Pirates threaten boats on US-Mexico border lake

ZAPATA, Texas - The waters of Falcon Lake normally beckon boaters with waterskiing and world-record bass fishing. But this holiday weekend, fishermen on the waters that straddle the U.S.-Mexico border are on the lookout for something more sinister: pirates.

Twice in recent weeks, fishermen have been robbed at gunpoint by marauders that the local sheriff says are “spillover” from fighting between rival Mexican drug gangs.
Boaters are concerned about their safety, and the president of the local Chamber of Commerce is trying to assure people that everything’s fine on the U.S. side of the lake.

At the fishing camp his family has owned for 50 years, Jack Cox now sleeps with a loaded shotgun at his feet and a handgun within reach. In the American waters, Cox said, “you’re safer, but you’re not safe.” Mexican commercial fishermen regularly cross to set their nets illegally, why wouldn’t gunmen do the same? he asked.

Two weeks ago, the Texas Department of Public Safety warned boaters to avoid the international boundary that zig-zags through the lake, which is 25 miles long and 3 miles across at its widest point. Authorities also urged anyone on the water to notify relatives of their boating plans to aid law enforcement in case of trouble.

Since issuing the warning, most boats have stayed on the U.S. side.

“That’s a good indication. It means they’re getting the message,” Texas Parks and Wildlife Capt. Fernando Cervantes said Thursday as he patrolled with two other game wardens. “They’re still coming out, but they’re not going across.”

The border is marked by 14 partially submerged concrete towers that mark the Rio Grande’s path before the lake was created in 1954.

Game wardens and the U.S. Border Patrol watch over the lake but do not cross into Mexican waters, and no Mexican law enforcement is visible.

Men armed with assault rifles robbed fishermen on the Mexican side of Falcon Lake on April 30 and May 6. They traveled in the low-slung, underpowered commercial Mexican fishing boats that are familiar here. They asked for money, drugs and guns, and took what cash was available. No one was hurt.

A third incident happened a couple of days before the warning was issued, but Cervantes said the fishermen were able to escape without the thieves boarding their boat.

The attacks “were really unusual,” Cervantes said. “We had never seen it, and then they started up.”

Violence on the Mexican side of the lake has been climbing for several months.

A fractured partnership between the region’s dominant Gulf Cartel and its former enforcers, the Zetas, plunged many of the area’s Mexican border cities into violence. Police stations were attacked, officers killed and rolling gun battles between the gangs and with the Mexican military became commonplace.

“To me, this is spillover violence,” Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez Jr. said. “I don’t do the Chamber of Commerce talk. I talk reality.”

Still, the sheriff says, boaters should be safe provided they stay on the American side.

Cox, 81, says it was only a matter of time before the violence from Mexico crept onto the water. And the idea that gunmen looking to score easy cash from fishermen would not cross the lake’s imaginary boundary doesn’t make sense, he said.

That perspective is what worries Chamber of Commerce President Paco Mendoza.

“What’s keeping our town alive is our lake,” Mendoza said. In recent years, drilling in the county’s oilfields has virtually stopped, and the wells are no longer producing like they once did. In those days, oilfield workers packed Zapata’s restaurants and hotels, he said.

So Zapata increasingly looks to the lake for economic growth. Five fishing tournaments are scheduled between now and July, and a few big ones are set for next year.

“As far as we know, all of our contracts are still in play,” Mendoza said.

Falcon Lake landed on the national map of fishing destinations after the 2008 Bassmaster Elite Series tournament, where bass-fishing world records were broken.

The pirate warning could hurt businesses that depend on the lake, “but anglers will continue to come to Falcon because of the great fishing,” Mendoza said.

Norma Amaya, who runs a tackle shop with her husband, insists there is plenty of good fishing in U.S. waters. She points to a photo taken in December of a woman holding a 13.2-pound bass and smiling broadly.

Amaya said her husband’s guide service had had a couple cancellations since the pirate warning, but they are still booked solid for next year’s peak season, which runs from December to March.

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Counterterror Adviser Defends Jihad as ‘Legitimate Tenet of Islam’

The president’s top counterterrorism adviser on Wednesday called jihad a “legitimate tenet of Islam,” arguing that the term “jihadists” should not be used to describe America’s enemies.

During a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, John Brennan described violent extremists as victims of “political, economic and social forces,” but said that those plotting attacks on the United States should not be described in “religious terms.”

He repeated the administration argument that the enemy is not “terrorism,” because terrorism is a “tactic,” and not terror, because terror is a “state of mind” — though Brennan’s title, deputy national security adviser for counterterrorism and homeland security, includes the word “terrorism” in it. But then Brennan said that the word “jihad” should not be applied either.

