"As the ports of entry and some of the other choke points have locked down, that's raised the stakes," said Lt. Jeff Palmer, head of the Pima County Sheriff's Border Crime Unit, which patrols the deserts between Tucson and Mexico. "People are more willing to commit violent acts to get their materials across."

That may be what's happening in Cochise County, a swath of rugged desert in the southeastern corner of the state that has been a favorite path for illegal immigrants and drug smugglers since the federal government fortified the California border in the 1990s.

Although Arizona's crime rate has gone down over the past few years, the crime rates in other states like CA have gone down much further during that same period of time.  As I understand it, for the past few years, Arizona has had just about the highest crime rate in the country for things like property crime and vehicle theft.  

I imagine that in the last decade there's had to have been a major upswing in anxiety in places like Arizona due to all the daily-reported horror stories about the cartel wars going on in Mexico. Due to proximity, if for no other reasons..

But there are very, very, very few of those people.  A minister once said to me, after hearing some tale of woe from me about having been wronged, "You know, everybody thinks they're doing the right thing."

I think that's true.  Doesn't make what they're doing "right," but the vast, vast, vast majority of people, even politicians, think they're doing "the right thing" for the good of all, even when they lie through their teeth.