Jim Hightower

The Bushites like to bill themselves as conservative, freedom-loving patriots. But what they’re doing in Brownsville, Texas, is the exact opposite.

The people of this city, located at the southernmost tip of Texas right across from Mexico, are locked in one of several nightmarish battles that Bush’s thuggish, autocratic Department of Homeland Security has forced on border communities. At issue is the multibillion-dollar, ineffectual, and offensive fence that DHS is erecting in the name of deterring terrorists. Operating as a tyrannical police bureaucracy, department officials are shoving their fence right through peoples homes and public parks, as well as running over ordinary civility and common sense.

In Brownsville, for example, the fence would cut a jagged line through UT-Brownsville, severing 180 acres of the school from the rest of campus. That’s a fourth of its total landmass. This division would put various students on opposite sides of the barrier, even though all are on the U.S. side of the border.

It also cuts off the university’s golf course. Not to worry, though, for the DHS geniuses designing this Alice-in-Wonderland structure say they’ll leave an opening so students and others can freely pass through. Hmmm. Wouldn’t “others” possibly include the terrorists this thing is supposed to keep out?

Then there’s the fact that this university has a unique cross-border mission, serving people on both sides – people who’ll now be separated by armed agents. As the school's president notes: “To slice off the “bi” part of binational violates the essence of this university.”

But forget logic and good will. DHS’s autocrats assert that they can build the fence wherever they want, with or without university consent, and they are proceeding with condemnation of the land. Tell me what’s conservative, freedom-loving, and patriotic about that?