EG posted the link to this article, I read it, and thought it would be a great topic of discussion. Here are some excerpts, but I really urge everyone to read the entire article.
Whether their brief detention was a mere inconvenience or a flagrant violation of their constitutional rights is the subject of a growing debate that seems likely to be resolved in federal court. Immigration officials, charged with enforcing the law against the estimated 12 million undocumented foreigners in the USA, are mounting more raids at slaughterhouses, restaurants and factories.
Increasingly, U.S. citizens and legal residents who work alongside illegal immigrants are being detained and interrogated, too. And some, such as Dhopade, are filing claims or lawsuits against the government.
Dhopade says he was a victim of racial profiling by ICE. An ICE agent questioned him about his immigration status and his ability to speak English “because of my skin color,” he says. “None of the white folks in the office … that I know of were asked for proof of citizenship. To be asked for proof of citizenship, in this country, it’s an insult. This is the United States of America. This country does not require that.”
“You cannot in this country engage in group detentions of large numbers of people because you think a smaller number within the larger group has done something wrong,” Schey says. At the Van Nuys plant, ICE “created a powerful atmosphere of fear and intimidation. People felt like they had been taken hostage.”
Barbara Coe, chairwoman of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, says raids “are providing the incentive for at least some of these illegal aliens to get out of here before they are deported. I don’t think there are enough raids. There should be more.” She says she’s sorry legal residents are sometimes questioned during raids but believes ICE needs time to determine who is here legally.
So does Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington. “It’s not the end of the world,” he says of citizens who are detained. “These people were briefly inconvenienced. Too bad.”
Denise Shippy, nine months pregnant the day of the MSE raid, says it was more than an inconvenience.
She had planned to take off that afternoon for parent-teacher conferences and a doctor’s appointment. But Shippy, 30, needed to train a receptionist to fill in for her while she was on maternity leave, so she took her two children to the office with her. The raid occurred as she settled Cassidy, 7, and Ricky, 9, into the mailroom for lunch.
As she left the mailroom, Shippy found the lobby filled with ICE agents, and she, the children and co-workers were herded in there. When Shippy tried to respond to an e-mail, she says, one ICE agent said, “Stop typing.”
“My rights were violated,” Shippy says. “I am a citizen of this United States. I was born here. I’m not who they’re looking for. I wasn’t allowed to leave. … I couldn’t go anywhere and couldn’t do anything. Neither could my children.”
Although she was upset, she tried to calm her kids, she says. She needed to use the restroom, but held off because she didn’t want an agent to accompany her.
“I didn’t want to scare the heck out of my kids,” she says. “I was trying to be cool and calm for my children. My heart was racing.”
As long as ICE has a warrant to enter a workplace, Myers says, agents can conduct what she calls a “survey” to determine the legal status of “anyone within the premises.”
She cites a 1984 Supreme Court ruling that said factory surveys during immigration raids don’t amount to an unconstitutional detention or seizure of those being questioned, even U.S. citizens.
In its ruling, however, the Supreme Court emphasized that the employees in the factory were not prevented from moving around, continuing to work or leaving. The current raids are different from those the Supreme Court approved, Schey says.
ICE can question workers as long as the interaction is voluntary, “but what they’re doing (now) is not that,” he says, because workers think they have no choice except to answer questions — which may incriminate those here illegally.
ICE’s raids foster discrimination, says Domingo Garcia, attorney for the League of United Latin American Citizens. “There’s a lot of racial profiling. … If you look like a Hispanic, you’re detained or arrested.”
He says he plans to file a class-action, civil rights lawsuit on behalf of legal workers detained in raids, including Jesus Garcia, 27, a green-card holder from Mount Pleasant, Texas. Domingo Garcia says he will ask the court to prohibit ICE from conducting raids until it changes its policies to prevent racial profiling.
ICE agents went to Jesus Garcia’s home on April 16 in conjunction with a raid on a nearby Pilgrim’s Pride poultry processing plant, where he worked marinating chicken meat. Garcia, from Mexico, has been a legal permanent resident for a year and a half. When about 10 ICE agents and local sheriff’s deputies knocked on his door, they told him he was using the wrong Social Security number, says his wife, Olivia Garcia, a U.S. citizen.
Though Garcia showed the agents his green card, they handcuffed him and jailed him. He was released a day and a half later after agents told him he wasn’t the person they wanted, he says. He had spent the night in jail. “He said it was pretty bad,” Olivia says. “People were crying and screaming.”
