Evelyn Schlatter

This past Saturday, the Absolut vodka company issued a formal apology for an ad it ran geared toward its Mexican markets. Absolut is known for its often edgy and creative ads, but this one brought calls for boycotts from U.S. consumers.

So what’s the big stink?

Syndicated conservative columnist Michelle Malkin, a blogger who also writes for Fox News, dubbed the ad “Absolut Reconquista.” The ad shows an 1830s-era map of the United States with the American Southwest as part of Mexico, which is what the boundaries were prior to the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which set the present-day border between the U.S. and Mexico in the wake of the U.S. and Mexican War (you’ll see it as “Mexican-American War” as well). The slogan across the map is “In An Absolut World.”

(Read on …)

Rebecca Clarren

Yesterday Michael Chertoff, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, announced he will waive the environmental review required by 36 federal laws in order to speed construction of an 18-foot high fence along the Mexico border. The two waivers cover 470 miles of the border from California to Texas, plus a separate 22-mile span in a Texas wildlife refuge. The fence, to now be completed by the end of this year, will block illegal border crossers that travel by foot and car. The department has already built 309 miles of fence. As reported today by the New York Times,

Previously, Mr. Chertoff had used his waiver authority three times to overcome environmental hurdles along limited segments of the border in San Diego and Arizona. But as the department strives to meet a deadline of year’s end for nearly 700 miles of fencing, he has now greatly expanded the use of his waiver authority, which was granted by Congress as part of the “Real ID Act.”

“We value the need for public input on any potential impact of our border infrastructure plans on the environment,” said Chertoff in a prepared statement, “and we will continue to solicit it.”

It’ll be a little late for solicitation after we power the bulldozers, build a concrete wall, and install extra cameras, towers and roads. Such actions conducted with no environmental review or public process is shortsighted and arrogant. (Read on …)

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

In the 1980s, a Presbyterian minister in Tucson, Rev. John Fife, and a few other religious leaders founded the Sanctuary Movement — smuggling refugees from Central America across the border and helping them start new lives in this country. Those refugees were often fleeing death squads, but U.S. authorities cracked down on the movement anyway, dragging Fife and others into court on criminal charges.

We haven’t heard much about the movement since then — if it’s been operating, it’s been quiet.

But now churches in five major cities have announced, they’re launching a New Sanctuary Movement. They have humanitarian goals, and it’s another rebellion against our nation’s heavy-handed, blundering, in-total-denial immigration policy. They say they have churches in more than 50 cities ready to participate. The AP story is worth a read.

Since the immigration crisis and the numbers of players have only grown, this Sanctuary go-round could be even more compelling than the last.

Jonathan Thompson

Editor in Chief

This time of year can be especially beautiful down in the Sonoran Desert along the U.S. - Mexico border. The cactus are in bloom, streams sparkle in lush canyons where birds sing jungle melodies and the long scarlet fingers of the ocotillo in bloom seem to have been dipped in blood.

But there’s quite a bit of real blood out there, too. So writes Michael Marizco in a rather long feature in the most recent Tucson Weekly.

Goat has blogged on some of the killings already, when migrants were ambushed by murderous thugs and bandits. Marizco shows us that these weren’t just isolated events, but rather part of a pattern of violence and murder aimed towards migrants, cops and journalists and breaking out between drug traffickers. An anonymous source tells Marizco:

“The closer you get to the border, two things occur: The border is actually erased and becomes a new territory, and mass chaos exists. This is the primary reason that today’s trafficking has changed from storing or staging at the border. Instead, it makes its trek north and is immediately crossed, causing problems on our side.”

That seems to sum it up pretty well. Marizco also wrote about the border for High Country News last spring. Read those articles here and here.