Drawing the Line

Kudos for the "Crossing the Line" article (December 19). First let me say that it's the winners that get to draw the line, label things and pass laws saying what behavior is illegal and what those penalties are. That said, the hypocrisy of the U.S. government is breathtaking.

We do have a legal channel for immigration. I have a friend, a Pakistani engineer, who waited three years to enter the U.S. on a work visa, and who became a U.S. citizen in 1976. Yet well over a million people flow across our southern border each year, if Leo Banks' numbers are accurate, making a mockery of my friend's three-year wait and endless paperwork.

There is a border. Whether it is right or just to label people born on one side of a line who have crossed that line "illegal" is not the point. We already know the hypocrisy at work in the system. Every day people's lives are ruined because possession of a certain herb is declared illegal. The real question is, why are one set of "illegals" persecuted beyond sense and another set of "illegals" mostly ignored?

If international borders and existing terms of law have any meaning at all, then the United States is in fact enduring a slow-motion invasion from the south. This country has the largest military on earth, and the best the geniuses in Washington can do with it is foam at the mouth over a non-enemy 8,000 miles away.

If the U.S. government wished to stop this invasion, it could. Since it does not, it means that the fix is in; the U.S. economy enjoys a steady influx of low-wage workers who theoretically don't participate in the benefits structure allowed to citizens. So we have under-enforcement on the U.S. side of the border; a tacit acceptance of the status quo. The Mexican government is also unlikely to do anything substantive to stem the tide; El Norte is a handy population-vent for a country beset with poverty and explosive population growth.

On a karmic level, it may be seen as a disgrace for one set of people to have so much, gained, perhaps, at the expense of the rest of the world. Does this mean that that by looking the other way, the U.S. and Mexican governments are endeavoring to close the prosperity gap between our two nations, with entirely spiritual motives? Nah.

So, this is a complex issue; but for U.S. border-area ranchers, the reality is that they are enduring, with two governments' tacit approval, a seven-day-a-week invasion across their land and into their homes. I'd be packing, too. (Note the cute double-entendre: "packing" as in "to leave" or as in "a firearm." You choose.)

--Karl Moeller

Illegal Acts

Thank you for the well-written article (it's about time!) about the potential war on the border by Leo Banks telling it like it is ("Crossing the Line," December 19). Leo talks about it being a matter of time until blood is spilled in certain counties in Arizona. Well, what about the blood, American blood, that has already been spilled and continues to be spilled by illegals? Are Americans' deaths any less outrageous if they happen in Texas, California, Pima County than if they happen in Cochise or Santa Cruz County? Three thousand Americans died last year from Arab terrorists--several of them illegals. Chris Eggles, a young Forest Ranger, was murdered recently by Mexican illegals. Camacho Navarrete, who murdered a young American theology student (who was trying to save an old man being beaten to death by a band of Navarrete's illegal buddies), was just caught trying to sneak back into the U.S. He is a Salvadoran illegal. What about the 36 (that's just the ones they know about) murdered U.S. citizens by the accused murderer Francisco Resendez Ramirez, a Mexican illegal?

This has nothing to do with racism. This has everything to do with protecting the American people. Americans have a right to protect themselves especially if the government refuses. The fact that the government is even refusing to protect our people is beyond belief. This is not immigration, it is "criminal chaos." When a "real" immigrant comes in legally, Americans are not murdered, raped or robbed or anything else. Our hospitals and schools don't go broke. Our welfare system is not depleted.

There is a reason for our laws and our immigration system and that is to protect Americans from foreign criminals, terrorists, drug dealers and contagious diseases to people and our food supply (an incredible danger even today!). Arabs from nine Arabic countries have been caught this year alone sneaking through the Mexican border. How many are terrorists? We don't know who they are nor where they are. And they continue to come. Thank you, Leo Banks, thank you Tucson Weekly but let's not forget the Americans who have already died at the hands of illegals. Not another American should die because of illegals!

--Laura Leighton

He Doesn't Really Like His Style

Few people display more arrogance than pseudo-intellectuals. I refer to James DiGiovanna, one of your film reviewers. For instance, in the opening of his review of the second Lord of the Rings ("Supreme Sequel," December 26), he refers to "episodes with deus ex machina endings." Are readers supposed to be impressed by the fact that he knows Latin? Or would they prefer knowing what that term means?

As for his writing in general, he seems to be one of those individuals who never met an adverb he didn't like. He really likes "really," for instance. (I counted three uses of the word in the review mentioned.)

If I remember my Strunk and White (The Elements of Style) from many, many years ago, a suggestion was that you try leaving the adverbs out and see if the meaning changes. It most often doesn't, especially with the word "really."

I think you should have Renée Downing check the writing in your newspaper--Mr. DiGiovanna's use (or non-use) of the subjunctive, for instance. Perhaps you should have your writers--Mr. DiGiovanna, of course--read Strunk and White, in which it is said that the most important thing in writing is clarity; and also George Orwell's essay "Politics and the English Language," in which he says to try to avoid using foreign words or phrases.

--B.Decker

Quiet in Phoenix

In reference to Margaret Regan's "Hall Monitor" (December 26), I feel your pain Margaret.

With my favorite seats for my favorite performances at beautiful Centennial Hall costing up to $60 (sometimes $75) a seat, a night out with a date starts at $120. I have learned over the years that the solution to rude spectators is simple. If the performance is important to me, and the cost high enough, I go to Phoenix. It's worth the extra driving for no late seaters and no interruptions.

--William Reyes