A vigilante by any other acronym, is still a viglante. A NY Times reporter visits the self-styled American Border Patrol.

A.B.P. is only the most organized and technologically ambitious of a cluster of unofficial border patrols that have emerged in Arizona since last year, including Civil Homeland Defense and Ranch Rescue. But the phenomenon probably reveals less about a crisis in illegal immigration (which, judging from the number of apprehensions, is down since 2000) than about an acute, frustrated patriotism. These are people who took the president at his word when he called for every American to stand vigilant and report suspicious activity after 9/11, and who live at one of the few remaining trapdoors into America.