Thursday, June 10, 2010

Another consequence of a wide-open lawless border.


Kindly explain the libertarian principles embodied by these.

I wrote about the The Botany of Illegal Immigration almost five years ago. And the trees continue to appear.

18 comments:

Witchwood said...

The ecological impact of illegals is something that is barely ever addressed. I for one see no reason to cede the cause of environmentalism to the Left.

I consider myself an environmentalist of the Edward Abbey school. Here's Ed's thoughts on immigration and private firearm ownership.

Anonymous said...

I am a libertarian who does not favor open borders.

George Reisman, one of only four men ever to be awarded a Phd. by Ludwig von Mises (Peace be upon him) is another:

"To the extent that a country has a welfare system, tax supported hospitals and schools, public housing and so on, and the immigrants come to take advantage of these offerings, the effect is a corresponding loss to the present inhabitants of the country, who have to pay the costs. The above proposition (open borders) applies to a country insofar as it is without these and other welfare-state-type programs--a country in which the immigrates must be self-supporting and themselves pay for whatever they receive."

You will find that many who belong to the "bobby socks" school of libertarianism decry immigration restriction as racist (sic) but they have more in common with the ACLU than they may wish to admit.

MALTHUS

Dave Lincoln said...

Witchwood, I'd like to explain that (your first sentence), for the case of the Sierra Club at least. It is one of the bigger environmental groups, with a lot of money to spend.

Just one donor, but a big donor, told that organization that he would suspend his donations if the Sierra club included any talk about overpopulation of the US (which is solely due to immigration, BTW - see NumbersUSA website). So, the Sierra Club, for one, can't speak about the main issue that underlies ALMOST EVERY environmental problem there is.

They will not touch it with the proverbial 10 foot pole, but they also won't be out there with an orange vest and 3 ft. pole either, picking up this trash. Most of those people don't pick up trash; they're more into talking trash.

parabarbarian said...

I don't get what libertarian principle your are trying to illustrate here. US and Mexican law insure that those trying to cross the border without the proper "papers" will seek help from outside the law. The logistics of smuggling large numbers of people requires a substantial infrastructure meaning that organized groups are better able to provide the service. Last time I checked, the folks doing this smuggling were not Catholics or Quakers but criminal gangs whose members routinely ignore the common human decencies.

The libertarian solution to rape is to arm the potential victims and their guardians but the law on both sides of the border makes that difficult bordering on impossible. It is no surprise to me that career criminals plus unarmed victims yields a bad outcome.

Anonymous said...

Absolutely disgusting.

Anonymous said...

Time for some border patrolling and S-S-S.

B Woodman
III-per

Anonymous said...

I expect to hear Billie Holliday singing "Strange Fruit" in the background.

B Woodman
III-per

Dennis308 said...

I have been living on the Mexican Border here just outside of Brownsville ten years and as of yet I have not seen one of these Rape Trees and I hope I Never do.I Know they exist I´ve heard to many stories before.But maybe it´s because the land owners and citizens of this small community do take care of(patrol)our lands.We still get people crossing from time to time but they don´t dawdle they get to there ¨safe houses¨as fast as they can.
To Witchwood,your Edward Abbey is correct about firearms and immigration,If the people of Mexico and most of the other Central and South America countries still had their arms then maybe they could take back their own countries.But after the Mexican Revolution one of the First things that the New Democratic(sic)Dictators did(after killing Pancho Via and Emilio Zapata)was Disarm the general populace.So there would be No Revolutions to dispose of Them.

Dennis
III
Texas

rexxhead said...

The libertarian principle involved:

If you make it difficult or impossible for people to do things legally, they will do those things illegally, often joining with others who are in the doing-things-illegally business.

People who want to do good things (like coming to America and working for a living) and are forced to do those good things illegally will work with people who do bad things illegally.

The solution is left as an exercise for the student.

Anonymous said...

This wasn't even a bad picture.

From a liberterian perspective as long as the klepto state robs the productive to give to these folks, open borders is plain stupid.

