Usually it's possible to determine a blog writer's approximate age simply by reading what he has written.

Like the majority of my fellow Americans, I have been waiting for those esteemed, elite ones in Washington, D.C. – the ones we voted in office to carry out the wishes of "We, the People" – to see the promised fence on our southern border. I have been waiting for our borders to be protected. I have been waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

Months ago, it was thought that just any day now, the fence would be going up. After all, Congress had passed a law saying that it would be. Who wouldn't trust Congress?

Watching Fox News one morning recently, I caught sight of Secretary of Homeland Security Chertoff (and, oh, thank God for such an effective, dedicated worker ant) saying, as quoted in

http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/TonyBlankley/2008/03/05/border_insecurity:

I said to the TV set, "Yeah, right." I had actually become disillusioned.

My disillusionment became quite universal, apparently, at least on the pages of Townhall.com. Around mid-summer it had become common to see, at the end of many blog posts, "WHERE IS THE FENCE?" The answer, my friend, to coin a phrase, was blowin' in the wind.

It was a question taken up with my own elected ones in D.C. frequently. As of this moment their responses are forgettable. They were nothing more than empty platitudes to soothe ruffled feathers. Those D.C. people are good at that. They should be: they have so much experience at it.

Sometime in the not-too-distant past it became known there were tunnels, some football-field sized, beneath the borders between the U.S. and Mexico. It was said that these tunnels were too expensive to destroy. I told my esteemed ones then that I had not priced a stick of dynamite lately, but that it was thought that a few sticks of it, strategically placed, would blast those tunnels to smithereens.

Later I learned that at least one of the tunnels had been cemented in with several feet of cement.

Having traveled by car on Interstates through Kentucky and Tennessee, and parts of southern Illinois and southern Indiana, it was noted that great hillsides had been blasted away (presumably by dynamite) to make it possible for the Interstates' existence.

Therefore one could hardly blame me for believing that it would take somewhat more than a few feet of cement to plug up the holes of those tunnels. Besides, some energetic and imaginative would-be illegal alien would be able easily to take a few sticks of dynamite and blow that cement to smithereens. A few feet of cement will not deter an illegal alien attempting to cross into the promised land. You know, that place where there's free practically anything. You know, that place where a job can be had for a few dollars a day, most of which goes straight into the Mexican economy – an economy, incidentally, which is comprised of one-fourth of such "remittances."

Your esteemed ones, as well as my own esteemed ones in D.C., apparently believe their constituencies are, well, stupid. Born yesterday. Born last night.

The veil has been lifted from my eyes. I can recognize fluff and kerfluffle when I see it, when I hear it. The sounds of fluff and kerfluffle have become quite noisy of late.

Thus, the "Yeah, right" response to the TV set when Shirt-off, earnest in his assurances about that 28-mile virtual fence, came off as the Emperor in his newest finery. He was, indeed, a sartorial splendor to behold.

Now we find – surprise! – that there will be no fence. Could it be that big business has anything to do with this? Could it be that politics has anything to do with this?

Where is the fence?

Well, can't you see it? It's like Shirt-off, along with his empty suit, and it's all of the other Washington, D.C. naked-as-jaybird worker ants, and, pardon the expression, the queen, flapping in the breezes created by their own windy lies.

One of our Presidential hopefuls has allowed -- even advertised and promoted -- the audacity to hope for a bright tomorrow for ourselves and for our grandchildren.

Is he simply to be called "audacious" when, because of his enthusiasm, we step from the shadows and hope -- perhaps for the first time in our lives?  Hope for life?  Hope for Liberty?  Hope for the Pursuit of Happiness?

Why would anyone -- those mostly on the far right -- be so harsh as to predict that the hopeful and audacious might just be disappointed? 

Simply saying that because a leader is young and inexperienced, he must not have the qualifications to bring this audacious hope to fruition is so, well, realistic. 

Do you remember the Topps company (right here in the U.S.)?  It made hamburgers sold all over the place which were found to have been tainted.

Topps is no longer in business.  The fact that they allowed a situation to exist that caused their hamburgers to be tainted was a very good reason for them not now to be in business.  I have no idea if they were sued out of business or if they simply folded by reason of the fact that they could no longer sell their products. 

The advantages of relocating to a "free zone" are certainly tangible; the non-necessity of the "trifles" like Social Security taxes and cheap labor are likely quite enticing.  As you said, if if were not so, no corporation would go anywhere else to set up shop.  Safety concerns should be paramount to them, however. 

With respect to your "corporate write-off," with all due respect I believe we're comparing apples and watermelons. 

While not having actual facts in front of me -- I admit it -- I doubt seriously that a corporation having nothing to do with prescription drugs or the healthcare industry can get away with advertising write-offs and R&D write-offs and manufacturing write-offs -- even when the drug manufacturer is manufacturing offshore and his R&D is helped along very nicely by the taxpayer. 

I also agree with you that the FDA has a huge burden.  It's a burden they cannot meet.  If you don't believe it, please read the 1/29/08 GAO testimony by Marcia Crosse, Director, Health Care, before the Subcommittee on Oversight and Inestigations, Committee on Energy and Commerce, House of Representatives.  It's GAO-08-428T. 

There it began.  That caused your "hoops that the FDA creates in order to get a drug to market."

Tort reform, as far as I'm concerned, is a problem only if drugs are unsafe or ineffective.  That is in the province of the drugmakers and the FDA, and the FDA is too shorthanded to carry the day.  And lawyers come in pretty handy if there's a legitimate claim.  As an aside, I worked for lawyers for umpteen years -- not the ambulance-chasing kind -- and I do not completely agree with Shakespeare about lawyers.  But I digress.

I have no problem with drugmakers wanting to make money.  They're not in the charity business.  But neither am I.  Profit, yes.  Profiteering, no. 

Sgt Relic, going offshore will not cause a cessation in the "legal nightmare"; that nightmare was inherent in the drugs and drugmakers -- and the FDA -- to start with.  It is an inverse problem. 

As far as an unfriendly tax structure is concerned, I believe you can think again.  Look into manufacturing writeoffs (while manufacturing is done outside the U.S.); look into advertising, which everybody knows is paid for by the American consumer, as well as paying for its so-called humongous outlay in drug research. Also, everybody knows there have not been many real breakthrough drugs in years; rather, drug companies are simply adding something to a drug so that it's longer-acting, or some such other change, and calling it "new."  Then umpteen years of patents can be tacked on as well.  Nice work if you can get it.   

Remember that much research is being done for these blood-suckers by the taxpayers through NIH and government-sponsored university facilities. 

So I would hardly call the drugmakers' tax structure "unfriendly."  I am "unfriendly" to the morass that is called the FDA, whose expenses are growing by leaps and bounds. 

This time, however, there is also news about a lawsuit over pet food. It was gratifying to know that someone is going to attempt to do something to let pet food manufacturers know that most people care very much about their pets and would not do anything purposely to harm them. The fact that some people unknowingly gave their pets food that apparently caused their deaths is simply unthinkable.

Possibly a lawsuit is the only act that will carry a strong enough message to any pet food manufacturers who may even think about manufacturing lethal pet meals.

http://www.fda.gov/oc/opacom/hottopics/petfood.html

http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2008/NEW01792.html