The Discerning Texan

All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Where the Surge Isn't Working

It is all well and good that our surge in Iraq seems to be making a big difference against Al Qaeda there; but there are other fronts in this War. And until very recently we seem to have all but ignored the front of the War where we are losing ground everyday: protecting our borders.

For Newt Gingrich, the senseless execution-style murders in New Jersey is a "wake up call" that we all need to pay attention to; like it or not, we are being invaded:

The night of Saturday, August 4, four young, college students were forced to kneel against a wall in a schoolyard in Newark, New Jersey.

They were then shot, execution-style, in the head. Three were killed and a fourth survived.

Just as the entertainment and free barbecue of the Iowa presidential beauty contest was getting underway, the news broke that the shooter in the Newark killings was an illegal immigrant who had recently been indicted for repeatedly raping a five-year-old relative and threatening the lives of her and her family.

He had also been arrested ten months ago for assaulting patrons at a bar. Fox News reported that the man’s illegal status had been known to officials since his previous arrests. And yet he was still out on the streets of America, free to kill, on a Saturday night in Newark.

For everyone who cares about the future of America, these killings of innocent Americans are a wake-up call.

There is a war here at home, and it is even more deadly than the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Far more Americans are being killed by violent, evil people here in America than in our official military “combat zones” overseas.

Americans are killed by violent criminals all too often, of course. But the senselessness and tragedy of these killings and too many others is that they were completely preventable. Their perpetrators were men who should not have been in the United States to begin with and, after multiple previous arrests, shouldn’t have been on the streets. Instead, they should have been in jail awaiting trial, sentencing, prison, and eventual deportation.

The contrast between the empty politics of our endless presidential-election process and the total failure of our government to protect the four young victims in Newark could not be more stark. No matter how big, painful, or urgent the problem — be it failing levies in New Orleans, failing schools in Detroit or failing bridges in Minnesota — we are trapped in politics as usual and partisan wrangling as usual.