Arizona's racial profiling law, SB 1070, is built on lies promoted by political opportunists like Arizona's Governor Jan Brewer and Senator John McCain who utilize fear as an effective political weapon. Hard working families who contribute to making all of our lives better are their unjust targets.
The Washington Post's Dana Milbank reports:
Jan Brewer has lost her head
The Arizona governor, seemingly determined to repel every last tourist dollar from her pariah state, has sounded a new alarm about border violence. "Our law enforcement agencies have found bodies in the desert either buried or just lying out there that have been beheaded," she announced on local television.
Ay, caramba! Those dark-skinned foreigners are now severing the heads of fair-haired Americans? Maybe they're also scalping them or shrinking them or putting them on a spike.
But those in fear of losing parts north of the neckline can relax. There's not a follicle of evidence to support Brewer's claim.
The Arizona Guardian Web site checked with medical examiners in Arizona's border counties, and the coroners said they had never seen an immigration-related beheading. I called and e-mailed Brewer's press office requesting documentation of decapitation; no reply.
Brewer's mindlessness about headlessness is just one of the immigration falsehoods being spread by Arizona politicians. Border violence on the rise? Phoenix becoming the world's No. 2 kidnapping capital? Illegal immigrants responsible for most police killings? The majority of those crossing the border are drug mules? All wrong.
This matters, because it means the entire premise of the Arizona immigration law is a fallacy. Arizona officials say they've had to step in because federal officials aren't doing enough to stem increasing border violence. The scary claims of violence, in turn, explain why the American public supports the Arizona crackdown.
The entire article is linked
Showing posts with label immigrants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label immigrants. Show all posts
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
The immigration panic of 2008
While most of the country is focused on rising gas and food prices, lay-offs, foreclosures, declining home values, crime, and the presidential primaries, the war on immigrant workers continues.
In Iowa, with the nation's lowest unemployment rate and labor shortages that are restricting economic growth, hundreds of immigrant workers were recently arrested, criminally charged and deported.
A New York Times editorial notes;
Someday, the country will recognize the true cost of its war on illegal immigration. We don’t mean dollars, though those are being squandered by the billions. The true cost is to the national identity: the sense of who we are and what we value. It will hit us once the enforcement fever breaks, when we look at what has been done and no longer recognize the country that did it.
A nation of immigrants is holding another nation of immigrants in bondage, exploiting its labor while ignoring its suffering, condemning its lawlessness while sealing off a path to living lawfully. The evidence is all around that something pragmatic and welcoming at the American core has been eclipsed, or is slipping away.
An escalating campaign of raids in homes and workplaces has spread indiscriminate terror among millions of people who pose no threat. After the largest raid ever last month — at a meatpacking plant in Iowa — hundreds were swiftly force-fed through the legal system and sent to prison. Civil-rights lawyers complained, futilely, that workers had been steamrolled into giving up their rights, treated more as a presumptive criminal gang than as potentially exploited workers who deserved a fair hearing. The company that harnessed their desperation, like so many others, has faced no charges...
The restrictionist message is brutally simple — that illegal immigrants deserve no rights, mercy or hope. It refuses to recognize that illegality is not an identity; it is a status that can be mended by making reparations and resuming a lawful life. Unless the nation contains its enforcement compulsion, illegal immigrants will remain forever Them and never Us, subject to whatever abusive regimes the powers of the moment may devise.
Every time this country has singled out a group of newly arrived immigrants for unjust punishment, the shame has echoed through history. Think of the Chinese and Irish, Catholics and Americans of Japanese ancestry. Children someday will study the Great Immigration Panic of the early 2000s, which harmed countless lives, wasted billions of dollars and mocked the nation’s most deeply held values.
In Iowa, with the nation's lowest unemployment rate and labor shortages that are restricting economic growth, hundreds of immigrant workers were recently arrested, criminally charged and deported.
A New York Times editorial notes;
Someday, the country will recognize the true cost of its war on illegal immigration. We don’t mean dollars, though those are being squandered by the billions. The true cost is to the national identity: the sense of who we are and what we value. It will hit us once the enforcement fever breaks, when we look at what has been done and no longer recognize the country that did it.
A nation of immigrants is holding another nation of immigrants in bondage, exploiting its labor while ignoring its suffering, condemning its lawlessness while sealing off a path to living lawfully. The evidence is all around that something pragmatic and welcoming at the American core has been eclipsed, or is slipping away.
An escalating campaign of raids in homes and workplaces has spread indiscriminate terror among millions of people who pose no threat. After the largest raid ever last month — at a meatpacking plant in Iowa — hundreds were swiftly force-fed through the legal system and sent to prison. Civil-rights lawyers complained, futilely, that workers had been steamrolled into giving up their rights, treated more as a presumptive criminal gang than as potentially exploited workers who deserved a fair hearing. The company that harnessed their desperation, like so many others, has faced no charges...
The restrictionist message is brutally simple — that illegal immigrants deserve no rights, mercy or hope. It refuses to recognize that illegality is not an identity; it is a status that can be mended by making reparations and resuming a lawful life. Unless the nation contains its enforcement compulsion, illegal immigrants will remain forever Them and never Us, subject to whatever abusive regimes the powers of the moment may devise.
