Obviously, you don't know Tucson. To call Hotel Congress a fancy hotel is a joke.

It was a great event and I'm glad I went. The border is not a laughing matter, but how republicans are framing the issue IS.

I'm a third generation Arizonian and I love my state. While everyone is focusing on the illegal immigration, I'm more concerned about the LEGAL immigration of people who disrespect our hispanic heritage and history. The way I see it, the message from Arizona is hispanics not welcomed even if you are legal.

As for your claims of the violence, the crime statistics are down not up.

Agreed- Congress is certainly not a "fancy" bar, and while the segment may have been rendered nearly incomprehensible due to the crowd screaming (oops, sorry!) and the poor-quality webcam, the points made by the interview with Sheriff Estrada were right-on: the vast majority of the politicians grandstanding about immigration are doing so just to get a vote, and aren't likely to do anything about immigration once they're elected. Also, most of the most virulent anti-immigrant, anti-immigration sentiment is based out of Maricopa County (home base of the infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio) and the closer you get to the border, here in SE Pima County and down to Santa Cruz County & Nogales, opinions are more moderate, and tempered with the daily awareness of the actual situation along the border.

It's a whole lot more insidious than just covering for Arpaio, Denise. Sheriff Joe doesn't care if he has an agreement with the feds or not. He continues to do his 'sweeps' regardless, and he doesn't need SB1070 to do it.

SB1070 is about private prisons mainly. Brewer has very close ties to that industry, and creating a new state law to be used to imprison illegals before turning them over to ICE, means lots of dollars for that industry.

In an article from the NY Times, the gist of it is laid out. The industry pays Arizona $100million up front, and Arizona turns over its prison system to the private guys. From the article:

"Nearly 30 percent of the state’s prisoners are being held in prisons operated by private companies outside the state’s 10 complexes.

In addition, other states, including Alaska and Hawaii, have contracts with private companies like Corrections Corporation of America to house their prisoners in Arizona."

This is not widely known in Arizona, and I have no doubt Arizona citizens would be just a little upset to find out we're accepting criminals from other states. This is especially true in light of the recent escape of three murderers. Nor was this escape the first one that's happened from the private system.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/24/us/24prison.html?_r=2&hpw

Haddie .

that is correct as well . even Jan Brewer has 2 staff members that are of the lobby for C.C.A. . this as well ties into joe's game plan as well . even when we had Andrew Thomas as County Attorny and the "minium Manditory sentacing " . that "Tent City " of joe's is to BREAK Down any one , inorder to get them to accept any thing tossed at them . if some one is picked up drunk jaywalking , then tossed into the Tent city , and the treatment of Joe's officer ( remember alot of other human beings have died in that jail system of Joe's , and cost the tax payers greatly for cases settled over such . lookup the name SCOTT NORBERG that says much alone ) .this bad system of Joe's is to break prisoners , even that drunk Jaywalker would gladly plea to anything they tossed infront of him . only to go to a C.C.A. prison or another corperate pen . only to get out of them tents and the horrid treatment bestowed upon the prisoners .

even Sal Reza was standing accross a street when joe's officers grab him , then they tried to find a charge later . only the case was dropped as it was a vindicitive action by Joe .

Denise, you are totally correct, and please don't think I'm defending Arpaio or Thomas! Both need to be held accountable for their excessive abuse of power and the outright murderous conditions they've placed people into.

During Arpaio's reign, he's cost the taxpayers close to $50million in lawsuit settlements to date, and he's currently facing mediation in other ones totalling another $48million. And there are still more lawsuits to be dealt with. There's also approximately 40,000 felony warrants unserved by the Maricopa County Sheriffs Office, but he's still out there doing his sweeps to check papers on buger flippers and people mowing lawns.

I suspect there will be accountability with at least one of the grand jury investigations going on, but don't expect anything to happen until after Nov.

I merely wanted to point out that the private prison system ties and background dealing has much to do with SB1070, because, as you say, this law has nothing to do with border security. I also think it has something to do with purging the voter rolls of hispanic surnames before the election. Expect that to happen probably in late Sept or early Oct. Time will tell if I'm correct on this.

thanks!

Happy you had a good time Carie. I would have been there but even transportation becomes a issue when your unemployed. Now I am jealous.

evans - it was rad. you should have hitch-hiked or stolen a donkey or something. definitely worth being there.

hey, what kind of phone do you have? i got a Rachel Maddow Show iphone cover, but of course, it doesn't fit on my G1.

A droid.

haha. yeah all they had were iphone covers. oh well.

i second that !!! yes please give Randy some air time .. he too has been a direct victum from Joe Arpiao . and is one of the best hopes of ridding us all from McSame !!! this man can tell alot from a first point account oft he happenings here in Az . lets get him on the air , and his voice ringing out to all to hear ofthe issues that haunt this land.

links please, BB?

I don't have all the specific dates, etc. But these incidents occur regularly and are reported in the Orange County Register and the LA Times. Google Rep. Dana Rohrbacher Catalina is in his district and he recently visited Avalon where the depuity counsel from the LA counselate had set up shop in a Catholic church to dispense "matricula counselor" cards to illegals waiting to board boats to Laguna Beach, where there is a city sponsored day laborer center.

BBnewhound of course you don't have dates to back up your claims.

Ah, Mad City on the isthmus. We used to call Madison the Berkeley of the Midwest. Rachel and Air America were on the road in Madison a few years back and their live show was great.

I think that's not the point at all - there IS an immigration problem, but it's not exactly as characterized by the noisemaking politicians in Maricopa County, and it's not a problem that can be dealt with the way we're going about it now.

