I usually don’t get too political here (notice the nonpartisanship in the ninja/pirate arena), but I do have some concerns about the border patrol web cams. In theory it looks like it would save money on patrolling the border. We would not need to pay as many agents if most of the scanning was done over the Internets (Internets being the world-wide web of computers that politicians use).

Web cams are set up across the border so that people at home can watch for “illegals” (the slang term). Here are some concerns:

1. Has INS/The MinuteMan Project considered the 8 year-old factor? What is to stop someone from tapping INS’s right shoulder but standing behind the left shoulder? “Hey! Check fence C! There’s a whole buncha illegals. But don’t waste your time on fence B. There’s no one there. It would be a waste of time. These are not the droids you’re looking for.” Even if the agent has a webcam to look at, you give me enough cell phones, especially the prepaid ones you can buy at Wal-Mart, and I could complicate their night. My general rule? If I can do it, or in my stead an 8 year-old could do it, a criminal has probably thought of it.
2. Has INS/The MinuteMan Project considered the moron factor? There are morons on the Internets. I expect that there will be many a phone call to the web cam hub of activity that will sound like this:
   INS: Thank you for calling. Please state your name for quality assurance.
   Caller: Oliver. Last name, Klosehoff.
   INS: Is that Russian?
   Caller: OMG. INS be pwned, joo, by HaX0r l33t tribez. All your base, f00.
3. Why is it a big issue now? Are we at a climate in our state politics where we are now comfortable blaming the illegals? Did they cause all of our problems? If you listen to the ads of Jim Pederson, Jon Kyl, J.D.Hayworth, Janet Napolitano, and pretty much everyone else on TV in our state (I think I heard Tex Earnhardt say, “We have Mustangs but no Coyotes and that ain’t no bull.” Don’t quote me on that, I could have misheard.) Which came first, us stressing out about the issue or the politicians telling us it’s an issue? Are our schools ranked worst because of migrant children taking our bread or could it be all of the superintendents of school districts the past few years who have been stealing from teachers, students, and parents?
4. Do we want people getting excited busting people from the comfort of their own home? We have webcams set up on the border. These are not the first government webcams. Hasn’t anyone seen ’24′? Traffic cameras are also up. If this saves a lot of money by busting immigrants, what’s to stop state legislators from proposing webcam monitoring at home for traffic violations? “You didn’t come to a complete stop before you made a right turn on red at 43rd and Indian School. HaX0Rz caughts jooz, n00b!” As one of my friends always reminds me, if you make a rule, the unfortunate thing is that you have to live by it. Do we really want to create a tattle-tale society? Do we want webcams everywhere, where you are monitoring your neighbor, your neighbor is watching the guy down the street [Begin Recursive Loop])Is this helping us to love our neighbor? I’m not saying that we give illegal immigrants the right to vote (even if they do pay sales tax). But…
5. What do the INS agents do once they’ve found the illegals? Do they ship them back? Do they detain them and treat everyone as a potential terrorist? (Did you know that we just lost a right last month? It was approved that if you were deemed an enemy of the state, you can be held indefinitely without a trial or even a nod at due process? This is good if you’re the bad guy, but what is the process that they use to separate the bad guys from people who protest against the government? I’m not a fan of Michael Moore, but I don’t think we should go Alien & Sedition Act on him. Yet.) What would happen if we funneled these illegal immigrants into the exact same process that legal immigrants use? What if we did that, starting relatively fresh, instead of trying to patch the problem?

Like I said, I don’t normally get political, but I wanted to make sure this got out on the Internets. I’m sure that the 8 year-old and I are not the first to think of these concerns, but just in case…

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