From The Orange County Register
letters@link.freedom.com
http://www.ocregister.com/
From the Second Front Page
By Susan Gilmore, The Seattle Times

It also appeared in the Houston Chronicle, and probably will run in other papers. It gives the appearance of being a serious news story. It is not. The story is the story, and it is not being understood.)

TROUBLE ON THE 'OTHER' BORDER

Northwest Agents Say Smuggling There Is On The Rise While Resources Are Diverted South

SEATTLE - The man walking through the darkened berry fields hugging the Canadian border east of Blaine, Wash., stopped and whistled, acting so fishy that Border Patrol agents, surreptitiously watching, immediately tagged him as suspicious.

Moments later, a Korean woman, with her 6-year-old child in tow, emerged into the open on the U.S. side of the berry patch.

The pair was quickly apprehended, along with the man who was waiting for them.

This is what happens when everything goes right on the U.S.-Canadian border. People who try to sneak across, like this mother and child last week, are caught by U.S. Border Patrol agents and either detained or returned to Canada.

The reality is that this often doesn't happen. More likely than not, the smugglers succeed. And one reason, say those who patrol the border, is that their force is being depleted to bolster the border with Mexico.

As a result, a leaky border is getting leakier. Undocumented immigrants sneaking in, criminals sneaking out. They slip across a vast border that slices through berry fields, forests, mountains and ocean. At night, much of the border is unprotected.

Many, without visas, are desperate to enter the United States, while others recognize the border as an easy way to bring in valuable baggage: lucrative, high-grade Canadian-grown marijuana known as B.C. bud.
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Prohibitionist Drivel At Its Worst.

A 1997 report by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, that country's equivalent of the CIA, found "most of the world's terrorist groups have established themselves in Canada, seeking safe have, setting up operational bases and attempting to gain access to the USA."

And it goes both ways. In June, a man charged in a Baltimore slaying slipped into Canada by walking across the tideflats from Blaine to White Rock, Canada, to apply for refugee status. His petition for asylum was denied.

Border Patrol officials, who defend the border beyond the established crossings, estimate that agents catch about one-third of the smugglers who try to cross near Blaine, and they freely concede that figure may be optimistic.

Most of the smuggling occurs between Blaine and Ross Lake, Wash., Eugene Davis, deputy chief Border Patrol agent, told a congressional committee earlier this year. "It is very easy to simply jump or drive across the small ditch which separates the two countries," he said.

It's known as Boundary Road on the American side, Zero Avenue in Canada. Narrow country roads, just a ditch apart, but a virtual freeway for undocumented immigrants, drug smugglers and other criminals. About three dozen Border Patrol agents are assigned to this border, and no one works the night shift.

What angers many of those who patrol the border is that despite the huge increase in smuggling from Canada, agents are being plucked from the Canadian border for assignments on the southern border. After a summer hiatus, three agents from Blaine, taken from a force of 49, were sent to Arizona on one-month assignments. Immigration and Naturalization Service officials say agents are desperately needed to patrol the busy southern border.

In a 1998 report to the U.S. Department of Justice, the Border Patrol reported that apprehensions in the Blaine area dropped from 4,473 in 1993 to 2,684 in 1997. The agency blamed the drop on the number of agents detached from Blaine to the Mexican border.

"We need to do the jobs we were hired to do and protect the Pacific Northwest border," said Keith Olson, a Border Patrol agent and president of the local National Border Patrol Council. "We have no graveyard shift. It's been like that for years. All the terrorists of the world can march right through."

He said agents joke, "We only catch the stupid ones."

Customs officials who staff the official ports of entry say they've seen a huge increase in the amount of marijuana seized at the border stations between Blaine and Lynden, Wash.

(Marijuananews note: While the percentage increase has been large, the actual amount of marijuana is less than one percent of that seized on the Mexican border.)

"B.C. bud is a continuing problem at the border," said Roy Huffman, the resident agent for U.S.Customs in Blaine. "People are always coming up with another ingenious way to smuggle."

Recently, two Canadian Kayakers were arrested on Lopez Island when a sheriff's deputy found 94 pounds of marijuana in their kayak. The pair allegedly had paddled from Vancouver Island with the contraband.

The smuggling of B.C. bud is considered so serious that the U.S. National Drug Policy Council has designated the area's Interstate 5 corridor as a "high-intensity" drug-trafficking area.

(Marijuananews note: This is truly a ridiculous waste of money. But the prohibitionists found an even better way to waste it, on prohibitionist propaganda.)
See
Seattle Times Editorial Reports Washington State Lt. Governor Brad Owens Fined
For Using Tax Dollars To Campaign Against State Medical Marijuana Initiative

The council names five main import routes into the United States: Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, the ports of Seattle and Tacoma, the Interstate 5 corridor, the Yakima Valley and the Canadian border.

"Poly-drug organizations with long standing family ties to Michoacan, Mexico, are currently utilizing the I-5 corridor to bring drugs to the Northwest," the drug-policy council reports in its Web page. "The purity of heroin has increased significantly, resulting in record level heroin-related overdose deaths in the Seattle area. Domestic

indoor-grown British Columbian and Mexican marijuana is readily available."

(Marijuananews note: Yes, Mexican marijuana is available all over DEAland. That should tell us that putting more people on the Canadian border is a total waste.)

Nunez said his agency confiscated 74 pounds of marijuana in 1996. In the fiscal year that ended last month, that number soared to 1,166 pounds.

(Marijuananews note: Again, this is less than one percent of the amount seized along the Mexican border.)

And that, officials have said, is just a fraction - perhaps 10 percent - of what comes across. Reports have pegged the value of the B.C. marijuana crop at more than $1 billion a year.

(Marijuananews note: They have no way of knowing the real numbers. This is pure conjecture. However, if they seized 1,200 pounds, at $3,000 per pound, a bit high at the border, then this is 36 million dollars worth. If this is ten percent of the total, then only 360 million dollars per year is smuggled in.)

"We have an open border. You can walk the stuff across, bike it, run it or canoe it across the water," said Mike Flego, resident agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration based in Blaine.

Frustrated U.S. border agents have appealed for help to Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, who chairs the immigration subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee and is sympathetic.

(Marijuananews note: Smith would -- in effect -- close the Canadian border by making crossing so difficult that it would paralyze traffic.)

"B.C. bud is a $1 billion cash crop in B.C. and, according to (U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey), 60 percent is exported to the U.S.," said Allen Kay, Smith's spokesman. "Almost all of it enters the U.S. through Washington state. And the Asian drug cartels are targeting Washington state."

(Marijuananews note: Gosh, and last week it was the motorcycle gangs. Now it is the yellow peril. The racism of the drug war keeps resurfacing. In fact, most of the people growing weed in BC are Anglos, my people, and I am proud of them!)
See
Organized Crime In The Marijuana Trade.
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An Excellent Halifax Editorial Says, "Marijuana laws encourage crime."

He said Congress authorized the hiring of 1,000 new agents, but the INS is dragging its feet, hiring only about 300 this year.

"We can't neglect the Northwest border," Kay said. "(Smith's) theory is if you build up the border at one place, the drug smugglers and terrorists will find the weak spot and exploit it. That seems to be exactly what's happening in Washington state."

(Marijuananews note: Terrorist from Canada?)
See
Run For Your Lives! "US Says Drugs, Terror Pouring In From Canada"!
Or, The Problems Of Living Next To A Superpower Run By Narcs.