resolution: The Border fence is beneficial to America

1. The resolution is that the border fence is beneficial. Whether there might be something more beneficial is irrelevant to the debate. Guns are smuggled into Mexico. A border fence would certainly reduce that smuggling. That would benefit Mexico, but it also the United States by improving relations with Mexico and by diminishing the power of the drug cartels that are attempting to destroy the Mexican government. If the cartels succeed in taking down the government, our problems would increase as more people attempt to flee into the United States to escape the violence. Evidence presented in the first round shows that there is already a presence of Middle Eastern terrorists in Mexico. Opium from Afghanistan is one of the main sources of terrorist financing, so we would expect increased heroin smuggling as well as incursions for terrorism. Con again makes the error of arguing that if a complete solution is not possible then there is no point in mitigation. I tried to explain it to him by using the example of bank robbery. Bank vaults do not provide a perfect solution to bank robbery. That does not mean that we should abandon the practice of keeping money in vaults, because it is better to have fewer bank robberies than more. Most problems cannot be completely solved, yet we take whatever steps that make sense to mitigate problems. That include vaccines to prevent most of certain diseases, seat belts and safety rules to reduce auto injuries, and so forth. Con suggests that a solution to drug smuggling is to legalize drugs. If we legalized marijuana, then the drug cartels would switch to pushing more heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Dealers at every level of the distribution chain make their money by pushing whatever is illegal, so they would all move to harder stuff. There are already very large quantities of these drugs smuggled across the border. In 2006, over 6000 pounds of methamphetimines were seized http://www.coha.org... Since then, domestic production of meth has dropped due to controls on the raw materials, so much more is illegally imported. In just one raid in 2009, authorities seized 17 kilos of cocaine and 188 pounds of meth from a Mexican drug cartel. http://www.wsbtv.com... Anything that has bad effects can be mitigated by declaring the "bad" to be "good." We ought to be government b the laws passed democratically. 2. The National Research Council is the joint research arm of the National Academy of Science and the National Academy of Engineering. As cited, the NRC concludes that illegal immigration costs the US $349 billion per year in welfare costs, education costs, medical costs, crime, and depressed wages. I think Con is confused and thought that $349 billion was the cost of enforcing border security. Why else would he say that I have somehow made his point? Clearly, the $349 billion is the cost of *not* enforcing border security. 3. Con concedes that the border fence cost is $0.44 billion per year, which is to be put up against the uncontested $349 billion yearly cost of having illegal immigration. 4. Arizona has two section of border, of about equal size. The Yuma section has the fence, and illegal captures there have dropped about 94%. The Tucson section, without the fence, had 241,000 illegals captured last year and 1.2 million pounds of contraband seized. Until the fence was constructed the bulk of illegal activity was in the Yuma section. As described in the references, the "fence" is actually two substantial fences separated by a road. The road is patrolled by Border Security. It is not the case that someone can just cut a hole in chain link and crawl through. Vehicle fences are concrete pillars or steel structures like World War II tank barriers. Con pointed to increased illegal entry by sea, although the numbers are extremely small -- 480 in a year. Why have not illegals always come by sea in large numbers? Because it is difficult and expensive, and the risk is high. Boats are fairly easy to detect. A few can masquerade as fishing boats, but not many. Job-seeking immigrants do not have huge budgets and while the immigrants take the risk of being sent home, the coyotes that run them do not want to be locked away. There are many expensive and risky methods that are alternatives to crossing the border directly, but being expensive and risky are what discourages their use. The net effect is that total illegal activity drops. Total illegal immigration has dropped, partly due to the incomplete border fence and partly due to the economy. http://www.foxnews.com... Completing the border fence would bring substantial reductions, because alternatives are expensive and risky. 5. I am talking about driving trucks across the unfenced border, not trucks at policed checkpoints. That was made clear. In Texas, drug runners actually poured concrete and ran 18-wheelers across the border, but generally the problem is box trucks or SUVs packed with illegal immigrants or contraband. A major crossing point was in the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in the Yuma section, as previously referenced. Roads lead to the border from Mexico and it is often only a short distance to road on the US side. Unless there is a fence at the border, running across the border is a high volume operation. Con claims that it is not legitimate to cite terrorism as a reason for protecting the border. We spend large sums inspecting cargo at ports and border crossings and screening airline passengers. It is perfectly legitimate to do that for fear of terrorist activity. Building fences to stop vehicles from crossing uninspected is a relatively inexpensive way to prevent terrorist incursions. I cited evidence that terrorists already have links to the drug cartels, and that the DEA and FBI are currently worried about the potential. Con should read my R1 for the specifics of who is involved. I have no idea what point Con was trying to make with his fanciful history of US efforts to stop terrorism. Does he really believe hat the US expelled Saddam from Kuwait in order to reinstate the dictator of Kuwait? Does he believe that Osama bin Laden was trained by the CIA to carry out 9/11? Searching for a grain of truth, it is a true that in war "the enemy of your enemy is your friend," so as we backed Stalin against Hitler, we backed the Taliban against the Russians, and so forth. That is one of the unpleasantries of waging war. 6. Con's questions were answered in R1. 7. I cannot understand Con's argument. He says, "Roy concedes that we simply cannot afford to keep this border operational immigrants coming to America by the thousands stealing our education and money how can we even let them do this we should nuke Mexico that way no one is in danger. We are a gun loving country why not nuke loving as well." The best I can make of it is that Con is suggesting we should either have no border security or we should retaliate with nuclear weapons. Obviously overreacting is not the alternative to doing nothing. Building a fence is shown to reduce illegal contraband and immigration by at 95%, so that border security personnel can then focus on the 5% that the fence doesn't deter. Once the flood of illegal immigration is reduced to a trickle, we can get on with setting up guest worker programs and rationalizing the whole immigration situation. Comprehensive immigration reform was enacted under Reagan, with amnesty granted under the promise that border security would be established. That failed because border security was never imposed. The America people now insist on border security first. We also need a fence to stop trucks laden with contraband and, potentially, terrorist WMDs, across the border. A fence is reasonable part of border security.