Papers Please

Posted on by

While immigration officers have the right to approach you, everyone has the right to refuse to answer questions. Hines said it’s difficult to get people to understand that.

“It’s very hard to teach people that you have the right to say, ‘no,’ because the general instinct is that if someone comes up to you you’re going to answer those questions,” she said.

Of course you have the right to say “no”, but as Mr. Mendez, an Austin resident and US citizen, found out, they also apparently have the right to put you in handcuffs and haul you off, if you don’t provide them with proof of citizenship.

“I told them no, because I had left it in my wife’s car this morning when she dropped me off,” he said.

That’s when Mendez said the uniformed men told him he’d have to leave his work site — in handcuffs. But there’s one problem. Mendez is a U.S. citizen born and raised in Austin.

“They told me to put my hands behind my back because they didn’t have proof I was a citizen.

I didn’t think Americans were legally required to carry ID on them at all times. Has that changed?

37 thoughts on “Papers Please”

  1. My guess is only some American’s have to carry their papers at all times. I bet my pink pudgy body and international English would stealth me very well as an illegal, if I ever chose to do that.

    Put another freedom on the pyre.

    I was once trapped into working in the US, which was not something I wanted to do at the time. I considered a small ploy to get myself refused entry and solve my problem — but the US is a big place and getting off a unwanted list is a difficult thing, I forsaw that I may need the “Excited States” (as we call them) from time to time.

  2. Sad, but true in America you do have to have proof of ID at all times. As if that was not enough the various police agencies can also detain you up to 24 hours on suspicion and another 48 hours for investigation. In short they can take you to jail on a whim. This is especially true if you tick them off and offend their authority status.
    One thing to remember is your driver license number because in your home state if you can rattle off your DL number they can call it in and check your ID, if they are so inclined, and as long as there are no suspicious circumstances to make them think you are a criminal you will be on your way.
    Sometimes, as in the case of Orb running out of gas in Austin / Mr. Mendez, the Police authority can be abusive and show the true nature of a “Police State” that supposedly does not exist.

  3. All the below has to do with if the police think you have or are about to commit a crime, known as the Terry Stop. The only time I am aware that we as Americans need to show identification is when you drive a car on the public roads, when you seek employment, when you enter the country.

    Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47 (1979), in which we held squarely that a State may not make it a crime to refuse to provide identification on demand in the absence of reasonable suspicion.

    A number of homeless person do not have identification:

    http://usff.com/hldl/courtcases/kolendervlawson.html

    “Individual who had been arrested and convicted for violating a California statute requiring persons who loiter or wander on the streets to provide a “credible and reliable” identification and to account for their presence when requested by a police officer, brought suit for declaratory and injunctive relief challenging the statute’s constitutionality. The District Court held the statute unconstitutional and enjoined its enforcement. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 658 F.2d 1362, affirmed and California officials appealed. The Supreme Court, Justice O’Connor, held that the statute was unconstitutionally vague by failing to clarify what was contemplated by the requirement that a suspect provide a “credible and reliable” identification.”

    Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada, Humboldt County, et al. (2004) was a United States Supreme Court decision that ruled that the United States Constitution does not prohibit police officers from demanding that a suspect give his name when he has been stopped due to a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.

    Hiibel was an expansion on the “Terry stop” established in Terry v. Ohio, which gave police the ability to stop and frisk someone for weapons when the officer had a reasonable suspicion that the suspect was committing or was about to commit a crime.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57604-2004Jun21.html

    http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:Ybr1MB4zA-UJ:civics.com/ecitizen/ecitizen/LawReviews/Sobel.htm+%22requiring+identification%22+if+stopped+by+the+police&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8

  4. Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47 (1979), in which we held squarely that a State may not make it a crime to refuse to provide identification on demand in the absence of reasonable suspicion.
    http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:PGx9m8IQ9i8J:laws.findlaw.com/us/443/47.html++%22Brown+v.+Texas,+443+U.S.+47+(1979),+%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1

    http://usff.com/hldl/courtcases/kolendervlawson.html
    There are only a few areas where you need to produce ID. Entering the US, purchasing a airline tickets, while driving a car on the public roads, places that sell alcohol, other than that I think you have little to worry about. Unlike a number of countries where they have the right to ask, “Papers please.”

  5. I disagree that we have to carry ID on us at all times. If you’re driving, are in an airport or some other place where security is known to be tight, then I would say in those cases that you’d better have ID on you. You’re supposed to have it on you when you’re driving. But just walking around or being at work it should not be mandatory to have ID on you.

    In this case it appears that because he had a Hispanic name and probably is from Hispanic descent, the police appeared to be racially profiling him. If he had been white, most likely they wouldn’t have hauled him off to jail unless he was uncooperative in any way. I’m sure some lawyer would love to take his case if he sues for racial discrimination.

    But as far as I know, there isn’t a law that REQUIRES us to carry our ‘papers’ on our person at all times when we leave our home. I don’t carry mine unless I’m driving or might drive or I know I will need it to get in someplace or purchase something. At least I know it won’t get lost if it’s at home.

  6. Texas Law

    Police may intimidate the hell out of you for not carrying an ID, but there’s is absolutely no law that says you have to carry one (unless you’re driving, of course). However, the catch is that if you’re not carrying any ID, then the police may take you downtown to try to figure out who you are (or just because they want to take you downtown).
    A person commits an offense if he intentionally refuses to give his name, residence address, or date of birth to a peace officer who has lawfully arrested the person and requested the information. A person commits an offense if he intentionally gives a false or fictitious name, residence address, or date of birth to a peace officer who has law-lawfully detained or arrested the person; or requested the information from a person that the peace officer has good cause to believe is a witness to a criminal offense. [A person must identify him/herself only if arrested; no ID is required.] Sec. 38.02. Failure to Identify

  7. This is nothing more than a red herring sort of story. ICE officers (Immigration and Customs Agents) have been making mass arrest of illegal immigrants of late at work sites. Construction sites, similar to where Mr. Mendez was working that day are known places where you will find large numbers of Hispanic workers, and some may be even be illegal. The article leads you to believe that only Mr. Mendez was singled out because he was Hispanic looking, and he that didn’t produce some sort of identification, but we don’t know if it is entirely accurate; there could have been others Hispanics produced identification and weren’t arrested, and there could have been other who didn’t have ID who were also arrested. So my thinking is, had Mr. Mendez produced ID that day, he too wouldn’t had been detained. We do know he was immediately released once is SSN was verified. There are those who would like to make this be a battle about immigration in general, it isn’t, it is a battle illegal immigration. Wonder how Orb, would feel if Lin lost his job to an illegal immigrant? That is what we are battling, illegal, not legal immigrantion. The ICE agents, not the police, were executing these duties, nothing they did was illegal, as they were looking for illegal immigrants; someone who has committed a crime. Nothing illegal about it, you really do need to read SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES, Terry vs. Ohio 392 U.S. 1.
    http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0392_0001_ZS.html

  8. I agree this story is a plant sponsored by those attempting to emotionalize the issue, specifically, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Mexican government. As to racial profiling, we here in the great Southwest know that only a distinct minority of Border Patrol and ICE agents are anything but Hispanic, the government recruiting heavily among Mexican-American and other Spanish-speaking groups specifically to utilize their cognitive skills to enhance enforcement. The story doesn’t say the man was arrested, just detained until he could provide proof of his right to work in the U.S., in this case his Social Security account number. Note that the story makes no mention of the employer, who presumably was in violation of the law, since it was stated that other workers didn’t come back to work, and few people blow off a job just because some cops show up, unless there was a real good reason. The omission of the company’s name is a good indication the story is a plant. When you realize that the New York Times, with its massive circulation, has been caught repeatedly running planted stories, it’s easy to see how far lesser news outlets might do the same thing.

  9. (Mostly in reply to Jocko’s post…)

    This doesn’t sound too good to me. Acting in a suspicious manner, or as a criminal might do, would lead to “cause” based on a behaviour, and not solely on the race or fist language of a person. The government employee should have equal cause to stop me, in my pinkness just as they would my Iberian brother. However, Mr. Mendez, not for other than his race was detained and the justification that he appeared to be working for paid employment, better not be indicative of a crime.

    It seems to me that if a government employee can detain you for 48 hours (sans habeas corpus — do you get a phone call?) based on your race then the equality of citizenship is not maintained. This places an unfair economic burden on citizens well beyond the civil issue, as they keep disappearing from their jobs for two days at a time while they try to prove they are legal participants in the economy.

    Here’s a freebee Texas: Where the rights of an individual citizen are embroiled with the rights of a corporate entity, then the rights of the individual shall supersede the rights of the entity. (Think of this as tracking down illegal’s by “going after the pushers and not the users,” metaphorically.) Hire fewer cowboy immigration officers and many more employment auditors to track and arrest the real criminals in the equation.

    Why? Since an individual must provide proof of legality to work and an employer must provide taxation data to the government, the identity of illegal employees can be determined without violation or detainment of an individual, which has a more deleterious effect on the person and discriminates against certain people – i.e. citizens whose rights deserve protection, refugees who do not have SSN’s, legal resident’s not yet landed, and most to the point – anyone who wishes to reasonably preserve their privacy from overly inquisitive government employees and little jackboot despots who get off on locking you up for two days because they don’t like the way you look, the car you were driving or maybe the job you had they thought should go to their cousin.

