Elmer's Brother

I was gob-smacked by the brazen law-breaking this article describes BUT, on a second reading I was really struck by the fact that this person is not an American but an "Argentine native".

I dunno, I'm an Australian, and we here seem to think it is ok for 'paper Aussies' to import every sort of barbarism, primitism and anti-social behavior, without ever raising an eyebrow, but, you know...."this is America", and all that. Don't you guys have some sort of clause that says, "you broke our law deliberately, you subverted our sovereignty, in defiance of your Oath of Allegiance. We think you should give back the paper and go home. Thanks, there's the door, what's your hurry."

"a cross-border arts exhibition called inSite". Would that be tax-payer funded??

Do you know why I am really ticked off, though? I'm in a wheelchair. What chance me getting across the border!!! You ever tried to get one of these to move in sand!!  It's like swimming in glue. "Hey Juan....wait for me!"

Guess I'll have to apply legally, and take my chances, just like we did with our daughter 4 years ago. Still no Permanent Residency status, despite her surpassing all qualifications, me being an Australian citizen, her being a tenured University lecturer, employed by the Government to train migrants!!! How "odd" has been the feeling, to see some 2,400 illegal immigrants granted visas, while we in the queue wait patiently. Actually, I've been thinking of applying for refugee status, as a member of an endangered minority. This country, Australia, is no place for a Celtic, Christian supporter of Judeo-Christian values.

Seriously, I have no free speech. I am prevented by the Victorian Anti-Vilification Laws from any criticism of Islam or the culture it spawns yet, at the University barely 500 metres from my front door, (Monash University, La Trobe Campus) there is a tax-payer funded Islamic Student Council website that  was "busted" 2 days ago for posting links to anti-Australian, anti-Jewish and anti-Christian sites. After being publically named the web has REFUSED to take the links down (as of yesterday). The University is in lock-down mode; no telephone calls will be put through to the Islamofascist office, vague replies to questions, lots of being put "on hold".... it's sacrosanct. No information is given out, no names of the leadership, no addresses where they can be contacted. In short, the University is protecting a terror-supporting organisation. The 'chaplain' of the University, Rev. Lyne Porrit, an Anglican, endorses the 'embracing of all religions', so I would expect no condemnation or action from her and hers. She recently hosted a "Christian Conference" which began with a learned disertation on "Christian Myths", meandered through "Aboriginal Dreamtime and how it can inform Christianity", "Eastern Mysticism" and closed with an address from the Student Immam. That's right.... a student Immam, on an Australian campus, lecturing Christians about religious tolerance.... that I have to pay for.

If I question Islam, I'm intollerant, ignorant, racist and bigotted. Question too hard and I go to jail. I do not pass "Go". I am fomenting racial/religious hatred.

I am not free. I think I will go live in the "Land of the Free". There are no attacks on the rights, freedoms and heritage values of America, from within. Are there?

I might be a handicap in a three-legged race on Independence Day.... but I value and understand what made America great and would willingly uphold those principles. Any room for me?

State-of-the-art shoes aid migrants
(Amy Isackson-BBC The World programme, San Diego)

Declarations of emergency in US border states like Arizona and New Mexico have kicked the immigration debate into high gear.
Artist Judi Werthein has walked smack into the middle of this controversy. She is hoping to leave her footprint with a special "crossing trainer" she has designed to help illegal immigrants negotiate the sometimes deadly terrain they encounter when crossing the border from Mexico to the US.

Migrants waiting for dark to hop the border fence from Tijuana into San Diego start calling out their shoe sizes when they see the boxes in Werthein's arms.

People start emerging from their makeshift homes in rusted cars and the cement channel that runs parallel to the border fence and drains Tijuana's fetid run-off.

Some have been waiting for months in this no-man's land for their chance to cross into San Diego.

Tarantula risk

They call the act of crossing the "brinco" - literally "jump" in Spanish. And that is the inspiration for Werthein's crossing shoes, called Brincos.

The trainers are adorned with unusual items.

"The shoe includes a compass, a flashlight because people cross at night, and inside is included also some Tylenol painkillers because many people get injured during crossing," Werthein says.

The artist was commissioned by a cross-border arts exhibition called inSite to develop a project that "intervened" in some aspect of border life.

While researching her project, the Argentine native became fascinated by illegal immigrants' primary mode of transportation - their feet.

"If they go through the sierra, they walk eight hours. Their feet get hurt. There's a lot of stones and there are snakes, tarantulas. So that's why it is a little boot," she says.

The Brinco is an ankle-high trainer which is green, red, black and yellow.

An Aztec eagle is embroidered on the heel. On the toe is the American eagle found on the US quarter, to represent the American dream the migrants are chasing.

A map - printed on the shoe's removable insole - shows the most popular illegal routes from Tijuana into San Diego.

First new shoes

Guadalupe Elias has arrived at the Madre Asunta migrant shelter in Tijuana. Catholic nuns run the refuge for women and children making their way north.

After the 48-hour trip from her home in southern Mexico, Ms Elias' trainers are ruined.

She tells Werthein, who has come to the shelter to pass out Brincos, that she needs shoes that fit.

Werthein gives her a pair of Brincos - and Ms Elias begins to cry.

"I'm crying because you gave me these and almost no-one ever helps me," she explains, adding that she has never owned new shoes before.

A few days after passing out shoes for free to migrants, Werthein begins selling the shoes at a hip boutique trainer store in downtown San Diego.

The shop sells only limited edition trainers. A pair of Werthein's Brincos are displayed on a pedestal under glass with a price tag of $215 (£125).

Real incentive

Though the store is only about 15 miles (24km) from Tijuana, here the champagne-sipping crowd sees the Brinco as a vehicle for discussion - not transport.

Andrea Schmidt, of La Jolla, is buying a pair to display in her living room.

"I think they're historical. I think it depicts a very special problem. And I thought it was important to have them," she says.

But her husband, Joe, thinks her purchase crosses a line.

He says: "It does give them an incentive to come. Because these are probably the best shoes they've ever had in their lives."

Werthein dismisses complaints that she is aiding and abetting illegal immigrants.

She argues she is just provoking an important discussion. The real incentive for illegal immigrants, she says, is Americans' demand for cheap labour.