I would fly into Tucson, then ride a shuttle van 45 minutes down to the border in Nogales, AZ. Sometimes I hoteled on the AZ side, sometimes on the Sonora side. 

I would people-watch from both sides of the border. 

Mexicans would go back home with American toys and TVs, and Americans would come back from Sonora with pottery and such. 

Each culture each wanted something from the other culture. Human nature. 

A few blocks southwest of the border crossing, on the Sonora side, was a jewelry store, one of many. 

An older blind man would sit on the east side of the street and play an accordion for donations. 

He would play a little to attract attention, then wait for someone to drop coins into the inverted hat in his lap. He would feel the coins to count the money, put the money in his pocket, then play accordionly to the donation. Then he would stop and wait for more donations. 

I made a point of seeing him every time I went to Nogales. 

Then he was no longer there, and I heard that he had died. Sad. 

I also visited Nogales one year for Cinco de Mayo. Hardly any children in the crowd. They were mostly either marching in school groups or riding on the back of a flatbed truck, showing off their dance or karate skills. Quite the deal, very festive.

I enjoyed both sides of Nogales. Then came 9/11. After 9/11, came the drug wars. Why? 

When the border became secure enough to slow terrorists, they also slowed the drug traffic that had always been there. 

Then the open drug-war began, and I felt Nogales, Senora wasn’t a safe destination anymore. 

The Wall: 

It’s necessary, It’s less expensive than troops. 

Non-Latinos are coming in through our southern border, which smells like an international conspiracy.

Sex trafficking occurs through poor borders. 

Women pay guides to take them across, and then some are raped by their guides and pimped out to other caravan members.  

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/dna-tests-reveal-30-of-suspected-fraudulent-migrant-families-were-unrelated

Latino gang members infiltrate immigrant caravans. 

A news report (2-21-19) said that American’s average life expectancy has dropped, primarily to drug abuse. 

Life expectancy also drops when illegals kill US citizens. 

Build the wall. 

The GOP Congress is failing us with the deals they let the Democrats write. 

We don’t have to question the motives of the Democrats, we know they hate America. 

But there is a cross-section of the GOP that is betraying us. 

If states contributed 25% of confiscated drug money toward building the Wall, this would help. 

‘An ounce of prevention is a worth a pound of cure’ is an adage that certainly applies here.  

I have to suspect that the Catholic Church is a major player in the assault on the USA’s southern border: 

1) The Pope is pressing the no-border mantra, so I have to assume the Vatican is pressuring the Mexican Catholic Church 

     to facilitate the migration assault. 

2) Democrat lawmakers are doing their best to make illegal immigration work on this side of the border and some US churches are cooperating. 

Eric J. Rose