"Stop Gatekeeper" campaign hits East Coast

CAMBRIDGE, MA--An activist in the Boston area responded to 
the "Stop Gatekeeper" material on MIM's web site and 
collected 60 petition signatures in two hours on July 22nd. 
The comrade took the initiative of printing out the petition 
and showing up for political work in a tourist and student 
area. Many signatures are from people in other states and 
outside the Boston-area.

The Immigration and Naturalization 
Service (INS) launched the military-style "Operation 
Gatekeeper" in 1994 to stop undocumented immigrants crossing 
into the united $tates into Mexico. "Gatekeeper" includes 
increased patrolling using high-tech, military grade night-
vision equipment and other interdictory measures, such as a 
triple wall built along the border in the Tijuana-San Diego 
area. This has forced migrants to cross in remote, 
wilderness areas. More than 500 people have died from 
exposure or border-guard violence since "Gatekeeper" began. 
This is more people than died attempting to cross the 
East/West German border -- much reviled in Amerikan 
propaganda -- in its entire 25+ year history. The Amerikan 
military was involved in "Gatekeeper" in the mid-nineties, 
to aid the INS in the so-called "War on Drugs." 
("Gatekeeper" also gave the military a chance to train 
troops in a "live combat" situation.) In 1997, 17-year-old 
Ezekiel Hernandez was killed by a u.$. Marine sniper while 
he tended his family's sheep. After widespread public outcry 
following this and similar incidents, the Amerikan military 
withdrew from "Gatekeeper." MIM thinks that ending 
"Gatekeeper" and immigration restrictions generally are 
winnable, progressive reforms under imperialism. The border 
imposes artificial barriers on families, communities, and 
nations. As the popular t-shirt slogan says, "We didn't 
cross the borders, the borders crossed us." Not everyone in 
Cambridge supported the petition. One Black womyn made a 
point of stopping by to oppose the petition. When asked why, 
she said she opposed letting in immigrants, "because then 
there are fewer jobs for us." When asked whether she had a 
job, she answered that she does--as a welfare political 
activist. MIM would describe this womyn as a typical labor 
bureaucrat. She makes her living in labor politics and she 
lacks in internationalist perspective. The combination of 
advocating for the welfare state and opposing immigration is 
common--the economic nationalism of social-democracy rooted 
in the labor aristocracy. In substance, the willingness to 
divide the international proletariat for the benefit of the 
privileged of imperialism is the same whether it is Nazism 
or the social-democracy of this economic nationalist sort. 

Under socialism, everyone has a job. It's guaranteed, so 
economic competition for jobs becomes a thing of the past 
under socialism. Socialism is the least we can do to end 
racism, oppressive nationalism and war based in economic 
competition over jobs. Another persyn walking the streets of 
Cambridge opposed the petition because "my cousin is an INS 
worker." Once again, it seems that Amerikans have some sense 
that closing the borders directly provides them jobs. It's 
true that MIM plans on cutting back INS employment. It's sad 
how millions of people in the United $tates have wasteful 
jobs in guarding borders, staffing prisons in the largest 
prison state in the world per capita, and guarding property 
in security jobs--and what is worse is that some of these 
people cannot look forward and wish that their children and 
other future generations would not have the private property 
that makes borders and security jobs "necessary."