    So, what happens? Let’s say two guys are hawking oranges on the street corner for Angus’s Drive-by Fruiting. Suddenly a couple of Brown Shirts in Stetsons scoop Hamish and Duffy into their van and roust them for ID’s. Both these blokes tell the cowboys to feck themselves – which translates in to something as biologically impossible as you think it might be.

    Now, Duffy is just an old codger, an anglophile and misanthrope, so while born in Dallas many years ago, he assumes an Irish accent and tells everyone to feck themselves (perhaps a reason for his general lack of success in business).

    Hamish, while a nice enough looking fellow just won’t tell them a t’ing. Downtown at the holding cell, the boss wants to know the “official reason for the detainment under investigation.” The form reads, “Swearing at us without a drawl and suspicion of drive-by fruiting. We think they may be illegal Canadian immigrants, ‘cause they talk dern funny.”

    So, Duffy, calls his mouth-piece, see and they bring him before the man on a writ of habeas corpus. He argues, that he has been subject to an illegal imprisonment and violation of his rights to security of the person (probably some other name in the US) because he is either forced to reveal his identity to the government or be detained based soley on his racial profile and he must suffer this violation only to prove that what he was doing was a common legal activity. That is, in no way suspect other than the cowboy’s idea that lots of Canadian’s go to Texas and engage in minor illegal economic activity that deprives the state of taxes. And for this reason alone, should the judge state that his detainment was correct: then certain citizens shall be deprived of rights that other citizens are entitled to in the state’s desire for every last tax dollar it desires? Recalling that in the American tradition, such rights have only been previously suspended in times of war – not that the feds got off too easy on that either, after words.

    Oh and the reasoning there was about security – meaning the government felt that the protection of its citizen’s lives was more important than any individual’s rights. What we are talking about here is the most minor of tax evasions – part-time drive-by fruit vendors not being the top of the economic stratum. I don’t know how hard you guys are on tax cheats, but the Roman’s who would crucify you for cheating Caesar out of his salad, would think this idea is over the top.

    Yikes, the man says the detainment was legal!

    “‘bout time,” sayeth the cowboys, them Canadians are in for it now. We can catch as many illegal immigrants as there are there to be caught; we simply “detain” everyone and anyone who doesn’t pony up the tax card gets a bus ticket to Saskatchewan! They’re not going to like this down at EDS, I can tell you – but it’s legal.

    Well, I’ll be damned; Duffy must have had Erin Brokovitch, from the Texas Poverty Law Centre, they went to appeal! Now, in front of the Big Man, they argue that if every citizen is entitled to not disclose their identity to the government without cause, then his detainment was illegal as it represents the de facto forcing of the citizenry provide such identification or be subject to summary detainment. You either have a right or you don’t.

    In continuing to uphold his right to privacy Duffy did not commit a crime, so his refusal to say anything other than “feck, this and feck that” can not be evidence of wrongdoing. Duffy is being forced to prove his innocence of an alleged crime (tax evasion) merely based on his associations and his guilt can not be determined unless he fails to do so, however, it is not the role of the police to determine guilt or innocence and they are restricted from employing unreasonable actions to extract a confession.

    What’s the unreasonable action? Being thrown in a holding cell for two days until you cough up the tax number or suffer further incarceration, based on the action of going to your job and working.

    What about Hamish? Well, as a citizen of Ireland he was subject to deportation once it was found he did not have a legal right to work in the US (Called it a green card in my day) but since he was a landed immigrant in Canada, they used Federal Dollars to put him on a bus to Medicine Hat, Alberta – a punishment worse than the vacation in Tijuana that he was earning money for selling fruit.

    Just shows to go you, there ought to be a fence right along that whole 49th parallel, don’t you think?

    :brow:

  10. Did anyone stop to think that with all the publicity about the immigration bill that this is just another ploy by certain factions to attempt to gain support for that bill? I mean come on the Mexican community shows their outrage over the proposed bill and as a show of force the other side has to flex its muscles. What it all boils down to is that this very issue is an issue that has been a topic of discussion since before Santa Anna ever crossed the Rio Grande. The Mexican people just as the Native Americans have been a part of this country before Plymouth Rock in 1620 especially throughout the Southwest.
    Our government in a effort to control the ever increasing influx of illegal immigrants allowed big business to go into Mexico under the guise of opening their plants and providing Mexican people with jobs so that didn’t have to migrate here.
    In actuality big business didn’t want to pay American wages in Mexico because after all that was the reason for going there in the first place to be able to get cheap labor for their products then bring their products back here and sell them for an outrageous profit.
    Sometimes you have to look beyond the obvious to see that the true motivation is fueled by money and political motivation. If it wasn’t election time a problem that has been a problem longer than this country has been a country would not be at the forefront and if all the immigrants who came to this country brought with them untold wealth it wouldn’t be a problem in the first place and they would be welcomed with open arms instead of armed ones.
    The migration of indigenous people has been going on forever as it is a way of life that comes from a need for self improvement of their individual need to stay alive to the best of their abilities. The race issue is a far greater problem that has plagued this country since they had to try and exterminate the Native Americans because they didn’t want to give up their home freely.
    People ( Mexicans, Native Americans, Caucasians, etc.) in the Southwest have been living together in harmony since the days of the Alamo. A problem is only a problem when it becomes necessary in the course of certain events to hide the truth.
    The truth is that in the name of NAFTA American jobs were lost to other people. Big business used it to the best of their own accord to gain cheap labor and now Americans are pissed because there are not enough jobs to go around so instead of placing the blame on NAFTA the blame is placed on the immigrants for taking jobs from Americans when in fact the immigrants are taking jobs of hard labor that a lot of Americans don’t want to do in the first place and the business people who pay them below scale are happy they are here.
    What we have is a government that allows big business to take advantage of not only our own people, but others in foreign lands as well. They go to Mexico for cheap labor and they allow immigrants to come here for the same reason and then they want to make appear as if they really don’t want it to be that way in the first place.
    Its MONEY people!!!! If you think that this country is controlled by the people, elections, or even politicians think again its all about SHOW ME THE MONEY. Case in point during the last draft of American men if you were from the poor side of town you were going to Nam if you were from the rich side of town you were staying home.
    To hide indiscretions the clusterfuck was invented by people (supposedly) in charge of being in control. For those who are non military this is were a problem becomes uncontrollable to the point that it has to be dealt with in a reasonable manner and the best way to deal with a problem out of a controlled environment is to cause as much confusion about the problem as humanly possible to ensure that it will be discernable forevermore.
    In the words of Lucas ‘Luke’ Jackson (Paul Newman) Cool Hand Luke 1967
    “ What we got here is a failure to communicate.”

  11. Cheers to Wildman, yes it’s all money, tax loss and NAFTA. North of 49, they lament the loss of jobs to Mexico too. They think it is the result of trying to solve America’s immigration problems at Canada’s expense. Yes, politics makes strange bedfellows.

    It shouldn;t be a surprise to anyone that this issue comes to the fore at the same time as the Immigration Bill. What will May 1 bring?

  12. On Monday May 1, 2006 the immigrants/illegal aliens are threatening to do absolutely no shopping of any kind. They want to show America how powerful their numbers are by staying home and by not spending their money at the stores; to show us how much we need them.
    In response, every American should go to at least one store and buy at least one item. It doesn’t take much of our time or money. Let’s send our message out that we won’t be pushed around and bullied.
    If Americans don’t do something, and just stand around and watch these aggressive demands WE ARE GOING TO LOSE OUR COUNTRY IN OUR LIFETIME.

  13. we DO need them. we use them as slave labor, then treat them like shit or ignore them. if you want to get technical about it, some parts of america belonged to them first. a lot (not all) of americans are too spoiled or lazy to do the jobs they do, and we deserve what we get. i plan on showing my solidarity with their cause by not buying anything that day, either. it’s nice to see some people getting off their asses and taking to the streets for once. we could learn from them.

    (by the way, i’m not mexican or latina – i’m as white as the driven snow.)

  14. Gish what part of the country do you live in? I agree with your assessment wholeheartedly and that is exactly why something has to be done. Their numbers are strong and growing stronger every day and what we have is just short of an invasion. Its more evident in the border sates than anywhere else and it is not just about Mexican immigrants ther are also people from beyond Mexico coming into our country.
    It is all about controlling our borders because if these people can come into our country so freely what’s to stop a more sinister group from coming in. Nothing at all.
    My wife and I both are of a Native American heritage my wife is so dark skinned that she is often mistaken for being Mexican when we travel to Mexico and when we do travel tuere it becomes clear why they want to be in our country.
    The problem is not with the Mexican Americans it is with our economy not being able to handle any more aliens/immigrants. They are placing a great burden on our people and that does include the Mexican Americans born in this country.
    Everyone knows or should know how badly the Native Americans were treated in order for this country to become what it is today. They were a people who had a great regard for the earth and the life it contained and here comes aliens/immigrants who had no respect for their way of life at all let alone for the earth nor its life.
    They accepted them with open arms as fellow beings and what they got in return was full blown genocide to a point that many whole tribes and families were wiped away from the face of earth. As Native Americans do we have the right to take to the streets and demand that our homeland be returned to us and restitution be made for the carnage done to our people and our homeland.
    You will say that yes we do have the right, but December 29, 1890 on the snowy banks of Wounded Knee Creek (Cankpe Opi Wakpala), nearly 300 Lakota men, women, and children — old and young — were massacred indiscriminately They tried to run but were shot down “like buffalo.” A people’s dream died there.
    Our people were here 10,000 years before Plymouth Rock was ever named and we numbered over 7,000,000 million strong we know only too well what can happen when your homeland is invaded and we remember the consequences of trying to rectify such an invasion.
    In my extended family I have a son in law who is Mongolian and four beautiful grandchildren, his country was invaded by a Communist Regime and that is why he is here. His sister is married to a full blood Mexican as are my cousins and we love one another with no limit. When we get together to celebrate Easter we go to Buffalo Creek among nature and there is a mixture of our heritages that represents what America has become which is a meeting of the minds.
    We have no hatred of any people, but we do understand the invasion of our homeland and the consequences.

