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Still think we don't need a wall?


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2016 May 19, 11:39am   14,425 views  57 comments

by Shaman   ➕follow (4)   💰tip   ignore  

http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/05/18/cartel-members-kidnap-texas-man-for-ransom-take-him-to-mexico/

Texas — Mexican cartel members kidnapped an American citizen in this border city and crossed him into Mexico and then demanded ransom money from his family. The region is controlled by the Gulf Cartel and outsiders engaging in kidnapping for ransom in their territory does not occur. The Mexican neighborhood where the victim was held is also a stronghold for the Gulf Cartel and considered a major base for their cross-border operations into the Rio Grande Valley Sector of Texas.

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1   georgeliberte   2016 May 19, 12:11pm  

And the wall would have jumped right in there and prevented it?

2   HydroCabron   2016 May 19, 12:32pm  

This anecdote proves we should spend billions.

All the statistics and piles of dead children in school shootings don't mean shit for public policy purposes, however.

3   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 12:40pm  

Guess what Pat.net assholes. While you whine and complain,

The wall just got 10 feet higher!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

4   Shaman   2016 May 19, 1:23pm  

They don't call them wetbacks for no reason you know. How about an electrified fence? Anywhere in the neighborhood of 4160volts should be fine.

5   NuttBoxer   2016 May 19, 1:27pm  

Another case of knee-jerk reaction because root cause is never understood. How much money and power can a drug cartel wield when drugs become legal, and people stop buying from these scum? Walls won't stop the war on us, or prevent any of its fallout, like this kidnapping.

6   🎂 Tenpoundbass   2016 May 19, 1:55pm  

georgeliberte says

And the wall would have jumped right in there and prevented it?

No just added another layer of excitement as the Perps in this case would have had to hoist the kidnapped victims up and over the wall.
Due diligence is that too much to ask for?

7   Shaman   2016 May 19, 1:57pm  

I think we could ask for some broken glass to be cemented along the top of the wall. Maybe use empty bottles of Dos Equis so it can be the most interesting wall in the world?

8   anonymous   2016 May 19, 2:06pm  

Building the wall is up there near the top of stupid ideas

I work too damn hard to have my tax dollars wasted on something so stupid

9   Shaman   2016 May 19, 3:59pm  

errc says

I work too damn hard to have my tax dollars wasted on something so stupid

1) You're unaffected in PA by illegal immigrant issues, so your flippant opinion lacks merit.
2) Trump keeps saying Mexico will pay for the wall. Maybe he means it?
3) not once did you explain how the idea is so incredibly stupid. This turns an otherwise average opinion into a pile of stinking 💩

10   Sharingmyintelligencewiththedumbasses   2016 May 19, 4:13pm  

Quigley says

errc says

I work too damn hard to have my tax dollars wasted on something so stupid

1) You're unaffected in PA by illegal immigrant issues, so your flippant opinion lacks merit.

2) Trump keeps saying Mexico will pay for the wall. Maybe he means it?

3) not once did you explain how the idea is so incredibly stupid. This turns an otherwise average opinion into a pile of stinking 💩

Well, since you are very stupid, I'll do this in slow motion for you:
1. It will cost much more like 20 billion. that comes from executives in companies that build walls. NOT counting the extra expense of building in in inaccessible places that don't even have concrete manufacturing near by, or roads to deliver it on.
2. Maintenance could be in the billion a year range.
3. it will need constant surveillance, since it is easy to tunnel under a wall, but that could lead to it toppling over.
4. There isn't an exact "on the border" even the small parts of the wall built last go round left americans, golf courses, homes etc on the wrong side of the wall, since like with a road, you can't just put a wall anywhere, hills, cliffs, poor soil and bedrock will force it be placed off the border, on our side.
5. Net migration by foot has been negative. YEP despite what you hear on faux news, more undocumented people leave at the border than come in illegally.
6. fully half of those in the US are here after coming in with a visa, then not leaving. I doubt your wall will stop planes.
7. Environmental disaster, as there are quite a few species that aren't aware of the border, and their terrain straddles the border.
8. drugs can easily be tossed over the wall with an air cannon, like you see shooting t shirts at ball games.
9. drugs can easily be flown over the wall with a drone.
10. a 50 foot ladder can be cobbled together out of 2x4's in a few minutes, by anyone who knows how to use a hammer and nails.
11. Repelling off of a 50 foot wall is childs play, 50 foot of static cord that could hold 500lbs will cost next to nothing in any hardware store.

