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RSS icon Comments on Mexican Misery

1

You can't ban it in the county -- it's a two way street. The same idea that says you can't have local law enforcement officials check on immigration status because it's a federal issue also means that you can't "ban"" federal officials from enforcing federal laws in your jurisdiction. If Charles left it up to King County voters to decide if Sheriff resources should be used to enforce immigration laws, I think he would be dismayed at the response/results.

Posted by GoodGrief | July 3, 2007 8:35 AM
2

to clarify: you are mad because our government arrested a person illegally in the country because they had an oustanding violation of another law?

does that mean there should be no laws applied to the people who are here illegally?

Posted by ddv | July 3, 2007 8:36 AM
3

What do you mean by "rural idiots"? I hope you aren't painting all non-urbanites with the same racist brush.

Posted by Justy | July 3, 2007 8:47 AM
4

She didn't murder anyone. She violated a no-contact order. Without knowing what the order concerned, or what the violation was, it's difficult to place blame--or lack of it--on her. What I can say for sure is that the punishment for violating a no-contact order for everyone else (including DV offenders and stalkers) is minimal.

Via seattle.gov:
"Violation of a No Contact Order which does not involve an assault is a separate gross misdemeanor offense."

Imagine being deported (i.e. ripped from your home, your livelihood, your family, your friends, the hope of a better future for your children) because of a gross misdemeanor. Especially one you committed ten years ago.

Posted by bitch on heels | July 3, 2007 8:55 AM
5

personally, i wish latino immigrants, illegal or not, would stop working so hard. many americans died in the struggle for the right to NOT work 16 hours a day, 6 days a week.

now i've got crews of mexican workers building a house across the street, showing up at 5:30, 6, leaving at 8, 9 (in violation of city work hours). they work 7 days a week. americans don't want those jobs? no shit. why does anyone?

now we're all in a race to claim the title of the "hardest working american". the prize is an early death.

Posted by maxsolomon | July 3, 2007 9:02 AM
6

To say that enforcing immigration law is "barbaric", that's what's crazy.

Posted by Will of HA | July 3, 2007 9:04 AM
7

and, i forgot: "rural idiots"? just come out & say hillbillies, and make some joke about incest or moonshine or missing teeth.

rural caucasians are the last people in america who can be insulted for their race & culture with no repurcussions.

no wonder this nativist crap plays so well to their paranoia.

Posted by maxsolomon | July 3, 2007 9:06 AM
8

The Mexicans building the pool at my parents house in Cabo work like 3 hours a day, and even that is done with cervesas in hand. They were supposed to finish it weeks ago, even after a few cash bribes to help speed it up.
Different perspective on work down there I guess.

Posted by owen | July 3, 2007 9:17 AM
9

Supporting your point with logic and reason, as opposed to sensationalism, generalization, and unrelated insults would likely render an argument that readers are less inclined to interpret as naive drivel.

Posted by adam smith | July 3, 2007 9:18 AM
10

While I might disagree with the "rural idiots" crack Charles tossed off at the end, I wholly agree with the general sentiment.

INS is increasingly resorting to completely over the top gestapo tactics, and it has to stop. Yanking anyone out of their home, obliterating their family, and deporting them over a minor crime more than a decade old cannot in any way be viewed as justice.

I remember hearing a story on NPR a week or two ago. A young hispanic man had been had been nabbed on a minor traffic violation and deported. He had grown up in the US, had spent his entire life here. His mother had never told him he'd actually been born in Mexico. He wasn't even aware that he wasn't a fully legal US citizen. He spoke no Spanish, his mother having insisted on raising him English speaking.

This is not justice. This is a fucking disgrace.

Posted by SDA in SEA | July 3, 2007 9:28 AM
11

to #4,

are you suggesting that we don't hold people accountable to crimes because it isn't convenient to the criminal? a gross misdemeanor is still a crime.

i suppose you are ok with Scooter Libby getting out of jail time as well...

Posted by ddv | July 3, 2007 9:34 AM
12

Its good to know that there are people out there like "moonday" who think laws should not be applied.

Makes that meth lab next to your place more likely to catch fire.

Posted by ecce homo | July 3, 2007 9:35 AM
13

maxsolomon @ 5:

Agreed. We need some French immigrants, since they only work 35 hours/week there. I want me some of that.

Posted by cdc | July 3, 2007 9:40 AM
14

Again @5&13. Y'all are lazy bastards. I'm working like hell already, here in my bathrobe uniform, smoking weed, drinking coffee...

@7 Ouch.

Posted by It's Mark Mitchell | July 3, 2007 9:55 AM
15

ah, burien.

Posted by infrequent | July 3, 2007 9:57 AM
16

the harsh tatics used and cited in numerous personal examples are not acceptable. that said, should we expect them not to enfore a law on the books? this is an indictment of us who have allowed this law and not changed it in the CITIES and rural areas of our country. if you consider a burien a city (walk down the street in burien and and walk down the street in seattle and tell me if they feel the same).

and, of course, i think people should be professional and nice and understanding. it is difficult, however, when you job is to catch someone unawares and make them move thousands of miles. it's not something you can schedule, really.

