A Monday story by the Reuters news service should be required reading for anyone opposed to illegal immigration: "Experts see U.S. border fence plan as impractical" is a stunning example of the intellectual dishonesty of Big Media and apologists for illegal aliens. And surely the most stunning, how oblivious both seem to be about it. The Senate voted last week to build a 700-mile double-layered fence to block five heavily used crossing points along the roughly 2,000 miles separating America from the Third World. Most of it would stretch across the Arizona border, as well as parts of California, New Mexico and Texas. The first sentence of the story assumes the reader is incapable of reason. "Building a fence to try to secure the U.S. border with Mexico is impractical and would simply lead illegal immigrants to cross elsewhere, according to former Customs and Border Protection agents and other experts." If the two former agents and the one other "expert" are right about illegals crossing elsewhere, then the fence would be securing 700 miles of the border. And that is about as practical as a fence can be. If fences are impractical, why are there so many of them along homeowners' property lines? One of the former U.S. Customs agents did not want to be named in the story. Reuters did not indicate if any were fencing experts. Much of the terrain is inaccessible even on foot, according to veteran agent Lee Morgan in the story. "Much" of course means that some is accessible. And would anyone like to wager that when the 700-mile fence is built, the "coyotes" whose livelihoods depend on leading illegals successfully into America will prove the terrain is even more accessible than Mr. Morgan ever could imagine? The anonymous expert told Reuters it would be difficult building a fence across hundreds of creek beds that are prone to flash floods. "You are going to have to build hundreds of culverts big enough for debris the size of brush and small trees to float through the length of the border," she or he said. "If it is wide enough for bushes to get through, then people can get through." The story did not indicate if the Federal Department of Prisons has consulted with these security experts to determine if fencing would be practical for maximum security lockups. "But analysts warned it would have a limited impact on security," according to Reuters. But only one "analyst" was mentioned. "It may work to curtail crossings in the immediate area it has been built, but it won't stop illegal immigration," said Doris Meissner, senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. MPI claims to address the rising demand for pragmatic and thoughtful responses to the challenges and opportunities of large-scale migration. Experience has shown that traffic will shift to other parts of the border where there is less vigilance, Meissner said about the useless barrier. "The draw for illegal immigrants is the availability of employment in the United States, and that is not being addressed by this fence," she said about the security fence that does address what it's supposed to -- security. A Reuters story on Tuesday was headlined "Mexico asks Bush to block border fence bill." Even Mexico understands how impractical the fence will be.

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