Post mentioning David Neiwert #2

YOU ARE VISITING THE OLD MALKIN(S)WATCH. THAT'S FANTASTIC. PLEASE VISIT THE NEW MALKIN(S)WATCH WHEN YOU GET A CHANCE.

For a response to Malkin's new column, I'm going to defer to Mr. Neiwert again. The column:

April 1st, in case you haven't heard, is the launch of the Minuteman Project, an all-volunteer effort by law-abiding American citizens to call attention to the nation's wide open southern border. Hundreds of Americans from New York to Michigan to California will travel down to the U.S.-Mexico border for a month to monitor illegal aliens and alert immigration enforcement officials if they witness law-breaking.

Call it the mother of all neighborhood watch programs.

Malkin goes on to explain how the border militia is simply "exercising its free speech rights" and won't be involved in any actions beyond observation and reporting. But that liberal, America-hating ACLU has gotten involved and is oppressing these law-abiding patriots who will be armed only with cell phones and binoculars.

Neiwert disagrees:

The last "call to arms" issued by one of the Minuteman Project founders resulted in a handful of volunteers and unproven contentions that they had detained more than 4,000 illegal entrants...

In November 2002, Minuteman Project founder Chris Simcox said dozens of people would come out for his much-debated Civil Homeland Defense, the Tombstone-based group that was supposed to patrol the border, gather up illegal entrants, turn them over to the U.S. Border Patrol and show up the federal government for not doing its job.

The group has seized about 150 illegal entrants, a far cry from the 4,000 Simcox contends have been apprehended since he started two years ago, according to Miguel Escobar, Mexican consul in Douglas. The consulate responds to every citizen's encounter.

Whether it's 150 or 4,000, it's not much of a stretch to doubt that the Minutemen will content themselves with "monitoring" and "alerting."

The last time there was an organized militia roaming the border, American citizens were dragged out of their tents and threatened for the crime of being brown along the border. I think I know why the ACLU is nervous.