Cost of free people and free markets: $9 billion
Lexington Green at Chicago Boyz:
The liberals like the idea of lots of illegals whom they can funnel benefits to and whom they can turn into Democrats. On the GOP side, the business and farming community likes the dirt cheap labor that cannot ask for benefits or be unionized and that cannot sue when injured or poisoned. This unholy alliance needs to be slapped aside. Most of us have no liberal guilt about illegal immigrants, and the people who get a commercial advantage out of employing illegal workers get no pity or sympathy from me, either. As to people in California who will have to pay more to have their yards kept pretty, the worlds smallest violin remains silent for them, too.
The solution?
I did a little Googling and I found out what the Israelis are paying per-kilometer for their walls around the West Bank and Gaza. At the same cost per km, the USA could build a wall from the Gulf to the Pacific for $9 billion.
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Well-appointed and well-guarded gate areas would allow the passage of legitimate commerce and personal travel.
And, as Mr. Green himself suggests, for the entry of lots of legal immigrants.
Not everyone opposed to illegal immigration is party to a nativist cabal. We're not against immigration; we're against unsecured borders, unregulated entry and contempt for the rule of law.
Our national security requires that we have control of our borders; public policy planning requires that we know how many immigrants to expect; and civic virtue requires that the immigrants themselves enter in the manner prescribed by law.