With all the chatter going on about al-Qaeda operatives in South America you'd think our officials would be really cracking down on the southern border. They aren't, of course, and there is a new article out in the
Washington Times on a top al-Qaeda agent making ties with a vicious El Salvadorian gang. Adnan G. El Shukrijumah has a $5 million bounty on his head already and has been seeking ways to get into the U.S. through our southern border. The notorious Mara Salvatrucha gang has been smuggling hundreds of thugs into our borders.
Although they are actively involved in alien, drug and weapons smuggling, Mara Salvatrucha members in America also have been tied to numerous killings, robberies, burglaries, carjackings, extortions, rapes and aggravated assaults — including at least seven killings in Virginia and a machete attack on a 16-year-old in Alexandria that severely mutilated his hands.
[they are] thought to have established a major smuggling center in Matamoros, Mexico, just south of Brownsville, Texas, from where it has arranged to bring illegal aliens from countries other than Mexico [OTM] into the United States.
Authorities said al Qaeda terrorists hope to take advantage of a lack of detention space within the Department of Homeland Security that has forced immigration officials to release non-Mexican illegal aliens back into the United States, rather than return them to their home countries.
Ahh yes, the old "Catch and Release" program that is so successful that more than 85% of those released don't show up for their immigration hearing. Let's just ignore the fact it doesn't work and keep doing it!
This is the murderous group we are going to be dealing with. A group that most definitely wouldn't hesitate in actually attacking our border patrol to get their paid OTM's into the country. I'm sure al-Qaeda will pay them well.
Authorities also have intelligence that Shukrijumah was in Canada last year looking for nuclear material for a "dirty bomb". He is also thought to have been involved in the September 11th planning, is a pilot and was one of 7 al-Qaeda operatives on Ashcrofts lists of evil doers planning to strike America.
Recently the Border Patrol has been increased to 6,900 personnel and the estimates are that 4000+ people hop the border each day. 6,900 people between you and a potential "dirty bomb", somehow I don't feel so safe. To top it off in part one of a three part interview with Bill O'Reilly yesterday, President Bush seemed to shrug off the whole southern border issue. From the transcript on Fox News.
O’REILLY: A “Time” magazine investigation says, three million illegal aliens crossed the Mexican border, and we talked about this four and a half years,
PRESIDENT BUSH: We have, I know, it’s a issue that you're concerned about.
O’REILLY: Every year, three and a half million illegals come over. Why can’t the federal government control that?
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, as you know, as the governor of Texas, I was very aware of this issue, there is a long border, that makes it hard to control. We have beefed up places along the border to try to stop the process of, of, of uh, of uh,
O’REILLY: With all due respect though, it’s not working.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well,
O’REILLY: Three million people.
PRESIDENT BUSH: It’s working a little better, they're doing a pretty good job down in Arizona, which is the main border crossing, but I was trying to get my words here for a minute. Trying to give you some facts that would, I think there's a thousand more border patrol agents along the border, we’re modernizing border techniques, we’re using better surveillance methods to stop this, crossing at the border. Now look, people are coming up because they want to work. You know, that, family values don’t stop at the border.
O’REILLY: Absolutely,
PRESIDENT BUSH: If you can make fifty cents in the interior of Mexico, and five bucks in uh, the interior of the United States, you're coming for the five bucks, and they're poor.
O’REILLY: Ninety percent of them are, but ten percent are bad guys.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, look, look,
O’REILLY: A lot of bad guys coming here.
PRESIDENT BUSH: I don't know how you got the ten percent number, maybe,
O’REILLY: The border patrol you know, incarceration, violent crime, that,
PRESIDENT BUSH: No question about it. It is a ter, serious issue. I happen to believe the best way to enhance the border is to have temporary worker cards available for people. And uh, I think it’s best for the employers who are employing these people, I think it’s best for the employees that are trying to find work. I think the long-term solution for this issue on our border is for Mexico to grow a middle class, that's why I believe in NAFTA (search),
O’REILLY: We’ll be in the grave.
PRESIDENT BUSH: I don't think so, it’s happening. Look, you, I wish I could have taken you down there and shown you the, the northern tier of states in Mexico, uh, ten years ago compared to today. I mean, it, it’s happening.
O’REILLY: You,
PRESIDENT BUSH: Free trade helps lift, lives, free trade develops commerce, free trade gives people a chance to realize their dreams. And so long as the wage differential is as big as it is, and so long as moms and dads feel the, necessity to feed their children, they're going to come and try to make a living.
O’REILLY: So you're not going to military militarize the border to stop,
PRESIDENT BUSH: No, we’re going to use the border patrol and beef it up, and make it, give it better technologies and better equipment to do its job.
O’REILLY: Okay. You know a lot of people are not going to like that answer, you know that.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Well it’s a, a truthful answer.
O’REILLY: Okay. Um,
PRESIDENT BUSH: I mean, as opposed as to what, putting a military on the border,
O’REILLY: Yeah, military to back up the border patrol, to just stop the, the, rampant,
PRESIDENT BUSH: No, I think the best way to do it is to give the border patrol the assets it needs to do its job.
So Mr. Bush totally ducks the questions, turns them into some economic issue and says basically we're going to keep doing what we're doing now. Which allows, according to what Bill says above,
3 million people to cross in every year. Obviously it's not working.
If we doubled the effectiveness of the border patrol we'd still have 1.5 million coming through every year.
So, I say to you Mr. Adnan G. El Shukrijumah, come on in. We know you're down there, we know you're planning to cross the border, we know you are planning to attack America in a devastating way and we're not going to do a damn thing to stop you! So come on up, we want you here according to the President.
Hat tip to California Yankee for the Shukrijumah story and The Command Post for a link to the O'Reilly transcript.
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