The federal government has posted signs along a major interstate highway in Arizona, more than 100 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, warning travelers the area is unsafe because of drug and alien smugglers, and a local sheriff says Mexican drug cartels now control some parts of the state.
The signs were posted by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) along a 60-mile stretch of Interstate 8 between Casa Grande and Gila Bend, a major east-west corridor linking Tucson and Phoenix with San Diego. They warn travelers that they are entering an “active drug and human smuggling area” and they may encounter “armed criminals and smuggling vehicles traveling at high rates of speed.” Beginning less than 50 miles south of Phoenix, the signs encourage travelers to “use public lands north of Interstate 8” and to call 911 if they “see suspicious activity.” “Mexican drug cartels literally do control parts of Arizona,” he said. “They literally have scouts on the high points in the mountains and in the hills and they literally control movement. They have radios, they have optics, they have night-vision goggles as good as anything law enforcement has.
“This is going on here in Arizona,” he said. “This is 70 to 80 miles from the border – 30 miles from the fifth-largest city in the United States.”
He said he asked the Obama administration for 3,000 National Guard soldiers to patrol the border, but what he got were 15 signs.
But like the man said…the borders are quite secure.
One of the few current issues that should draw bi-partisan revulsion from everyone that posts here.
Or–who wants to declare that unlimited uncontrolled illegal immigration is a good thing, a necessary element of inalienable human rights as the official leaders of the Catholic church have said?
Its one of several/too many issues that shows our government, Dem and Puke, are not responsive to the clear majority will of the people. Make you wonder who/what they actually serve.
No border = No country.
Thought the problem had gone away?
What happened to that earlier post of gun toting, ‘husky’ teabaggers dressed like big foot?
Total BS. This is right-wing Arizona’s attempt to justify their racial profiling and lawless Border Patrols.
Total nonsense. And yet the Palin and Beck dolts will swallow it whole.
#3. There ya go.
#2. Dallas, I think we can both agree that those guys were cartoon characters.
It’s painfully obvious that Wretched Gnu has never been on I-8 through Arizona. Control of this area has been ongoing for a long, long time-it’s just now coming to the public. I suggest you take a drive from Phoenix to Tucson and let us know how it went before you open your mouth and remove all doubt.
#3 Go down there for a week or so then report back. If we don’t hear from you, well then… “There ya go”!
The Arizona wingnuts/teabaggers have been out in the sun for too long, apparently. Do they have any idea idea how truly dangerous 115 degree temperatures can be with little or no water?
If the AZ teabaggers really think that there will be that many illegals crossing this time of the year, then they haven’t been out in that heat. Yes the night’s cooler, but people still die in that kind of heat.
I call bullshit!!
I live in the area, drug cartels don’t control a damn thing here, and if they tried to control the area, my armed to the teeth neighbors would take care of it right quick.
There is no need for 3,000 troops here, this was a made up number by John McCain after Obama announced 1,200 troops which is already overkill. McCain had to oppose it somehow.
You better watch out
You better not pry
Better not scout
I’m telling you why
The illegals are coming to town
They’re packing some shit
and hiding it twice;
Gonna hang out with Paris and some guy named Brice
The illegals are coming to town
They’ve seen that Obama has been sleeping
They know he’s never awake
They’ll sell you shit whether it’s bad or good
So check it for goodness sake!
You better watch out
You better not pry
Better not scout
I’m telling you why
The illegals are coming to town
The illegals are coming to town
This is crazy! And we are in Irak and Afganistan to restore democracy and freedom. What about cleaning up in our back yard for Pete’s sake???
Sorry TThor, our backyard can vote for Democrats.
#6 Unless you can prove the sign is fake I suggest you try dealing with the real world.
That sign is enough to justify an impeachment of any president of any party that allowed conditions to reach that sorry a state at least in my humble opinion.
The Feds are responsible for controlling the boarder and if they fail to do their job for less than a major armed invasion by a major power they need to be thrown out of office and into prison.
Drugs bad (others say “good”), but prohibition is worse, so decriminalize/deillegalize drugs.
Illegals bad (others say “good”), but underground societies are worse, so decriminalize/deillegalize illegal immigration.
And on and on.
#12 Dude, what are you smoking? The border has been a sieve since the Gadsden Purchase established the border. You want every president since Ulysses S Grant impeached?
This article was published in a right wing rag, and quotes heavily from the fascist Pinal County Sheriff.
The teabaggers are pissed off that the Tohono O’odham reservation will not allow a wall through their reservation which exists on both sides of the border, so they post signs saying it is not safe to go on the reservation.
The lack of a fence on their reservation does not mean they are a friendly place for immigrants. The reservation also kicks out humanitarian groups trying to set up water stations, and the tribe routinely informs ICE about groups traveling through their territory.