Jesus Garcia, who has since left Pilgrim’s Pride for another job, says the mishap cost him three days of work. “I worked hard to get my residency,” he says. “And to take me to jail just over a mistake?”
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-24-Immigration-raids_N.htm?csp=34
Mackie and Lucky Duck,
Now see! We have a “who is more delusional” contest between the two of you.
I see your point Lucky Duck, I wonder what will happen when these suits make it to a higher court. It may be legal for now, but I hope that changes. There are plenty of legal residents who don’t speak english fluently, I see their rights being trampled on quite easily. YOU may not have an issue showing I.D. during an I.C.E. raid, but I sure would!
Elena,
I too believe in our Republic and the contract We the People have with it called our Constitution. It’s when we lose respect for our Constitution that our country starts to get into a lot of trouble. The iraq war is a glaring example of how the American people can so easily roll over and say ‘whatever’ to the guys with badges. The democratic party has no less blood on its hands and their shameless hypocrisy at blaming the republicans is breathtaking. Now, we’re turning our internal society into a police state and for what? Some working class immigrants who are loud and rowdy? Is this all it takes for us to throw away our rights? What is happening to the immigrants today WILL be happening to us all tomorrow.
It’s not really that we need more answers. The answers are self evident. It’s just that they’re very painful to accept. The mercenary component of this war is a perfect example. They are here. On our soil. They do not take an oath to defend the constitution. Do you understand? That means they will follow orders no matter how unconstitutional. They have already been deployed on American streets and fired upon american citizens. And there should have been a national outcry…but there was none. Because the guys with badges said its whats best for us.
The fact that our soldiers take an oath to the constitution and NOT to the president is an important distinction. But it only matters if We the People support them when they honor that Oath like Lieutenant Ehren Watada and refuse to deploy to iraq. It’s unfortunate that so few of our officer corps have this kind of moral courage. It’s unfortunate that so many Americans are brainwashed into believing the oath our soldiers take is just a bunch of words not to be taken seriously.
The real country is us. The guys with badges are just here to help us. We have rights…the govt has privileges. We do have the best system in the world…and we’re losing it, not with a bang but with a whimper…a sheep’s whimper.
Lucky Duck:
Haha, the lawyers are your standard? What a joke. You should look for a better standard.
DWI checkpoints should be abolished. They are violations of the 4th amendment.
You should move to china or north korea where you’d feel more at home.
Don’t worry my friend. Useful idiots such as yourself are speeding their arrival. Keep it up…you won’t have long to wait. Talk about delusional, I think if you had been in new orleans after katrina, that’s exactly what you would have seen outside your window…
Michael, you’ve now left the kids’ table and join the adults’ table. Welcome. But remember, when you post here, there is an open discussion, allowing almost all comments, even ones that disagree with or challenge the administrators. And, most of the people who post and/or read this blog are capable of thinking for themselves. That means you can’t call a defeat a victory and expect anyone to believe you…
The average citizen, and the average reader of this blog is a whole lot smarter than the contributors to the old blog. We don’t except inane, unsubstantiated claims without questioning, so there is little use in claiming that the old blog has somehow won an argument that it did not allow to happen.
one, post the whole article. Two, nothing wrong with a raid. three, I’m glad they are doing something. justice is usually more right than wrong, I’m fine with that. sometimes innocent people are caught in the crossfire and although tragic, I’m fine with that too. when you look at the greater good, it’s really acceptable to me. when you look at all the people that are using fake SSN’s and that are criminals during these raids it’s shocking. If a family has to be broken up to save someones credit then I’m fine with that. I’m also fine with detaining innocent people long enough to determine whether they are legal or not, and it’s perfectly legal. you can detain, not arrest, without a warrant. that what the authorities are trying to do..find out who to arrest.
be thankful as yours may be the next SSN used by an illegal alien, I know more than a few people who show up in bankruptcy court and other proceedings who have been sacked by an illegal alien piggybacking off their SSN. and for mackie, not all lawyers are corrupt and bad there are some really goods ones out their who want to see justice upheld for both society and their clients as a whole. Lawyers are really an integral part of our society, dont let a few bad ones spoil the whole batch.
DUI checkpoints have been shown to be perfectly when the rights of law enforcement to conduct as they fall into the realm of public safety, feel free to check on this.
What has the world come to…
… when a Brit has to remind Americans of the wisdom of your founding fathers:
Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
Benjamin Franklin
Does anyone think that your current incumbent will be judged as worthy of the position as Benjamin Franklin by future generations?
