Tales from the Trail

When Arizonans John McCain and Janet Napolitano started arguing over border security in the Senate on Wednesday, it sounded briefly like the pair could be heading for a modern day shootout at the O.K. Corral.

But it ended in a Mexican stand-off instead, with each cow poke flanked by an imaginary posse of sympathetic sheriffs.

The trouble started when McCain, a Republican senator, got his chance to ask questions at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano, a former Democratic governor of Arizona, was a testifying witness in discussions that had been all about Islamist militancy up to then.

But McCain turned the conversation sharply toward the southwest to ask about security along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The simmering row over Arizona’s tough-as-nails immigration law has led to a shift in venue for the U.S.-Mexico border governors’ meeting, an annual event usually characterized by unity and good will.

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, a Republican, canceled the bash she was due to host after six border governors from Mexico pulled out in protest at the desert state’s crackdown on unauthorized immigrants she inked into law in late April.

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, a Democrat, stepped in this week to save the meeting which is now set to take place in Santa Fe in late September — although full attendance looks doubtful in the poisoned atmosphere that lingers.

So Vice President Joe Biden wasn’t the only one making a stealth trip to an overseas hot spot over the Independence Day holiday weekend.

Turns out Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano ended her European visit with an unannounced seven-hour stop in Pakistan on Friday and discussed border security and other issues with officials including the president, prime minister, and interior minister.

Of course, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security doesn’t have any role in securing the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, so it was more of a discussion about her experience in dealing with U.S.-Mexican border security issues.