Personally I agree with Mark Steyn regarding his views on the subject.

Also property owners should be able to use ample force to deter destruction of their property and protection of their persons.

No nanny state and private property as sacrosanct then no problem.

Cory

Bill (Bad Cyborg) Mullins said...

I'm sorry but there is a simple solution for Mexican (and other nationalities) women who do not desire to be raped - STAY THE F**K OUTTA THE U.S.!!!!! DON'T COME HERE ILLEGALLY!!!

Of course we could also do with some enforcement efforts in the areas where the acts are taking place. I have a strong suspicion that none of the "rape trees" were used for a single incident. Someone could do a stake-out and when they caught some asshole raping a woman shoot the bastard. In Texas deadly force is justified to prevent sexual assault and aggravated sexual assault.

Kent McManigal said...

Since there IS a "border", and this happens anyway, I'm not sure what your point is, other than an attempt at justifying the unjustifiable; supporting a part of a tyrannical government you happen to like, while pointing out the parts of a tyrannical government you don't like.

Assuming the explanation of the tree is correct (not necessarily a given)...
The libertarian answer: Get rid of stupid "national borders" AND all the stupid "laws" against self defense and "keeping and bearing" ANY weapon you see fit for self-defense AND don't punish people for killing those who attack them- and then see how long rapists survive. It has zero- absolutely nothing- to do with open borders, which don't exist anyway.

Anonymous said...

George W. Bush, an otherwise decent man

?

Anonymous said...

Walter Williams, the well known and respected libertarian economist, has addressed this issue. Basically he said, there are 7 billion people in the world, if they all wanted to come here would we have to take them? Since the answer is clearly no (we couldn't even if we wanted to), there can be rational and reasonable limits put on immigration. That is the non-knee jerk libertarian position.

Witchwood said...

Well stated, Mr. Lincoln. As of right now, virtually all environmental groups in the U.S. are wedded to Leftist politics, so the Sierra Club would probably stay away from the immigration issue on its own (but perhaps I'm being unfair). Anyone who is for the environment and also for open borders has a crisis of philosophy, but advocating directly conflicting political causes is by now one of the standard strategies of the Left.

So there would be No Revolutions to dispose of Them.

True enough. As it is the illegals are willing pawns in Mexico's ongoing game, which is to send its worst elements far enough north so that they become someone else's problem. It should be understood that Mexico is a hostile foreign country.

People who want to do good things (like coming to America and working for a living) and are forced to do those good things illegally will work with people who do bad things illegally.

Coming to America to work or whatever else is not a fundamental human right. No borders = no sovereignty. And the gun-grabbers are all for giving amnesty to roughly 12 million illegals, who can be depended upon to vote for the gun-grabbers in perpetuity, so anyone who is for liberty has a vested interest in seeing this invasion halted.

Of course, I'm not a libertarian, so I don't particularly care what the libertarian answer is.

Happy D said...

Sorry to point out the obvious, again. Many Crimmigrants do not use our welfare systems.
So how would eliminating the welfare system change this? Beyond scale.

Oh right like the Anarchists and Socialists your theory is pure so it must work.
No matter how many must suffer even by your hands if necessary to make it work.

Dave Lincoln said...

Bull, HappyD. That is, unless you don't count free care at any emergency room, food stamp (excuse me, credit cards), and free education in Spanish for their kids.

Happy D said...

Sorry I should have checked back here sooner.
Dave I do not wish to be offensive but you are ignoring the evidence to fit the your favorite Libertarian narrative.
Many Crimmigrants avoid our systems earn money and leave. Call these the good Crimmigrants.
Many Crimmigrants come here earn money doing damage through criminal acts. Drug runners being the most prominent example then leave with massive damage in their wake.
Spare me the victimless crime lie that could only be true if they stayed in their home while screwed up.
I do not mean just while high!
If I could get back a fraction of the costs that I have incurred due to the actions of addicts I would be thousands of dollars richer.

Now many studies of both these groups have been done. So if you do not believe me look it up for yourself.