America used to stand for decency; right now it isn’t and that’s a great shame.
I want to give credit New America Media for much of the following, since these are not all my words but they do represent my views:
ICE has carried out well-publicized immigration raids in factories, meatpacking plants, janitorial services, and other workplaces employing immigrants. ICE calls the workers criminals, because immigration law forbids employers to hire them.
But while workers get deported, and often must leave their children with relatives, or even strangers, don’t expect to see many of their employers go to jail. Further, ICE can’t, and won’t, deport all 12 million undocumented workers in the country. This would quickly halt many industries. Instead, these raids have a political purpose.
In the Fall of 2007 after agents raided Swift & Co. meatpacking plants, Homeland Secretary Michael Chertoff told the media the deportations would show Congress the need for “stronger border security, effective interior enforcement and a temporary-worker program.” Bush wants, he said, “a program that would allow businesses that need foreign workers, because they can’t otherwise satisfy their labor needs, to be able to get those workers in a regulated program.”
There have been many labor schemes throughout history. From 1942 to 1964 the Bracero program recruited temporary immigrants, who were exploited, cheated, and deported if they tried to go on strike. Growers pitted them against workers already in the country to drive down wages. Cesar Chavez and other Latino leaders campaigned to get the program repealed.
Advocates of today’s programs avoid the bitter “bracero” label, and call them “guest worker,” “essential worker,” or just “new workers”. You can’t clean up an unpleasant reality, however, by renaming it.
Guest worker programs are low-wage schemes, intended to supply plentiful labor to corporate employers, at a price they want to pay. Companies don’t recruit guest workers so they can pay them more, but to pay them less.
The Southern Poverty Law Center’s recent report, Close to Slavery, shows that current guest worker programs allow labor contractors to maintain blacklists of workers who work slowly or demand their rights. Public interest lawyers spend years in court, trying just to get back wages for cheated immigrants. Meanwhile, the Department of Labor almost never decertifies contractors who abuse workers.
The AFL-CIO opposes guest worker programs, and says immigrants should be given permanent residence visas, so they have labor rights and can become normal members of the communities they live in. Since 1999, the AFL-CIO has called for legalization of the 12 million people living in the US without documents. Most unions oppose employer sanctions and the recent immigration raids, because they’re often used to threaten and punish workers when they speak out for better wages and conditions.
Today over 180 million people in the world already live outside the countries where they were born. In the countries that are the main sources of migration to the US, trade agreements like NAFTA, and market-based economic reforms, have uprooted hundreds of thousands of farmers and workers, leaving them little option other than coming north. The United States government has created this issue but are reluctant to do anything to resolve the problems associated with it. Why??? Because it serves the purposes of the US Government to keep costs down for big greedy US owned companies.
A rational immigration policy should end trade and investment policies abroad that produce poverty and displace people. In the US, immigration policy should emphasize rights and equality, and protect all families and communities, of immigrants and native-born alike.
Using immigration raids instead as a pressure tactic to get Congress to approve guest worker programs is not a legitimate use of enforcement. IT UNDERMINES THE FAMILY AND THE COMMUNITY VALUES FOR WHICH THIS COUNTRY STANDS.
We need comprehensive immigration reform and we needed it yesterday. I hope with the election of a new president more attention will be focused on domestic issues which have been ignored for the past 8 years.
Cutting through all the emotional BS, let the courts figure this one out. That’s the beauty of being in the U.S.
Why Here Why Now said “I heard this crazy rumor that Gospel Greg’s little blog wagon has lost its wheels.”
Reading the rest of that post makes me think Why Here Why Now has lost his/her marbles. Why Here Why Now goes on to make a bunch of assumptions that may or may not be true.
Elvis:
Your paragraph is truly breathtaking Elvis. You cannot detain someone without probable cause that a crime has been committed. The Constitution is very clear here. Those who violate this amendment without probable cause open themselves up to lawsuit and jail time. Would you be willing to accept the responsibility and consequences for these detentions? What would your criteria for probable cause be? Remember that probable cause would have to hold up in court.
There was a loophole created in the 4th amendment for DUI checkpoints. The supreme court did a great disservice to the American people for DUI checkpoints that really aren’t useful. Hopefully, someday we can overturn this.
Mackie,
Stop with the personal attacks. Lucky Duck is stating how things are, not necessarily how utopian world would be. Not all of us share your libertarian free spirit. Not sharing your views doesn’t make us all idiots.
