Local San Diego Activists Defend Friendship Park (tags)
Since 1971, the Monument Mesa at Friendship Park on the U.S.-Mexico border has been an informal gathering place where people kept from physically coming together by the border fence could nonetheless reach out and pass each other greetings, kisses, presents and food. No longer: the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, seemingly determined to wipe out any sign that the people of the U.S. and Mexico should actually regard each other with anything other than wary hostility, have put the mesa straight in the cross-hairs of the triple border fence. Local activists Christian Ramirez and John Fanestil addressed a San Diego audience April 17 to tell what they're doing to try to save Friendship Park.
Pat Nixon at the U.S.-Mexico Border (tags)
Editor's Note: Nearly 40 years ago this month, First Lady Pat Nixon crossed the U.S.-Mexico border and embraced Mexican children, saying, "I hate to see a fence anywhere." Times have changed, writes the commentator, and ironically, President Richard Nixon helped to bring about many of these changes. Joseph Nevins is an associate professor of geography at Vassar College. His latest book is Dying to Live: A Story of U.S. Immigration in an Age of Global Apartheid (City Lights Books, 2008).