Bloodstar

You know, some days people will say things better than I could even dream of saying it, Today, E.D. Kain writes a post on balloon-juice that really should be read by everyone on all sides of the immigration debate.

The entire post is fantastic, but this part really stands out

No, armed drug gangs from Mexico are not raiding peaceful Arizona farmers. Blood is not flowing in the streets. Contra Jan Brewer, ‘most’ illegal immigrants are not smuggling drugs. The bulk of violence and crime in Arizona* stems from the War on Drugs, not from hard-working immigrants trying to make a better life for themselves. We won’t solve that problem by building a danged fence. (*And even these stories of kidnappings are wildly overblown by the media.)

It’s interesting to me that the last three Republican presidents were fairly pro-immigration given the rabid opposition to any sort of “amnesty” among conservative activists. Of course, Ronald Reagan signed a bill that granted amnesty to nearly three million illegal immigrants, and both Bush Sr. and Bush Jr. made significant efforts to court Hispanic voters in spite of the obvious, ugly reality that the Republican party has no interest in making itself more hospitable to them or to pursue anything resembling humane immigration reform.

Then looking further there’s a fantastic point made by Jason Kuznicki on birthright citizenship. and how utterly awful the idea is in reality.

I’d give the nod to Tim, because I don’t imagine that anti-immigration activists are going to be bought off so easily. Instead, a permanent, multi-generational class of non-citizens would just be fuel for the fire. Twenty years on, immigration foes will look at all the second- and third-generation non-citizens we’ve created, and the mass arrests and deportations will really begin in earnest. Not a problem I’d want to create.

The writers of the 14th amendment understood the dangers of creating a permanent underclass, and denying birthright citizenship is the quickest and easiest way to creating a permanent underclass. And if you thought we had problems before, imagine how that would turn out in 20 years when the children start growing up, and have no investment in the US because they’re not even good enough to count as a citizen.

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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You know that bullshit that the Republicans Spew about original intent? Well for the last 150 years, the concept of birthright citizenship has been part and parcel of America. Well not anymore if the Republicans have their way.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told The Hill on Monday that Congress “ought to take a look at” changing the 14th Amendment, which gives the children of illegal immigrants a right to U.S. citizenship.

McConnell’s statement signals growing support within the GOP for the controversial idea, which has also recently been touted by Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.).

We know this is another pander to xenophobia, and a promise that ‘no really we won’t pull citizenship from all you fine upstanding Americans just the evil icky dirty diseased immigrants. What really pisses me off is the concept of ‘illegal’ immigration is a fairly recent one, For the longest time America didn’t care how you got over here, if you’re here, you’re here. But now with record keeping and with computers and with the ability to track who is where, doing what, you have the ability to suddenly keep closer tabs on people.

Which is great for the Government, who’d never turn down a way to keep tabs on it’s citizens. But instead of understanding the danger of giving the Government more power, the Republicans are too busy finding ways to hand more power to the government in the guise of stopping ‘teh illegal’. After all, who needs intelligent debate when you can once again take Oxygen out of the room and pander to the worst of America?

Tags: Immigration, Political, bloodstar by bloodstar
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After all, if you make people afraid, they’ll do what you want, even if they’re afraid of a lie

According to the FBI, the four large U.S. cities (with populations of at least 500,000) with the lowest violent crime rates — San Diego, Phoenix and the Texas cities of El Paso and Austin — are all in border states. “The border is safer now than it’s ever been,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Lloyd Easterling told the Associated Press last month. Even Larry Dever, the sheriff of Arizona’s Cochise County, where the murder last March of a local rancher, believed to have been committed by an illegal immigrant, sparked calls for the law, conceded to the Arizona Republic recently that “we’re not seeing the [violent crime] that’s going on on the other side.”

But if anything, the truth seems to make people hold onto the falsehoods even more, it’s like they can’t stand having their worldview challenged. And that means that no matter what you do, that group of people, you’ll never reach. Perhaps a better term for that mindset is… fanaticism.

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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It’s insanity like this

State agencies are investigating whether any of their employees leaked Social Security numbers and other personal information after a list of 1,300 people who an anonymous group claims are illegal immigrants was circulated around Utah.

The anonymous group mailed the list to several media outlets, law enforcement agencies and others this week, frightening the state’s Hispanic community. A letter accompanying the list demanded that those on it be deported immediately.

The list also contains highly detailed personal information such as Social Security numbers, birth dates, workplaces, addresses and phone numbers. Names of children are included, along with due dates of pregnant women on the list.

One of the most disheartening things about this is seeing the comment thread on the yahoo article. I’m beginning to lose faith that the majority of Americans are good people. People are too easily swayed by fear and xenophobia, and a bad economy will cause people to overlook the xenophobia and racism that has poisoned the Republican party.

I’d call this a stunt, and dismiss it, but when you read studies that show that too many people are willing to ignore accurate information if it doesn’t fit their worldview, you realize that it doesn’t matter if something is a stunt, it helps solidify the worldview, and in this case the worldview is that there are too many nasty dirty illegals downloading babies and stealing from America. Just because the facts on the ground don’t support this worldview does not matter, because facts no longer matter and America is a weaker country because of the continued use of fear which weakens reason and the resolve in America to do the right and reasonable things instead of reacting like scared children.

Where’s the America I love?

Tags: Criminal, Evil, Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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“Few of their children in the country learn English. The signs in our streets have inscriptions in both languages. . . . Unless the stream of their importation could be turned . . . they will soon so outnumber us that we will not preserve our language, and even our government will become precarious.”

