ago Border Patrol agents reported 12 arrests of undocumented immigrants carrying knives or handguns. Fact is, agents last week reported that they got shot at while patrolling the desert. And according to Frank Armarillas---he's the spokesman for the Border Patrol down here---the agents confiscated three pistols from the migrants.

But the real kicker is this: Jen Allen, the director of an immigrant rights group, has the gall to say that our civilian patrols are responsible for the rising number of undocumented immigrants packing weapons. "Immigrants have heard about civilians patrolling the border, carrying rifles, and they are afraid of being attacked."

How about them rotten apples? THEY threaten us, tear down our fences, cut loose our cattle, barge into our homes, intimidate our womenfolk, and THEY are afraid of being attacked! If that ain't a kick in the butt, what is?

Here we are in 2003, and while illegals are stampeding across our border, the U.S. government is not only NOT stopping the invasion, it is actually preventing American civilian patrols from doing so!

If they don't have enough Border Patrols and National Park Rangers to stem the tide of illegals and protect us and our land (and they don't), why do they keep turning down volunteer help from us ranchers, who are being assaulted? Something's fishy in Denmark.

I'll tell you what I think. I think that the more illegals they can cram into the U.S. and get them documented and signed up right quick, the more votes they're going to pull in for their party. (Politics is dirty in more ways than one.)

To help them do this, they have to cut off all opposition to illegals any way they can. And one of those ways is to call us and our civilian patrols, Vigilantes. That way they can tell the rest of the country that in Arizona we're taking the law into our own hands.

Well I got news for those Washington stonewallers. Vigilantes of the Old West used to hang people and ask questions later. We don't do that around here. When we round up illegals we turn them over to the Border Patrol.

So, to call us vigilantes is unfair, unreasonable, and dead wrong.

What we are is 4th Amendment Americans. We believe in "the rights of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects." And by George, under that constitutional mandate we're going to take action against foreign intrusion and personal harm, in any way we can, like it or not.

* * * *

And so, I sit here at my computer, in Florida. But the terror and heartbreak of living on the Arizona border with illegal, armed intruders crossing over, although on my mind, is a feeling not easily stomached.

Worst of all, is the knowledge that our own U.S. government is not only NOT protecting the citizens of Arizona, but is actually hindering the Arizona people from protecting themselves!

In this writer's view, that is worse than Un-American. It is Anti-American. The perpetrators of this detestable rejection of constitutional duty deserve something for their efforts. I suggest that a good dose of Old West vigilante justice might be just the thing.


"Published originally at EtherZone.com : republication allowed with this notice and hyperlink intact."
 
It's no longer just illegal aliens jumping the border and harassing us, now it's ARMED illegal aliens jumping the border and threatening me and my neighbors with pistols and knives.
They’ve been armed for a long time. Back before WWII my grandfather would have encounters with armed illegals. Its possible that more are armed than were a while back but I’m not convinced just yet.

But the real kicker is this: Jen Allen, the director of an immigrant rights group, has the gall to say that our civilian patrols are responsible for the rising number of undocumented immigrants packing weapons. "Immigrants have heard about civilians patrolling the border, carrying rifles, and they are afraid of being attacked."
I support ranchers, homeowners, women, men, dogs, cats and Martians protecting their property and their lives with whatever force they deem necessary. Nevertheless, it is entirely possible and even probable that as the word has spread that the “civilians†illegals encounter are likely to be armed, the illegals react. This should not be construed as a negative comment towards the aforementioned people doing what they think is necessary. I just wish to point out that actions have consequences, and one of the potential consequences of heavy “civilian†action is an increase in the level of respondent violence by their targets.

How about them rotten apples? THEY threaten us, tear down our fences, cut loose our cattle, barge into our homes, intimidate our womenfolk, and THEY are afraid of being attacked!
Good. Now you know you’re working. What’s the problem? Did you expect that everything you did would be devoid of consequences? I know you’re smarter than that.

So, to call us vigilantes is unfair, unreasonable, and dead wrong.
I beg to differ. Just because the end result is not taking the life of the target doesn’t mean you are not meeting out a form of justice. Regardless, as I have asked on numerous occasions, what is wrong with vigilantism?

Worst of all, is the knowledge that our own U.S. government is not only NOT protecting the citizens of Arizona, but is actually hindering the Arizona people from protecting themselves!
As I have delineated on more than one occasion here on THR, the gov’t is in fact taking steps to improve the situation. Gov’t by its very nature cannot and does not move fast. Moreover, there is only one event that could be construed as the gov’t hindering “civilians†from protecting themselves, and that is Simcox’s arrest. While I can’t speak to the motives of the park ranger, I can speak to the motives of everybody else involved (and I did in another thread), and nobody involved wanted anything to do with the situation. Simcox was an idiot for breaking the law. Every member of his organization should walk up to him and slap him in the face for what he did. If you’re going to do something controversial you damn sure better make sure you keep your nose clean. His one action did more to set his organization back than just about anything else he could have done.
 
So ... what do all you folks who think Bush is doing such a great job think about this?
I think rather that those that think he isn’t doing anything are just burying their heads in the sand so they can have something to complain about.
 
I think rather that those that think he isn’t doing anything are just burying their heads in the sand so they can have something to complain about.

It seems to be the other way around to me .... :confused:

Let me tell you something - I voted for Bush, and I voted Republican in every presidential election since 1980 (after Jimmy Carter converted me from a Democrat :) )

I was in the "support Bush 110%" group right after 09-11-01; behind him all the way in attacking Taliban and AQ in Afghanistan.

But a year and a half later, I'm not so sure.

Bush admin has done everything in its power to block airline pilots being armed. Bush signs unconstitutional CFR ("incumbent protection act"). Bush picks a fight with Iraq but appears unconcerned about our own borders.

I suppose if the Mexican army invaded El Paso, the White House would say "we're working on the situation, we'll get back to you in a few months"
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top