Michael Dear: A little-known paradox in debates on immigration reform is the ongoing fortification of the United States-Mexico border, which is occurring at the same time as the number of official ports of entry between the two countries is expanding.
Secretary Napolitano Clarifies President’s Deferred Action Plan…Again
Micehele Waslin: Several members of Congress praised Napolitano for providing undocumented youth who had been brought here at a young age with hope for the future.
What’s the Matter with Arizona?
Victoria Defrancesco Soto: Western states have their own personality. Arizona’s brand of cowboy politics is largely unbridled by partisan institutions and a republican form of government.
DHS Extends Temporary Protective Status for Haitians
Seth Hoy: The extension would allow approximately 48,000 Haitian nationals—whose homeland was devastated by an earthquake in 2010 and is still plagued by disease and instability—to extend their TPS for an additional 18 months.
Wheels Falling Off DHS’s Immigration Enforcement Wagon?
Seth Hoy: Instead of defending the Administration’s enforcement strategy, however, maybe Secretary Napolitano should take a serious look at the egregious enforcement actions taking place right under her nose.
Brewer Countersues Feds
Andrea Nill: Gov. Jan Brewer (R-AZ) announced that she is filing a countersuit against the federal government on behalf of the state of Arizona. The countersuit names several counts, including a “failure to protect Arizona from invasion.”
White House Continues Drumbeat for DREAM
Seth Hoy: Yet even with the weight of the White House and a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score that has DREAM reducing the deficit by $1.4 billion over ten years, Republican votes may be short.
Too Ignorant To Articulate Their Own Evil Ideas
David Love: Tea party folks are far too extreme for old-time conservatives who mostly cared about their money. (Come to think of it, for all of their so-called Christianity, the tea party conservatives wouldn’t have thought much of Jesus for that matter—a hippy man of color who spoke out against the rich and powerful, and hung out with the sick and the poor and the prostitutes. But alas, I digress.)
Arizona Gov Outlaws Teaching Tombstone’s OK Corral Gunfight and Cowboy Pix
Ed Rampell: In a press conference the unelected Governor also announced that as part of the legislation the Arizona public school system was prohibiting teaching about the shootout at the O.K. Corral. “Educating students about this purported gunfight at Tombstone in 1881 could inflame racial animosity against Caucasians,” contended Brewer, noting that all of the participants in the brief but bloody barrage of bullets were whites.
Love Letter to Arizona: Your Appointed Governor Is a Coward
Tina Dupuy: In fact, everything about SB 1070, Arizona’s new ruthless immigration law signed last week seems refried. It’s the same bill Governor Janet Napolitano vetoed twice. It’s a three-peat of a bad idea. And it’s a political cliché: when the economy is struggling, scapegoat “illegals.” In 1994 California’s then-Governor Pete Wilson knew the drill: His notorious re-election commercials showed immigrants running over the border like invading pathogens and he got to appear responsive to voters’ fears.
DHS Inspector General: No Assurance That Deputization Of Immigration Law Is ‘Achieving Its Goals’
Andrea Christina Nill: Immigrant and civil rights activists have long claimed that the program leaves all brown-skinned residents vulnerable to racial profiling and other civil rights abuses, regardless of their immigration status. The inspector general’s assessment largely concurs with observations made by groups on the ground and goes further in pointing out that the program is inefficiently administered and failing to meet its goals
Joe Arpaio’s Chief Deputy Cites Conspiracy Theory Involving President Obama To ‘Muzzle’ His Boss
Adnrea Nill: During his own deposition testimony, Arpaio admitted to not reading his own book and blamed the references to the wingnut reconquista conspiracy theories contained in it on his co-author.
LA Progressive: 27 December 2009, to 2 January 2010
This week’s articles.
