Making a Run for the Border

In Mark Steyn's column today on Canada (previously mentioned here), he tells a couple of stories about the current state of the Canadian border, and the unarmed people stationed there:

Like much of the European Union, we're so heavily invested in the idea that we've found a kinder, gentler way we can scarcely bear to contemplate the reality. At the Washington state/British Columbia border last week, two guys on the lam were hightailing it through Blaine heading for the 49th parallel with the cops in hot pursuit. Alerted to what was coming their way, Canada's (unarmed) border guards walked off the job. For a country whose national anthem lyrics are mostly endless reprises of the line "we stand on guard for thee," we could at least stand on guard. A few years back, I was chatting with a border guard at the Derby Line, Vt./Rock Island, Quebec, crossing. A beat-up sedan came hurtling northward and we jumped out of the way. She sounded a klaxon. By then the driver was halfway up the Trans-Quebecoise autoroute and, if he ever heard her stern warning, he declined to brake and reverse back to the post to show his papers. "Oh, well," she said to me, "it's probably nothing."

Yikes! And we all thought the Mexican border was a problem.