  15. I just wanted to say I am not ignoring this conversation. Quite the contrary, I have been enjoying reading the conversation going on, and I am still formulating my own opinion about this immigration matter, so I don’t have a lot to say about it just yet.

  16. (Hmm, where I say “you” here, please don’t consider it a personal reference, I’m just using this forum to address the American People, in fact, I shall consider it an address to all the People of the Americas, shedding as I do considerable perspective on your collective situation, in the hope that you will get it right as see things my way. And thank you Orbbo, for the virtual soapbox in cyberspace.)

    Invasion! Now that might be a bit strong, especially when you consider… “In pursuit of American interests, the US has overthrown or undermined around 40 Latin American governments in the 20th Century.”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4861320.stm

    I would think that the “them” has more right to the use of the word invasion than the “we” do.

    Beyond the North–South Dialogue, which never seems to get reported in the US, I would suggest that continuing to ignore the “rest of the world” will only leave the US as the world’s largest gated community and the consequences of that will be a little more that the inconvenience of having to show an identity card to a civil servant on demand.

    Your President James Monroe, did something very helpful for the new world, illegal as it was, in suggesting that the US would take it personally if the Euros kept messing with other countries as they are wont to do. After that, the US seems to have dropped the ball and now is engaging in the same type of behaviour that Monroe knew to be so toxic to the community of nations and the betterment of people.

    But this is economics and politics, it is not about culture. Cultural integration is inevitable; at least as long as the oil holds out and we can still get around this planet. Look two hundred years down the road, what do you see? Just as much as New Zealand will be an Anglo-Asian nation, Canada will be a multi-cultural nation with vestiges of Franco-Anglo heritage (like two legal systems), the US will be a Anglo-Afro-Hispanic nation. Get used to it, we’ll all be better for it, really. You just have to get used to the idea, learn a bit of language you momma didn’t teach you and be open to embracing a future where the words, “We the people…” really means something other than the bloody landed gentry (the male property owners, referenced in a number of the US’s founding documents). You got past letting women in the truck (except the for ERA, but I won’t mention that, not wanting to rub any noses in it), you’ll get used to this too.

    There aren’t too many models, yet, that come to mind, although the new Europe seems to be making some real steps forward. In Brazil, they seem to still be working on the project of forming a national identity based on the three founding groups of the current age (Natives, Euros and Africans) and that seems to be a bit of a longer-term project, despite the efforts of some brilliant and forward thinking people, like the late George Amado. Fiji, is a place were this thing seems to be working itself out as they become an Indo-Polynesian country, but I wouldn’t suggest their path as a good one.

    At around 10 years of age, children begin to discover that there is more than one way living a life, that all lives are not lived as they are in one’s family of origin. There is more than one way to cook, to pray, to communicate, to solve problems. I remember it was quite a shock to me that my married sister, made the spaghetti differently than my mother did (neither of whom were Italian and spaghetti was considered an “ethnic” food to our family at the time. I hated my sister’s way of doing it; the bloody meat was in the sauce, not rolled into little balls like it is supposed to be! I took me a little while to get pasta-it. But, as I matured, a couple of things happened that left me without lingering trauma.

    I learned how to cook it both ways myself and then, spaghetti somehow became just another part of my Irish-Anglo-Canadian life and it was no longer an exotic food from those foreign Mediterranean types who were so different form us and needed to be watched closely because they can take over a neighbourhood and before you know it everyone will get home after a hard days work and order a pizza. Where will our culture be then?

    :brow:

  17. i live in florida, where, like texas, the second “official” language seems to be spanish. and, while we have our share of mexicans, there are a lot of cubans, too. and germans, british, canadians, etc. i know my opinion is very unpopular, especially post-9/11, but i feel that everyone should be welcome here. if people want to get pissed off at the unfair aspects of immigration, like losing jobs to foreigners, they should get mad at corporations first. if companies (and farms, apparently) were willing to pay a fair wage to begin with, maybe more americans would be willing to do the jobs that immigrants are doing. corporate america is doing a good job of diverting attention away from their actions – as usual – and onto immigrants and making them villians. we need to start focusing on the real problem here, and do something about that, and then see what needs to be done from there. besides, immigrants don’t want to take over the country. they just wanted to be treated fairly, like human beings, and i don’t think that’s too much to ask.

  18. Cheers to Kenno of New Zealand for bringing fourth an unbiased perspective and double cheers to gish for expressing what she thinks might be an unpopular opinion and for having the courage to express her concern. Which in a meeting of the minds all opinions need to be expressed to reach a final outcome. It is always the final outcome that will be deemed popular/unpopular and not your thoughts which you are entitled to hold without need of being right or wrong to anyone, but yourself.
    Kenno you have a keen(o) insight in that the people of the world will eventually become as one. After all it is inevitable to people who have a common interest in survival in a world where we are neighbors no matter what the geological distance in between may be.
    The reality of life is that mistakes are going to be made, this is a part of the learning process, sometimes at great cost to the terms of endearment of the people, but the mistakes of people are individual to the nature of themselves and people do learn from them unlike the mistakes of world politicians.
    World politicians call deliberate acts mistakes in order to mask their deceitful intentions which is always in the name of the people and then the people of that country are branded with the same moniker. Hence we have a world of distrust far from the harmonic balance of what could/should be shared between neighbors.
    Greed, political ambitions, and religion have been the cause of death for more people than all the diseases/natural disasters throughout the history of the world. Is it not so inconceivable that with all the so called progress humans have made since the beginning of time that we are still so ignorant that we have not the ability to control our own destiny/identities. Instead our destiny/identities are controlled by others who would dictate what our destiny/identity will be and in short this equals the dictaiton our very survival.
    The word invasion has many meanings one of which is, arrival in large numbers: the arrival of large numbers of people or things at one time. I count the Blessings of my son in laws invasion by his family which without I would not know the love of my grandchildren.
    In retrospect Mexico is a vast beautiful land which has the potential of becoming as great for its people as anything they could ever find in the USA and the same holds true for a lot of other not so prosperous countries. It would be in the best interest of the world for people to help these countries to prosper not out of greed, political ambitions, nor religious belief, but more out of the necessity of the survival of the species.
    For instance in Mexico, as in other areas, food crops can be grown year round because of their climate, but because of the political stance (in favor) people go hungry. The same holds true for the embargos placed on Cuba for a mistake made by Castro. In reality it is not Castro that the embargos have hurt it is the people of Cuba that have suffered and truth be known Castro has tried to correct his mistake by offering aid to the US in the aftermath of Katrina.
    No it is not the people of Mexico that we need to fear nor any other immigrants it is more the political endeavors of governments that can’t trust anyone/anything outside of their own realm and for the sake of survival of the species this is an area that needs to be improved without hesitation.
    As some of my Mexican friends and family I have had mixed emotions in regard to the issue of immigrants. Thanks to an open forum provided by Orb (CHEERS !!) and to her loyal readers a meeting of the minds is open and it has helped me make up my own mind about how to feel about a very complicated issue.
    Which is that perhaps this issue will open the door for all world politicians to come to realize that in the meeting of minds there are no boundaries and that borders cannot contain the Spirit/love of neighbors in a world of people whose nature is to care for one another for after all if we don’t care for one another who will? Our world politicians?
    The world is watching America’s lead and hopefully if we make the right choice this will be the beginning of something that has been long overdue.

  19. The above was posted by Wildman. A storm passed through and zapped my puter- didn’t log in.
    Thanks again Orb and thanks gish for allowing me to borrow from your courage. Thanks to Kenno for being an unbiased observer.

  20. They are called illegal immigrants for a reason, their very first act was to break the laws of this country. Wonder what will be the next law the US will stop enforcing? Which one will we turn our heads the other way so we can not see what is happening? Maybe it will be a law that benefits you, and you become the victim, but no one will care or come to your aid, because no one will see it for what it is. But that is sometime in the future, the laws being broken today you make accuses for, you don’t see it as a big deal. Breakdown of society never starts out like a rushing waterfall, but merely as a trickle. Legal immigrants are welcome here, you just have to obey the laws, stand inline, take your number, and wait your turn.

    If companies that make many of today’s common items, textile manufacture for example, didn’t move their manufacturing plants off-shore, one of two thing would have happen. 1. You couldn’t afford a new set of towels, and would be complaining about their high cost, or 2. the company would just file bankruptcy, close it’s doors, and people are out of work.