Remember the’ good manners rule’ here, please. It makes for a much more civil discussion.
Mackie, you have the writing and thinking skills to SELL us your ideas, not beat us over the head with a baseball bat like Oliver Stone.
‘useful idiot’ is a phrase coined by Lenin. It isn’t meant as an insult. It’s meant to denote someone who is naive and being manipulated into hurting themselves by forces they don’t understand.
“Remember the’ good manners rule’ here, please. It makes for a much more civil discussion.”
You assume he’s here for civil discussion and he’s admitted that’s not his goal in past threads. Stirring the pot and getting his ego stroked seems to be his forte.
Acutally I am here for civil discussion, but I do not shrink from defending myself.
Marie, that post was awesome. I hadn’t heard of New America Media, but the two of you make an outstanding team! Ultimately there is a much bigger issue at hand than “them brown people’s too many,” a.k.a. nativism. However, we do have to take this sentiment into account (as Prince William County has learned) in the course of policy making, at the local level or at the Federal level. We have compared this situation to lessons from history on this blog, some of them more dreadful than this situation by any comparison ….
Although I grant, for instance, that some of the early symptoms of those horrible events exist here in PWC, but we are not and will never be on that road. Those symptoms exist today in many places around the world (immigration is happening everywhere), but they have only snowball into mass violence when politicians or dictators exploit them without check, and THAT will never happen here.
Look at the cycle in PWC, and in Virginia state politics. Look at the Presidential primary process. Those who exploited nativism as a campaign issue lost, and they will continue to lose until there is a consensus to achieve the Comprehensive Immigration Reform that John McCain (news flash: the GOP Presidential nominee) was courageous and insightful enough to propose more than a year ago.
Of course we will continue to struggle with nativism, here in this county and throughout the U.S. But this sentiment is far too common, in my view, to compare our county to places and times where such intolerance reached its apex in the form of “ethnic cleansing.”
In my view, a better comparison would be the Desegregation Era. Changes in demographics and attitudes among the people will correspond to changes in Federal law. Those who resist such changes at the local level, will resist the same when it becomes Federal law. The reforms are inevitable. The only questions is, how many Americans want to be remembered for having opposed them, decades from now, when we are as ashamed of this behavior as we are today of those who stood against Desegregation.
Mackie said “DWI checkpoints should be abolished. They are violations of the 4th amendment. ”
Tell that to the next person who gets killed by a drunk driver that would have been caught at a DWI checkpoint. And, the use of DWI checkpoints has been upheld in court. Maybe in your definition of the 4th amendment they are a violation, but then again it seems you advocate some form of government close to anarchy. Good luck with your quest to get them overturned. I’m sure Mother’s Against Drunk Driving will be right behind you!
So does a darker skin color than white constitute as “probable cause” that the person is a criminal or is here illegally?
10 years ago, I would have thought that would not hold up in court, but today…..
An Observer,
Actually, I only advocate the Constitution as the basis of our government. It’s worked pretty good in the past, and when we stop using it and start improvising we get into trouble like in Iraq.
The Supreme Court has upheld that DUI checkpoints qualify as seizures. That being the case, the 4th amendment doesn’t make exceptions to its requirement of probable cause to make a seizure. However the supreme court created an exception out of whole cloth. Someday we will correct this injustice. MADD may do good work, but when they attack our Constitution, they do us all a disservice. I fully support MADD’s efforts to raise safety and awareness but they should keep their hands off the constitution.
http://www.getmadd.com/
http://www.duiblog.com/2004/10/17
It seems the Hate Bunnies are outmatched by Mackie when it comes to discussing the Constitution vis a vis “anarchy” (LOL). Hate Bunnies, time to call in Robert “The Disaster” Duecaster. If he’s not available, I’m sure you could get the self-proclaimed mad scientist from F.A.I.R. In the meanwhile, just stick to the usual talking points you’ve already memorized.
PS: I nominate the term “Hate Bunnies” to supplant “Useful Idiots” since the word idiot is obviously hurtful.
Rod2155, you’re right, “Probable Cause” would not have held up in court. That’s why we changed the Immigration Resolution several times until we got it right. Immigration checks are now done post arrest. Everyone is checked, regardless of skin color or language proficiency. Unlike the early versions of the Resolution procured by the Duecaster Disaster and F.A.I.R., the Resolution that goes into effect on Tuesday is legally defensible, and will not hinder our Police Officers’ ability to do their jobs.
