tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3375512083268389933.post8740505311233400393..comments2023-09-30T10:36:23.154-05:00Comments on Accidental Historian: That Lovely Arizona Immigration LawGedshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15047239425466517786noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3375512083268389933.post-87216498547947789472010-04-29T09:55:20.913-05:002010-04-29T09:55:20.913-05:00Exactly.
One of the real problems with the issue ...Exactly.<br /><br />One of the real problems with the issue in Arizona, though, is it's almost impossible to figure out where the lines are drawn. With Jim Crow it's fairly obvious that racism and political expediency went hand-in-hand. In Arizona...well...<br /><br />On the one side you have the nativists/racists (who I group in the same basic category, as it's all bigotry and nativists usually conflate "white" with "real American"). They're the ones who are genuinely afraid of being overwhelmed by the brown tide from the south. Then you have the Minutemen-types, who are probably 100% nativists and a high percentage of racists.<br /><br />Then you have the people who just sit back and say that illegal immigration is a problem that must be stopped. They might not actually be racists, but they support the racists in their plots. The fact is that there's a reason we draw a line between legal and illegal immigration and you can argue that we need to maintain and enforce without saying that the brown people are taking over our country.<br /><br />And then there are the political operators who don't give a shit about immigration or freedom and are willing to cynically manipulate such sentiments for their own gain. When it gets right down to it, we don't know who is who.<br /><br />The main problem I see is that this particular law is massively dangerous. I do not carry around proof of citizenship everywhere I go, nor should I have to. I'm protected by the Fourth Amendment and I'm pretty sure that this law will be thrown out on Fourth Amendment grounds the first time an American citizen is illegally detained and gets a case to the SCOTUS. But until that happens every American citizen in Arizona has to be aware that they can be arrested and detained (and if you're in Maricopa County, well, you're fucked. I'm officially overjoyed I never got around to moving to Phoenix) if they're not carrying around their birth certificate or passport.<br /><br />Moreover, until this law is struck down, anyone in any other state where sufficient hatred of immigrants can be whipped up has to be aware of the fact that this can happen to them, too. There's already talk of duplicating the law in Texas, Colorado, Georgia, and, I believe, Ohio.<br /><br />What's that Franklin quote everyone is so fond of tossing about when hyperventilating about Obama's AmeriCorps death camps? Something about trading freedom for safety and deserving neither?Gedshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15047239425466517786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3375512083268389933.post-69911705444239684532010-04-29T01:40:50.007-05:002010-04-29T01:40:50.007-05:00Proving yet again that politics is nothing if not ...Proving yet again that politics is nothing if not practical, and only principled when convenient.Janethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13003020514718578503noreply@blogger.com