    Mexico is a beautiful country, but you should check out their immigration policy. Not very welcoming to say the least.

    And Wildman, the privates, the grunts, the ground pounders for the most part have always been made-up from the ranks of the common man, Viet Nam was nothing special in this area. The only thing special about Viet Nam was the Generals wren’t allowed to fight the war, that duty was left up to the politicians back in DC who followed the polls of the people, who watched TV news, that certainly in the late 60′s and early 70′s was almost entirely against the war. The US declared victory and got out, leaving the South Vietnamese to stand alone against the juggernaut of the North Vietnamese army, who were supplied and supported by Russia and China. Had America stayed and finished the job, there is a very good chance the Killing Fields of Laos, where 2.3 million people were murdered under Pol Pot, would never had happened. But we left, America was left to chewing it’s tail, and Pol Pot knew America didn’t have the stomach to fight another war, in another Asian country. He was given cart blanche to do whatever he wanted to do, and millions were exterminated. That is one of America’s great shames that rarely reported.

  21. Jocko you have to look beyond the immigrant issue as being a single issue. When the legal immigrants do come here they leave behind family and friends who eventually want to be with their loved ones and sometimes the bonds of family super precede the red tape. I agree they should all be legal, but I cannot see making felons out of innocent people because they want to be American. With that kind of thinking it will only fill our overcrowded jails and add to the economic burden even more.
    I have often thought that in your retorts to a lot of the issues posted on “Just Orb” and I have in the past taken up for your point of view and the right to express such, but I have come to the conclusion that you must work, or have worked, or you must be a government employee because you always stand in defiance of other peoples view of certain issues that pertain to the view of American politicians not being so pristine.
    As far as the issue of Viet Nam I served in the Army in 68’ & 69’ and just because “the privates, the grunts, the ground pounders for the most part have always been made-up from the ranks of the common man” that doesn’t make up for the cold hard fact that during that war more than any other the common man was singled out for the draft when the rich boys got to set it out because of who their daddy knew.
    Furthermore economics was the prime factor of that war. My DI was an old war horse who had fought in WW II against the Japs and Germans, fought in Korea, and went to Viet Nam 3 times before they declared him unfit for combat and he said it best.
    “ We have the men and power to walk from one end of Viet Nam to the other and kill every man, women, and child in Viet Nam in a weeks time, but because there are so many people making so much money off this war our hands are tied for the first time in the history of American warfare.” In later conversations with Gen. Omar Bradley and LBJ they both concurred and I have to tell you it was a very sore point that broke both of their hearts being that so many American lives were being lost for the sake of the almighty dollar. It was common knowledge among the common ( poor “boy soldier) soldiers that for the sake of American TV viewers the body count of VC was greatly extemporaneous. It wasn’t the politicians fighting that war and only a pompous ass would think so because it was outright good old American Greed that fought/fueled that war. Hell everybody knows that the only thing a politician is capable of fighting for is the almighty VOTE which in turn brings them the almighty dollar .
    One of my best childhood friends was killed along with his whole platoon because they were placed on the Cambodia border and left there without supplies for the sake of making it look as though the war machine needed more money. The US didn’t want to win that war in the beginning and you have to give credit to Charlie because he was one tough MF and by the time the US wanted to save face public opinion forced them to withdraw. In short Jocko you can only fool the public with a ruse for a short time before you end up the fool.
    “America didn’t have the stomach to fight another war” You make it sound as if America (“chewing it’s tail”) is responsible for the “Killing Fields of Laos” the politicians knew it wasn’t a matter of anything more than their political ass if they tried to dupe the American people twice in a row.
    The people of Viet Nam spoke load and clear for more than 200 years their stance and when the “Killing Fields of Laos” did take place what was to make the American people feel that the stance people of Laos were any different.
    As for the issue of immigration the legal immigrants who happen to be US citizens have just as much right to voice their concerns and opinions as any other US citizen and just because of their previous nationality does not diminish that right what so ever. I guess in order to make yourself and the government right about this issue you would have the right to Freedom of Speech be abolished in order to quell their voice.
    They are here as American citizens and they have every right of being such so get over it.
    The outcome will be decided by the people/citizens of America which ineffaceably does include Mexican Americans.
    Perhaps if the American people had been as compassionate about Viet Nam and Laos as the Mexican Americans are about the issue of immigration 58,226 American lives would not have been given without the need of greed.
    Freedom is never free it has to be earned and the Mexican Americans have earned their right to protest just as in as much as you have the right to voice your Jocko you have to look beyond the immigrant issue as being a single issue. When the legal immigrants do come here they leave behind family and friends who eventually want to be with their loved ones and sometimes the bonds of family super precede the red tape. I agree they should all be legal, but I cannot see making felons out of innocent people because they want to be American. With that kind of thinking it will only fill our overcrowded jails and add to the economic burden even more.
    I have often thought that in your retorts to a lot of the issues posted on “Just Orb” and I have in the past taken up for your point of view and the right to express such, but I have come to the conclusion that you must work, or have worked, or you must be a government employee because you always stand in defiance of other peoples view of certain issues that pertain to the view of American politicians not being so pristine.
    As far as the issue of Viet Nam I served in the Army in 68’ & 69’ and just because “the privates, the grunts, the ground pounders for the most part have always been made-up from the ranks of the common man” that doesn’t make up for the cold hard fact that during that war more than any other the common man was singled out for the draft when the rich boys got to set it out because of who their daddy knew.
    Furthermore economics was the prime factor of that war. My DI was an old war horse who had fought in WW II against the Japs and Germans, fought in Korea, and went to Viet Nam 3 times before they declared him unfit for combat and he said it best.
    “ We have the men and power to walk from one end of Viet Nam to the other and kill every man, women, and child in Viet Nam in a weeks time, but because there are so many people making so much money off this war our hands are tied for the first time in the history of American warfare.” In later conversations with Gen. Omar Bradley and LBJ they both concurred and I have to tell you it was a very sore point that broke both of their hearts being that so many American lives were being lost for the sake of the almighty dollar. It was common knowledge among the common ( poor “boy soldier) soldiers that for the sake of American TV viewers the body count of VC was greatly extemporaneous. It wasn’t the politicians fighting that war and only a pompous ass would think so because it was outright good old American Greed that fought/fueled that war. Hell everybody knows that the only thing a politician is capable of fighting for is the almighty VOTE which in turn brings them the almighty dollar .
    One of my best childhood friends was killed along with his whole platoon because they were placed on the Cambodia border and left there without supplies for the sake of making it look as though the war machine needed more money. The US didn’t want to win that war in the beginning and you have to give credit to Charlie because he was one tough MF and by the time the US wanted to save face public opinion forced them to withdraw. In short Jocko you can only fool the public with a ruse for a short time before you end up the fool.
    “America didn’t have the stomach to fight another war” You make it sound as if America (“chewing it’s tail”) is responsible for the “Killing Fields of Laos” the politicians knew it wasn’t a matter of anything more than their political ass if they tried to dupe the American people twice in a row.
    The people of Viet Nam spoke load and clear for more than 200 years their stance and when the “Killing Fields of Laos” did take place what was to make the American people feel that the stance people of Laos were any different.
    As for the issue of immigration the legal immigrants who happen to be US citizens have just as much right to voice their concerns and opinions as any other US citizen and just because of their previous nationality does not diminish that right what so ever. I guess in order to make yourself and the government right about this issue you would have the right to Freedom of Speech be abolished in order to quell their voice.
    They are here as American citizens and they have every right of being such so get over it.
    The outcome will be decided by the people/citizens of America which ineffaceably does include Mexican Americans.
    Perhaps if the American people had been as compassionate about Viet Nam and Laos as the Mexican Americans are about the issue of immigration 58,226 American lives would not have been given without the need of greed.
    Freedom is never free it has to be earned and the Mexican Americans have earned their right to protest.Jocko you have to look beyond the immigrant issue as being a single issue. When the legal immigrants do come here they leave behind family and friends who eventually want to be with their loved ones and sometimes the bonds of family super precede the red tape. I agree they should all be legal, but I cannot see making felons out of innocent people because they want to be American. With that kind of thinking it will only fill our overcrowded jails and add to the economic burden even more.
    I have often thought that in your retorts to a lot of the issues posted on “Just Orb” and I have in the past taken up for your point of view and the right to express such, but I have come to the conclusion that you must work, or have worked, or you must be a government employee because you always stand in defiance of other peoples view of certain issues that pertain to the view of American politicians not being so pristine.
    As far as the issue of Viet Nam I served in the Army in 68’ & 69’ and just because “the privates, the grunts, the ground pounders for the most part have always been made-up from the ranks of the common man” that doesn’t make up for the cold hard fact that during that war more than any other the common man was singled out for the draft when the rich boys got to set it out because of who their daddy knew.
    Furthermore economics was the prime factor of that war. My DI was an old war horse who had fought in WW II against the Japs and Germans, fought in Korea, and went to Viet Nam 3 times before they declared him unfit for combat and he said it best.
    “ We have the men and power to walk from one end of Viet Nam to the other and kill every man, women, and child in Viet Nam in a weeks time, but because there are so many people making so much money off this war our hands are tied for the first time in the history of American warfare.” In later conversations with Gen. Omar Bradley and LBJ they both concurred and I have to tell you it was a very sore point that broke both of their hearts being that so many American lives were being lost for the sake of the almighty dollar. It was common knowledge among the common ( poor “boy soldier) soldiers that for the sake of American TV viewers the body count of VC was greatly extemporaneous. It wasn’t the politicians fighting that war and only a pompous ass would think so because it was outright good old American Greed that fought/fueled that war. Hell everybody knows that the only thing a politician is capable of fighting for is the almighty VOTE which in turn brings them the almighty dollar .
    One of my best childhood friends was killed along with his whole platoon because they were placed on the Cambodia border and left there without supplies for the sake of making it look as though the war machine needed more money. The US didn’t want to win that war in the beginning and you have to give credit to Charlie because he was one tough MF and by the time the US wanted to save face public opinion forced them to withdraw. In short Jocko you can only fool the public with a ruse for a short time before you end up the fool.
    “America didn’t have the stomach to fight another war” You make it sound as if America (“chewing it’s tail”) is responsible for the “Killing Fields of Laos” the politicians knew it wasn’t a matter of anything more than their political ass if they tried to dupe the American people twice in a row.
    The people of Viet Nam spoke load and clear for more than 200 years their stance and when the “Killing Fields of Laos” did take place what was to make the American people feel that the stance people of Laos were any different.
    As for the issue of immigration the legal immigrants who happen to be US citizens have just as much right to voice their concerns and opinions as any other US citizen and just because of their previous nationality does not diminish that right what so ever. I guess in order to make yourself and the government right about this issue you would have the right to Freedom of Speech be abolished in order to quell their voice.
    They are here as American citizens and they have every right of being such so get over it.
    The outcome will be decided by the people/citizens of America which ineffaceably does include Mexican Americans.
    Perhaps if the American people had been as compassionate about Viet Nam and Laos as the Mexican Americans are about the issue of immigration 58,226 American lives would not have been given without the need of greed.
    Freedom is never free it has to be earned and the Mexican Americans have earned their right to protest just as you have the right to voice your opinion.

