Pro or Con for Border Control?

[Wild Cobra]

A few days ago, a group of armed men came across the border with military weapons and executed a rival drug operative in Phoenix. If we had good border control, the likelihood of this would have decreased. However, we do have one less drug operative running loose.

Details are sketchy. Various reports say different things. I heard a rather complete account on talk radio as to the vehicles used, escaped, left behind, etc.

The account I heard says this is a rather common practice, that Drug Lords send hit squads across the border to execute rivals. It is just rare that they get caught to verify this is what happened. I would guess it makes it even harder to prosecute the person who contracts the hits because it occurs in two very different jurisdictions.

Now a part of me doesn't mind one less pusher to be alive. The vigilante part of me appreciates it. However, these groups would kill any neighbors nearby who were in the way without hesitation. Could one of you in Texas live next to a drug rival, not know it, and come home one day to find your family dead?

One of many articles if you search:

ICE: No Proof Home Invasion Suspects Part of Mexican Militia

[ElNono]

A few days ago, a group of armed men came across the border with military weapons and executed a rival drug operative in Phoenix. If we had good border control, the likelihood of this would have decreased. However, we do have one less drug operative running loose.

Details are sketchy. Various reports say different things. I heard a rather complete account on talk radio as to the vehicles used, escaped, left behind, etc.

The account I heard says this is a rather common practice, that Drug Lords send hit squads across the border to execute rivals. It is just rare that they get caught to verify this is what happened. I would guess it makes it even harder to prosecute the person who contracts the hits because it occurs in two very different jurisdictions.

Now a part of me doesn't mind one less pusher to be alive. The vigilante part of me appreciates it. However, these groups would kill any neighbors nearby who were in the way without hesitation. Could one of you in Texas live next to a drug rival, not know it, and come home one day to find your family dead?

One of many articles if you search:

ICE: No Proof Home Invasion Suspects Part of Mexican Militia

This just goes to show how big is the hole at the border. Just as these people go in and out with weapons and drugs like that, what's to prevent a radical nutjob to enter through the same hole with some bomb/virus/etc?
Border control makes complete sense. You can't have a sound security policy without it. Even if they want to hand out temporary 'work' visas to some people, it's better to do that and be able to have some control (background checks, records of who got in, where and when) than this whole outlaw system.

[Anti.Hero]

The only border you can hope to defend in this country anymore is your own front door.

[Nbadan]

To think that some rogue group could get through our southern border with a WMD is naive...if some group wanted to infect the U.S. with a deadly virus it could do so much more effectively by putting a few people infected with said virus on international flights headed to the U.S.....and we have many 'assets' in Mexico and other countries that provide us with valuable information about possible threats....

....as far as the drug wars, these gangs have people that work for them on both sides of the border, including Mex and U.S. border control agents....the only way to control these gangs is to take the profit motive away from drugs and drug dealing....

[sabar]

If it's the Mexican Mafia then a tight border wouldn't do much anyways. When these guys get on parole they go back to the slaughter. There are sects (or whatever gang divisions are called) all over the southwest. They regularly order hits on rivals (and their families) from within federal prison. The hitman is usually a new young inner-city youth trying to prove himself.

Anyways border control makes sense for other reasons.

Drug controls don't matter by the way. Gangs originally operated off extortion and contract murder and the Mexican Mafia is excellent at both. Yeah, drugs are part of it, but not the solution unfortunately.