And "mexico is going to pay for it" is equally moronic. There will be repercussions, in the form of counter tariffs on americans, and a possible trade war. With our third biggest trading partner… great idea.

or to watch a hilarious video taking this dumb shit idea apart:

11   🎂 Tenpoundbass   2016 May 19, 4:15pm  

errc says

I work too damn hard to have my tax dollars wasted on something so stupid

But you have no problem with paying for all of the Walls near the highways to keep the traffic noise out, and to help Marge raise the price of historically crappy Real Estate because it was near i95?
And what about all of those walls around gated communities and upper end parts of the City where the City actually upkeeps the wall because it's on the city swell?
What about all of those fences around top secret facilities, think they just asked John to puck up the tab? Walls and fences all over the damned place, I don't get the sanctamonious butt hurt over this.
It's just popular JoobJube to do. It sounds progressivly hip to bitch about that racist Donald Trump, "Man Fuck Donald Trump!" I bet a shit load of dudes out there getting laid by all of the blue haired ladies saying that shit.

"Fuck Donald Trump!"
"tee Hee!"
"Yo How YOU Do'in?"

Fuck the Wall!

12   marcus   2016 May 19, 5:14pm  

Tenpoundbass says

Walls and fences all over the damned place, I don't get the sanctamonious butt hurt over this.

You cal it sanctimonious butt hurt. People with an IQ over 80 call it facts and common sense.

Common sense can tell you not only why it's stupid as SMIWDA did above, but also inform you as to why idiots like the idea so much.

But it won't work and would be a massive waste of money.

The following two facts alone should do it for you, if your world view wasn't pure emotion.

Sharingmyintelligencewiththedumbasses says

5. Net migration by foot has been negative. YEP despite what you hear on faux news, more undocumented people leave at the border than come in illegally.

6. fully half of those in the US are here after coming in with a visa, then not leaving. I doubt your wall will stop planes.

13   RWSGFY   2016 May 19, 5:27pm  

Wall won't have prevented it. Simple exit control on the border with Mexico would make dragging unwilling dude across the border in a trunk practically impossible. Right now nobody gives a shit what's in your trunk when you go from US to Mexico.

14   MisdemeanorRebel   2016 May 19, 5:29pm  

It's impossible to build a wall along the flat semi-arid plains flanking the Rio Grande - have you seen the terrain? And it would take such advanced technology.

It's not like the Great Wall is almost double the length of the entire US-Mexican border - of actual wall, not just defensive positions and fortified places.

How to pay for it?

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/mexico/remittances

15   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 5:42pm  

thunderlips11 says

It's impossible to build a wall along the flat semi-arid plains flanking the Rio Grande - have you seen the terrain? And it would take such advanced technology.

Of course it CAN be done. The issue is if the cost is worth the utility of a wall.

Personally, I think there are a lot of better ways to spend $20 Billion.

16   curious2   2016 May 19, 5:44pm  

tatupu70 says

Personally, I think there are a lot of better ways to spend $20 Billion.

But can you make Mexico pay for them?

17   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 5:45pm  

curious2 says

But can you make Mexico pay for them?

I doubt it. Just like you can't make Mexico pay for the wall.

18   curious2   2016 May 19, 5:47pm  

Do you agree to building a wall if Mexico pays for it?

19   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 5:49pm  

curious2 says

Do you agree to building a wall if Mexico pays for it?

Mexico is already on record saying they won't pay for it, so the question is moot.

20   anonymous   2016 May 19, 6:02pm  

The idea is stupid because it serves no purpose.

So we build a big ass wall along the border with Mexico. Mexico pays for it. What changes?

21   MisdemeanorRebel   2016 May 19, 6:03pm  

tatupu70 says

Mexico is already on record saying they won't pay for it, so the question is moot.

They'll lose an annual ~$50B Trade Surplus each and every year so as not to finance a $20B wall over years?

22   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 6:05pm  

thunderlips11 says

They'll lose an annual ~$30B Trade Surplus so as not to finance a $20B wall over years?

Nope--what would happen is that they would still have a $30B trade surplus with no wall.

Or they'll have a $30B trade surplus and a wall that was paid for by the US taxpayer

23   MisdemeanorRebel   2016 May 19, 6:05pm  

(I adjusted the amounts, it's much higher)

tatupu70 says

Nope--what would happen is that they would still have a $30B trade surplus with no wall.

How? You build the wall, or we abrogate NAFTA.

PS, Presidents have unilaterally abrogated Treaties (though the Senate later agreed and claimed it had the privilege of approving it); it's a grey area of law. Constitution only requires the Senate to agree to Treaties the President makes, says nothing about the President abrogating them.

