Science / Space Forum

NF Reporter · 05-21-2007, 08:20 PM

AP - Nancy Brown drives the government truck slowly past mossy ponds, thick shrouds of beard-like Spanish moss and majestic ebony trees, gleefully identifying the song of the kiskadee and the gurgling call of the chachalaca.

Full Story...

waltky · 06-23-2008, 08:56 PM

Court Rules Against Environmental Groups in Fence Construction...

Court Won't Hear Anti-Border Fence Pleas
June 23, 2008 : Court Rejects Case on Fast Track for Border Fence

Quote:

The Supreme Court on Monday turned down a plea by environmental groups to rein in the Bush administration's power to waive laws and regulations to speed construction of a fence along the U.S.-Mexican border. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has used authority given to him by Congress in 2005 to ignore environmental and other laws and regulations to move forward with hundreds of miles of fencing in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas.

The case rejected by the court involved a two-mile section of fence in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area near Naco, Ariz. The section has since been built. "I am extremely disappointed in the court's decision," Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said. "This waiver will only prolong the department from addressing the real issue: their lack of a comprehensive border security plan."

Thompson chairs the House Homeland Security Committee. He and 13 other House democrats - including six other committee chairs - filed a brief in support of the environmentalists' appeal. Earlier this year, Chertoff waived more than 30 laws and regulations in an effort to finish building 670 miles of fence along the southwest border. Administration officials have said that invoking the legal waivers - which Congress authorized in 1996 and 2005 laws - will cut through bureaucratic red tape and sidestep environmental laws that currently stand in the way of fence construction.

ABC News: Court Won't Hear Anti-Border Fence Pleas

Eagle One · 07-24-2008, 12:45 PM

What animals are migrating to Mexico? The birds? Coyotes? Maybe they're talking about butterflies.

I don't take environmental matters lightly, but I have to side with National Security on this one. Border security is not a matter of choice anyway.

freminn · 08-03-2008, 11:07 PM

Border fence also threatens the criminal invaders.

waltky · 09-15-2008, 01:54 AM

Granny says, "Keep dem rowdy yahoos out...

First US-Mex Fence: Fewer Migrants, More Violence
Sep. 13, 2008 - In Neighborhood That Was Home To First US-Mexico Border Fence, Fewer Migrants, More Violence

Quote:

There is a moment each evening, as the sun melts into the Pacific, when Colonia Libertad is at peace. The dimming light blurs the hilltop slum's rough edges, camouflaging piles of trash in long shadows and making it difficult to tell that some of the tightly packed homes clinging to vertical canyonsides are made of old packing crates and cast-off plastic tarps. The stadium lighting that towers over the corrugated metal wall marking the U.S.-Mexico border is dark, permitting residents a bird's eye view of Tijuana, where lights are blinking on, blanketing hills that lead toward the ocean. Farther inland, the dark shadows of mountains are sketched across the sky.

There are no helicopters reverberating overhead, no drone of all-terrain vehicles. Even the bony guard dogs chained outside their homes respect the silence. Fathers stroll lazily behind children who steer beat-up tricycles along the rutted dirt paths that serve as streets. For a moment, residents are reminded of what it was like before the wall, when children ducked under a barbed wire fence to play soccer in U.S. territory and returned home for dinner. When smuggling meant giving directions to migrants who simply outran border agents and melted into the crowds of tourists. But it is only a moment.

The floodlights click on, bathing the neighborhood in a blinding light. The helicopters return, clattering past. And the smugglers arrive with their ladders and blow torches and groups of people desperate to escape a fate similar to the one residents of Colonia Libertad long ago accepted. As the U.S. government battles environmentalists and residents to build hundreds more miles of fencing along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border, both sides would be well served to take a long look at Colonia Libertad _ Freedom Neighborhood. In the early 1990s, Colonia Libertad became one of the first places to coexist with the recycled, corrugated-iron barrier that has become a symbol of the conflicted relationship between a first-world superpower and the developing nation that lives in its shadow.

More First US-Mex Fence: Fewer Migrants, More Violence, In Neighborhood That Was Home To First US-Mexico Border Fence, Fewer Migrants, More Violence - CBS News

waltky · 09-19-2008, 10:26 PM

Mexican gov't. gonna combat kidnappings...

Mexico plans anti-kidnap police
Saturday, 20 September 2008 - Mexico's finance minister says that violence and crime is affecting the economy, cutting growth by 1%.

Quote:

The Mexican government has created a specialist police force to tackle the level of kidnapping in the country, among the highest in the world. The authorities say so far this year more than 650 people have been abducted in Mexico a huge rise on last year. Mexico's National Security Council says all 32 states will get an extra 11.5m pesos ($1.1m; £580,000) in funding to set up the anti-kidnapping units.

The move was proposed at a security summit last month. They were responding to mass protests - triggered by the abduction and murder of a 14-year-old boy - which brought 100,000 people on to the streets of the capital last month calling for tougher punishment for serious crime.

Corruption allegations

Violence has escalated in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon came to power in December 2006, despite his deployment of more than 40,000 soldiers to try to curb the power of the drug cartels. This year alone there have been 3,000 drug-related murders, but kidnappings often receive less media coverage. Although officials say there have been more than 600 abductions this year, human rights groups point out that up to two thirds of all kidnappings may actually go unreported.

They also accuse corrupt police officers of involvement in the practice. Among other measures the security council is considering is the creation of high-security prisons for kidnappers, and standardising anti-abduction laws across Mexico. Mexicans will be hoping that the tougher line on kidnapping, and a related commitment to purge corrupt police officers, will create the safer society their president promised when he was elected.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Mexico plans anti-kidnap police

waltky · 10-02-2008, 07:24 PM

I fail to see how this will reduce the cartel violence resulting from fighting over turf...

Mexico seeks to decriminalize small-time drug use
Thu Oct 2, 2008 - Mexican President Felipe Calderon, locked in a bloody battle with drug cartels, wants to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of street drugs in a plan likely to irk Washington.

Quote:

Calderon, a conservative in power nearly two years, sent a proposal to Congress on Thursday that would scrap the penalties for drugs including cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, opium and marijuana. "What we are seeking is to not treat an addict as a criminal, but rather as a sick person and give them psychological and medical treatment," said Sen. Alejandro Gonzalez, head of the Senate's justice committee.

Under Calderon's plan, people carrying up to 2 grams (0.07 ounces) of marijuana or opium, half a gram of cocaine, 50 milligrams of heroin or 40 milligrams of methamphetamine would face no criminal charges. It would also give Mexican states the power to try drug dealers in local courts instead of at the federal level.

Reviving a similar effort by his predecessor, Calderon aims to free up police to hunt for dealers and smugglers. But the plan could run into opposition in largely conservative Mexico as well as in the United States. In a separate proposal, the president asked the Senate to shake up Mexico's notoriously inept and often corrupt police.

More Mexico seeks to decriminalize small-time drug use | International | Reuters