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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsA conservative challenged liberals to "make a case, not based on emotion" against trump's wall...
A conservative challenged liberal Facebook friends to make a case, not based on emotion against Trumps wall. Conservative buddies flooded his post with snide remarks about how this would be impossible for deluded libs.
Okay, Ill play, I responded. And in order to avoid being accused of bias, I explained that I would use only conservative sources to prove my point. My primary source was a policy paper by the Cato Institute, a conservative, rightwing think tank, along with other conservative voices (listed at the end of the piece). Heres why Im against the wall, I wrote:
1. Walls dont work. Illegal immigrants have tunneled underneath and/or erected ramps up and down walls to simply drive over them. People find a way. When East Germany erected its wall, it created a military zone, staffed by booted, machine-gun carrying guards ready to shoot to kill. Yet thousands managed to make it to West Germany anyway. More to the point, do we really want to model ourselves after communist East Germany?
2. Most illegal immigrants are overstayers. They come to the US legally for vacations, business, to study, etc. and then STAY past their visas. By 2012, overstayers accounted for 58% (THE MAJORITY!) of all unauthorized immigrants. A wall is meaningless here!
3. Walls have little impact on drugs being brought in to the US. According to the DEA, almost all drugs come in through legal points of entry, hidden in secret containers and/or among legit goods in tractor-trailers. A wall will have little to no impact on the influx of drugs into our country.
4. Its environmentally impractical. Walls have a hard time making it through extreme weather. For example, in 2011, a flood in Arizona washed away 40 feet of STEEL fencing. Torrential rains and raging waters do serious damage. Also, conservative sources generally do not address the environmental harm that walls create, but there is plenty of documentation available that show its potential for irreparable damage to both plant and animal life.
5. A wall would forces the U.S. government to take land from private citizens in eminent domain battles. Private citizens own much of the land slated for the wall. The costs of the government snatching private land and the legal battles that would ensue are incalculable.
6. Border patrol agents dont like concrete or steel walls because they block surveillance capabilities. In other words, they cant mobilize correctly to meet challenges. So in many ways, a wall makes their job more difficult.
7. Border patrol agents say, Walls are meaningless without agents and technology to back them up. Are we prepared to pour countless billions annually after the wall is built to create a nearly 2,000 mile, militarized 24-hour surveillance border operation? Because according to patrol agents, thats the only way a wall would work. Again, are we really, going to use East Germany, a brutal communist state, as our model here?
8. Where walls have been built, there was no discernable impact on the influx of unauthorized aliens. In other words, they came in elsewhere, primarily where natural barriers such as water or mountainous regions precluded a wall.
9. An unintended consequence is that a wall blocks farmworkers from EXITING when their invaluable seasonal work is done. Farmers are against the wall because it makes getting cheap seasonal labor almost impossible as few American citizens want or can even do those jobs. And if seasonal worker do get in, a wall makes it harder for them to leave! A wall traps migrant farm laborers in our country.
10. Trumps $5 billion is a laughable drop in the bucket for what would ACTUALLY be needed. For example, according to the Cato Institute: An estimate for a border wall area that only covered 700 miles was originally 1.2 billion. How much did it REALLY cost? SEVEN BILLION. And thats only for 700 miles. Whatever we think its going to cost, experience shows us we have to multiply it by more than 500%.
11. According to MIT engineers, the wall would cost $31.2 billion. Homeland Security estimates it at $22 billion. Given the pattern of spending mentioned in number 10 (plus Murphys Law), that means were really talking about pouring endless billions into something that doesnt even work. And, of course, we taxpayers will be footing the bill, not Mexico. Given all the drawbacks, is that REALLY the best use of our taxes?
As the conservatives of the Cato Institute put it, President Trumps wall would be a mammoth expenditure that would have little impact on illegal immigration. (Emphasis mine) Also it would create many direct harms: the spending, the taxes, the eminent domain abuse, and the decrease in immigrants freedoms of movement.
