Pubdate: Sat, 17 Nov 2001 Source: Oak Ridger (TN) Copyright: 2001 The Oak Ridger Contact: http://www.oakridger.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1146 Author: David Coffey A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER We are a nation of immigrants, not fools. At least let's hope that's true. The events of Sept. 11 showed we have been naive. Also in Tennessee: Our Legislature just this year authorized issuing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants -- as Virginia did for many of the terrorists planning the Sept. 11 attack. We allow illegal immigrant private pilots to rent airplanes and survey our facilities -- as Muhammad Atta, the World Trade Center terrorist pilot, did in spying on possible targets in southeast Tennessee. Illegal immigrants work, sleep and roam through our communities. Most are peaceful, hard-working and needed to do many tasks that Americans run from. But they are illegal! An estimated 4.5 million Mexicans live illegally in America. It's not just Mexicans. "We are experiencing a tremendous increase in OTMs" -- border lingo for "other than Mexicans," as a border patrol supervisor reported to WorldNetDaily.com. So who are they? "Central and South Americans, Orientals, Middle Easterners, the former Soviet Union. About one in every 10 that we catch is from a country like Yemen or Egypt." A retired Drug Enforcement Agency supervisor told me Tennessee is a favorite stop for illegals. His tales are frightening. More chilling is the 4,000-mile Mexican border and the flood of OTMs reported by WorldNetDaily.com. A rancher tells, "It was Thanksgiving 1998, and I stepped outside my house and there were over a hundred 'crossers' in my yard. Damnedest bunch of illegals I ever saw. All of them were wearing black pants, white shirts and string ties." He called the Border Patrol who caught them -- all Iranians. Only 10-20 percent are caught. Over 800,000 cross over each year, including drug smugglers, violent criminals and some with known terrorist connections. Our war in Afghanistan is essential to confront and eliminate the rabid extremists who have declared war on us. The diplomatic and financial initiatives are just as important. But our homes and neighborhoods are at risk from the illegals that pour through our borders. Iraqis, Egyptians, Yemenis have recently been intercepted at the Mexican border. WorldNetDaily.com reports, "Arizona appears to have been the home of a 'sleeper cell' of Osama Bin Laden's worldwide terrorist organization." A retired army colonel living near the border says, "There is only one way to handle this. In a world now filled with biowarfare agents, backpack nuclear devices and chemical weapons like sarin gas, we must militarize the border. There is no other way to stop the flow." Clearly our federal government has been negligent. The U.S. Constitution, Article IV, Section 4, states: "The United States ... shall protect each of [the states] against invasion." Steve Moore, president of the Club for Growth (www.clubforgrowth.org), declared, "We spend $2 trillion a year on the most expensive government in the history of the world, and the one thing it's supposed to do is protect us from foreign enemies. We need smarter government, not bigger government." Is it too much to ask that the federal government do its No. 1job? The invasion of illegal immigrants is a clear and present danger. It must be attacked, halted and controlled. Otherwise we are proven fools. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake