Immigration Reform and Arizona's Law

President Obama has decided to avoid tackling the sticky immigration reform issue this year before the 2010 midterm elections. While this may not sit very well with many within the Latino community, it is nevertheless probably a savvy political move. As I have stated before, it will be the issues being debated just before the election that will most intensely galvanize various interests into disproportionately going to vote on Election Day. The calculation is that the Democrats would lose more by appearing to be opening up the borders for a mass influx of Mexicans, even though the proposals circulating around so far seem more in line with the previous Republican Bush administration, supported then by (never really was a maverick) senator John McCain. Having already seen how the GOP is so willing to blame the Democrats for their own proposals (in health care reform, Republican Senator Johnny Isaakson's living will amendment was the source of the "death panels" and "killing grandma" hysteria last summer), it is no surprise that the elected majority party may not want to confront another legislative behemoth reminiscent of the recent struggle to get health care reform passed through Congress.

Regarding the newly passed law in Arizona giving that state's police officers much greater personal latitude in selecting individuals out of the general population to demand "papers" documenting their legal status in the U.S., it should be noted that Rachel Maddow showed the connection with racist white supremacist groups and this new law. And why not? If I'm walking the streets of Mesa or Flagstaff, the cops aren't going to bother me because, to them, it's clear that I obviously look like an "American" (i.e. I'm white). It doesn't matter that those who support the new law say the police won't be profiling people "waiting outside for the bus". If they are ignoring people who don't "look" like they might be illegal immigrants, than that constitutes an unacceptable racial profiling in itself. So that's why I oppose this law, although I do understand the concerns of legal residents in the region about the recent rise in violent crimes. There has to be another way.

I have a suggestion: you don't need another bill to more aggressively enforce the immigration laws we already have on the books. Our president should quickly act to assert as much federal authority into this matter as legally possible, both to protect legal residents from crime and to ensure that people won't be persecuted by the state and its police force because of their appearance. Arizona, as far as I know, is not an independent country. Its border with Mexico is not only its state border: it's our NATIONAL border. And thus this a national issue on which our federal government, under our president's executive power, has the legal right and responsibility to assert itself for the NATIONAL interest. So Arizona can take its precious new state law and stuff it, as far as I'm concerned.