Both Lincoln and McKinley abrogated Treaties.

24   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 6:08pm  

thunderlips11 says

How? You build the wall, or we abrogate NAFTA.

#1--Trump can't abrogate NAFTA unilaterally.
#2--Mexico will still have a trade surplus absent NAFTA

25   MisdemeanorRebel   2016 May 19, 6:11pm  

tatupu70 says

#1--Trump can't abrogate NAFTA unilaterally.

Sure Can.

Both Lincoln and McKinley abrogated Treaties.

Examples of treaty terminations in which the President acted alone are much disputed with respect both to facts and to the underlying legal circumstances.361 Apparently, President Lincoln was the first to give notice of termination in the absence of prior congressional authorization or direction, and Congress shortly thereafter by joint resolution ratified his action.362 The first such action by the President, with no such subsequent congressional action, appears to be that of President McKinley in 1899, in terminating an 1850 treaty with Switzerland, but the action may be explainable as the treaty being inconsistent with a subsequently enacted law.363 Other such renunciations by the President acting on his own have been similarly explained, and similarly the explanations have been controverted. While the Department of State, in setting forth legal justification for President Carter’s notice of termination of the treaty with Taiwan, cited many examples of the President acting alone, many of these are ambiguous and may be explained away by, i.e., conflicts with later statutes, changed circumstances, or the like.364


https://www.law.cornell.edu/anncon/html/art2frag19_user.html

With NAFTA as unpopular as it is, it will be very difficult for the Senate to reject an abrogation, not including the Constitutional Authority battle they very well might not win. The Constitution only expressly allows the Senate to approve Treaties the President makes. Otherwise it invests the President with near-total foreign policy powers.

tatupu70 says

#2--Mexico will still have a trade surplus absent NAFTA

NAFTA eliminates almost all tariffs. Without NAFTA, there is no barrier to tariffs on Mexico.

26   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 6:14pm  

thunderlips11 says

Sure Can

Not really. You go on to say that he will need Senate support.

thunderlips11 says

NAFTA eliminates almost all tariffs. Without NAFTA, there is no barrier to tariffs on Mexico.

Yes. So, you then have to establish tariffs. But even after you have done that, you won't end the Mexican surplus--at best you will narrow it a bit.

27   MisdemeanorRebel   2016 May 19, 6:18pm  

tatupu70 says

Not really. You go on to say that he will need Senate support.

Nope. No express consent by the Senate required in the Constitution to abrogate treaties, only to approve them when they're made. Grey Area heavily weighted towards presidential foreign policy powers.

tatupu70 says

Yes. So, you then have to establish tariffs. But even after you have done that, you won't end the Mexican surplus--at best you will narrow it a bit.

I think a 35% tariff will do just great. If NAFTA is abrogated, I wonder if Tariffs return to what they were before.

Good luck with Congress trying to fight Trump on keeping NAFTA and free trade with Mexico - totally unpopular policy. Be great if he were to do this around Summer 2018, a few months before the off-year elections, to make all the neoliberal Clintonistas and country club Republicans explain their militant re-instatement of NAFTA to their voters.

Another example: Carter abrogates the Taiwan Treaty:

No such ambiguity accompanied President Carter’s action on the Taiwan treaty,365 and a somewhat lengthy Senate debate was provoked. In the end, the Senate on a preliminary vote approved a “sense of the Senate” resolution claiming for itself a consenting role in the termination of treaties, but no final vote was ever taken and the Senate thus did not place itself in conflict with the President.366 However, several Members of Congress went to court to contest the termination, apparently the first time a judicial resolu[p.491]tion of the question had been sought. A divided Court of Appeals, on the merits, held that presidential action was sufficient by itself to terminate treaties, but the Supreme Court, no majority agreeing on a common ground, vacated that decision and instructed the trial court to dismiss the suit.367 While no opinion of the Court bars future litigation, it appears that the political question doctrine or some other rule of judicial restraint will leave such disputes to the contending forces of the political branches.368

https://www.law.cornell.edu/anncon/html/art2frag19_user.html

The Senate never voted to approve Carter's abrogation. Appeals Court narrowly in favor of Carter, SCOTUS vacated the whole thing, and the unilateral abrogation stood.

28   Dan8267   2016 May 19, 6:29pm  

Quigley says

Mexican cartel members kidnapped an American citizen in this border city and crossed him into Mexico and then demanded ransom money from his family.

By that logic, we need to immediately ban all cars. They kill way more people than are taken for ransom to Mexico by like many orders of magnitude.