The problem is that average folks who want to come here for "The American Dream" - for political, religious freedoms, for better opportunity for their families, have NO LEGAL MEANS by which to come here. Unless they're sponsored by an employer or they're a proven super-genius with publications the US Gov't deems "useful", they're out of luck. Even for those who meet the complicated requirements for legal entry, the road to even getting a visa is ridiculously long - ICE is JUST NOW processing visa / green card applications from 1994. That's a 16-year wait. No wonder people, in desperation, try to come over illegally.

But it's not the average-joe-looking-for-work immigrants who are causing the violence and increase in crime - it's the drug smugglers and human smugglers, gangs and cartels fighting each other over territory, etc. We've already got massive numbers of Border Patrol and National Guard on the border, we've got motion sensors and infrared cameras and helicopters and drones, but that's not working. We're fighting the symptoms, but not the causes.

If there was comprehensive immigration reform, creating a legal path for average folks looking for American opportunity to enter the country, obtain work permits and residency, that would start to address the problems with human smuggling...

To deal with the cartels and drug smugglers, we need to do more than just build fences or man the gaps... we need to address the problem of US weapon exports to Mexican cartels (just preventing guns bought in the US from entering Mexico would deal a sharp blow to the cartels).

We can't stop the drug trade until we deal not just with the supply side, but with the demand. No matter what you think of California's current debate on the legalization, regulation, and taxation of marijuana, the legal availability of US-grown marijuana would be seriously bad for business for the cartels... Remember how the repeal of Prohibition destroyed the speakeasy business.

Yes, the US is currently in the middle of a recession, with high unemployment, but that pales in comparison to the economies of the third-world nations immigrants seek to escape. Immigration isn't the "cause" of the recession and immigrants aren't "stealing our jobs" - the irrational belief in trickle-down economics (tax cuts for the rich will help create jobs? uh, i think not) and congressional fear of New-Deal style deficit spending (yet again, a failure to understand the difference between micro- and macro- economics) are hurting us more.

We don't have scarce resources. My partner & I had to downsize our home and cut back on everything when he got laid off, but just walking across the border in Nogales (on the way to get a root canal at the only dentist we could afford - the Mexican dentist), which is, in comparison to many other towns / regions in Mexico, relatively affluent, reveals the true meaning of "scarce resources."

Things may suck economically right now in comparison to a few years ago, but the US is still one of the best damned places to live in the world. Being proud of American opportunity and being aware of why so many people want to come here is by no means "anti-American."

Well said, carie.

Economics, like love, is not a zero-sum game. The net effect of immigration tends to be positive due to increased purchase of goods and services, the payment of sales taxes, and even the payment of payroll taxes. Think about it: in order to work in this country, you need a social security number. If you use a phony one, your SS and Medicare and withholding go to the government, but because it's not a real SS number you can never claim benefits on it.

When we first came to Arizona in 1986, we bought a humor book called Arizona 101. One of the things in that book that stuck with me was the claim that "Most Arizonans believe the border should have been closed the day after they arrived." People used to move here in droves for the warm weather, clean air (not any more) and natural beauty, but as the state fills up people resent all those additional cars on the road and lines at the bank or whatever. The same thing is largely true of this country, and has been for generations. Each wave of immigrants to the Land of Opportunity was resented and vilified by the groups that were already here. Yet the Irish, Italians, Germans, Chinese, and so on contributed greatly to the country's success - and so does the Hispanic community. There is no inherent difference in virtue, worthiness or basic human rights and dignity between someone who wants to come to America now, from whatever country, and someone who wanted to do so in 1870, 1910, 1945, or 1995. "Give me your hungry, your tired, your poor - unless of course your skin is darker than mine, because it means you're here to sell drugs or steal my job." That's not how it works!

JLeon-1895344 f you actually did your research and not go off assumptions and propaganda emails you would be aware that Democrats and liberals are not fighting for open boarders. They are fighting for reform of the system that is riddled with red tape and ineffective immigration procedures just like republicans are. The difference is the way in which each group wants to solve the issue of immigration. Most of the news on immigration is put out there is flat out false. People assume crime is rising because of immigration. In arizona crime is significantly down. Deportations of illegal immigrants is up. The hiring of illegal immigrants is being reduced due to better enforcement and online verification of employees. Is the problem solved? No, however it is not what the republican and tea party people would lead you to believe. Every election cycle the republican party brings up immigration and uses it to scare the American people into voting for them. When in reality just like promises to repeal the 14th amendment are no more than political posturing by a party that sense it's inception has used fear and religion to draw supporters.

Everyone agrees more needs to be done for immigration reform but things like releasing the 14th amendment, and racial profiling are not the solution. It has been proven that racial profiling is no more effective than random screenings and they do not alienate and divide our country. As long as there is profit to be made and extremely poor people willing to take great risk drug smugglers will continue to stay in business. If you destroy one supplier another simply takes his place.

Also it does not matter if you think racial profiling is racist or not the fact will remain that millions of people considerate to be discrimination and therefor it will be a problem. You can spout thousands of reasons why you are not racist yet support profiling but the fact is if the populace feels it is offensive it is period. Why can't we just get a national biometric ID it would be a very cheep and effective solution to most of these issues as long as everyone is required to have it.

But people a-pose that because you would have to give your fingerprints to the government and that would be an invasion of privacy. BS, it would be a small price to pay that is much smaller than the millions of tax dollars we pay to be used on less effective solutions.

I second imogenfm's request.