Past Statements Tell Present Truth About Immigration Law's Goals
Responding to
critics who say the legislation does just that, she, like many conservatives,
insisted, "I don't know what an illegal immigrant looks like"—the
implication being that Republicans are colorblind.
It sounds
reassuring, but methinks she doth protest too much, and I say that because one
of the Republican Party's leading law enforcement voices has already disclosed
the true objective of precisely this kind of legislation.
That seminal
admission came in November 2001, when the emotional aftermath of 9/11
momentarily removed politicians' rhetorical filters. There on the floor of
Congress, GOP Rep. Scott McInnis delivered an address about "the need for
profiling for the national security of this country."
Brandishing his past
experience as a police officer, he implored lawmakers "to quit being
politically correct" and let authorities make "ethnic background a
legitimate component" of law enforcement investigations—just as Arizona's new statute
allows.
"Insurance
companies profile for risk. That is what I am asking that we continue to do—we
need to profile for risk," he thundered, adding that using ethnicity as a
risk factor "is very legitimate—I think it is smart."
In other words, we
should do to civil rights what insurance firms have done to, say, health
care—namely, deny people rights and privileges based on their ascribed
characteristics.
Had McInnis' career
been buried in the political graveyard, Republican apologists could easily
pretend his kind of bigotry is irrelevant to today’s fears that the Arizona law
will both encourage prejudice and appear in other states. But McInnis is now
the Republican gubernatorial frontrunner in Colorado,
and this week he became the first major GOP candidate in America to pledge to replicate Arizona's statute in his state if elected in
2010.
Considering the
candidate's pedigree as a former state House Majority Leader and six-term
congressman, and considering his views on what a law like Arizona's is really
all about, McInnis' promise is not an inconsequential outburst from some
nobody, nor is it likely to be just an isolated campaign plank in an
unimportant backwater. On the contrary, this is a far-reaching signal from the
national Republican Party establishment, for it comes from that establishment's
hand-picked poster boy in a state that GOP guru Karl Rove said will be
"ground zero" in the upcoming elections.
For his part, Rove
acknowledges that the Arizona
law aims to let police use racial and ethnic cues to profile
individuals—exactly the way McInnis envisions.
"(Police) are
going to (target suspects) on the basis of reasonable suspicion that these
people are here illegally," he said, "like they're driving a car with
a Mexican license plate or they can't speak English"—in short, cultural
metrics that even anti-immigration activist Tom Tancredo has said could unduly
result in people getting "pulled over because you look like you should be
pulled over."
David Sirota is the author of the best-selling books
"Hostile Takeover" and "The Uprising." He hosts the morning
show on AM760 in Colorado
and blogs at OpenLeft.com. E-mail him at ds@davidsirota.com
or follow him on Twitter @davidsirota.
2010 Creators.com
Supporting immigrants rights builds us bridges and consolidates people power! The legality of immigrants is a human rights issue. To say otherwise is an insult to anyone with a brain living in a land of immigrants, who’s ancestors originally slaughtered the indigenous, and enslaved other continents to build up their wealth. By definition, nobody other than the indigenous are legal here. To say a human being is ‘illegal’ is a violation against all life and all creation. This poisonous language, originating from the ruling class, is meant to condition the people they pimp to accept the illegitimate role of the capitalist state and their class position under subjugation. Their ideology is best described as class chauvinist nationalism, a sort of class protectionism, which is actually counter-revolutionary exclusion and opportunism. Unwittingly, their miss-aim defends and preserves the very structure that is harming them, while attacking scapegoats and sowing the seeds of violence. From a historical perspective, these Immigrant-bashers occupy land stolen from Mexico. If you finished part 2 of "What "Populist Uprising?" , you’d know how hollow of a shell the tea party actually is. The report is an excellent intellectual analysis of this corporate front for the republican party. I’d add some of these people are complete brain-dead lunatics master baiting on race with their twin pillars of fundamentalism and Sado-masochism.