M.A.M.O.N. – Latinos VS. Donald Trump / Ale Damiani from Taxi Films on Vimeo.
A lovely little highly topical film…
And this:
An engineer explains why the wall won’t work….
“No. Donald Trump is not a builder. Donald Trump could not build a doghouse. Donald Trump is a developer who pays what he would call “very, very smart people†to build things on his behalf. His response to Ramos’ question was meant both to exaggerate his understanding of construction and to downplay the challenges posed by his border wall project.
“Though I would never classify the construction of a 95-story building as simple, it is a feat that has been achieved many times before. There are at least 30 buildings that have reached a height of 95 stories or more, according to the obsessively detailed database at SkyscraperPage.com, and there are even more in the design phase or under construction.
“On the other hand, human beings have built a 2,000-mile-long frontier wall exactly one time. Once. And it was accomplished only through a centuries-long building campaign that necessitated the forced labor of millions of Chinese peasants.
“The challenge of Trump’s border wall is not technical, but logistical. The leap in complexity between “building a wall†and “building a 2,000-mile-long continuous border wall in the desert†is about equal to the gap between “killing a guy†and “waging a protracted land war.†Trump’s border wall, if built as he has described it, would be one of the largest civil works projects in the history of the country and would face an array of challenges not found when constructing 95-story skyscrapers.”
Worth reading in full.
Oh – and, Happy Year of the Rooster ! We certainly have a large cock in the chicken coop this year…..
Soooooo…. are we applauding the possibility of the greatest construction feat since the Great Wall of China…?
And will they higher Americans for the work, or cheaper imported labour from somewhere nearby?
*hire
Why not look back at a slightly more recent example – the world-famous Berlin Wall.
Now the Berlin Wall certainly doesn’t compete for length, and probably it won’t compete on height, either. But whilst bigger may be better in some people’s eyes,I’m not sure that size is all that important.
I think that what’s important is porosity.
How easy is it to pass through, over, round, or under the wall.
The real feature of the Berlin Wall was the accessories. The guard towers, the guard dogs, the minefields, the searchlights, the automated gun systems, the various sensor arrays, the clear-fire zones, the concrete obstacles, all those nifty little bolt-on accessories.
A thousand miles of pre-cast concrete slab? Meh. Not so much.
A thousand miles of integrated defensive perimeter? Now you’re talking!
The US government had better get its act together and start recruiting before all those old dudes from the Stasi die of old age.
Excellent points Mr Filth! Porosity and the Stasi – a delightful combination !
m-d – noting Donut J Drumpf’s amazing propensity for :
A) Lying
B) going bankrupt
C) blaming other people when things go wrong
D) not paying his architect
E) employing illegal labour and not paying them proper wages
F) did I already say Lying?
Then I think it is highly likely this will be the biggest balls-up since Napolean invaded Russia.
It will fail to do its job, but he will claim it is a success anyway.
It may be started by the time his P-residency ends, but it sure as hell won’t be finished.
Oh, and :
G) I haven’t seen anyone else raise this yet, but: Environmental concerns, anyone? A successful wall would stop banded armadillos from migrating, long-eared Mexican field mice from breeding, affect territorial migration routes of South Baja endangered Puma, disrupt migratory patterns of Monarch butterflies, and generally fuck with all known land-based insects, mammals, reptiles, and flightless birds in the area.
Here’s a really good article about why the “wall” will be a failure, no matter what Trumps says, or if he actually manages to construct it all.
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2017/01/26/5-reasons-trumps-border-wall-will-be-nowhere-near-as-easy-to-build-as-he-makes-it-sound.html
Thanks Seamonkey. Good reference. Good little film too though, eh? Them Mexicans – good at making satire as well as tortillas!
Disinclined to build a wall though…
And… here we go:
“Assuming Trump’s wall will run along the entire 1,989-mile long land border the U.S. shares with Mexico and that the construction project will impact a total width of 1,000 feet (access roads, support structures, staging areas, etc), the USFWS estimates that the project will “potentially impact†111 endangered species, 108 species of migratory bird, four wildlife refuges and fish hatcheries, and an unknown number of protected wetlands.”
https://www.outsideonline.com/2075761/trumps-wall-threatens-111-endangered-species
Jaguar (Panthera onca)
The Trump wall would undoubtedly spell the end of jaguars in the U.S. The very last jaguar thought to call the U.S. home is “El Jefe,†a 7-year-old male. Heavily studied by conservationists, he was captured on video earlier this year.
Gray Wolf (Canis lupus)
“The Gray Wolf, being a keystone predator, is an integral component of the ecosystems to which it typically belongs,†explains USFWS. Any border wall would invariably cut off populations of wolves north and south of the border. Populations are down to just 100 or so immediately north of the border, and there are only a few dozen south of it. That means a genetic “bottleneck†has already been created, and wolves need as much intermixing as much as possible in order to survive.
West Indian Manatee (Trichechus manatus)
“To be effective, any wall would presumably need to extend at least partially into shallow water to prevent people from simply wading or swimming around it. Shallow water is exactly where manatees reside, and the border neatly aligns with their habitat along Texas’ coastal waterways.”
“Sea Turtles (Green, Hawksbill, Kemp’s Ridley, Leatherback, Loggerhead)
All the above species of endangered and threatened sea turtles call the Texas coast, where the U.S. meets Mexico, home. Development directly on beaches and in the water would bring noise, pollution, seabed disturbance, and light pollution.”
Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)
The national bird (and national animal) of the United States, the bald eagle’s range extends into northern Mexico. The wall would neatly divide that range. While such a proud example of freedom could obviously soar over the top of any man-made wall, such a large construction project would nevertheless disrupt a large portion of the bird’s habitat.
http://www.der-postillon.com/2017/01/IKEA-wall.html?m=1
danker schon Herr Schmutz ! Sehr gut… Aber ich denke, es muss größer sein