Every time this country has singled out a group of newly arrived immigrants for unjust punishment, the shame has echoed through history. Think of the Chinese and Irish, Catholics and Americans of Japanese ancestry. Children someday will study the Great Immigration Panic of the early 2000s, which harmed countless lives, wasted billions of dollars and mocked the nation’s most deeply held values.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Basta!! Patrick McIlheran
Basta!! Patrick McIlheran!
In his latest "Quick Hit"Patrick McIlheran implies that the very foundations of American civilization are threatened by Spanish speaking residents refusing to learn English.
Of course, nothing could be further from the truth!
Spanish speaking immigrants and their progeny are learning English. They must to survive in the United States.
It is true that adult immigrants often struggle with learning a new language, just as earlier generations of non-English speaking immigrants did. Adult brains simply aren’t as adaptive as those of younger people.
The children and grandchildren of today’s Spanish speaking immigrants, like the children of previous generations of immigrants from Europe and elsewhere, adopt the language of their new country. Travel anywhere in the world and you will see people of African decent speaking French, German, and Italian, Iranians speaking Swedish, Norwegian and Spanish and Latinos speaking English!
Second generation Latinos speak English, most as their first language. They may also continue to speak their native language, just as German, Polish, Italian and Jewish immigrants before them. This enables them to communicate with and assist their parents and grandparents who often lack English proficiency. It also allows them to serve as a bridge between the United States and our southern neighbors who are almost all Spanish speaking.
My Minsk born grandmother spoke very little English. But she successfully raised eight children all of whom spoke English as their first language, even those not born in the US. One, a Harvard educated physicist wrote IBM’s first programs. Three others took the truck their father used to transport eggs and turned it into a regional trucking business. Another became a photographer who took the earliest photographs of Rosa Parks before she refused to move to the back of the bus. Three were WWII veterans including the youngest son who was wounded at Normandy. One was my mother. All retained Yiddish so they could communicate with their parents and other older relatives, assisting their transition to this new and very different world. All I know of Yiddish are the few words that all Americans have adopted! The transition took all of three generations!
Earlier generations of immigrants didn’t have television shows in their first language. They didn’t even have television for that matter! But they did have newspapers, radio shows and even public schools in their native language. Milwaukee had Polish and German language public schools and papers. The UP had a Finish radio program until a few years ago! None of these institutions prevented these immigrants or their children from learning English and becoming productive members of society. Nor did they undermine the foundations of western civilization! They actually helped smooth the transition by teaching immigrants about the institutions and practices of their new homeland just as Spanish language TV does today!
Senor McIlheran swung and missed with his "Quick Hit." What will he propose next? Banning guacamole and margaritas?
In his latest "Quick Hit"Patrick McIlheran implies that the very foundations of American civilization are threatened by Spanish speaking residents refusing to learn English.
Of course, nothing could be further from the truth!
Spanish speaking immigrants and their progeny are learning English. They must to survive in the United States.
It is true that adult immigrants often struggle with learning a new language, just as earlier generations of non-English speaking immigrants did. Adult brains simply aren’t as adaptive as those of younger people.
The children and grandchildren of today’s Spanish speaking immigrants, like the children of previous generations of immigrants from Europe and elsewhere, adopt the language of their new country. Travel anywhere in the world and you will see people of African decent speaking French, German, and Italian, Iranians speaking Swedish, Norwegian and Spanish and Latinos speaking English!
Second generation Latinos speak English, most as their first language. They may also continue to speak their native language, just as German, Polish, Italian and Jewish immigrants before them. This enables them to communicate with and assist their parents and grandparents who often lack English proficiency. It also allows them to serve as a bridge between the United States and our southern neighbors who are almost all Spanish speaking.
My Minsk born grandmother spoke very little English. But she successfully raised eight children all of whom spoke English as their first language, even those not born in the US. One, a Harvard educated physicist wrote IBM’s first programs. Three others took the truck their father used to transport eggs and turned it into a regional trucking business. Another became a photographer who took the earliest photographs of Rosa Parks before she refused to move to the back of the bus. Three were WWII veterans including the youngest son who was wounded at Normandy. One was my mother. All retained Yiddish so they could communicate with their parents and other older relatives, assisting their transition to this new and very different world. All I know of Yiddish are the few words that all Americans have adopted! The transition took all of three generations!
Earlier generations of immigrants didn’t have television shows in their first language. They didn’t even have television for that matter! But they did have newspapers, radio shows and even public schools in their native language. Milwaukee had Polish and German language public schools and papers. The UP had a Finish radio program until a few years ago! None of these institutions prevented these immigrants or their children from learning English and becoming productive members of society. Nor did they undermine the foundations of western civilization! They actually helped smooth the transition by teaching immigrants about the institutions and practices of their new homeland just as Spanish language TV does today!
Senor McIlheran swung and missed with his "Quick Hit." What will he propose next? Banning guacamole and margaritas?