On costs alone, you are proposing spending billions of dollars per kidnapped American. When do we get that level of funding for our personal safety? And couldn't we spend it better saving tens of thousands of American lives who are lost each winter as the homeless die of hypothermia?

29   Dan8267   2016 May 19, 6:31pm  

If you want a wall, you pay for it. Don't tax me for it. I don't want it that bad.

Let the free market decide if there should be a wall. Let private citizens fund private enterprise to build it with their private funds. A publicly funded wall is nothing less than massive socialism.

30   zzyzzx   2016 May 19, 6:35pm  

errc says

I work too damn hard to have my tax dollars wasted on something so stupid

Mexicans will pay for it. They will also benefit greatly when the flow of drugs into the US from Mexico is stopped and the cartels in Mexico lose their source of income.

31   zzyzzx   2016 May 19, 6:35pm  

zzyzzx says

Let private citizens fund private enterprise to build it with their private funds. A publicly funded wall is nothing less than massive socialism.

It can be funded from remittances going to Mexico or a tariff on Mexican goods entering the US.

32   curious2   2016 May 19, 6:49pm  

zzyzzx says

Mexicans will pay for it. They will also benefit greatly when the flow of drugs into the US from Mexico is stopped and the cartels in Mexico lose their source of income.

I keep seeing reports of tunnels, which a wall might not stop, but a cheaper and more effective way to stop the cartels would be to end the drug "war". We've been arming at least two supposedly opposite sides of that war, between the Mérida Initiative and Fast&Furious, so the body count south of the border is essentially made in USA.

33   tatupu70   2016 May 19, 6:51pm  

The funny thing is that if Trump or anyone here wanted to really hinder illegal immigration, they could do it for a LOT less than $20B and without a wall.

Simply enforce the laws already on the books against companies and executives hiring illegals. If Mexicans know that it will be impossible to get a job in the US, they won't come here.

You don't see Trump advocating for that, however. Because it doesn't have the same effect on the right wing crazies as building a 10 foot wall does...

34   HydroCabron   2016 May 19, 6:54pm  

tatupu70 says

The funny thing is that if Trump or anyone here wanted to really hinder illegal immigration, they could do it for a LOT less than $20B and without a wall.

It's much simpler to explain all this if you suppose that Trump is lying.

35   🎂 Tenpoundbass   2016 May 19, 7:11pm  

We could also tax Taco Bell to help pay for it.

36   Dan8267   2016 May 19, 7:22pm  

curious2 says

I keep seeing reports of tunnels, which a wall might not stop,

Most of the "illegal immigrants" arrived on airplanes and then just didn't leave when their visas expired. Airplanes fly at 36,000 feet. Unless you build a wall over 40,000 feet tall, you aren't going to stop all those American Airlines and Delta flights carrying Mexicans into the United States.

Building such a wall is not technologically possible, would fuck up climate if built, and would cost about several thousand times the entire GDP of the United States. The wall is a just plain stupid idea.

37   FortWayne   2016 May 19, 7:54pm  

I still think we should just send in our military and take over Mexico. Annex it as 51st state to the union.

Few month of martial law and suspended human rights and we can clear up all the drug and gangs pretty fast.

38   Y   2016 May 19, 9:36pm  

cheaper to just declare the first 20 miles inside the us border a military test missile range, then flood the area with cheap drones programmed to shoot on site anything that moves...then turn the whole fucker over to skynet for logistics...

39   Ceffer   2016 May 20, 12:16am  

If we used illegal aliens to build the wall, it would be a lot cheaper.

40   Sharingmyintelligencewiththedumbasses   2016 May 20, 12:38am  

thunderlips11 says

How? You build the wall, or we abrogate NAFTA.

you and precisely zero economists think this is a good idea. Trade wars hurt both countries, so as is par for the course for trump supporters and most posters on here, you are either real fucking stupid, or blinded by hubris and bigotry. No other option. FortWayne says

still think we should just send in our military and take over Mexico. Annex it as 51st state to the union.

Few month of martial law and suspended human rights and we can clear up all the drug and gangs pretty fast.

fortwhine, you don't get to start a sentence with "I think" ever. You've never thought in your life. But, just because I'm feeling generous, I'll actually respond to you, an intellectual gift to an inferior, if you will: How has nation building been working out for the USA in Iraq? Afghanistan? SO, you really think taking on another is a good idea?

AND if we made mexico the 51st state, then all 150 millions would become AMERICANS with free right to travel anywhere else in the US they chose, which seems to run counter to the normal racist sentiment on here, that you guys want to send Mexicans out of here.

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