Posted by infrequent | July 3, 2007 10:04 AM
17

A Mudede post that makes perfect sense! Stupid xenophobes.

Posted by Cook | July 3, 2007 10:27 AM
18

The bourgeoisie has subjected the country to the rule of the towns. It has created enormous cities, has greatly increased the urban population as compared with the rural, and has thus rescued a considerable part of the population from the idiocy of rural life.

Just as it has made the country dependent on the towns, so it has made barbarian and semi-barbarian countries dependent on the civilised ones, nations of peasants on nations of bourgeois, the East on the West.

Posted by Karl Marx | July 3, 2007 10:30 AM
19

"And how on earth could the Seattle Times publish this article without condemning in the strongest terms this team of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and the whole deportation system ..."
Really? You want a NEWSpaper reporter to take sides? That's strictly for the editorial pages, pal, regardless of what your rag does.
P.S. Times reporters and editorial writers don't talk to each other about their stories/columns. Honest.

Posted by Thinking out loud | July 3, 2007 11:03 AM
20
To say that enforcing immigration law is "barbaric", that's what's crazy.

LAWS ARE LAWS! Is there any way we can retroactively give Harriet Tubman, Oskar Schindler, and Nelson Mandela the death penalty for breaking the Law?

Posted by jamier | July 3, 2007 11:25 AM
21

Wait why in hell is it okay to do it in the country but not in the city? What kind of whack logic is that? If you think such a thing is wrong, shouldn't it be wrong anywhere??? I'm truly confused. I'd say immigrants in rural areas are all the more vulnerable, considering they likely have fewer people to advocate for them.

Posted by LBD | July 3, 2007 11:31 AM
22

Oh for fuck sake.

If I move to Canada illegally and get caught, I'll get deported. If I move to the UK illegally and get caught, I'll get deported. If I move to pretty much any developed nation in the world illegally and get caught, I'll get deported.

Why is it the responsibility of Americans to let anyone who stumbles across the border and drops a few kids stick around indefinitely? Because we're "a nation of immigrants"? Fuck that. Again: Canada's a nation of immigrants-- and yet, they seem weirdly reluctant to just let me move up there without asking.

Liberals believe in American exceptionallism as surely as those PNAC fuckers, it's just liberals believe America should spend an exceptional amount of time getting fucked in the ass out of some misplaced paternalistic idea that we deserve it because we're a wealthy powerful nation-- in other words because we're so much "better" that we owe it to other people to try to elevate them to our way of life. It's horseshit. If Mexicans want to live in a democratic republic, maybe they should work on turning Mexico into one.

Posted by Judah | July 3, 2007 12:50 PM
23

OMG. I actually agreed with what Charles wrote, and didn't even once roll my eyes while reading it.

I must be coming down with something.....

Posted by catalina vel-duray | July 3, 2007 7:12 PM
24

@23,
I hear you! lol
Well done, Charles. All borders are imaginary. Humans are so weird.

Posted by Jamey | July 3, 2007 9:01 PM
25

Every time I hear someone say "but they're here ILLEGALLY" it makes me so mad. Crossing the border without the proper paperwork may be technically against the law, but it hardly cuts against the standards of basic morality. Taking someone away from their family, friends, and livlihood IS a violation of basic morality, and a very large one at that. But it's technically legal! When the law is out of alignment with morality, it needs to be changed, and if the legislators called pull off their asses enough to do that, we the people have a moral responsibility to violate it.

Posted by east coaster | July 3, 2007 10:28 PM
26

I'll never understand this sort of thinking. When I read a story like that, I feel bad for the people involved. I would support changes in the law to make it much much easier for people to be here legally. BUT, if I show up in another country, and just start living there, I would would expect to be deported eventually. I would actually feel bad about making the people of that country go to all the trouble of finding out about me, and kicking me out, so I wouldn't even do it in the first place. Terribly inconvenient for everyone really. I just wonder why the people in this story weren't expecting it. And when terrorism is such a concern that we have to take off our shoes to travel one state over on a plane, why is it a good idea to let in whoever wants to come here, without even a criminal background check? I support open borders in the same way I support anarchy: it would be great if the world were in such a state for it to make sense.

Posted by Lythea | July 4, 2007 3:12 AM
27

illegal immigration helps this country immensly. the work that illegal immigrants do are work that the lazy natives of this country won't do. You would be paying 5 fucking dollars for a tomato if it wasn't for illegal immigrants. if you dumb flag waving, bush bumper sticker having, types want to end illegal immigration then you will have to do the work that they are not doing. are you willing to do that? do you think businesses are gonna want to pay 3 times the money to you to so that you can haul your fat lazy ass into work late every day and produce less than the illegal immigrants do? It is really easy to eat like a pig and stare at your tv with your fat piggish eyes and say "illegal immigrants are ruining our country" while enjoying the fruits of their labor.

troll out

Posted by the troll | July 4, 2007 2:32 PM

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