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Sunday, April 25, 2010

Arizona -- no semblance of reality

Today's news brings the earth shaking development that Al Sharpton is threatening civil disobedience to fight the new Arizona law cracking down on illegal immigration. Given the enormous brouhaha that has arisen following the passage of this law, I need someone to explain the cause of this upset. Simply put, it is without question that federal immigration agents have the power to ask for identification from those for whom they have reasonable cause to believe are illegal immigrants. The Arizona law gives this same power to the state police. Federal law already makes it a crime to hire illegal immigrants and sets severe fines and penalties for employers who do so. The Arizona law adds that potential employers of day laborers are now prohibited from stopping to hire day laborers if their stopping creates traffic blockages. No one seems too upset by this provision. Federal law already makes illegal immigrants subject to deportation. The Arizona law makes it a crime to be an illegal in Arizona with the remedy being deportation. In short, the only real difference between current federal and new state law is that the new state law allows the state police to do what the feds are supposed to be doing already. And this is racist? How? There is a reason that polls in Arizona show over 70% support for the new law. Perhaps if the media were to ask those who protest so vehemently in Washington or New York about the law just why the law is racist, we could get to the bottom of the problem. The truth is that this law does nothing different from current law except for making it a state enforcement problem in addition to a federal one. The feds have stopped enforcing the immigration laws on the books, so the states are going to be forced to do so. That is not racism. Indeed, maybe President Obama can tell us all why it was wrong for Arizona to act when the federal apparatus that Obama controls is just not doing anything.

I would love an answer to this problem.

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