  22. Wildman I think you got overly excited with the send key. We have multiple copies of your same reply.

    “No one wants to make felons of innocent people”. Not sure that is how the system works. If you come into this country illegally, and the act is classified as a felony, this would label you as a felon, this fact would certainly indicate you are not innocent. So now you have x number of illegal immigrant who have broken the laws of this country demanding to have the same rights as legal immigrants who went through the immigration process properly. So we are rewarding those who break the laws with the same privileges as those who obey the law. What is wrong with that picture? This wouldn’t fly in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico or a number of other countries, they just wouldn’t put up with it and neither should we. Here is a great idea, the US should set up refugee camps along the boarder similar to those in other countries where you have mass numbers of people fleeing one country to find safety in another country. God that would keep the ACLU lawyers busy for years to come. Speaking of Australia, did you know in and around 1974 Australia was actively looking for Americans to come to their country, but not just any American. They had stipulations, they wanted them to come legally, and they wanted them to be proficient in a trade that Australia needed. Now that seems fair doesn’t it. A country opens it doors and ask that you obey it’s laws and if you come have a trade we can use. This country was built by immigrants of one persuasion or another. The Indians got screwed, no doubt about it, but that sort of event is not native just to the Americas, it has happen in every country that has been taken over by another civilization. The Muslims blame the crusades for their dismal plight of today. That is pure foolishness, what wrecked most of the Muslim countries wasn’t the crusades, but a person by the name of Tamerlane, a Mongol. He came after the crusades, and he just didn’t conquered the people and land, he totally laid waste to them, so that nothing left nothing in his wake. But the reason the Muslims don’t place the blame at his feet, is because he half-heartedly converted to Muslim.

    Gerald Ford was the president during the period surrounding the Killing Fields. Ford wasn’t elected by a single American, but was still placed in office through our constitutional process. Ford sure as hell wasn’t going back to another Asian country, to fight for yet another Asian boy, in the same part of the world which we just a few years earlier abandoned, and with the exposed raw nerve of the Viet Nam still lingering. Actually it wasn’t just America that didn’t come to their aid, no country responded and 2.3 million people were murdered, exterminated in similar fashion to the same fate the Jews faced during WWII.

    Every company in the war effort makes money, Dow, GE, Hercules Powder, Martin Marietta, you name it, if they supply our military in a time of war they will make money. And it has been that way forever, in every war fought, in every country of the world, even the communist countries. War means money, and there will always be someone ringing up the register.

  23. So, I’m learning that illegal immigrants number 11.5 to 12 million people in the US. Holy Mooly, that’s bigger than the city of LA, bigger than NY. The best headline I read was — immigration bill will empty America’s Salad Bowl.

    11 million people, what system can deal with that? There are what only 2 million people in jail in the US (I’m open to correction on these stats, it was rather fast research). What system can deal with that may people. It seems no matter what you feel either collectively as a nation or individually, you have no choice but to negoiate a solution other than prisions and bus tickets.

    No doubt that many people would have an impact on any culture and the lack of legitimancy in that population could be trouble. If you know your Marx, it is the substrait for a revoltion. Then again, there is the point, that even at illegal or substandard wage averages, this many people make a heck of a difference to the economy (Consider that at average wage rates they would equal almost 3% of GDP!). It might be easier to turn back a clock than ignore this many voices.Many of my own ancestors sought refuge in America, refugees from a silent genocide. My guess is Orbbo’s ancestors did as well. It was the dream of the new world, the hope. Now many more people call on you for the same refuge and opportunity.

    Elsewhere, I have argued that America is not such a great deal for these folks and it may not be the best deal for working people either, but it is the best deal that’s nearby. The American Dream has worked for many over a few generations. Who would have predicted the Kennedy’s before they happened? I suppose in 20 years, I might get to say the same thing about the Mendez’s.

    To anyone who might be of the impression that I feel that Canada is doing a better job of this North – South situation, I do not. Ontario for instance, has legalised transient international labour, it even seeks Mexican and Caribbean seasonal farm workers for labour that is beyond the reach of labour law in the province. Legalised slavery is the term used, and to create such an extra-legal system to extract labour from the “rest of the world’s poor” it’s not too far off the mark in my opinion. New Zealand imports labour too, but it is within the local law for wages and health, so it’s not so much about extracting value that is illegitimate as it is providing bodies for needed employment in a smaller country. I sure though, it is not the same as having actual rights that are defendable though.

    Further, to give credit where it is due, Ms. Rice, I commend for her stance to “rattle the trees” in Dufour, before many more unnecessary deaths occur there. It should be anticipated that some Americans will die in Dufour and many may not have a personal attachment to the place sufficient to do so. America’s might in putting down these petty overlords and thugs has been a positive influence in the world.

    That being said, I’m hoping against hope that you keep you paws of Bolivia and let the Bolivia – Venezuela – Cuba alliance make its own path to prosperity. Bolivia being the second most impoverished nation in the West, yet it sits on a pile of natural resources that should make it as rich as many Arab Peninsula countries. Let’s face it the neo-con approach didn’t do a damn thing to effect a positive change there, so the socialist backlash is inevitable – sorry Sun and Shell and BP, you might take it in the neck this time, just because you acted like we expect you to. Hey, your shareholders were happy to get into the deal for the obvious profit taking – time to pony up. I’m hoping no one gets killed though. Killed over oil and gas seems like such a waste to me.

    The deeper I look into the B-V-C alliance, the more it makes sense to me. Cuba’s technology in education, Venezuela’s resources and international oil money for ventures and Bolivia’s untapped resources and needs for education and infrastructure, it could be a triple win if left alone. It may seem easy to scoff at such low level rejection of American solutions that might offer faster and more easily won prosperity, but lets not forget that Brazil, Chile and Argentina have rejected American proposals for Free Trade Agreements. It brings new meaning to “the South will rise again.” Maybe we haven’t seen anything yet.

    Well, it’s May second now, how have you been changed by May First?

    Me? well, it’s beem mostly academic, but I have been prompted to leran more about America than I otherwise would have.

  24. Jocko,
    Kind sir I beg to differ with you. If Kennedy, who just happened to be a decorated military soldier, had been in office during the war in Southeast Asia the outcome would have been a lot different. One reason being is the fact that his family was already wealthy and another being that he didn’t play the political game by anyone’s rules, but his own. There is no way in hell he would have let American soldiers be slaughtered for the sake of the almighty dollar.
    Case in point when the Cuban missile crisis took place if Russia had not backed off Cuba would not exist today. True the rest of the world might not be here either, but the point is that he didn’t take no guff off a bunch of panty waist money hungry politicians. Why do you think he was assassinated? Because Oswald had enough brains to pull it off, but not enough to escape?
    And what about WW II did we enter that war because we needed the money or was it because we were attacked unprovoked at Pearl Harbor? Seems to me there were scrap metal drives just to supply the war effort. In that engagement the US men were called out regardless of their backgrounds to the point that the women were the only ones left to work in their absence. You stand corrected Dear Sir without recourse/need of rebuttal for that was a war fought by Honor alone on it’s own merit.
    I travel to Mexico several times each year and it’s not because it is on the top list of places to vacation it is because going into the remote areas away from the tourist traps and seeing how the people there have to live makes me appreciate my own life and my country even more.
    Although not knowing the possible ramifications of the outcome of the issue with the immigrants, of which Kenno pointed out, has cause of concern. I know he said it best when he spoke of our forefathers in America being immigrants themselves. I for one cannot believe that of all the countless lives given by our soldiers in the name of Freedom that it would be conceivable to turn our backs on any people of any ethnic background when the very structure of our Great Nation is made up of all the known ethnicities.