If the Resolution had mandated that everyone be checked out on the street, based on any contact with a Police Officer no matter how routine, our Officers would have been swamped with busywork, detaining legal citizens for long periods of time to check their status. This is why “Probable Cause” was introduced — to reduce the workload for our Officers by narrowing these checks to people who seems or looks like they might be illegal.
Woops, that turned out to be not so good either, because it could lead to racial profiling. And yet, if the Board was going to direct Police policy without forethought or consultation with county staff, this was the only way. The first scenario I described, with all residents including legal citizens being checked on the streets, the force would have been overloaded and the citizens would have been angered by the needless delays caused by extended detentions. Imagine getting pulled over and waiting on the side of the road for an hour just to be issued a summons (a.k.a. traffic ticket).
However, if we check only those people who are arrested, we are checking far less people, and these checks can painlessly be worked into the other background checks the Police are doing anyway. It’s very similar to the 287G program (where such checks are done at the jail, after the magistrate has remanded a suspect to jail). 287G is Constitutional and legally defensible. We implemented it here in PWC without controversy or threat of legal action. It makes sense to learn all we can about our prison inmates.
The repeal of Probable Cause, and the removal of mandated checks to post-arrest was the only logical way to apply the Board’s rushed and ill-considered unanimous vote two weeks before the election of 2007. If they had followed the usual procedure for making policy, and done their research and gotten input from county staff BEFORE passing the law, they would have arrived at this law without hosting a culture war in the Board chambers.
Although the year-long ordeal was not pretty, thank goodness we got this done. It was painful and damaging, but now we will be in good position to defend ourselves when we end up in Federal court. And, it works for moral mindset of the majority of citizens: use immigration law to protect us from real and actual criminals, and allow productive, law-abiding members of our community to peacefully co-exist until such time as our Federal government makes this entire Duecaster Disaster obsolete by passing Comprehensive Immigration Reform.
I second the hate bunny nomination. Useful idiot is …well….idiot is just not a good thing to call people.
Ok, lets work on this new glossary.
Hate Bunnies= useful idiots
Duecaster Disaster=THE RESOLUTION
Copy and paste and grow the glossary
I’m sorry if I hurt anyone’s feelings.
Mackie, while you’re being nice, I think I’ll slide in with this thought:
These raids, or roundups, or whatever you call them, remind me of gutless schoolteachers who punish an entire class with detention rather than calling out the perpetrators and dealing with them directly. I was a goody-two-shoes in school, but suffered several detentions because someone else couldn’t control him/herself. It has happened to my own kids on occasion, too, and it’s an unjust, weak and ultimately ineffective response to a much bigger problem.
I still say we need to go after the fat-boy CEO’s who are hiring illegally in the first place.
whoops, mispelled my own email address and got myself in moderation. I’ll try this again:
Mackie, while you’re being nice, I think I’ll slide in with this thought:
These raids, or roundups, or whatever you call them, remind me of gutless schoolteachers who punish an entire class with detention rather than calling out the perpetrators and dealing with them directly. I was a goody-two-shoes in school, but suffered several detentions because someone else couldn’t control him/herself. It has happened to my own kids on occasion, too, and it’s an unjust, weak and ultimately ineffective response to a much bigger problem.
I still say we need to go after the fat-boy CEO’s who are hiring illegally in the first place.
Mackie, You didn’t hurt mine. But thank you for your apology.
Rick, I was just over you-know-where lurking. I saw you made a very wise comment about the upcoming presidential election. I am requesting that you post it here.
(Rick Bentley said on 26 Jun 2008 at 11:32 am) <--------that one.
Actually, I was thinking more about the ICE raids and ICE suspisionless border checkpoints. Supposedly they cannot sieze anyone without probable cause, I was wondering if Skin Color and Language can be factors, because I know a lot of dark skinned people in my workplace who from time to time will speak to others in Urdu, Farsi, French, Spanish,Hindi, Thai and sometimes a crazy blending of 1-3 other languages and English, but I know for a fact that they are legal citizens.
Sometimes you just want some privacy of your home affairs and speaking something diffrent than English can keep you out of awkward moments in front of English speaking co-workers. But it’s disconcerting that my American co-worker could be discussing the health problems of his children with his friend in Urdu, and using only this evidence he can be detained and questioned by ICE, his personal home matters made public to the Government, who are notorious for privacy violations.