“Nor do we describe our enemy as ‘jihadists’ or ‘Islamists’ because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one’s community, and there is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children,” Brennan said.

Full Story Here:
Counterterror Adviser Defends Jihad as ‘Legitimate Tenet of Islam’

I have mentioned on many occasions that I believe the entire administration of Barack Hussein Obama to be morons. I am now even more convinced of that.

Brennan defined the enemy as members of bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network and “its terrorist affiliates.”

But Brennan argued that it would be “counterproductive” for the United States to use the term, as it would “play into the false perception” that the “murderers” leading war against the West are doing so in the name of a “holy cause.”

Brennan is simply echoing the words and beliefs of his *master*, Barack Hussein Obama.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

The Obama administration appears to be backing away from the phrase “global war on terror,” a signature rhetorical legacy of its predecessor.

In a memo e-mailed this week to Pentagon staff members, the Defense Department’s office of security review noted that “this administration prefers to avoid using the term ‘Long War’ or ‘Global War on Terror’ [GWOT.] Please use ‘Overseas Contingency Operation.’” SOURCE

This administration is led by the most GUTLESS individual to ever hold the office of president!

I do NOT hold back on my beliefs or opinions. I am fully convinced that Obama is;

1. Aiding and abetting the enemies of this nation
2. Determined to bring this nation to it’s knees financially
3. Determined to bring this nation to it’s knees militarily
4. Determined to force his socialist/Marxist beliefs ON this nation
5. Allied with the Islamic jihadists that seek to attack and destroy this nation
6. Is himself a Muslim (stealth) and is NOT a citizen of this nation.
7. Will do all in his power to give this nation TO Islam

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I received this via email and thought it worth posting for all to read.

Obama — The Transformation of America

When Obama wrote a book and said he was mentored as a youth by Frank, (Frank Marshall Davis) an avowed Communist, people said it didn’t matter.

When it was discovered that his grandparents were strong socialists and had sent Obama’s mother to a socialist school and introduced Frank Marshall Davis to young Obama, people said it didn’t matter.

When people found out that he was enrolled as a Muslim child in school and his father and step father were both Muslims, people said it didn’t matter.

When he wrote in another book he authored “I will stand with them (Muslims) should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.”, people said it didn’t matter.

When he admittedly, in his book, said he chose Marxist friends and professors in college, people said it didn’t matter.

When he traveled to Pakistan after college, on an unknown national passport, people said it didn’t matter.

When he sought the endorsement of the Marxist party in 1996 as he ran for the Illinois Senate, people said it doesn’t matter.

When he sat in a Chicago Church for twenty years and listened to a preacher spew hatred for America and preach black liberation theology, people said it didn’t matter.

When an independent Washington organization that tracks senate voting records gave him the distinctive title of being the “most liberal senator”, people said it didn’t matter.

When the Palestinians in Gaza set up a fund raising telethon to raise money for his election campaign, people said it didn’t matter.

When his voting record supported gun control, people said it didn’t matter.

When he refused to disclose who donated money to his election campaign, as other candidates had done, people said it didn’t matter.

When he received endorsements from people like Louis Farrakhan, Muammar Qaddafi and Hugo Chavez, people said it didn’t matter.

When it was pointed out that he was a total newcomer and had absolutely no experience at anything except community organizing, people said it didn’t matter.

When he chose friends and acquaintances such as Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, who themselves were revolutionary radicals, people said it didn’t matter.

When his voting record in the Illinois senate, and in the U.S. Senate came into question, people said it didn’t matter.

When he refused to wear a flag lapel pin, and did so only after a huge public outcry, people said it didn’t matter.

When people started treating him as a Messiah and children in schools were taught to sing his praises, people said it didn’t matter.

When he stood with his hands over his groin area for the playing of the National Anthem and Pledge of Allegiance, people said it didn’t matter.

When he surrounded himself in the White house with advisers who were pro gun control, pro abortion, pro homosexual marriage and wanting to curtail freedom of speech to silence the opposition, people said it didn’t matter.

When he aired his views on abortion, homosexuality and a host of other liberal issues, people said it didn’t matter.

When he said he favors sex education in kindergarten, including homosexual indoctrination, people said it didn’t matter.

When his background was either scrubbed or hidden, and nothing could be found about him, people said it didn’t matter.

When the place of his birth was called into question, and he refused to produce a birth certificate, people said it didn’t matter.

When he had an association in Chicago with Tony Rezko, a man of questionable character, who is now in prison, and had helped Obama to a sweet deal on the purchase of his home, people said it didn’t matter.

When it became known that George Soros, a multi-billionaire Marxist, spent a ton of money to get him elected, people said it didn’t matter.

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