El Filo de la Frontera

We're less than a week away from our departure from Portland, OR. Our friend Lisa, former KBOO volunteer, has offered to ferry us from the Northwest to the Southwest. We'll be leaving at about 5 am on Friday 16 Sept, and trying to make it all the way to San Diego in one day.

Though it seems almost incomprehensible, 16 hours - we will try to make it in a day. From there, to Calexico\Mexicali for "delete the border". While Bartolina and I have chosen Mexican Independence Day (Sept 16th, 1810) to initiate our cross-cultural bridge building, the Friends of the Border Patrol have chosen the same day to launch their "Border Watch". We'll show up there on the 17th, and collect audio.

http://www.deletetheborder.org/

Definition: cazainmigrantes - a person who hunts immigrants.

The timing is evocative. This is the perfect way to begin this expedition - from the end. A lot comes to an end at La Frontera del Norte. Cultures, values, economics, and lives. They are powerful places, geographic atherosclerosis. But like most conditions of this world, these hardened arteries have a greater effect on the poor than others. Over 130 deaths have been reported in the Arizona desert this year. My mother lives in Tucson, where I grew up. I was horrified to hear her exclaim, in frustration, "those people are stupid!" She means to refer, of course, to the high risk of death for crossing the Sonora desert - but it's painful to hear her say that.

It's a more complicated issue than stupidity. The question I return to is: If industry can move across borders at will, why can't people? In 1994, NAFTA opened up the borders for global trade. That has permitted maquiladoras to proliferate along the border, and brought people from further south up north to get jobs. It only makes sense for a company to move it's operations to Mexico, right? Fewer regulations, lower wages, limited labor rights, bigger paychecks for the company.

So, how is it that we can blame people for making the same decision? Would the minutemen advocate the elimination of maquilas because they export profits out of Mexico? NAFTA (and CAFTA, the Central American Free Trade Agreement) squeezes the people of Mexico and Central America up against the border...



In the 1990's, the US implemented a new tough border policy, focusing on the major arterials - San Ysidro, El Paso, Nogales. Cameras, surveillance planes, and a doubling of agents in the major areas... our borders are tougher, all right. But oddly, the number of immigrants entering each year has doubled since then, the number of arrests has doubled.. and the number dying in the desert.. well, it just didn't use to happen that way at all. 1998 was the first year the Border patrol kept track - 28 died that year, and that freaked people out. We're at 130 in Arizona this year. I'm glad we're counting, there's a lot of counting to do.

Oh, and the cost - about $480 million adjusted $$ in the 90s, and now? $1.4 billion per year.

NAFTA and Tough Borders - more expensive, deadlier, and less effective by any measure.