…unless they do.
DB2
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Which of these is larger, 8 miles or 2 thousand miles?
If there were two borders, one 8 miles long and one 2-thousand miles long, which would be easier and faster to build a wall, and to monitor it?
Maybe math is too hard, but I’m thinking it’s a little more complicated than pointing to a teensy tiny example and saying “See how easy? Now just do it 250 more times, and ignore the climate, geologic, aquatic, cultural, and all the other differences.”
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Why Alice? What does this mean?
@DrBob2 Inquiring minds want to know?
You mean we do not shoot to kill if you climb our wall? Or do you mean we offer political asylum?
And if the Pals come tomorrow with 11 meter ladders, like folks do at the US border, then what?
Steve
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Why would Arabs build a wall to keep out Arab brothers?
The Captain
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To force an issue that all of the lands be under Muslim control. Stand your ground.
These wars go back.
So, when people say “walls don’t work” they need to add qualifiers such as length, personnel and policy.
DB2
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Not really.
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Regional trade agreements and foreign aid work better and end up being more profitable in the long run for our side as well.
For example, Tesla pouring billions of dollars into the Mexico gigafactory will probably be far more effective at stemming the tide of refugees from the south than an equally expensive wall, while also helping US car parts and service providers.
What would also help would be to reduce our use of illegal drugs that support the cartels to the south who are the direct cause of much of this migration.
Solving the border problem using economics would at least allow us to keep the Statue of Liberty without feeling like total hypocrites.
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But then we may find ourselves short of laborers in the agricultural, home building, and hospitality fields since the job creators won’t be able to hire enough (legals or illegals).
Pete
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The only qualifier needed to add is “…in the long run”. Note the Iron Curtain, China’s great wall, Hadrian’s wall, the Maginot Line, walls found in any zombie apolcalypse movie, etc.
Far more profitable to try to get along with one’s neighbors.
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We are not in a war with Mexico.
The Israeli wall worked poorly all along.
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Neither are Egypt and Gaza. Neither are Greece and Turkey. Neither is Spain with its North African possessions.
DB2
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Let us try it this way. Mexico is not at war either.
Refugees are largely not originally from Mexico. A factory in Monterey is not going to do anything to deter people from Venezuela from coming to the USA. People from Venezuela will not be offered those jobs.
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Tesla pays line workers (assembly) MXN 55/HR about $3.20 USD. With bonus pay it comes to about $7,500 / year.
There is sufficient motivation to work in the United States. There are plenty of corporations willing to hire undocumented workers
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The number of illegal border crossing has significantly shifted away from Mexico and Guatemala/Honduras, but illegal encounters at the border for 2023 shows that Mexicans still are the highest count from a single country.
I think the subtly might be net migration.
Mexicans for a while now also go home.
Yes, but that misses the fact that Mexicans cross back and forth, and what matters is the net of in and out. According to the (somewhat murky) figures, Mexicans are now probably leaving USA in greater numbers than arriving.
see https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/MEX/mexico/net-migration
d fb
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I never suggested that the Tesla gigafactory was going to solve the entire migration problem, only that it was going to be more effective than a wall. Two things must happen for the southern border problem to go away. The first is that Central America must develop a climate sustainable economy. The second is that American citizens have to stop funding the drug cartels that are terrorizing Central America.
We can deal with both issues with some effort and doing so will be to our benefit. We will be a better society if there is less illicit drug use and a more prosperous regional economy.
To not do so will mean that we will have to continually build bigger walls and put an increasingly bigger army on the southern border. The refugees coming up from the south feel like they have no choice. They will keep on coming.
1 Like