In today's Washington Post, Marc Fisher has an excellent column that focuses on illegal immigrants and also on Prince William supervisor John Stirrup (R), a leading anti-illegal-immigrant voice. As I read the article, I kept thinking that this isn't purely about "crime" or "gangs" or whatever. To date, I have yet to see any credible evidence (aka, "facts") whatsoever that "illegals" engage in crime or gang activity at higher rates than anyone else. Have you? And I have come across no credible evidence that immigrants from Latin American are any less likely to want to assimilate into American culture than previous waves of immigrants coming from Eastern Europe (my great grandparents) or wherever.
More than anything, the one thing that jumped out at me in Fisher's article was Stirrup's comment that he moved from South Arlington because "our neighborhood was changing pretty drastically." Translation: lots more brown people speaking Spanish, and a few "gang markings spray-painted on the trees." Isn't that what "white flight" from the cities during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s was all about? And wasn't there a large racial component to that (except it wasn't Hispanics back then, it was black people that scared the whites off into distant exurbia)? Oh yes, those WERE rhetorical questions.
P.S. Arlington and other counties in the area are saying they will NOT follow the "lead" of Prince William and Loudoun Counties on this issue. County Board member Walter Tejada of Arlington says, "What Loudoun and Prince William counties are doing is government-sanctioned xenophobia at its very ugliest." Fortunately, Tejada adds that "Arlington will continue to be a welcoming and inclusive county." I'm glad I live in Arlington.
Instead of deporting illegal aliens we can send them to Arlington which would cost alot less in transportation costs.
I really miss this site but I finally realized I am never going to change your opinion and I was wasting my time here.
I do admit its hilarious to watch you spin everything into an argument
See this is an example of how we can come together
It just took us a few comments to get the rhetoric out of the way.
There is a better way to blog
So if someone is arrested for a crime I think it is logical to ask for their citizenship. If they aren't citizens they should go. Agree?
Ds are always right and Rs are always evil
The really sad thing is you are no better than the right wing thugs you so gleefully enjoy attacking
and in case you couldn't figure it out this is Novamiddleman
By the way, "novamiddleman" is not banned, so there's no need to post under another pseudonym.
I would humbly suggest you reread the text of Deeds language from the conference
The unfortunate reality is that the vast majority of the people in the blogosphere are on the fringes of the right and the left. There is no intention of ever working together but we learn this from the best who are the actual elected politicians.
The bloggers might be hypocrites but Deeds and the vast vast majority of politicans from both sides of the aisle are double hypocrites. I ask in all seriousness if the democrats were the majority party would you be pushing for redistricting?
The reason I made a new name is I forgot the password and the recall feature wasn't worknig with my email.
With my final thought I must compliment you and the overall Raising Kaine team for having one of the best sites on the Internet for advancing your particular agenda.
Personally I don't agree with your position, but I enjoy the mental exercise that your comments provoke and find it a good addition to this blog. Conventions and ideas need to be challenged. One thing is certain however: if you run away, none of us will ever have the chance to be convinced of your opinion. Don't give up your position so quickly.
Thankfully the Alexandria police have refused to sell-out their regular duties as peace keepers to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) thugs. How safe will you feel when a rapist is roaming around because the undocumented victim is too afraid to go to the police to report the crime for fear of deportation?
Come on people, if the humans in question were not poor or darker skinned, this issue would not garner the attention it's getting. Get over it and focus on the war and our own well-being -- we (all of us) are immigrants of some type at some point in time. People are humans first and should always be treated as such.
Those of you with weak knees, try to be strong, and don't be afraid, pretend you are strong Americans for once.
*"Immigrants are being used as scapegoats in a political contest."
*"[Anti-immigrant legislation] is a mean spirited and cynical political tactic."
*"The Republicans are attacking people who are looking for work."
*Anti-immigrant legislation is nothing better than "explicit bigotry under the respectable cover of legality."
*"Classifying a whole group of people as illegal is a choice" that Republicans are making, not a necessity.
*"Look at France to see what happens in a place where they believe in strict immigration controls."
*We all need to "reject the effort to divide us."
*"We need to be true to our heritage," and "they symbol of this country is not a barred gate, it's the Statue of Liberty!"
Let me make a comment on the rate of assimilation. People who are not familiar with the immigration waves from Latin American cannot see that the rate of assimilation is the same or even faster than previous immigrants.
One mark of assimilation is how many generations it takes for people to start marrying outside of their ethnic group. It normally takes 3 generations, in other words, the grandchildren of the immigrating person, for people to marry outside of their ethnic group. Normally the second generation, those born from immigrant parents, marry people from their same ethnicity.
In my family most of us who are second generation have married outside of our ethnic group. Our family has Vietnamese, Scots-Irish, and Scandinavian-American members through marriage. We all speak English, and some of my cousins only speak English or prefer it over speaking Spanish. About a quarter works in law enforcement, and another quarter got college degrees.
In contrast, it took three generations for my Scandinavian-American inlaws to marry outside of their ethnic group. In fact, it took 4 generations or more than 140 years for the Norwegian immigrants who were the ancestors of my mother-in-law to see the first of their great-grandchildren to marry non-Scandinavians.
One of my uncles came to the US with the Bracero Program, and eventually worked in road construction. With that job, he sent several of his children to Stanford, and paid for a sister to go to a private university in Mexico. One of her daughters has a PHD who recently retired from teaching in a University of California campus. The other one was a stock trader.
Most of my aunt and uncles are American citizens, and most got their citizenship when it meant giving up their Mexican citizenship. Many of them were illegal at some point, but eventually got green cards and then became American citizens.
And this pattern is not uncommon. I know many people whose families that have the same fast pattern of assimilation. Just recently the post published statistics showing how Latino men have one of the greatest rates of marrying outside of their ethnic group.
In my view, our current immigration system is messed up mainly because it allows corporations to exploit poor workers and to weaken labor unions. I would add that the reason immigrants are coming to this country can NOT be separated from the economics of trade agreements like NAFTA and of globalization in general. These problems need to be addressed, no doubt. But bashing hard-working immigrants and their children? I couldn't disagree more strongly.