I’m tempted to start conducting more conversations in Arabic and see if ICE will come to my workpalce and question me. It sounds like if I don’t answer them and keep working, they can’t do a damn thing.
2008 year of the police state!
“Is not speaking or comprehending English a valid factor? Yes, it is. Remember, the original Prince William Resolution had this as a probable cause factor to question immigration status.”
Lucky, as someone pointed out (Elena?) there are too many people who do not speak English well. Using language skills to assess probable cause for checking citizen status is a racially/educationally charged leap no one should be making. It’s too slippery a slope.
If we were to penalize people just for poor English skills, we would have to check the status of just about every person posting on the Internet.
I, too, would be more than furious if I were caught up in an ICE raid. That does sound unconstitutional to me and I hope the ACLU among others picks up on this. Once more I say, “Enforcement only creates more problems than anything else.” Reform the policy or we will continue to go down this socially explosive path we have begun on.
Rod, good points. To boot, this kind of enforcement doesn’t exactly persuade people to come out to classes to learn English! What’s next? Raids in schools?
–I think we should start by rounding up the folks who don’t know the difference between “it’s” and “its”, and “they’re,” “their” and “there.”–
LOL!!! Thanks, Emma!
The prisons will be filled with us all, including the cops and ICE agents. Hey! Want to FOIA some reports from ICE and look at their grammar???? : )
I’m liking your thinking! I used to be a proofreader, and I still screw up.
I have tremendous respect for proof readers. It takes me a LONG time to proof read and edit which is why you see so many of my own errors here. Writing really is labor.
I see your point Rod2155. You are concerned about Constitutional questions on a Federal level, i.e. is ICE using racial profiling when conducting raids. I, by comparison, may be more provincial in that sense. My primary concern has been whether or not this county government was violating rights protected by the Constitution. I commend you, and this blog, for your willingness to confront the human rights and civil rights violations that are occurring during ICE raids. The details of this period of cultural “growing pains,” especially if you look at it on a national scale, contain so much personal tragedy that it’s almost too depressing for me to focus on it. I take heart, though, in knowing the progress that is coming will come no matter what the Hate Bunnies post here, and no matter what F.A.I.R. manages to sneak in to Lou Dobb’s style variety shows on cable news.
On the other hand, I have deep roots in PWC. I hope my children will stay here when they are grown. I really don’t want the landmark court case that decides this issue to have “Prince William County” etched in the collective consciousness. That’s what happens if you’re on one side of the V. Do you get me? If our local laws were to be struck down by the Supreme Court in a case known as The United States V. Prince William County, I would be… well very, very despondent.
I’m not saying I have more pride in this county than in my country, or that Constitutional issues are more important when tested at the local level. Nor am I saying that it is in any way less concerning when ICE violates Constitutional rights than when or if our local government does so. Rights are rights. Human beings are human beings. I’m equally concerned about the raids on a human level. We are in total agreement there.
I’m just slightly more focused on PWC’s reputation in the long term, and thus, I’m overly zealous to point out that the amended Resolution as of April 29 adheres to the guidelines of our Constitution. There are too many people who still think otherwise, due in great part to the subterfuge of Chairman Stewart and Gospel Greg (suggested glossary term: The Greg&Corey Show).
WHWN, I also would like the rest of the resolution recinded–the part about services being denied to elderly and disabled. Even if there aren’t that many affected, it is a mean-spirited policy that in my mind, violates basic human rights. That aspect certainly makes PWC look bad IMHO.
If people are really concerned about “free loaders” in the system, they should take heart criminals who have been arrested are not receiving those services. Also take heart that plenty of immigrants are paying enough taxes to cover the expenses as numerous studies (cited elsewhere in this blog and in the newspapers) prove. We can’t afford to have sick or homeless people roaming the streets. THAT is more expensive than anything else.
I hear you Kgotthardt. Obviously it would have been better if F.A.I.R. never came to Prince William County and we weren’t forced to go through this ordeal for the purposes of their eugenicist-inspired “mad scientist” experiment. But they did. And our democracy suffered a big blow in the process. But we bounced back. The past year has strengthened my faith in democracy, not weakened it, because what we arrived at was a compromise.
