Back to the drawing board

As Peter Boyer explained in The New Yorker, Rudy Giuliani promises to solve America's illegal immigration woes by constructing

what he calls “a technological fence,” which he insists would be much more effective than a simple physical barrier.... The innovation is a sensor-based platform that can be launched aloft and will “see” a twenty-kilometer area, in a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree panorama. “It will be able to conduct a surveillance, actually,” a person familiar with the project told me. “It can follow an individual, or follow a car, at very far distances.”

Yes, well, and Ronnie Reagan imagine ending nuclear war with a neato magic space shield. Back here in the reality-based community:

(Sept. 20) - Because of a software glitch, the first high-tech "virtual fence" on the nation's borders remains inoperable, three months after its scheduled debut.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he is withholding further payment to the prime contractor, Boeing Co., until the success of the pilot project stretching 28 miles near the border southwest of Tucson.

Nine 98-foot towers laden with radar, sensors and sophisticated cameras have been built in an area heavily trafficked by illegal immigrant and drug smugglers. The towers, each a few miles apart, are intended to deter or detect border crossers and potential terrorists and enhance the ability of Border Patrol agents to catch them.

More testing is expected by early October, Chertoff told the House Committee on Homeland Security this month in Washington.

"We are now looking to begin acceptance testing in about a month," Chertoff said - meaning the point at which contracting officials give the go-ahead for testing - "and we will then kick the tires again."

Of Chertoff's remarks, Boeing spokeswoman Deborah Bosick said only: "We're working with our customer to solve some remaining technical issues."

Not to fear, though. Surely under a President Giuliani, the incompetents at Boeing will be sent back home where they belong. Raytheon—much better!—will handle the job. Reported Boyer: "Giuliani’s security division is a part owner of a company that is developing such technology with the defense contractor Raytheon." George Bush's version of missile defense is costing us $62.9 billion; neato that our Republicans have figured out an additional crony capitalism boondoggle upon which they might spend even more.