Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2018 | 2 a.m.
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I would like for readers to contemplate a few facts before making up their minds about the need for a border wall.
First, publicly available literature shows that over 60 percent of the smuggling of drugs and people across the southern border occurs at established border stations. So, adding expensive wall components at other remote places along the border would be a less effective deterrent than beefing up the established ports of entry. Second, there is a lucrative business smuggling people and drugs by boat around the wall in the Pacific Ocean. New expensive inland wall construction would do nothing to stop this route. Last, from what I read about the new prototype wall designs constructed near San Diego, most can be overcome by using a ladder or a tunnel. To be effective, those prototypes, like the current border, would require expensive and continuous observation by people or by electronic means — so they add no value.
A much less costly and much more effective deterrent would be to stop U.S. demand by properly classifying drug use as a sickness that can be treated in a hospital setting instead of as a crime resulting in years of taxpayer-funded incarceration in for-profit-prisons; and, requiring people who hire workers to rigorously verify the citizenship of those who apply and to not hire undocumented immigrants.
