Human Borders is an American group setting up drinking water points in the desert in the Arizona - Mexico border. They are motivated by humanitarian feelings, trying to reduce the number of migrants dying in the desert and to invite public discourse on migration issues. They put up maps in Mexican border towns, like this one in Nogales, with disaussive legends (in Spanish) but showing walking distances and directions, and how to prepare for the expedition. This is what I call "encountered sentiments" - pro and contra. 
Its leadership is heavily religious: President, Felipe Lundin; President Emeritus, Rev. Robin Hoover; Faith Representative, Rev. Hal Cowart. Americans are a generous people.
6 comments:
Oh really. Would you also have praise for this if it were being set up in the Sinai?
Forgive me, if your post is meant sarcastically. It's a little subtle.
I have no praise for people helping to commit a crime - crossing illegally a border. I said that Americans are a generous people.
The fact is that I see so much on the internet against immigration - some very well written and intelligent blogs - that I wanted to see who and what is in the other side. I found generosity and good will.
As for me, count me among the law and order people, in Sinai as well in Arizona.
Not all of the charity directed at illegals is the result of generosity. The Diocese of Phoenix maintains an organization called the Arizona Catholic Conference, which is the lobbying arm of the Catholic Church in AZ. As far as I can tell the ACC is not just a local phenomenon but the Church hierarchy has mandated that every diocese in the country collaborate in setting up one of these lobbying organizations for every state in the union. These lobbying organizations actually have a national association with its own website here.
Prior to the 2008 election the ACC put together a candidate survey ranking all candidates on how they stood on issues considered critical to the Church. To give you an idea of the hidden influence of this organization look at point #8 on the candidate survey, which I will copy here:
8. Establishing and maintaining a statewide public defender’s office to provide adequate legal representation to those facing the death penalty.
If you go to this PDF maintained by the AZ Joint Legislative Budget committee on page 11 you will find a table entitled FY2011 General Fund Summary by Agency. In the FY2011 table you will find that the Capital Postconviction Public Defender's Ofc., State has been allocated $647k for FY2011. The head of the ACC once bragged that he was running the most influential lobbying organization in the state, and he also stated here that in the years prior to the passage of SB1070 he fought the passage of similar legislation in previous years.
This of course begs the question: Why is there no LDS Pioneer Conference? The answer is probably that the LDS church likes to stay out of migration politics since it sees itself in universal terms and invites Mestizo converts. This is common among Protestant churches too, which along with anti-racist feelings explain why they cannot be relied upon when dealing with the National Question. Of course, a lot of the Protestant Mormon politicians and voters have had their mental abilities reduced by their belief in free markets.
Finally, Tucson is a Democratic stronghold here in AZ. Essentially the entire Republican lead in politics here is fueled by all of the excess Republican voters in the Phoenix Metro Area. Without Phoenix Arizona would be New Mexico.
One more thing. Both Israel and the United States need a fence like this one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separation_barrier#South_Africa
It is a measure of how liberal even Apartheid South Africa was that a necessary fence was only constructed to protect wildlife in a national park and not across the entire border.
From the wiki article,
"According to a report recently published by the South African Catholic Bureau for Refugees, the fence has caused more deaths in three years than the Berlin Wall did in its entire history."
Mark Doane,
You have to marvel at the idiocy of that statement.
When we were teens, we would joke about how a tree ran out in front of a car and caused an accident.
I makes about as much sense.
Fences don't kill people. Duh.
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