In addition to F.A.I.R.’s meddling, and the fear and hysteria created by Gospel Greg, there were real issues that people in the county were facing, and, through Gospel Greg’s facilitation, they conveyed those issues to the Board. It was a painful process, with grave consequences, in particular for our economy, our schools, and our public safety, but our county government has succeeded in addressing those concerns, if not on with a policy that will be effective or have any real impact, at least with a process that has responded to their concerns, and in fact, allowed their concerns to dominate our government’s resources and time expenditure, from our police force, to our County Executive’s office, to our County Attorney’s Office, to the Board itself. We gave theme their say, and we responded.
Now, specifically to the point of the county services that have been denied… the truth is that compared to what the original Resolution wanted to do, what we ended up with are some paper rules that amount to basically nothing. The services that are being denied were not being used by anyone without documentation. There has not been a single instance we can point to of an undocumented immigrant being involved in elderly and disabled programs. The new policy gives the appearances of a “crack down,” but through the process the county went through, they managed to do so in a way that doesn’t violate any laws, doesn’t cost us more to weed through who’s go papers or who doesn’t than the rendering of the services itself, doesn’t force us to put check-points at the entrances to our parks, etc. In other words, although the sentiment that forced the issue was ugly, the result was not so ugly, while still acknowledging those who were consumed with resentment toward “those people” … because however repugnant we may find that sentiment, people who feel that way are as much a part of our community as the rest of us. (Yes, yes, they got more attention than their numbers justified, but it would not have been wise or fair if the Board had ignored them entirely).
Red Dawn, 26. June 2008, 21:43
One more time for FUN and NO, I am not out of music 😉
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L30V5vnYHzk
Oh! That one worked for me! Got to get the old amp and 6-string out now, put it on the deck and give the neighborhood dogs something to howl to! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Just for fun…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjO9kX4npVY
Hell, yeah!!!
kgotthardt,
If people were concerned over freeloading off of the taxpayer money, I wouldn’t have read so much negative about BRUU and Unity in the Community. There is just no pleasing some people. They get pissed off if ‘their tax money’ goes for a crumb of bread for someone of questionable status. Additionally, they get pissed if a church or community organization provides help. I would say this was mean-spirited.
“the truth is that compared to what the original Resolution wanted to do, what we ended up with are some paper rules that amount to basically nothing.”
WHWN I totally agree. But the fact these are even on the books still makes us look like a bunch of meanies. I think the BOCS should step up to the plate and say “well this wasn’t worth the time” and strike it from the policy all together. Having it sit there continue to ruin our image, has the potential to rear its ugly head again, and makes the BOCS looking like pandering politicians who do nothing. “Do or do not do. There is no try.” (Yoda)
Well, you know that it’s really not politically possible for a majority Republican board to do that, KGotthardt. Think about it this way. How many years now have passed since we found out the hysteria that led to the occupation of Iraq was ill-founded and probably manufactured by our current administration. And yet, in a fractured and soul-searching Republican party, there are still some very strong factions who feel that never admitting an error and never admitting a defeat is some how central to their philosophy. Sadly for those of us who assess reality first and political reality second, we find that even the most venerable members of the party are forced to straddle the line between truth and fiction with regard to the Iraq War. So if you take the Duecaster Disaster as a similar rush to action based on false information and self-induced hysteria, we are years away from the type of political climate that would allow our Board to admit their errors and endeavor to correct them. As good as that might be for the county, it would be a real headache for them politically, not just with the HSM crowd, but also with the state party chairman, and perhaps even some in the national party.
If the BOCS struck down the resolution, the Duecasters would go on the warpath to ‘repel the invasion one way or another’. So we would need to call in the Virginia National Guard.
Correction: the Board IS endeavoring to correct their errors. They just can’t do it in a public way because of the political realities within the Republican party. That’s why we’ve let the Greg&Corey Show get away with the smoke screen about “Reasonable Suspicion,” designed to cloud public perception about what really happened on April 29th.
There are candidates running for Congress all over this country who will be using F.A.I.R.’s talking points and F.A.I.R.’s play book. If it were publicly known that converting such a play book into POLICY, as opposed to politics, results in not only economic and social disasters, but also POLITICAL disasters that need to be reversed, fixed, backed away from, etc. … well, they’ve had no chance what-so-ever of regaining power in the Senate or limiting losses in the House. Also, there’s the Senate race here, but it doesn’t look like there’s much hope of winning that one, with or without F.A.I.R’s assistance. Bottom line, it’s just to early to be completely forthright about what happened in PWC last year.
