A Southern Arizona Travelogue, Courtesy of the BBC

That's the British Broadcasting Company, not the Bisbee Breakfast Club, about which more later. The video below just came up in my YouTube feed. It's a feature about the border, the wall, the President and his Party. Click through to see the vid and I'll supply some background.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0bYoUnZ_ZQ width:600 height:360]

It looks to me like the film crew flew into Phoenix, rented a Suburban and drove down I-10 to the border at Naco. They must have taken I-10 to Benson and turned south on Highway 80 going through St. David, Tombstone, Bisbee and finally to the twin cities of Naco. They didn't stop in Tucson, all the urban shots are Phoenix. The background during the first minute or so features the current border fence and some small summer storms. I'm pretty sure the hill that the reporter is standing on is located east of Naco. In the background you can see the towns of Naco, Arizona and Naco, Sonora divided by the fence. That fence is ugly enough, no ? Many of us remember when the border was just two or three strands of barbed wire if that. Nobody in Southern Arizona wants a wall like the ones separating apartheid Israel from Palestine. Trump's Fox News-viewing supporters elsewhere might think it's a good idea but nobody down here wants it, except maybe that one bar owner in Tombstone who appears later in the video.

At the 1:42 or so we are in Bisbee, at St. Elmo's Bar in Brewery Gulch. I've been in there a time or two. It's nothing special, just yellow beer and a pool table with not enough room to play. I play at the Bisbee Grand when I'm down there. They've got a full-size table and plenty of room. As for the beer, the Old Bisbee Brewing Company is right across the gulch from St. Elmo's and they have a good IPA. At about 1:53 we are in downtown Bisbee, across the street from the mining museum and down the hill from the Copper Queen.

At around the 4:22 mark we are driving west on I-10. We see a long line of idled locomotives stashed on a siding south of the freeway. It goes on for miles. They are idled for the same reason that illegal immigration is down, the U.S. economy has not recovered. There's not enough aggregate demand, reducing the need for shipping goods and hiring construction labor. At the 5:20 mark we're back in Bisbee, or nearby, in the little "suburb" of Lowell. It is here that we find the BBC. Perhaps the crew had breakfast there. Finally, starting at about 6:15, there's the segment in Tombstone, with the Trump supporter, who owns a bar, which I will make it a point never to patronize.

The Tombstone guy was standing behind the President and to his left at the Phoenix rally. Here's a vid about the black Trump supporter who was behind him to his right in Phoenix.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dg4o8b9nkyw width:600 height:360]

You can read more about the border and immigration HERE and HERE.

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enhydra lutris's picture

Sierra Vista. We got freaking snowed on up there, in spring, in our travel trailer. We used some RV park in Sierra Vista as home base whilst roaming around birding.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Azazello's picture

@enhydra lutris
Did you go up into the Huachuca Mountains, Ramsey Canyon perhaps ? We used to camp at the next canyon over, Carr Canyon. Hiked Carr Peak once. Madera Canyon gets a lot of birders too.

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

enhydra lutris's picture

@Azazello
preserve in a riparian area a bit east of Sierra Vista. That trip was to be exploratory and we planned on getting back and getting into the sky islands, but it never happened. Still ....

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

yellopig's picture

The wall is a terrible idea.

Glad you're keeping busy, Azazello! Smile

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“We may not be able to change the system, but we can make the system irrelevant in our lives and in the lives of those around us.”—John Beckett

Azazello's picture

@yellopig
I have so much to tell. When you coming into town ?
I sent you an email, like a week ago.

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

yellopig's picture

@Azazello You didn't answer my email at Easter. LOL.
Actually, there's a super-lot of weeding being done here, after that FOOT of rain in July.
I should go into town this week sometime; when are y'all free? (not Wednesday, it's senior discount day at the grocery, heh.)

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“We may not be able to change the system, but we can make the system irrelevant in our lives and in the lives of those around us.”—John Beckett

earthling1's picture

It sometimes takes a foreign perspective to see an issue clearly. That vid did a great job and your observations on the miles long locomotive was spot on. The economic recovery is a sham.
Love that landscape though. It's beautiful. Would love to come down and see firsthand. But I'm scared crapless of being pulled over and robbed blind by local LEO.
I know I know, it goes on all across the country now. It's just flying Washington state plates beggars pulling over and searching for pot or other. Even though I don't indulge in any, it's still frightening.
Feel free to pass this comment on to your state Chamber of Commerce.
Thanks again for a great read.

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

Bisbonian's picture

I think your IDs of the places in the film are spot on. My opinion of Elmo's is similar...the music is also too loud.

Hey, I took another friend kayaking on Saturday, in the same boat you rode. He had a bit of an accident, and ended up upside-down. His glasses ended up on the bottom, and his phone took in a fatal dose of salt-water (we were in Newport Harbor). He wriggled out of the boat though, and had a fine rest of the day.

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"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X