I was contemplating an alternative to beating and torturing unaccompanied immigrant children as a way to discourage such immigration.  I had the idea that if we could at least stop making their home countries impossible to live in with our forced trade agreements, that might go a long way.

Rather than write my own diatribe, I went looking for an article to make my point.

Counterpunch has the story How Population Growth, “Free Trade,” and Inequality Produced a Calamity on the Border.

Finally, President Obama, instead of seeking to spend $4 billion on additional border security measures, should figure out how that same money can be used to develop and bolster the economies where the migrant kids actually are born. In Central America, a few billion dollars is real money and wisely spend it could actually transform these nations in tangibly beneficial ways. Flourishing economies and reliable sources of employment would reduce local rates of crime and despair and keep families rooted and together. Rather than gawk and squawk over a border crisis, we should all be working to ensure that every child in the hemisphere has a place right at home.

Who could possibly have foreseen that enhancing US corporate profits in Latin America at the expense of the poor in those countries and in ours could possibly have any unintended consequences?  Well, of course, I suppose that it could be these consequences were not unintended.

The Miami Herald has the story Expansion of ‘secret’ facility in Iraq suggests closer U.S.-Kurd ties by Mitchell Prothero McClatchy Foreign Staff.

IRBIL, Iraq — A supposedly secret but locally well-known CIA station on the outskirts of Irbil’s airport is undergoing rapid expansion as the United States considers whether to engage in a war against Islamist militants who’ve seized control of half of Iraq in the past month
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…said one Western logistics contractor who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he’d signed nondisclosure agreements with the U.S. government on the matter

The story is, no doubt, worthwhile to read.  I included the last part of the excerpt for the delicious irony.  At least they did not say that this contractor who violated the nondisclosure agreement that he signed with the US government is highly trustworthy.

If you think that the feelings of the majority of Americans will have anything to do with the decision on whether or not to get into the war in alliance with the Kurds, then you are a real optimist.

The Real News Network has interview Israel, World Capital of Homeland Security Industries – Shir Hever on Reality Asserts Itself (3/4).

So, actually, Israel is now the world capital of homeland security industries. They’re selling security cameras, surveillance equipments, drones, riot gear. That is the sort of technology that governments need in order to control their citizens. And it comes not just with the actual technology; it comes also with an ideology. It comes with the ideology that, look what Israel is doing, how Israel is controlling Palestinians and every aspect of their lives, and decides who can pass and who gets a permit and so on, and uses this technology to leave Palestinians no option to resist, and why don’t we sell that to other governments around the world. For example, Brazil bought a lot of that technology in order to repress the favelas in preparation for the World Cup. We see that in India, not just in the area of Kashmir, but mainly there along the border with Pakistan, and in East Europe. And we also see that with extreme-right governments, like Berlusconi in Italy that was worried about asylum-seekers coming from Africa, and using Israeli drones and Israeli technology to try to block that, but also not just buying the technology, but also buying the legitimacy, saying Israel is a wonderful country. Berlusconi was a big pro-Israeli spokesman. And if Israel is allowed to do it, we can do it too.

How many times has it been said and how many times have you thought that the solution to our airport security problems would be to follow the Israeli example? Surely they know how to enforce security with all the practice they have had.

This interview gives you some insight into the danger of getting our “wish”. How well controlled do you want to be as a citizen in a democracy? At what point does being this controlled put an end to the idea of democracy? I am not suggesting that these are easy questions to answer.