Earlier today, Roy Beck — head of the immigration restrictionist group NumbersUSA — appeared on G. Gordon Liddy’s radio show blasting Republicans who support “amnesty” for wasting their time on poor immigrant voters who will always vote for the “distribution Party.” Towards the end of the interview, Liddy and Beck appeared to agree that one way to fix the nation’s broken immigration system would be to build a double fence along the U.S. – Mexico border similar to the Israeli West Bank barrier:

BECK: You’re not going to get the immigrant vote if you’re a Republican by supporting amnesty. Because most immigrants are poor and poor people — especially when they come from the kind of countries that most of these poor immigrants come from are going to vote for the redistribution party and for bigger government. [...]

LIDDY: I’ve been over to Israel a number of times and they’ve got fences that work.

BECK: You bet.

LIDDY: They’re like Jersey barriers 18 feet high.

BECK: It would be a great thing…the idea was a double fence, you gotta have a double fence. Because the idea was you slow them down getting over the first wall. You’ve got these long distance cameras, they see the people working the first wall. And while they’re getting over the first wall and we’ve got boots on the ground — they’re driving between these two walls. And you either catch them or you get them on the other side of the wall, but that’s the whole idea.

Listen:

The implication that the U.S. should seek to build a border wall similar to the barrier Israel has constructed is jarring. The United Nations has documented that “it is difficult to overstate the humanitarian impact of the [Israeli] Barrier.” Amnesty International has written that the West Bank barrier violates “international humanitarian law” and has had the effect of turning “Palestinian towns and villages into isolated enclaves, cutting off communities and families from each other, separating farmers from their land and Palestinians from their places of work, education and health care facilities and other essential services.”

Meanwhile, in the U.S., experts have blasted the fencing that’s currently in place along the U.S. – Mexico border and further warned of the negative effects of its expansion. Research has found that the border enforcement is more successful at keeping undocumented immigrants in the U.S. than in persuading them to not come in the first place. U.S. government investigators have indicated that it will cost taxpayers $6.5 billion over the next 20 years to maintain the fencing already in place and the Congressional Research Service estimated in 2007 that building and maintaining a double set of steel fences along 700 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border would add up to $49 billion over the expected 25-year life span of the fence. Meanwhile, Mexicans with no interest in emigrating to the U.S. are largely offended. “Much of the international boundary between the world’s economic superpower and its far poorer neighbor is laden with tension — tension fueled by an unequal, unavoidable and unsettled relationship,” wrote NPR reporter Jason Beaubien after the wall’s construction. Environmentalists have added that more fencing could “spell environmental disaster,” even “the destruction of the borderlands region.”

While poverty is certainly a concern for the two communities, the suggestion that immigrants and Latinos vote for the Party that offers the most handouts isn’t just erroneous, it’s insulting. Ultimately, it was the GOP’s inability to offer anything but enforcement-only solutions backed by angry anti-immigrant rhetoric during the 2007 immigration debate that turned Latino and immigrant voters off from the Republican party in 2008. And if the GOP doesn’t “change its tune,” it may also render the Republican Party obsolete.

The negotiations on START may or may not be close to being finished. But it is pretty clear what is holding up an agreement over the treaty: It’s missile defense in Europe. While missile defense concerns on both sides can likely be resolved for this treaty, eventually US-Russian tension over missile defense will have to be resolved if the President is to further advance his disarmament agenda.

The Russians, after initially seeing the Obama administration’s announced change to Bush’s European missile defense program as a significant victory, have realized that the current plan proposed by President Obama will (despite claims from politically craven conservatives) produce a more capable and comprehensive missile defense system for Europe. While the shift in focus by the Obama administration – from long-range missiles that Iran doesn’t possess to short and medium range missiles that Iran does possess – is clearly not directed at Russia, the Russians are still very worried about latter phases of the Obama plan, which call for developing long-range missile interceptors in Europe.

At issue here is that the Russians simply don’t trust the United States – a distrust that has little to do with the Obama administration. An article in Der Spiegel paraphrasing Dmitri Trenin of the Carnegie Endowment’s Moscow Center notes:

The Russians, in particular, feel that they are once again being misled. They may believe that man now in the Oval Office has honorable intentions, but they do not believe he is capable of reversing his country’s position on nuclear weapons… For the Russians, this is clearly reflected in Washington’s plans to develop new missile defense systems around the world.

Thus in negotiating a nuclear arms reduction deal through a new START treaty, the Russian military and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin fear that the US is trying to pull a fast one on them. The Russians fear that if we both cut our nuclear forces to the same levels, they will be at a disadvantage, because long range missile defense programs conceivably (if they actually worked effectively which they don’t) could take out some Russian nukes, thereby depriving the two sides of nuclear parity.

Despite assurances from the Obama administration, Russian paranoia makes perfect sense. Not only do they see the US squirm in response to the sensible argument that in any arms control agreement there has to be a connection between offensive and defensive systems in order to maintain the nuclear balance. But they also see that the US is willing to throw billions of dollars every year at unproven and ineffective missile defense systems. And they note with concern when they see three conservative Senators say they won’t support a treaty Ronald Reagan initiated if even symbolic language about missile defense is included. From this, the Russians conclude that we will stop at nothing to develop a massive and comprehensive system that will try to neuter a Russian nuclear response. Der Spiegel quoting Russian military experts:

“This is where the White House’s age-old plan to suffocate our strategic armed forces and destroy our own intercontinental missiles, directly after START, is being implemented,” … They insist that Russia is being surrounded by an “anti-missile fence” that will provide the Americans with one-sided superiority.