Mackie, the odd thing is that Robert Duecaster knows he’s been beaten. He’s been seen in public shouting matches over this. He’s pissed. But unless or until Corey Stewart comes out and says “We’ve been beaten,” there will be no warpath because Duecaster doesn’t have the clout to insight a riot any bigger than one or two people. Even Gospel Greg, when he calls out the troops, ends up with an army of four. Nay, Chairman Stewart is the gatekeeper for the kind of backlash the other Supervisors fear. The Supervisors don’t want a war on the Board. The party doesn’t want a war in an election year. And the public doesn’t want a war on the streets. That’s why everyone is complying with the fiction Chairman Stewart has created with a big boost from the Washington Post. It keeps the peace on many levels.
Wooops, “incite,” not “insight”
Far be it from me to accuse Robert Duecaster of insight!!!!!
“They get pissed off if ‘their tax money’ goes for a crumb of bread for someone of questionable status. Additionally, they get pissed if a church or community organization provides help. I would say this was mean-spirited.”
Too true, MH! What it comes down to is this: “We don’t want to help people and we don’t want you to do it either.”
Well at least privately, we can say, “TOO DAMN BAD!” and do it anyway.
WHWN, I understand partisanship gets in the way, but I think the truly honorable would put that second and do what is good for people. YES address problems, but not at the expense of the economy and human rights! The BOCS has shot itself in the foot with this resolution.
Striking the section on services from the books wouldn’t mean the resolution would change any more than it already has. You’re saying “it doesn’t affect anyone anyway” so why NOT strike it? Surely the foot soldiers couldn’t logically complain if that part of the policy had no effect anyway. (Emphasis on logic here.)
Logic is not an issue for said foot soldiers, Kgotthardt. You must know that. There is simply no will on the Board to revisit the issue. The county government has been hijacked for a year (almost exactly a year) in which the Duecaster Disaster took up 80 percent of the work hours of our officials’ and their staff. That means they only had 20 percent of the time to attend to the actual business of governing … our schools, our public services, our public safety, etc.
If they revisit the Resolution, the Hate Bunnies will be posting comments 24 hours a day, the emails and faxes will start pouring in, Citizens’ Time will be littered with ignorant and intolerant rants. I guess what I’m saying is that we were indeed infected by a cancer. We’ve survived, and I don’t think the cancer is coming back. So let’s look on the bright side, even though there are some scars that remain.
WHWN:
The Republican Party is finished. They stupidly started this war against latinos and they thought they could keep it under control as a way to galvanize their base and win some of the working class vote. But it’s gotten out of control now and it’s like holding onto a tiger’s tail. They can’t let go or it will eat them, as it is threatening to eat John McCain alive for supporting a pathway to citizenship.
The Repubs are committing political suicide. I honestly am amazed they would have done this. It would have been better to go down hard once in November than to set the stage for defeat for the next 50 years. I think many latinos are feeling on fire this year. I know I am. I am donating for democrats, I’m campaigning for democrats, I’m marching for democrats, and I’ll never vote republican for the rest of my life except for someone extraordinary like Dr. Paul.
The only hope for McCain is if Obama manages to say something stupid about latinos like he seems to have a habit of doing when talking about working class people. His crowd seems to be the latte sipping liberals. I campaigned for Obama and I’ve gotten kind of turned off with some of the cult of personality growing up around this guy. I mean we keep talking about our presidents as if they were kings and can solve problems we’re supposed to be solving ourselves…how can we be surprised when they begin acting like Kings (i.e. Dubya)? Isn’t it our fault when we say ‘All hail Dubya! The Protector! All hail Obama! The new Messiah!’. I had a conversation with one of his supporters where I was arguing that Ron Paul’s position of immediate pullout from Iraq was the best way to go. And the Obama supporter, who no doubt calls the Repubs evil for invading Iraq, was actually strongly in support of maintaining our troops in that country to mold the future of Iraq and help them achieve a stable govt. And I just wondered to myself, here is an individual who is attending a school costing 30k plus a year. She doesn’t have any financial cares in the world. Her future is safe and sound. And she doesn’t see anything immoral with forcing some working class family to throw their child’s life away so that she can feel good and say that the she did something good for the Iraqi people.
So we are just about back to where the Police were a year ago. It cost about $4million to get Corey & Greg on CNN and put the county through this emotional hell
I think that’s pretty darn irresponsible. Six of them are 100% responsible. I’d like some accountability for that.
Juturna,
UFB! $4million to get the C & G show on CNN. I needed a good laugh. It’s been a long week.
Many thanks!
Accountability from that bunch? I think not. I hope you aren’t holding your breath.