Organizers of the Minuteman Project hoped to focus the nation’s attention on the fact that the federal government is doing little to nothing to protect our borders.

Just days before the project begins deploying more than a thousand volunteers to watch the Arizona-Mexico border, federal officials have announced the addition of 500 U.S. Border Patrol agents to southeastern Arizona to combat illegal immigration and protect against potential terrorists.

The DHS officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, expect that as many as 150 agents will be dispatched to Arizona within the next few days and that the rest will be on the border by midsummer — when most foreigners try to sneak into the country.

The move follows bipartisan criticism of President Bush’s failure to fund 2,000 agents set out in the intelligence-overhaul bill that he signed in December. He has proposed funding for 210 new agents. …

Border Patrol agents, who last year apprehended more than 1 million illegal aliens, estimate that they apprehend only about 20 percent of the border-crossers. Last month, former Homeland Security Deputy Secretary James Loy notified Congress that intelligence indicates that al Qaeda plans to exploit the nation’s porous border.

Now that’s what I call effective citizen activism.