Don’t believe any of this crap!
I get the feeling that if Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida announced they were going to build a mosque on the Arizona/Mexico border, the Obama administration wouldn’t do anything about it.
Except maybe order the Justice Department to sue anyone who tried to stop them.
@#6, #7 There are videos of the area showing well organized and heavily armed smugglers traveling through daily. Signs are by Fed’s not AZ. There are also video interviews with local business and residents at the typical points where smugglers switch to motorized transport, including actual footage of trucks being loaded with what are presumably drugs, under assault weapon guard i broad daylight.
Source of the problem: Fed’s Park branch denying access to border control agents within Fed’ park lands at the border (and from the border to 80 miles inland).
There was recently a string of robberies in the parking lot of the building I work at. The company put up signs warning employees to make sure their vehicles were locked. This frustrated a coworker of mine, who said the signs should have warned the robbers to watch out for police.
Same idea applies here. Let’s not turn this into a race/rep-dem/immigration policy thing, this is a law and order issue.
Then again, our idiotic drug policy makes it reeeaally lucrative to break this particular law.
#15 What an idiotic nonsensical non-sequitir straw man statement!!
Troll much?
Take the mountain lions from two stories earlier and turn them loose in this area. Problem reduced!
RE: #16 @#6, #7 There are videos of the area showing well organized and heavily armed smugglers traveling through daily. Signs are by Fed’s not AZ.
Yes, the signs exist. Yes there are “coyotes” in operation in the area.
There are also video interviews with local business and residents at the typical points where smugglers switch to motorized transport, including actual footage of trucks being loaded with what are presumably drugs, under assault weapon guard i broad daylight.
Hell, I have seen it myself.
Source of the problem: Fed’s Park branch denying access to border control agents within Fed’ park lands at the border (and from the border to 80 miles inland).
BULLSHIT!! The border patrol routinely enters unrestricted into the three national monuments, BLM land, reservation lands and other public lands in the area. Anyone who says differently is lying, but that is BAU for the right wing whaco crowd.
#19 There are mountain lions in the area, I have seen them. Too bad they are not carrion eaters as there have been at least 200 heat related deaths this summer from people trying to cross the desert.
So, basically we just conceded a part of our land to a foreign enemy. How is this not treason?
#22 First, nothing has been conceded. The signs are nothing more than PSAs, not declarations of surrender.
Second, “Coyotes” are criminals, not foreign enemies.
Third, by your logic, foreigners should not be allowed to own land in the US?
Well, we can’t make any sort of use of this public land anymore because it is being occupied and invaded by criminals from another country.
The right wing vigilante defenders of America are doing it wrong. They should move their surveillence and deterrence operation south of the border- say fifty miles are so. The should keep the riff raff down there where it belongs instead of allowing the Mexican drug cartels to encroach onto sacred turf.
Just legalize drugs, dig some mass graves for all the idiots that kill themselves, and bring is some reasonable controls for many drugs along the line of government liquor stores in Canada. Then you concentrate on the drugs that should remain illegal like meth.
Pot, heroine, cocaine, and all the derivatives of those drugs should be legal. Some amphetamines should be legalized…again (good enough for AF pilots? good enough for citizens. Hell, many amphetamines were legal 50 years ago, if not more recently.
#9 pedro
“Apparently, the DOJ & the State Dept. http://tinyurl.com/27qydf6”
Just another part of our Federal policy of appeasement. They should have included a little photo of “someone” bowing.
Then put the wall around the reservation. Let them decide which side of the fence they want to be on.
Arizona. John McCain’s state. The guy who ran for US President in 2008, can’t keep his own backyard secure. Probably doesn’t live there, any more than he absolutely has to.
But really, what the h*ll has happened to Homeland Security? Wouldn’t this be something they ought to be majorly concerned about? So why aren’t they, if this item is true? Who called off the so-called “war on drugs”, that this invasion and takeover isn’t ringing many alarm bells? If this were the Russians, waltzing across Alaska, there would be all kinds of screaming about “Amerika” coming true. But drug cartels taking over AZ, well that’s not so bad.
Actually, it’s not that shock a revelation to me. Years ago, I read about how many of these interstates thru the southwest were fairly lawless. And people could simply disappear, traveling them at night. Not from UFOs, as I’m sure some morons would prefer to fantasize as the cause. But from whatever breed of highwaymen, America enjoys. And the authorities are spread too thin, in these states, to do much about it.
Perhaps another reason for a southern US leg of a High Speed Rail system. Not everything can be hauled aboard a jet plane, across country. It’s just not economical or feasible. And why should Americans be forced to fly or drive, to across the still wild lawless west?
What can you say….AMERICANS LOVE THEIR DRUGS.