Mexico Trucker Online

Congress approved a shift of $400 million from technology accounts to construction of the U.S. border fence despite a Customs and Border Protection admission that it cannot be completed by year’s end, officials said Monday.

The House Appropriations Subcommittee for Homeland Security agreed to a CBP proposal to transfer funds from other accounts to build the remainder of the 670 miles of border fence.

Eagle Pass Mayor Chad Foster, chairman of the Texas Border Coalition, voiced disappointment over Congress’ decision to continue to fund “the border wall.”

“It won’t work. It is lethal to people and wildlife and eventually will be torn down,” Foster said.

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Dismissing a White House veto threat, the House voted Tuesday to end a pilot program giving Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways.

The Bush administration stressed that the United States is obligated, under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, to open up American roads to Mexican truckers, and that terminating the year-old demonstration project would have repercussions for American trucks allowed into Mexico. Passage of the House bill, it said “would pose significant and immediate risks to U.S. interests.”

But the pilot project, which permits up to 500 trucks from 100 Mexican companies access to U.S. roads, is opposed by Jimmy Hoffa and others who say it would eliminate American jobs and that Mexican trucks are subject to less stringent safety regulations. They say Mexico lacks adequate drug testing and hours-of service standards and that the program could contribute to smuggling or insurance fraud.

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Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administrator John H. Hill responds to Jimmy Hoffa

We all know the controversial Mexican Cross Border Program was extended for two more years on August 8, under Federal guidelines concerning Pilot Programs, and as we reported, Jimmy Hoffa immediately showed his no class ignorance by continuing his boring mantra about those unsafe, dangerous and illegal Mexican trucks, a notion we have continually disproved on this site.

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"Senator Obama will stand with the Teamsters and do as I tell him to do when it comes to fighting against those mean MExican trucks," General President Jim Hoffa said

It was no surprise when FMCSA Administrator John Hill extended the Mexican Cross Border Program for another two years, thus beating the opposition at their own game.

You see, FMCSA has been calling it a “demonstration program” while the opposition called it a “pilot program” which operates under different requirements, requirements that FMCSA has met.

So John Hill, using the oppositions definition of the program, extends it to 3 years as is permitted for a “pilot program”, and Jimmy Hoffa is furious!

I’m mad as hell about it, but I’m not surprised. - Jimmy Hoffa -

What is Jimmy “mad as hell about? That all the money that has found it’s way into the hip pockets of his politicians hasn’t yielded the intended results? Maybe.

I think Jimmy is further pissed because Mexican law forbids him and his union from organizing in that country. Canada allows it and we don’t hear any objections from him about Canadian trucks.

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U.S. Sen. John Cornyn announced new federal legislation Friday that aims to crack down on commercial truck drivers who smuggle illegal immigrants.The legislation, dubbed the Putting the Brakes on Human Smuggling Act, imposes tougher penalties against commercial truck drivers convicted of smuggling humans, said Cornyn, who was flanked at the Laredo North checkpoint by Carlos X. Carrillo, Laredo Sector Border Patrol chief; Gene Belmares, mayor pro tem; and Steve McCraw, Texas Homeland Security director, among others.

“While those who smuggle narcotics generally lose their commercial license permanently, human smugglers are often free to continue operating commercial vehicles and frequently continue to break the law,” Cornyn stated.

Under current federal law, those convicted of smuggling drugs can receive a lifetime suspension of their commercial driver’s license, with no opportunity to reapply. However, anyone convicted of smuggling humans can have their commercial driver’s license suspended for only a year.

And, if they receive a second conviction of smuggling illegal immigrants, they can wait up to 10 years before reapplying for a commercial driver’s license.

“We’re going to be urging colleagues of Congress to act to eliminate this disparity and make sure we discourage all manner of illegal activity here along the border region,” Cornyn said.

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How appropriate is it that on July 4, 2008 we are freed from the hateful thoughts and rhetoric of this vile excuse for a human being.

Former Sen. Jesse Helms, who built a career along the fault lines of racial politics and battled liberals, Communists and the occasional fellow Republican during 30 conservative years in Congress, died on the Fourth of July.

He was 86.

Helms died at 1:15 a.m., said the Jesse Helms Center at Wingate University in North Carolina. The center’s president, John Dodd, said in a statement that funeral arrangements were pending.

This is the man that led the opposition in the Senate during the debates to create a federal holiday in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.

This is the man who clashed frequently with President Clinton, whom he deemed unqualified to be commander in chief. Even some Republicans cringed when Helms said Clinton was so unpopular he would need a bodyguard on North Carolina military bases. Helms said he hadn’t meant it as a threat.

Like so many other not-so-fine wines, Jesse Helms may have mellowed as he aged but his various changes in positions on social issues did not and cannot change the fact that he stood against so many and supported the denial of protections and rights under the Constitution to so many.

He will probably join Jerry Falwell and so many others who took this country down the wrong path. And I doubt it will be in Heaven.

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