Just following orders…

XicanoPwr discovered, and commented on, the troubling story of an ICE agent in Grand Prairie Texas who committed suicide during a stand-off with the local police. What bothered XP – and Orcinus (who also commented on the story) — was that the dead agent’s apartment was filled with Nazi memorabilia. Local police, laughably claimed the deceased “could have been” a collector – though collectors don’t normally have a hidden stash of whatever it is they’re collecting (except maybe porn – though the guy also had a suitcase full of that too).

XP, and Orcinus, are both haunted by the possibility that ICE is harboring closet Nazis. The dead man was only a driver, but I’m not surprised. When I was in grad school, I worked for a time for an electronic security firm (still a novel concept at the time) and somehow ended up with the job of sorting through resumes for installers. It wasn’t exactly police work, but you got your share of “police junkies” (a term I learned from my boss – a former small town police chief) who were visibly disappointed when they found out you didn’t get a badge and a gun. At the time, I was living in a “changing neighborhood” where the local coppers used to round up the winos on cold nights. I ended up calling the REAL police on a security guard from the senior citizen’s complex across the street who took it into his head to start beating the crap out of the winos the cops had missed earlier one cold night. The officer who responded to my phone call about the situation was on the side of the angels (and the winos… and the old folks that creep was supposed to protect), but even so… Tha 5 foot nothin’ woman (still a novelty at the time) was amazing, lifting the guy off the ground with one hand (the other in a power grip on his nuts) as she explained to him the concept of “protect and serve.” That wasn’t police brutality, but what if the cop was 6’8″ and of the mindset that “the law’s the law?”

My point is that there are good cops, but police work – even at the periphery – is the kind of job that attracts bullies. I can understand why the local police tried to downplay the Nazi connection… simple embarrassment.

That’s not what REALLY bothers me. I can’t help wondering if it isn’t to be expected that a paramilitary police agency like ICE – or the Border Patrol – doesn’t create what have been called “Good Germans.” Don’t get me wrong – I know — and like, a number of Border Patrol agents and ICE personnel. In our rural communities, the Border Patrol agents are often the only people around when there’s an accident, or a loose horse on the highway or you get bit by a rattlesnake. They are my neighbors, and down here on the border — in some of the poorest countries in the United States – the federal government is the best employer around.

Given the local labor pool, and the demographics of the region, and the needs of the border patrol, naturally most of the agents are Mexican-American. I thought it was remarkable the night I got pulled over by the Border Patrol (driving a white van at night for the railroad, I get tailed by BP agents all the time) who was Anglo. I mentioned it to a BP agent I know, who joked the guy probably was hired under some minority affirmative action program.

But, as the Border Patrol presence grows, and the agents are less the local “hick-spanics” and more the outsiders (who, with their much higher salaries than are available locally, are going to have cultural expectations that make them “aliens” down here), it could be only a matter of time before we do find agents who see themselves as the “Americans” and the locals as the “aliens”. Or as people to be controlled.

Border Patrol agents are bureaucrats. They are expected to follow rules set by outsiders, with a mission to maintain walls and barriers to our normal social and business life that many of us resent. Or oppose. And subvert in subtle ways. But, these agents are also a paramilitary unit. They aren’t wearing security-guard type uniforms or, like our local sheriff’s department, practical outdoor work clothes. They are dressed for combat. With whom? And, against whom?

As the pathetic suicide in north Texas shows, there are people attracted to police work who aren’t right in the head. The nature of bureaucracy is to create a routine that is followed without deviation. These are bureaucrats with more than the usual firepower, and quite capable of using it. I worry that even without being a Nazi, or hanging a swastika in your closet, people are capable of following legitimate orders, especially when you are an outsider.