Many American conservatives will even acknowledge that their hope is for US missile defense systems to do exactly what the Russians fear it will do. While the right will make the easy domestic political argument – why wouldn’t you want protection from the Russians? – the fact is that any system we develop will only push the Russians to build more nuclear weapons to overcome US defenses. Missile defense won’t make us safer or protect us from nuclear attack, instead it will only lead to greater international distrust and a new nuclear arms race, which would just further increase the dangers of proliferation. Dmitry Rogozin, Moscow’s ambassador to NATO in Brussels noted this bluntly when he said “this [missile defense] plan presents us with even greater challenges. Our military will react with a new weapons system.”

Hence, right-wing paranoia in the United States about Russian nuclear intentions plays directly into Russian paranoia about America’s nuclear intentions. In other words, both our right wings freak each other out, making arms control efforts exceptionally difficult.

Since the Ft. Hood shooting and the failed Christmas Day terror attack, some on the right have stepped up their calls for ethnic “profiling” and “discrimination,” with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich saying the Obama administration is more interested in “protecting the rights of terrorists” than “protecting the lives of Americans.”

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s (R) response to the Ft. Hood shooting was “profile away.” Rep. Peter King (R-NY) argued after the Christmas Day attempt that “100 percent of the Islamic terrorists are Muslim, and that is our main enemy today. So why we should not be profiling people because of their religion?” Fox News host Steve Doocey commented, “[F]or the most part all the people who tried to blow airliners out of the sky pretty much look alike, look similar.”

And at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing in January, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) said, “I’m, for one — I know it’s not politically correct to say it — I believe in racial and ethnic profiling.” While Inhhofe conceded that “not all Middle Easterners or Muslims between the age of 20 and 35 are terrorists,” he did say that it’s “by and large true” that “all terrorists are Muslims or Middle Easterners between the age of 20 and 35.”

But yesterday the Department of Justice brought terrorism charges against a “petite” blond-haired, blue-eyed 46-year-old American woman. Colleen Renee LaRose — who called herself “Jihad Jane” — “has been quietly held in U.S. custody since October on suspicions that she provided material support to terrorists and traveled to Sweden to launch an attack” against cartoonists who depicted the Prophet Mohammed. The Washington Post reports:

LaRose, who lived in suburban Philadelphia, allegedly recruited men and women in the United States, Europe and South Asia to “wage violent jihad,” according to an indictment issued in Pennsylvania. She fueled her interests on the Internet over the past few years and used Web sites such as YouTube to post increasingly agitated messages, the court papers said.

As an American citizen whose appearance and passport allowed her to blend into Western society, LaRose represents one of the worst fears of intelligence and FBI analysts focused on identifying terrorist threats. She is one of only a handful of women to be charged with terrorism offenses in the United States, national security experts said.

In fact, several high-profile terrorists look nothing like Inhofe’s description. Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is Nigerian and “shoe bomber” Richard Reid is British-Jamaican. Meanwhile, Pakistani officials reportedly recently captured a Taliban leader who was born in Oregon.

“Jihad Jane” is further evidence that ethic profiling — in addition to being an affront to civil rights — is ineffective. The practice actually wastes law enforcement resources by chasing false targets who do not match the profile. Even former Bush Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the Christmas Day incident showed “the danger and the foolishness of profiling.”

On Monday, the day Vice-President Joe Biden was to arrive in Israel, the Israeli government announced approval for 112 new homes in Beitar Illit, an ultra-Orthodox settlement near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, despite having agreed in November to curb settlement growth in partial fulfillment of Israel’s obligations under the Bush administration road map.

On Tuesday, Israel’s Interior Ministry announced plans “to build 1,600 new housing units for Jews” in Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem. Biden released this statement in response:

I condemn the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem. The substance and timing of the announcement, particularly with the launching of proximity talks, is precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions that I’ve had here in Israel. We must build an atmosphere to support negotiations, not complicate them.

Interior Minister Eli Yishai apologized on Wednesday “for causing domestic and international distress” with the timing of the announcement, and Prime Minister Netanyahu reportedly told Biden, “No one was seeking to embarrass you or undermine your visit — on the contrary, you are a true friend to Israel.” But Meir Margalit, a member of Jerusalem’s City Council told Israel’s Ynet News that the ministry “meant to sabotage the announcement that Netanyahu issued today regarding the renewal of indirect negotiations with the Palestinians. It is also a kind of slap in the face of the American administration.”

Despite Netanyahu’s apology, his position in favor of settlement expansion is clear. As Max Blumenthal reports, “a day before Biden’s arrival, Netanyahu appeared onstage with Pastor John Hagee in Jerusalem.” Hagee is a radical American cleric who opposes the two-state solution and supports unlimited Israeli settlement expansion with millions of American dollars. “If America puts pressure on Israel to divide Jerusalem we are following the blueprint of the Prince of Darkness,” Hagee has said. “Amos 3:2 states that any nation that divides the Land of Israel will come under the severe judgment of God.”

Hagee’s views are 180 degrees opposite of the goals of the United States and the international community to establish a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza. Netanyahu’s appearing onstage with Hagee is a strong indication that his stated support for the creation of a Palestinian state is less than genuine.