    As far as “the silent majority” of Americans, they see services being cut after Bush has wasted billions of dollars in invading Iraq, and teeter on the edge of holding him and Republicans responsible, or making scapegoats of illegal immigrants.
    The words reflect the worldviews. Are the people who risk their lives in perilous crossings of desert and ocean “illegal aliens,” or are they “undocumented workers?” Are we, in America and beyond, going to allow fear and loathing of the great unwashed other to rule our hearts and halls of government, or will the realization take hold that we are all inextricably part of the same chaotic, suffering world, and that solutions no longer lie within national borders, but in new concords of cooperation between peoples?

    Martin LeFevre

    The human Spirit is boundless and cannot be contained by the bonds of any issue because of the sheer number alone of their very being. No vessel of any kind can contain this human Spirit that only longs for a better life save, but one which is a vessel of Freedom.

    Our defense is in the spirit which prized liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands everywhere. Destroy this spirit and you have planted the seeds of despotism at your own doors.
    ABRAHAM LINCOLN

    Give me your tired, your poor,
    Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
    The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
    Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
    I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

    The very Spirit of these words have brought the world where it is today, but some would have us tear it all down.

  25. cheers to you, too, wildman. :biggrin: i’m glad that the discourse here has been civil, unlike some sites i’ve been visiting recently. i think, as someone with native american heritage – and a vet to boot – you have a lot of good insights to bring to the debate.

  26. Gish it is I who owe you thanks for sharing your courage to overcome a fear that clouded my judgment. I too have seen the belligerence on other sites in regard to the issue at hand. Orb has a unique site unto itself and I think it comes from our host being so unique in the honestly of being able to share her innermost feelings without the fear of being ridiculed and also being able to handle the slings and arrows of her efforts with the intelligence reflected by the people who frequent her site.
    In as much as I do favor my native American heritage of my mother’s people my father’s people were of a German, Irish, and Black Dutch heritage, but I grew up around my mother’s people. Even though the Nations of the Native American people are sovereign nations within a nation we take Pride in the fact that American Indians have the highest per capita participation in the armed services of any ethnic group.
    Back in the days of old it was common practice to adopt people from other ethnic groups into our Tribes as part of our own to work together in a common goal of kinship and there were strict guidelines of respect of one another to be followed by all regardless whether you were born into the Tribe or adopted into it.
    When we lose respect for one another it is because we lose respect for ourselves which in turn causes undue hardship for all concerned. I think that is why in the “Tribe of Orb” respect is given and received which keeps things civil no matter if a stated opinion concurs with an issue at hand or not.
    Respect should never be given without being returned and it cannot be taken without being earned.

  27. Well said, Wildman, well said. Thanks gish, you drew that out of him extremely well. This is a special place with a wonderful tribe of people and a pint sized Texas polymath at the centre of it all.

    Orbbo, take a moment, shed a tear, for you have drawn people from around the world to share ideas, express deeply personal feelings and debate like humans should to get to Truth and it is indeed because of your uniqueness, power with words, honesty and art.

    Many of us, I’m sure would call your mother and bloody tell her so the next time she… well, never mind. Pats on back, even if self delivered are deserved. (Wonders if selected posts end up in a scrapbook somewhere for future Orbbo biographers to reference.)

  28. Wildman,
    Viet Nam History 101, during the time John Kennedy held the office of president. Kennedy may not have wanted to go to SE Asia, but go he went. Sorry for being so long, but that is history for you.

    January 20, 1961- John Fitzgerald Kennedy is inaugurated as the 35th U.S. President and declares “…we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to insure the survival and the success of liberty.” Privately, outgoing President Eisenhower tells him “I think you’re going to have to send troops…” to Southeast Asia.

    The youthful Kennedy administration is inexperienced in matters regarding Southeast Asia. Kennedy’s Secretary of Defense, 44-year-old Robert McNamara, along with civilian planners recruited from the academic community, will play a crucial role in deciding White House strategy for Vietnam over the next several years. Under their leadership, the United States will wage a limited war to force a political settlement.

    However, the U.S. will be opposed by an enemy dedicated to total military victory “…whatever the sacrifices, however long the struggle…until Vietnam is fully independent and reunified,” as stated by Ho Chi Minh.

    May 1961 – Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson visits President Diem in South Vietnam and hails the embattled leader as the ‘Winston Churchill of Asia.’

    May 1961 – President Kennedy sends 400 American Green Beret ‘Special Advisors’ to South Vietnam to train South Vietnamese soldiers in methods of ‘counter-insurgency’ in the fight against Viet Cong guerrillas.

    The role of the Green Berets soon expands to include the establishment of Civilian Irregular Defense Groups (CIDG) made up of fierce mountain men known as the Montagnards. These groups establish a series of fortified camps strung out along the mountains to thwart infiltration by North Vietnamese.

    Fall – The conflict widens as 26,000 Viet Cong launch several successful attacks on South Vietnamese troops. Diem then requests more military aid from the Kennedy administration.

    October 1961 – To get a first-hand look at the deteriorating military situation, top Kennedy aides, Maxwell Taylor and Walt Rostow, visit Vietnam. “If Vietnam goes, it will be exceedingly difficult to hold Southeast Asia,” Taylor reports to the President and advises Kennedy to expand the number of U.S. military advisors and to send 8000 combat soldiers.

    Defense Secretary McNamara and the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommend instead a massive show of force by sending six divisions (200,000 men) to Vietnam. However, the President decides against sending any combat troops.

    October 24, 1961 – On the sixth anniversary of the Republic of South Vietnam, President Kennedy sends a letter to President Diem and pledges “the United States is determined to help Vietnam preserve its independence…”

    President Kennedy then sends additional military advisors along with American helicopter units to transport and direct South Vietnamese troops in battle, thus involving Americans in combat operations. Kennedy justifies the expanding U.S. military role as a means “…to prevent a Communist takeover of Vietnam which is in accordance with a policy our government has followed since 1954.” The number of military advisors sent by Kennedy will eventually surpass 16,000.

    December 1961 – Viet Cong guerrillas now control much of the countryside in South Vietnam and frequently ambush South Vietnamese troops. The cost to America of maintaining South Vietnam’s sagging 200,000 man army and managing the overall conflict in Vietnam rises to a million dollars per day.

    1962

    January 11, 1962 – During his State of the Union address, President Kennedy states, “Few generations in all of history have been granted the role of being the great defender of freedom in its maximum hour of danger. This is our good fortune…”

    January 15, 1962 – During a press conference, President Kennedy is asked if any Americans in Vietnam are engaged in the fighting. “No,” the President responds without further comment.

    February 6, 1962 – MACV, the U.S. Military Assistance Command for Vietnam, is formed. It replaces MAAG-Vietnam, the Military Assistance Advisory Group which had been established in 1950.

    February 27, 1962 – The presidential palace in Saigon is bombed by two renegade South Vietnamese pilots flying American-made World War II era fighter planes. President Diem and his brother Nhu escape unharmed. Diem attributes his survival to “divine protection.”

    March 1962 – Operation Sunrise begins the Strategic Hamlet resettlement program in which scattered rural populations in South Vietnam are uprooted from their ancestral farmlands and resettled into fortified villages defended by local militias. However, over 50 of the hamlets and are soon infiltrated and easily taken over by Viet Cong who kill or intimidate village leaders.

    As a result, Diem orders bombing raids against suspected Viet Cong-controlled hamlets. The air strikes by the South Vietnamese Air Force are supported by U.S. pilots, who also conduct some of the bombings. Civilian causalities erode popular support for Diem and result in growing peasant hostility toward America, which is largely blamed for the unpopular resettlement program as well as the bombings.

    May 1962 – Viet Cong organize themselves into battalion-sized units operating in central Vietnam.

    May 1962 – Defense Secretary McNamara visits South Vietnam and reports “we are winning the war.”

    July 23, 1962 – The Declaration on the Neutrality of Laos signed in Geneva by the U.S. and 13 other nations, prohibits U.S. invasion of portions of the Ho Chi Minh trail inside eastern Laos.

    August 1, 1962 – President Kennedy signs the Foreign Assistance Act of 1962 which provides “…military assistance to countries which are on the rim of the Communist world and under direct attack.”

    August 1962 – A U.S. Special Forces camp is set up at Khe Sanh to monitor North Vietnamese Army (NVA) infiltration down the Ho Chi Minh trail.

    1963

    January 3, 1963 – A Viet Cong victory in the Battle of Ap Bac makes front page news in America as 350 Viet Cong fighters defeat a large force of American-equipped South Vietnamese troops attempting to seize a radio transmitter. Three American helicopter crew members are killed.

    The South Vietnamese Army is run by officers personally chosen by President Diem, not for their competence, but for their loyalty to him. Diem has instructed his officers to avoid causalities. Their primary mission, he has told them, is to protect him from any coups in Saigon.

    May 1963 – Buddhists riot in South Vietnam after they are denied the right to display religious flags during their celebration of Buddha’s birthday. In Hue, South Vietnamese police and army troops shoot at Buddhist demonstrators, resulting in the deaths of one woman and eight children.

