Border insecurity, the English language, and more

Canada, probably more than any U.S. ally, responded to the events and the threats of 9/11. Since then, Canada has invested many billions of dollars in security and intelligence. Cooperation between law enforcement authorities is exceptional–across the entire 5,500 mile border. No attacks have been perpetrated in either country since 9/11. Persons have been arrested in both countries and charged with planning attacks. Based on the record, any objective observer would conclude that cooperative systems put in place since 9/11 work well.

Guitta didn’t “fact check.” He cites Homeland Security to the effect that 1,517 individuals were stopped at “the border” from October to December last year, falsely claiming U.S. citizenship. However, as the Washington Post reported on January 25 (citing DHS), only 20 of those cases were at the Canada-U.S. border. Only 210 false claims were made at the Canada-U.S. border over the past three years (30,850 were made at the U.S.-Mexico border).

So, at the United States’ northern border 70 persons, on average, are stopped each year making false claims of U.S. citizenship (there are approximately 67 million entries from Canada into the U.S. per year). Again, systems seem to be working!

Guitta states that “immigration to Canada from terror-exporting regions is on the rise.” What countries does he have in mind? Pakistan? Iran? Saudi Arabia? Later in his article, he identifies two: Algeria and Morocco. But immigration to the U.S. is greater than immigration to Canada from those five countries, according to 2006 statistics–the most recent year for which data is available. Furthermore, every legal immigrant to Canada is security screened before gaining entry. And we know who is gaining entry to our country (there is negligible illegal immigration to Canada).

Finally, it’s sad that Guitta so uncritically bought speculations (fostered by a GAO “study”) that someone could cross the border wearing a knapsack full of “radioactive contents.” I hope U.S. authorities control radioactive material as closely as Canadian authorities do. My guess is that if Guitta were to try to obtain such material in Canada he’d be writing his next article from behind bars.

ROY NORTON

Minister, Embassy of Canada
Washington, D.C.

OLIVIER GUITTA RESPONDS: I quoted the U.S. Customs and Border Protection press release of January 22, 2008, announcing the stepped up controls on the U.S.-Canadian border. As the press release focused solely on the northern border and nowhere mentioned the border with Mexico, I mistakenly assumed its report of “1,517 cases of individuals falsely claiming to be U.S. citizens” meant the Canadian border. A number of senators assumed the same and elicited from the DHS the clarification quoted by Roy Norton. I regret the error.

I’m not sure why a reporter should be faulted for conveying the findings of a U.S. Government Accountability Office (the investigative arm of Congress) report, based on testimony given before the Senate Finance Committee on September 27, 2007. Readers can judge for themselves by downloading the full report (www.gao.gov/new.items/d07884t.pdf). The GAO’s video, simulating the transport of radioactive material and other contraband across northern and southern U.S. borders at unmanned or unmonitored locations, can likewise be viewed at: www.gao.gov/media/video/gao-07-884t/.

WOMAN OF LETTERS
LAST WEEK, I spent two full hours just trying to convince my college freshman composition students that use of “he or she” to refer to “one” (or “student” or “person” or “individual”) degrades logic and weakens language. Tired and not convinced of my success, I pulled THE WEEKLY STANDARD from my mailbox and there found David Gelernter’s genuinely eloquent article (“Feminism and the English Language,” March 3) in which he makes a similar effort.

I reveled in Gelernter’s references to E.B. White and William Strunk and nodded at his examples of “firefighter” not “fireman”–never “authoress” but, rather, “author.” I did not chuckle. The logical abuses generated as a result of the enslavement of English by feminism, once a matter of humorous aberration, have become another evil of political correctness.

I must also concur with Gelernter’s closing remarks on “brotherhood.” I’m a sister, but I don’t believe “sisterhood” suffices for the fullness of “brotherhood”–never has, never will. And I don’t find general use of “he” or “him” or “his” confusing or insulting or gender-tainted. Thank you David Gelernter!

ELAINE KROMHOUT

Ft. Pierce, Fla.

CLARIFICATION
IN STEPHEN F. HAYES’s article “New York Times vs. John McCain” (March 3), the author refers to “Time magazine’s Blake Dvorak.” Blake Dvorak blogs for Real Clear Politics, which is hosted by Time.com, but is not an employee of Time magazine.