And, we must add, since conservative sources do not that the environmental harms are likely to be severe.
In other words, the facts show that walls dont work and they create even bigger, more expensive problems.
So what happened after I posted this conservative-sourced, fact-based list of why the wall is a bad idea?
Silence.
I waited for someone to respond, to engage with me. Where were the angry defenses or rebuttals? But when I searched for the post after a few days, I couldnt find it.
My FB friend had deleted it. You could say, like Trump with the government, he shut me down rather than deal with the facts.
The ugly genius of Trump is his ability to manipulate deep, primal emotions namely fear and hate. He, along with Fox News, have convinced his base that they are in extreme danger from immigrants and only a wall will make them safe.
Unfortunately, the need to feel safe is much stronger than the will to grapple with a complex, multi-faceted problem.
And so, here we are, paralyzed by shutdowns at every turn.
Conservative Sources Outlining the Uselessness of Trumps Wall:
The Cato Institute: https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/why-wall-wont-work
Former Reagan staffer and Tea-Party liaison: https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2011/10/12/the-conservative-case-against-a-border-fence-trying-to-stop-illegal-immigration-with-a-really-big-fence-would-be-a-futile-waste-of-money
Chicago Tribune (conservative paper): https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-perspec-chapman-trump-wall-mexico-immigration-20180314-story.html
The National Review (conservative magazine): https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/04/donald-trump-border-wall-plan-ridiculous-guaranteed-failure/
Nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute (MPI) think tank: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/borders-and-walls-do-barriers-deter-unauthorized-migration
CREDIT: https://medium.com/@vickyalvearshecter/what-happened-when-a-trump-supporter-challenged-me-about-the-wall-e54e86a5edd1
Facebook post credit: Daniel James Holloway
spooky3
(34,401 posts)TheFarseer
(9,317 posts)Thanks for laying out the case.
LakeArenal
(28,798 posts)Last edited Wed Jan 16, 2019, 02:20 AM - Edit history (1)
Alaskas Road To Nowhere. A three mile access road that was $223,000,000.
B Stieg
(2,410 posts)Hitler thought a wall on the sea would work; Rommel knew it wouldn't. It didn't.
Like antivirus software or car alarms, walls only slow--not stop--invaders.
Maru Kitteh
(28,313 posts)GREAT THREAD!!!
pnwmom
(108,955 posts)Wall expert Amy Patrick explains why the wall is "a disaster of numerous types waiting to happen."
"Structurally and civil engineering-wise, the border wall is not a feasible project," Patrick began. "Trump did not hire engineers to design the thing. He solicited bids from contractors, not engineers. This means its not been designed by professionals. Its a disaster of numerous types waiting to happen."
https://www.engineering.com/BIM/ArticleID/17599/Writing-on-the-Wall-Report-Suggests-Border-Project-Is-Off-Track-and-Over-Budget.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1kDcI9yVDWGZkXjpycL-BdAhjXwjL9KUHKpXvJRMzwBi9ZceQDfxfvvqk
One possible answer is the chaos surrounding the bid submission process. CBP opened its call for proposals in March 2017, and gave potential bidders just 12 days to submit their proposals (in comparison, the industry standard is 30 days). During those 12 days, CBP added seven amendments to its original requests for proposals, and extended the deadline just hours before the original deadline.
Heartstrings
(7,349 posts)pnwmom
(108,955 posts)SunSeeker
(51,504 posts)Fullduplexxx
(7,840 posts)ProfessorGAC
(64,827 posts)... You probably could have started with "You first!"
The attraction of PINO and the stupid symbolic wall is rooted in fear.
Fear is an emotion.
I'm guessing the OP could not provide a reason for the wall not rooted in irrational fear.
erpowers
(9,350 posts)Aren't Conservatives the people making emotional arguments. What facts are conservatives using to make their arguments? Trump and other Republicans keep bringing up emotional stories as reasons why we need a border wall. It seems to be the Democrats who have been using facts, like the wall will not work and most illegal drugs flow into America through leagal ports.