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Police Attack Immigrant Marchers In Los Angeles
Yesterday, in Los Angeles, the police attacked immigrant May Day marchers in an event eerily similar to, although not as deadly as, an attack on immigrant workers in Milwaukee 120 years ago in which seven workers were killed and Polish workers were scapegoated, fired, and blacklisted.
In 1886, German and Polish workers in Milwaukee organized by the Knights of Labor rallied for the eight hour day proclaiming "The workmen do not beg, they demand", "We do not work for King Mammon" and "Eight hours is our battlecry."
The Milwaukee Journal billed it as the biggest event in city history. The parade was observed by 25,000. Despite the threat of violence, eight hour strikes spread throughout the city. Workers paraded in the city's multi-lingual neighborhoods carrying banners demanding the 8 hour day in English, German and Polish. In response,
Wisconsin Governor, Jeremiah Rusk called out the state militia.
On May 5th, in Chicago's Hay Market Square a bomb exploded after an eight-hour day demonstration, killing seven police and wounding sixty. As word of the bombing spread, tensions in Milwaukee grew.
Milwaukee employers were determined to draw the line at North Chicago Rolling Mill.
The next day, striking demonstrators, undeterred by the Hay Market events, began a march to shut down the Rolling Mill in Bay View, the last open factory in Milwaukee. Governor Rusk issued an order to the General of the National Guard -- "Fire on them." The fight culminated when the National Guard opened fire on a march of mainly Polish workers at the Rolling Mill in Bay View.
The Journal described the marchers as "foreign agitators, especially from Poland." It wrote: "Lincoln Avenue, the boundary line between the south end of the city and Bay View, was sprinkled with the blood of Polish rioters at 9 o'clock this morning." Seven people died as a result of the attack.
In the aftermath of North Chicago Rolling Mill massacre, the jury charged with investigating the events praised the officers who had fired on the workers, and indicted 50 Polish and German workers on "riot and conspiracy" or "riot and unlawful assembly" charges. They received sentences for hard labor (a cruel irony) ranging from six to nine months
Polish workers, many of whom were fired and replaced by non-Polish laborers, became the focus of an employer backlash. They were called "too radical" and blacklisted.. For their part in the massacre, businesses owned by members of the Kosciuko guard were boycotted by the city's Polish community.
Employers who benefited from the deadly strike-breaking tactics at Rolling Mill later rewarded the militia companies that fired on the Polish laborers with gifts of cash for their service.
May 1 was declared International Workers Day in honor of those who died and sacrificed on May 1, 1886 in Milwaukee and Chicago.The Latino workers marching through the streets of Milwaukee and other cities were marching in the footsteps of their Polish and German immigrant brothers and sisters. They have revived a proud American tradition of immigrant workers fighting for their rights.
In 1886, German and Polish workers in Milwaukee organized by the Knights of Labor rallied for the eight hour day proclaiming "The workmen do not beg, they demand", "We do not work for King Mammon" and "Eight hours is our battlecry."
The Milwaukee Journal billed it as the biggest event in city history. The parade was observed by 25,000. Despite the threat of violence, eight hour strikes spread throughout the city. Workers paraded in the city's multi-lingual neighborhoods carrying banners demanding the 8 hour day in English, German and Polish. In response,
Wisconsin Governor, Jeremiah Rusk called out the state militia.
On May 5th, in Chicago's Hay Market Square a bomb exploded after an eight-hour day demonstration, killing seven police and wounding sixty. As word of the bombing spread, tensions in Milwaukee grew.
Milwaukee employers were determined to draw the line at North Chicago Rolling Mill.
The next day, striking demonstrators, undeterred by the Hay Market events, began a march to shut down the Rolling Mill in Bay View, the last open factory in Milwaukee. Governor Rusk issued an order to the General of the National Guard -- "Fire on them." The fight culminated when the National Guard opened fire on a march of mainly Polish workers at the Rolling Mill in Bay View.
The Journal described the marchers as "foreign agitators, especially from Poland." It wrote: "Lincoln Avenue, the boundary line between the south end of the city and Bay View, was sprinkled with the blood of Polish rioters at 9 o'clock this morning." Seven people died as a result of the attack.
In the aftermath of North Chicago Rolling Mill massacre, the jury charged with investigating the events praised the officers who had fired on the workers, and indicted 50 Polish and German workers on "riot and conspiracy" or "riot and unlawful assembly" charges. They received sentences for hard labor (a cruel irony) ranging from six to nine months
Polish workers, many of whom were fired and replaced by non-Polish laborers, became the focus of an employer backlash. They were called "too radical" and blacklisted.. For their part in the massacre, businesses owned by members of the Kosciuko guard were boycotted by the city's Polish community.
Employers who benefited from the deadly strike-breaking tactics at Rolling Mill later rewarded the militia companies that fired on the Polish laborers with gifts of cash for their service.
May 1 was declared International Workers Day in honor of those who died and sacrificed on May 1, 1886 in Milwaukee and Chicago.The Latino workers marching through the streets of Milwaukee and other cities were marching in the footsteps of their Polish and German immigrant brothers and sisters. They have revived a proud American tradition of immigrant workers fighting for their rights.
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