Border Agents Recruited for Iraq Duty
Herald Tribune
PHOENIX
A military contractor is recruiting current and former agents with the U.S. Border Patrol to teach Iraqis how to secure their national borders.
The U.S. State Department has asked Virginia-based DynCorp International to find 120 people with Customs and Border Enforcement experience to go to Iraq for the training.
The company already has 700 police trainers in Iraq. The department made the request for border security trainers in late March.
Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano said she was worried that DynCorp’s effort is distracting from security along the U.S.-Mexico border. She and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson wrote President Bush this week to say the deal “makes no sense.”
“We should be focused on supporting our nation’s security efforts along the Mexican and Canadian border instead of hampering (the Customs and Border Patrol) by sending our best agents to a war zone in Iraq,” the governors wrote.
Agent Shannon Stevens, a Border Patrol spokeswoman, said the number of personnel DynCorp is looking for is “a very small number compared to the agents we have.”
DynCorp is offering recruits $134,100 for a one-year stay, plus a $25,000 signing bonus. The first $90,000 in income is tax free, and housing and food are free, company spokesman Gregory Lagana said.
Border Patrol agents with at least two years’ experience make roughly $55,000.
Arizona’s Tucson sector employs 2,600 agents, and there are more than 13,350 nationwide.
Wild Thing’s comment……..
Well, with Amnesty just around the corner, Bush/Rove no longer need the extra border agents I guess. (shaking my head)
It’s a private military contractor. Not the state department. The agents would be employees of the contractor. Not the govt.
Besides, they may as well go to Iraq. They’re sure not doing any bloody good here.
While they’re at it, take the prez with them. He’s not doing any good, either.
Carter gave away the Panama Canal. Jorge wants to give away the country. I wonder what the next President will want to give away?
I’m just wondering why this company thinks US border patrol agents know how to secure a border? what an absurd idea!
yeah, ditto on your thoughts on Jorge and company.
Well, I guess I better learn some spanish.
Hasta La Vista America!
The government sold us down the river.
This is exactly why socialism will take a stronghold in America–because we can’t stand up and say, “NO!We won’t go blindly into the night!”
I’m writing my congresspeople this week to tell them my displeasure in the immigration bill. Will it work? Probably not, but as soon as Georgie signs that paper, those illegals are legit. So they wontt pay those fines, return home or anything.
I am NOT going blindly into the night–They’ve opened up a Hornet’s nest with me and I’m pissed off!
With this new Amnesty Deal, does that mean they will bring back the ‘Cisco Kid’ and Pancho. Or is that actually Bush and Rove. In Cisco Re-runs.
The bill is a sham, Amnesty now maybe some enforcement later. There have been many small versions of Amnesty for different countries over the past decade, and none of them included enforcement.
The 700 mile fence project has completed almost 0.29 percent of it or approximately 2 miles. Hell at that rate it may be done when the last illegal from Mexico crosses the border. And the only Mexicans still living in Me-Hee-co will be the ruling class, Spanish.
Kennedy will probably still be in the Senate and the new state of Mexico will become the next welfare state, becasue all the drugs gangs and disease has gone north.
The bottom line is Bush has had six years to enforce the border, he has not and five since 9-11 but now we are getting serious about border security. But thats only after we make legal all the 12 Million new welfare victims, who of course is our fault.
Why don’t we collectively douse ourselves in gasoline and lite a match, afterall isn’t that what this bill will accomplish, the destruction of America.
When I think about Jimmy, I snicker a bit and then laugh. Oh, if only I could recall where I read the enlightened statement that explains why Jimmy never did well as President. Jimmy…the only president AMERICA ever elected who had a boy’s name, J-i-m-m-y. I might have read it in Michael Phillips blog. That Jimmy never grew up is apparent; his social skills are lacking as is his respect for the Office he held; his social graces are not, in my opinion, on the same level as a high school boy’s social skills. When you recall his mention of having lust in his heart, you might envision a high school boy slowly turning the pages of a PLAYBOY. Imagine the Presidential Aide saying: “Sorry,General,the Commander-In-Chief cannot be disturbed at the moment–he’s lusting over Miss August. It was a Jimmy Carter secret I didn’t need to know. It was a SECRET THE ayatollah OF IRAN DIDN’T NEED TO KNOW. One would assume a man who was intelligent enough to graduate from the U.S.Naval Academy would possess the social graces expected of an officer and a gentleman. It is obvious that Jimmy was more concerned with his legacy, vanity and his own political career than he was about showing the strength of America. He never learned the definition of united. Much of the trouble the US suffers today is due to Carter’s cowardice and/or his erroneous interpretation of the Christian ethic about turning the other cheek. He not only turned both cheeks, he then pulled his pants down below his knees and let the ayatollah give him a good spanking. He is, in my opinion, the perennial peanut, always the same, yesterday, today and tommorrow. If he was President today, we would have no doubt made one too many concessions to those who want to change the face of the United States.
Jimmy Carter gave away the Panama Canal. George Bush is giving away America. Even though I had learned to be leery of Bush as Texas Governor, I still had high hopes and optimism for him when he was elected president. Especially after eight years of the Clintons. Now I think George W Bush is my greatest political disappointment.
I had already begun to question whether he was running the war in Iraq correctly. I give him credit for his tax reductions, although he increased both government and it’s spending. Some of his political appointments have been a disaster and his horrible leadership abilities have seen the Republicans in Congress also become a disaster.
His greatest sin though is his socialistic desire to further his father’s New World Order as he has sold out the traditional and successful American Culture for some screwy idea of a utopian multiculture.
America will no longer be a united states, but a broiling civil strife of Balkanized groups making more demands than contribution. George W Bush is a Benedict Arnold.
Mark Krauss,I agree it is absurd. I had never heard of that company before. It just seemed really odd to me, like saying the USA does not need Border Patrol anymore.
Lynn, good idea, I wrote to mine too, also the RNC and GOP and let them know how this will effect the coming election too.
Thanks for all you do Lynn.
Mark, haha I used to watch ‘Cisco Kid’ and Pancho when I was a kid. BUsh and Rove, heh heh
Oh my gosh that is all that have done on the fence? Good grief, it will be just like you said.
ROBERT, yes Carter was all that, he is a weirdo and all the things you said.
And right now I want nothing to do with any of them. Carter, Clinton, or Bush. They have each in their own way proven to let this country down and I will not forgive any of them.
Tom your right, it will be a land of more demands then contributions.
Good run down too of the various things that have happened.
Chrissie & Patriots – One would ‘think’ that after wacking the Saddam Hussein regime that our hundreds of GENERALS in the Pentagon were map reading qualified! Iraq is surrounded by Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia…We can’t even SECURE our own U.S. borders! Is the Death Star II missing something here? This is pathetic for a ‘supposed’ world superpower, eh?