A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER

We are a nation of immigrants, not fools. At least let's hope that's
true. The events of Sept. 11 showed we have been naive.

Also in Tennessee: Our Legislature just this year authorized issuing
driver's licenses to illegal immigrants -- as Virginia did for many of the
terrorists planning the Sept. 11 attack.

We allow illegal immigrant private pilots to rent airplanes and survey
our facilities -- as Muhammad Atta, the World Trade Center terrorist
pilot, did in spying on possible targets in southeast Tennessee.

Illegal immigrants work, sleep and roam through our communities. Most
are peaceful, hard-working and needed to do many tasks that Americans
run from.

But they are illegal!

An estimated 4.5 million Mexicans live illegally in America. It's not
just Mexicans. "We are experiencing a tremendous increase in OTMs" --
border lingo for "other than Mexicans," as a border patrol supervisor
reported to WorldNetDaily.com. So who are they? "Central and South
Americans, Orientals, Middle Easterners, the former Soviet Union.
About one in every 10 that we catch is from a country like Yemen or
Egypt."

A retired Drug Enforcement Agency supervisor told me Tennessee is a
favorite stop for illegals. His tales are frightening.

More chilling is the 4,000-mile Mexican border and the flood of OTMs
reported by WorldNetDaily.com. A rancher tells, "It was Thanksgiving
1998, and I stepped outside my house and there were over a hundred
'crossers' in my yard. Damnedest bunch of illegals I ever saw. All of
them were wearing black pants, white shirts and string ties." He
called the Border Patrol who caught them -- all Iranians.

Only 10-20 percent are caught. Over 800,000 cross over each year,
including drug smugglers, violent criminals and some with known
terrorist connections.

Our war in Afghanistan is essential to confront and eliminate the
rabid extremists who have declared war on us. The diplomatic and
financial initiatives are just as important.

But our homes and neighborhoods are at risk from the illegals that
pour through our borders. Iraqis, Egyptians, Yemenis have recently
been intercepted at the Mexican border.

WorldNetDaily.com reports, "Arizona appears to have been the home of a
'sleeper cell' of Osama Bin Laden's worldwide terrorist
organization."

A retired army colonel living near the border says, "There is only one
way to handle this. In a world now filled with biowarfare agents,
backpack nuclear devices and chemical weapons like sarin gas, we must
militarize the border. There is no other way to stop the flow."

Clearly our federal government has been negligent. The U.S.
Constitution, Article IV, Section 4, states: "The United States ...
shall protect each of [the states] against invasion."

Steve Moore, president of the Club for Growth (www.clubforgrowth.org),
declared, "We spend $2 trillion a year on the most expensive
government in the history of the world, and the one thing it's
supposed to do is protect us from foreign enemies. We need smarter
government, not bigger government." Is it too much to ask that the
federal government do its No. 1job?

The invasion of illegal immigrants is a clear and present danger. It
must be attacked, halted and controlled. Otherwise we are proven fools.