Official foolishness - fencing the U.S.-Canada border

[n2doc]

BY JOEL CONNELLY, SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF
Published 11:18 p.m., Tuesday, October 4, 2011

A Seattle friend is still wondering how America was made more secure by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency checkpoint that stopped and inspected his car up in Newhalem on the North Cascades Highway.
It would have taken a terrorist who was a world class rock climber to do an alpine traverse from Chilliwack Lake in British Columbia, up over 8,900-foot Mt. Redoubt, through mile-high cliffs of the wild Picket Range and down through the slide alder of Goodell Creek to arrive at S.R. 20.
We've seen a sixfold increase in federal agents patrolling at or near the 4,000-mile-long U.S.-Canada border since Sept. 11, 2001. Human traffickers and smugglers of B.C. Bud find life a lot more challenging than in days when the world's longest peaceful border suffered an excess of inattention.
Alas, the National Security State can never limit itself to the reasonable and practical. It is prone to excess: An example, wanting to fence portions of America's border with the Great White North.


Read more: http://www.seattlepi.com/local/connelly/article/Official-foolishness-fencing-the-U-S-Canada-2202620.php

[L. Coyote]

1. To keep the workers in?

[ileus]

2. Looks like we care about our friends to the North.

[Turbineguy]

3. It's probably part of a cunning plan

by the Canadians. Keep the Americans out and get them to pay the costs.

[MADem]

4. The Canadians will gladly sell us the lumber for the effort, I'm sure.

It's one thing for a 'terrist' to walk/climb in, but if they want to carry in a bunch of nefarious crap, they'll have to smile at the border guard.

We're not quite at the point where we leave the door open, but fencing would be absurdly expensive/ineffective. People would cut through the Native American tribal areas, that couldn't be effectively fenced as some are plopped right on the border.

[JBoy]

5. I like the border the way it is. I ride my bike along here all the time:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqPJLGLlEoE

Zero avenue runs for miles, right along the border in Canada. There are a couple of spots where I can wave to my American neighbours sitting out on their back patio. I love it.