I'm on deadline today, so I barely have time to breathe, but here are a couple of things I felt I should point you to re: everyone's favorite topic: illegal immigration.
First off, check this opinion piece and slideshow about the standoff at Pruitt's by New York Times editor Lawrence Downes, titled, "Showdown in Arizona, Where Mariachis and Minutemen Collide."
"Want to see America unraveling?" asks Downes. "Come here, to Thomas Road and 35th Street, to M. D. Pruitt’s furniture store. Come on Saturday morning and stand near the eight delivery trucks barricading the parking lot, like the wall of an urban Alamo."
Urban Alamo indeed. This weekend, I was happy to see that the cops had brokered an agreement to have the nativists on one side of 35th Street, the pro-immigrant protesters led by Salvador Reza on the other. Reza gets points for suggesting it. The cops get points for refereeing it. And the nativists get points for accepting the proposal. For the most part folks stuck to it, and I hope this continues. There is still the potential for violence, but it is certainly lessened if these groups are not mingling with each other.
In the voice-over for his slideshow, Downes rightly calls the scene, "very loud, very ugly." He also points out that in the midst of the shouting and provocations, "Practical solutions are not what people want to hear." He's certainly right about that, as he is that, "All the hate at Pruitt's is focused on men who simply want to work...and they have no way to do so legally."
On a related subject, regarding the PHX PD's Operations Order 1.4.3, and the possibility that local cops may soon be enforcing immigration law like the nativists want, take a look at this Rocky Mountain Poll from November. It shows that people are all for the po-po becoming the city version of the INS, up until the point that it detracts from the cops fighting real crime, or till we all have to pay for it in the form of a tax increase.
Fun-ny. So when your business is getting robbed at gunpoint by some tweaker and the cops are too busy pulling over Pedro for DWB, "Driving While Brown," keep your whining to yourself. This is the world you numskull nativists want. Have fun living in it when it's a reality. The residents of Aguila can already tell you what it's like.