>Show me a quote where the IBT and/or Junior
>"demonize" Mexican *truck drivers* (emphasis
>added), as opposed to demonizing unregulated
>trucks & trucking and/or low-wage labor.
Well, there was this lovely passage from Teamster magazine, Nov 99. Check out the cover pic - "The NAFTA Trucker" <http://www.teamster.org/comm/newsletters/1199.htm>. The piece and especially the presentation draw on the whole Buchananite discourse about the smelly tide inundating our southern border.
>Unsafe and Unsearched
>
>Today, less then 10 percent of the vehicles crossing the bridge are
>searched. At present, eight crossing points on the border have x-ray
>capacity for trucks-but each scan takes eight to 10 minutes and at
>most each unit can scan 60 to 90 trucks a day. This capacity to
>search is being rapidly increased. Other technologies are coming
>online, but our ability to probe can never match the truck traffic
>or trade would simply grind to halt.
>
>Mexican drug traffickers know this. When NAFTA was being discussed
>in the early nineties, the Drug Enforcement Administration picked up
>conversations between major Mexican drug dealers talking about the
>bonanza the treaty presented them. In fact, drug dealers began
>buying border factories, facilities called maquiladoras, in
>anticipation of the joys of the free trade.
>
>Stemming the Tide
>
>Phil Jordan is an El Paso native raised in a barrio five blocks from
>the Rio Grande. He rose to a high level in the Drug Enforcement
>Administration (DEA) and in the mid nineties ran the El Paso
>Intelligence Center (EPIC), the biggest narc spy center on the
>planet with more than 300 agents under his command and a computer
>that handled 75,000 police inquires a day. He is bilingual,
>Mexican-American and has relatives splashed across both sides of the
>border. On the implications of NAFTA, he is clear.
>
>"With Mexican truckers, we have a double whammy-not only are they
>screwing us by bringing in more dope, but there is the matter of
>truck safety. They fix things with bubble gum and tape."