Border Security – The Enduring Joke

According to a report from the U.S. Border Patrol, security measured by illegal alien arrests at the U.S.- Mexican border along the Tucson, Arizona, sector has improved by 16%.

A spokesman says the drop continues a trend from last year and may reflect the state of economic conditions in both the United States and Mexico as much as it does enhanced enforcement efforts.

Through the end of August, agents in the Tucson sector arrested just under 300,000 illegal immigrants.

That's 16% fewer than the nearly 359,000 caught in the first 11 months of fiscal 2007.

So, 300,000 divided by 11 equals 27,273 illegal aliens a month were arrested. And, of course, 27,273 divided by 30 means 909 illegal aliens were arrested each day.

Continuing, 909 divided by 24 means that every hour of every day for 11 months 38 illegal aliens were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol.

With these kinds of numbers, how in the world could anyone expect law enforcers to be effective? Not only that, but nobody is talking about the ones that got away. All the data reflect illegal aliens who were caught.

To appreciate the problem from another perspective, imagine the equivalent of the entire population of the city of Cleveland, Ohio, sneaking into the U.S. every year through the Tucson corridor alone. Other major American cities are represented well by the other border corridors of international trespass.