    Political pressure now mounts on the Kennedy administration to disassociate itself from Diem’s repressive, family-run government. “You are responsible for the present trouble because you back Diem and his government of ignoramuses,” a leading Buddhist tells U.S. officials in Saigon.

    June-August – Buddhist demonstrations spread. Several Buddhist monks publicly burn themselves to death as an act of protest. The immolations are captured on film by news photographers and shock the American public as well as President Kennedy.

    Diem responds to the deepening unrest by imposing martial law. South Vietnamese special forces, originally trained by the U.S. and now controlled by Diem’s younger brother Nhu wage violent crackdowns against Buddhist sanctuaries in Saigon, Hue and other cities.

    Nhu’s crackdowns spark widespread anti-Diem demonstrations. Meanwhile, during an American TV interview, Nhu’s wife, the flamboyant Madame Nhu, coldly refers to the Buddhist immolations as a ‘barbecue.’ As the overall situation worsens, high level talks at the White House focus on the need to force Diem to reform.

    July 4, 1963 – South Vietnamese General Tran Van Don, a Buddhist, contacts the CIA in Saigon about the possibility of staging a coup against Diem.

    August 22, 1963 – The new U.S. ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge arrives in South Vietnam.

    August 24, 1963 – A U.S. State Department message sent to Ambassador Lodge is interpreted by Lodge to indicate he should encourage the military coup against President Diem.

    August 26, 1963 – Ambassador Lodge meets President Diem for the first time. Under instructions from President Kennedy, Lodge tells Diem to fire his brother, the much-hated Nhu, and to reform his government. But Diem arrogantly refuses even to discuss such matters with Lodge.

    August 26, 1963 – President Kennedy and top aides begin three days of heated discussions over whether the U.S. should in fact support the military coup against Diem.

    August 29, 1963 – Lodge sends a message to Washington stating “…there is no possibility, in my view, that the war can be won under a Diem administration.” President Kennedy then gives Lodge a free hand to manage the unfolding events in Saigon. However, the coup against Diem fizzles due to mistrust and suspicion within the ranks of the military conspirators.

    September 2, 1963 – During a TV news interview with Walter Cronkite, President Kennedy describes Diem as “out of touch with the people” and adds that South Vietnam’s government might regain popular support “with changes in policy and perhaps in personnel.”

    Also during the interview, Kennedy comments on America’s commitment to Vietnam “If we withdrew from Vietnam, the Communists would control Vietnam. Pretty soon, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Malaya, would go…”

    October 2, 1963 – President Kennedy sends Ambassador Lodge a mixed messaged that “no initiative should now be taken to give any encouragement to a coup” but that Lodge should “identify and build contacts with possible leadership as and when it appears.”

    October 5, 1963 – Lodge informs President Kennedy that the coup against Diem appears to be on again.

    The rebel generals, led by Duong Van “Big” Minh, first ask for assurances that U.S. aid to South Vietnam will continue after Diem’s removal and that the U.S. will not interfere with the actual coup. This scenario suits the White House well, in that the generals will appear to acting on their own without any direct U.S. involvement. President Kennedy gives his approval. The CIA in Saigon then signals the conspirators that the United States will not interfere with the overthrow of President Diem.

    October 25, 1963 – Prompted by concerns over public relations fallout if the coup fails, a worried White House seeks reassurances from Ambassador Lodge that the coup will succeed.

    October 28, 1963 – Ambassador Lodge reports a coup is “imminent.”

    October 29, 1963 – An increasingly nervous White House now instructs Lodge to postpone the coup. Lodge responds it can only be stopped by betraying the conspirators to Diem.

    November 1, 1963 – Lodge has a routine meeting with Diem from 10 a.m. until noon at the presidential palace, then departs. At 1:30 p.m., during the traditional siesta time, the coup begins as mutinous troops roar into Saigon, surround the presidential palace, and also seize police headquarters. Diem and his brother Nhu are trapped inside the palace and reject all appeals to surrender. Diem telephones the rebel generals and attempts, but fails, to talk them out of the coup. Diem then calls Lodge and asks “…what is the attitude of the United States?” Lodge responds “…it is four thirty a.m. in Washington, and the U.S. government cannot possibly have a view.” Lodge then expresses concern for Diem’s safety, to which Diem responds “I am trying to restore order.”

    At 8 p.m., Diem and Nhu slip out of the presidential palace unnoticed and go to a safe house in the suburbs that belongs to a wealthy Chinese merchant.

    November 2, 1963 – At 3 a.m., one of Diem’s aides betrays his location to the generals. The hunt for Diem and Nhu now begins. At 6 a.m., Diem telephones the generals. Realizing the situation is hopeless, Diem and Nhu offer to surrender from inside a Catholic church. Diem and Nhu are then taken into custody by rebel officers and placed in the back of an armored personnel carrier. While traveling to Saigon, the vehicle stops and Diem and Nhu are assassinated.

    At the White House, a meeting is interrupted with the news of Diem’s death. According to witnesses, President Kennedy’s face turns a ghostly shade of white and he immediately leaves the room. Later, the President records in his private diary, “I feel that we must bear a good deal of responsibility for it.”

    Saigon celebrates the downfall of Diem’s regime. But the coup results in a power vacuum in which a series of military and civilian governments seize control of South Vietnam, a country that becomes totally dependent on the United States for its existence. Viet Cong use the unstable political situation to increase their hold over the rural population of South Vietnam to nearly 40 percent.

    November 22, 1963 – President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas. Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as the 36th U.S. President. He is the fourth President coping with Vietnam and will oversee massive escalation of the war while utilizing many of the same policy advisors who served Kennedy.

    Other Kennedy contributions:
    Bay of Pigs, rings a bell? Kennedy dropped th ball there, and that was never forgotten by the Cubans and/or certain members of the CIA.

    The US and Russia came within a nat’s hair of using nukes. Thankfully the Russians blinked, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation today. Where did old man Kennedy’s (Jack’s dad)wealth come from? Do I hear bootleg whisky.

  29. Sorry about this, but I need to correct a small point.

    I am sure it was a typo, but Kennedy was a decorated Naval office, not a military soldier. John Kennedy as we all know commanded PT-109, a US naval vessel. I think you may have been thinking of his older brother Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. who was shot down and killed over occupied Europe in World War II.

    Now back to this immigrant issue.

    Americans like and welcome immigrants. America after all is a country made up of immigrants, even the Native Americans came to this land from another place. Genetic studies estimate the colonization of the Americas dates from between 40,000 to 13,000 years ago. So we all came from some other place than here, some just have been here longer than others. America is a sovereign country, 99% of Americans obey the laws of this country, we expect, and demand those entering this country to do the same; to learn our language; to adopt to our ways; to assimilate themselves into our country. The list of immigrants who have come to this country legally, and have taken advantage of the vast numbers of opportunities to better their lives is endless. We are a sovereign country with a fence, and along this fence there is a gate. The gate is always open to those who will respect our laws, those who want to work, those who want to contribute of themselves to make this a better place. Those who do not respect our laws and regulations should leave. In the simplest of terms, who would you allow to enter your home, once they were in what would you expect of them, if they didn’t conform with the rules of your home, do you ask them to leave, if they won’t leave do you call the law, or do you let them stay doing whatever they want to do, what become of your home?

    But here is another great idea, similar to my refugee camp. I think ALL Americans, actually lets make it all the peoples of the world who live in an modern industrial society, should rid themselves of all their accumulated wealth (kind of sounds like China under Mao), and distribute that wealth to the rest of the world’s population who haven’t been as lucky and/or as fortunate as we. Because Wildman you have to admit it, that home you own, car you drive, clothes you wear, somehow someway was earned on the backs of the poor of some 3rd world country somewhere. How can we, the truly compassionate, the caring more than you, I feel guilty because I have a toaster crowd, live with this burden. Ridiculous proposal isn’t it? The truth is we may feel guilty because we have more than they, that we by some stroke of luck have been born here and not in some mud hut, tree, or on the jungle floor, and as such we have been afforded to live better lives, to accumulate some wealth. Now we both know neither you nor I are about to sell our homes cars, stocks bonds, mutual accounts, give away our jobs, computers, or any other things we worked so hard to obtained, to ease our guilt ridden conscience, just so we can live in similar conditions of those in 3rd world countries. Or hope somehow this will lift them up to our standards; that just isn’t going to happen, no matter how much money is dumped on them. Reminds me of the Johnsons “The Great Society” program, but only in a much grander scale. If that is the intent of some go for it, all one has to do is move there, providing that doesn’t violate that country’s immigration policy. And those who think things would be some much better if we were a Communist or Socialist state, all you have to do is look at the mother of all such states, Russia and China. The idea sounds so good until they are put into practice, and the results are always the same: they just don’t work. So let Bolivia, Cuba, Venezuela, do whatever it is they think they can do. In the short term they’ll gain some traction, but they have built their future on sand, the poor of their countries will never reap any of the benefits, and this will lead to their failure. For any country to survive, you have to be more than a one trick pony, and when the demand for fossil fuel abates and other sources of energy take their place, and it will sooner that we think, the one trick pony will die from within.

