NIGHT ROLLERS:

Minutemen appear to be restyling campaign along Mexican border (Michael Marizco, 3/27/05, ARIZONA DAILY STAR)

The Minuteman Project - reported on by the media as an impending disaster in the immigration debate - is changing its tune.

What started as a group of volunteers intending to monitor illegal entrants crossing the border and calling them in to the U.S. Border Patrol is now being sold as something more like a tailgate party on the banks of the San Pedro River.

"Our MO has changed," said Richard Humphries, a retired federal agent who's in charge of the planes the Minuteman volunteers will use to patrol the area. "Originally, we were going to try to remain quiet and hidden. That way when the illegals walked by, we could see them."

The group has been concerned about the misconception that "the media is putting out" and wants to show "that it's not just a bunch of shaved head rednecks," Humphries said.

Organizers now claim 40 percent of it's still-unproven 956 volunteers are women and minorities and that the group includes "4 wheelchair bound paraplegics and 6 amputees."

Now this is a reality tv show just waiting to happen.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 27, 2005 6:11 PM