Answer below the fold…
[Read more →]

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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ALF-CIO President Richard Trumka in Ohio yesterday

And yet today I hear from working people who should know better, some in my own family – that those immigrants are taking our jobs, ruining our country. Haven’t we been here before?

When I hear that kind of talk, I want to say, did an immigrant move your plant overseas? Did an immigrant take away your pension? Or cut your health care? Did an immigrant destroy American workers’ right to organize? Or crash the financial system? Did immigrant workers write the trade laws that have done so much harm to Ohio?

Organized labor and immigration reform has always been at odds, I think mostly from perception that immigrants are less likely to organize and are more likely to depress wages. As more evidence mounts that the perception isn’t true, it will be interesting to see if people will look at the evidence, or continue to hold to stereotypes.

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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Nothing happens in a vacuum, and this could be one of those times where something polls well but ends up still being horrible politics, not only in the long run, but in the short run as well.

There’s no doubt that the new Arizona immigration law is popular nationally, but that still doesn’t mean the issue’s going to work to the GOP’s advantage this fall.

When we polled Colorado in early March Michael Bennet and Jane Norton were tied. Last week we found Bennet with a 3 point lead. One of the biggest reasons for that shift? Bennet went from leading Norton by 12 points with Hispanic voters to a 21 point advantage. That large shift in a Democratic direction among Hispanics mirrors what we saw in our Arizona Senate polling last month- Rodney Glassman went from trailing John McCain by 17 points with them in September to now holding a 17 point lead.

I’m not holding my breath that Magically McCain will be fired, (though if he’s primaried out, I think the seat could be up for grabs) but it could help Bennet and keep him in decent shape this election.

Tags: Election, Immigration, Political, bloodstar by bloodstar
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But I love the quote,

“I was also going to give a graduation speech in Arizona this weekend. But with my accent, I was afraid they would try to deport me.”

– California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R), quoted by the Atlanta Journal Constitution, at a graduation speech at Emory University.

Tags: Immigration, Political, bloodstar by bloodstar
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It’s only funny (and sad) because it’s true.

Tags: Humor, Immigration, Political, bloodstar by bloodstar
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Seriously, absolute morons. You can’t sit here and use Illegal Immigration as an excuse to create the National ID Card, it’s stupid, tone deaf, and one of the dumbest things you could possibly do. I mean, really, you’re not going to win the Tea Party crowd either way, so why piss of everyone else by telling them they have to give DNA samples and have this ‘biometric’ bullshit card. Sorry, Immigration is not an excuse to implement your wet dream of having a neo police state.

Second, working to let people who got here illegally stay, but coming down harder on people who came here legally, but overstayed their visa, is backwards and dumb. I’d argue people who made it here legally, but somehow had their status should be reviewed first to see if they have committed any crimes and have been productive members of society. If they have, then let them stay.

The rest of the proposals I can live with. but damn, those two are real deal breakers to me… And this is why I’m libertarian.

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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I do like Reason magazine from time to time, even if often times I think they’re a bit shrill in tone and not libertarian enough for my liking. but they will put some good stuff out there, and this article is one example of that.

You can show that there is a correlation between illegal immigrants and crime. but unlike what the hysteria from the natavists and racists might think, that correlation is inverse.

The state has an estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants. But contrary to myth, they have not brought an epidemic of murder and mayhem with them. Surprise of surprises, the state has gotten safer.

Over the last decade, the violent crime rate has dropped by 19 percent, while property crime is down by 20 percent. Crime has also declined in the rest of the country, but not as fast as in Arizona.

Babeu’s claim about police killings came as news to me. When I called his office to get a list of victims, I learned there has been only one since the beginning of 2008—deeply regrettable, but not exactly a trend.

Truth is, illegal immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native Americans. Most come here to work, and in their desire to stay, they are generally afraid to do anything that might draw the attention of armed people wearing badges.

This has been mentioned before, the idea that we have more illegal immigrants in the country now, but again, it’s the irony that the efforts to keep people out, are serving to keep them here:

Massey says the number of people coming illegally has not risen appreciably in the last couple of decades. But the number staying has climbed, because anyone who leaves faces a harder task returning.

Another point that should be made, yes it’s hard to immigrate to the US legally, and therefore the people coming to the US illegally have an easier time of it (I would argue that the issues illegals deal with outweigh any issues legal immigrants deal with) because they don’t have to deal with the red tape and other crap. but the question is, should we reduce the red tape and harassment for legal immigration instead of just pounding sand harder?

Tags: Immigration, bloodstar by bloodstar
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Let’s work on immigration reform:

U.S. Border Patrol manpower has been doubled since 2005 — to 20,000, making it the largest law enforcement agency in the U.S.

The Department of Homeland Security has spent billions of dollars creating physical and high-tech “virtual” barriers along the border with Mexico, and the DHS last year deported 350,000 illegals caught in the U.S., a 20 percent increase over 2007.

And the Bush and Obama administrations have toughened enforcement of laws against the hiring of illegal immigrants, staging large-scale raids on various businesses to make the point.

Let’s get to work people. You’re not going to hand wave people who are here away. So do something to make them productive member of society instead of simply sticking your fingers in your ears and saying ‘la la la they should just go away.’

Tags: Immigration, Law, bloodstar by bloodstar
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It’s about time. we’ll just have to see if they can do something with reform this year.

The oft-delayed White House immigration meeting is back on the schedule for tomorrow, and is expected to include congressional advocates of immigration reform from both parties.

Tags: Immigration, Political, bloodstar by bloodstar
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