  30. Jocko Dear friend,
    I guess I should have said if Kennedy had remained in office things may have turned out different then they did in Southeast Asia. As for the issue of the Bay of Pigs it was already being planned, by the CIA, months before Kennedy even took office and was placed in his lap 3 months into his term. It was a CIA operation of a clandestine nature of which Kennedy was a participant in that he was the man in charge who would have to answer for it’s outcome be it good or bad, but as is the case of CIA operations he was not in control of the operation. He was in the infancy of his office which could be termed as a learning period. As is the case with most all presidents they are, but figure heads that take the brunt of being responsible for the actions of their country.
    Yes it is a well known fact that the Kennedy family had mob ties. Just as it is a fact that in the election campaigns of both John and Robert mob money was used. In short perfection, in human form, is only achieved through a learning process in which we learn from our mistakes.
    I was very impressed in the detail of your coverage of the war in Southeast Asia (Kennedy), very impressive indeed, and I have to say Jocko we can debate pros and cons of any issue until the cows come home and no man can say for sure how it would have turned out to be if it had happened a certain way because when you speak of issues already decided by time then we can only speculate what could have been, but you have my respect for sharing our thoughts on a subject that left a lot of people open to speculation and in pain from the outcome. We can only hope for an outcome of the issue of the immigrants to reach an accord that will lead the way for the world to an understanding such as we have shared in our words.

  31. Jocko you sure are a picky person aren’t you? Small point indeed. What difference does it make what branch of the ARMED SERVICES Kennedy was in? The fact that he was decorated and did serve was the point. I beg your pardon for the obvious typo/misplaced word, but if you get your jollies being a hound dog for that sort of thing by all means enjoy yourself. As for the immigrant problem you would do well to chill out a little and have a little more Faith in America.

    “who would you allow to enter your home, once they were in what would you expect of them, if they didn’t conform with the rules of your home, do you ask them to leave, if they won’t leave do you call the law, or do you let them stay doing whatever they want to do”

    People like me have no need to bother the law. Those boys have got their hands full already and why bother them with something I have no need to worry about. Those who know me, well enough to come to my home, know me well enough to know not to disrespect me or my home. When people see me on the street they know instantly that the last thing on this earth they would want to do is disrespect me personally in any language.
    Perhaps it is because of the way I carry myself or perhaps it could be that the first time they look upon my face they see just a few of the more than 200 scars I carry on my body. Maybe it’s because they take one look and know that I’ve been to hell and from my appearance they know without a doubt that the Devil lost the battle and that I did indeed enjoy every minute of the experience.
    They can tell they don’t want any trouble with me at first glance because that one look is all it takes for them to know I don‘t have a thing to lose and what I do have wouldn‘t be worth the pain of them taking it. I guess its something they see in my eyes rather then the scars and Bubba they know it without a word having to be spoken in any language.
    I grew up half Indian/half cowboy on a 2k acre ranch stringing barb wire and breaking horses and I take Pride in being a genuine Texas Redneck and FYI my momma gave me almost half those scars before I ever turned 12 so I guess I didn’t have much choice, but to be a Wildman. Guess my momma loved me enough to make sure I could handle the pain of life.
    That’s the whole point about this immigration thing Jocko. I’m just one person that someone would not want to mess with for many reasons, but it’s just like Keno said there are more than 20 million immigrants already here and the last thing you want do is piss off a bunch of people who risked it all to come here in the first place and have nothing to lose if they lose what they have here.
    Lets face it they are here and more are arriving every day and the best ideal our politicians can come up with is to make felons out of them. How ironic is it that the very first ideal they come up with starts instantaneous controlled protest from the very people the issue is about. Oh yeah it just makes all the sense in the world to walk up to a hornets nest and provoke the hell out of them with no where to run nor any ideal of what to do next. American people have always took to defending the downtrodden and with the international exposure from the felon ideal it gave the immigrants a lot of unexpected support and the rules of engagement for everyone changed dramatically at that point.
    And you just had to nitpick about the Native Americans coming from somewhere else. What difference could it possibly make where they came from when the truth of the matter is that they got here first and brother they weren’t passing out visas and immigration papers in the time shortly after Plymouth Rock. No sir they were passing out food and kindness and even though they did our people wrong we still have enough respect for America to offer more Warriors in defense of her than any others. It’s called adaptation in order for the whole to survive.
    Get over it Jocko the world is changing just as it was meant to be and the real success of life is adaptation. Like I said have some Faith in your Country and the American people because after all the American people have always had the heart to overcome anything and when you consider that American people are made up of a mixture of all people of the world I think they have done an excellent job of adaptation in living with one another of mixed kinds for about 200 yrs so why stop now. Sure mistakes have been made along the way and more will be made which is the mere process of living/adaptation and don’t be afraid of a few bad Apples there are plenty of us Wild men around to take care of any that might get out of hand.

  32. “Those who know me, well enough to come to my home, know me well enough to know not to disrespect me or my home.” Exactly Wildman. Thank you for making my point.

    The Bay of Pigs thing. It makes little difference if Kennedy was only in office for 3 months, as they say it happened on his watch. Plus he failed to provide then air cover, it wasn’t that he hadn’t been brief on the matter. Fact, “telephone conversations between President Kennedy and his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, on March 2, 1963, in which they discuss concerns that a Senate investigating committee might reveal that the president had authorized jets from the U.S. aircraft carrier Essex to provide one hour of air cover for the brigade’s B-26 bombers on the morning of April 19. The unmarked jets failed to rendezvous with the bombers, however, because the CIA and the Pentagon were unaware of a time zone difference between Nicaragua and Cuba. Two B-26s were shot down and four Americans lost.” Sounds to me like Jack knew exactly what was going on.

    Small point indeed. What difference does it make what branch of the ARMED SERVICES Kennedy was in? Well try calling a group of Marines, sailors. They maybe sea going bellhops, but they sure aren’t sailors; although someone might argue the Marine Corp is under the Navy. Military decorations. Interesting point. Most people have no idea how a military person is awarded a medal, I mean other than a good conduct medal. A medal for gallantry, such as the CMH, Silver Star etc, are based on several factors. 1. What was done. 2. Who can substantiate it. 3. How well are you and that person who wrote up the accommodation liked by their superiors . 4. Who reviews it , and 5. who’s your out side rabbi. Always pays to have a congressman as a friend. A number of individuals who have been put in for a Silver Star,only to end up with a Bronze star.

    Tough guys, bad guys, mean guys. Although I do not fit any of the aforementioned titles, I have at one time or another ran across all these people. What I always found interesting with this group, bikers, brawlers, personal bodyguards, pug fighters, martial arts experts, etc. is they believed in their own hype to such an extent that they at one time or another got their assed whipped by some smaller, unassuming looking shmuck. And to add more embarrassment to the fire, these poor unassuming shmucks did know who to fight, but they knew how to survive. So they would strike first stunning the tough guy to cause him sever pain, and then they would unleash all their fury on him. Strength, muscles mass, bone density mean nothing in this sort of event, the tough guy never figures the little guy is going to do anything, and that is such a mistake.

    12 or 20 million illegals. Thinking to myself I wonder how many illegals NZ has, maybe they need a few. I mean if it is good enough for the US, hell it has to be good enough for those Kiwi’s.

    First off much to the liberals dismay not all illegals, are Mexican, or Mexicans who work picking crops, or work in sweat shops. That is a nice image to paint but that is far from the truth, but it is a nice try to stereotype the illegal as such. Out of the X million factor of illegals, only 40% are Mexican, or Latino. The other 60% are from every other place. I am just speculating here as I have no idea how this illegal immigration issue will unfold, but I have a wild guess. It would not surprise me if the illegals who have been here for years turn in their brothers and sisters who are recent arrivals. Why would they do this you might ask. Very simple, they have a lot to lose and the new arrivals have very little to lose. Plus it makes they get a gold star placed alongside their name.

    “And you just had to nitpick about the Native Americans coming from somewhere else.” Hardly nitpicking just stating a fact. The Native American’s as we know them came across the land bridge from Asia. Like I said, “So we all came from some other place than here, some just have been here longer than others.” Not all Native American were friendly, Jamestown massacre 1622, some yes, but not all. Did you know where the first slave ships to our shore unloaded it’s cargo? I think most would say somewhere in the South, most likely Virginia, but actually it was in Massachusetts. Wonder if Kennedy and Kerry are aware of that fact? :uhoh:

  33. There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in. -Leonard Cohen, musician (1934- )

  35. Yup Jocko you got me. I am a little man at 5’ 6.5” and 160 lbs soaking wet. With an extended reach of 36”. You know in my older years I am sorta glad that my looks are what they are cause even though I became immune to pain a long time ago truth is I’m just getting too old to scrape with the youngins. They make so many mistakes they take all the fun out of the scrap.
    Not being able to register pain has it’s drawbacks such as the time I almost cut the end of my index finger off. If not for a friend pointing out that it was completely severed and only held on by a tendon no telling when I would have noticed. First joint under the finger nail. The only reason my doctor reattached it was because I told him it came in handy for my artwork. Not being able to feel pain gave me a slight advantage when it came to being in scrapes, but sometimes the damage sure would add up.
    Try to chill about that immigrant thing Jock it will all work out one way or the other. Thats just the way it is.

  36. I view the “needs to be correct” all of the time as a serious character flaw.

  37. The real truth is that no one ever wins in War, fights, or arguments.