I see racist people...

By GottaLaff

Look who's running for governor of Florida:

CPR chief Rick Scott was ousted as a hospital exec amid a 1990s fraud probe, and the memo will alarm pro-reform forces, because it shows that the anti-reform camp is beginning to sense that victory is within reach on their top goal: Killing the public option.

Oh, you already knew that? Did you know all this?

R Lynn's Wiki:

Richard Lynn "Rick" Scott (born 1953 in Bloomington, Illinois) announced his candidacy for Florida governor on April 13, 2010.^[1]

Scott is a healthcare industry executive and founder of Conservatives for Patients' Rights (CPR) which advertises against expanding the U.S. government's role in regulating the healthcare system but failed in its efforts to block healthcare reform.

Scott founded the Columbia Hospital Corporation in 1987. With Columbia HCA Chairman Thomas J. Frist, the brother of Senator Bill Frist, the company merged Columbia with Hospital Corporation of America in 1989 to form Columbia/HCA. Ten years later, Scott was ousted by the company's board of directors in the midst of the nation's biggest health care fraud scandal in which the company ultimately plead guilty to the nation's then largest Medicaid and Medicare fraud and paid a record fine of $1.7 billion dollars.^[2][3][4] In 2001, Scott co-founded the Solantic Corporation, which operates walk-in medical care centers. He also owns Continental Structural Plastics, North America's largest industrial composites molder. [...]

CPR opposes the broad outlines of President Obama's health-care plans, and has hired Creative Response Concepts, a public relations firm which previously worked with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Isn't he the bee's knees? The cat's pajamas?

The liver worst?

Now he can add "racial profiler" to his resume. Congratulations, Ricky Lynn, you've topped yourself:


H/t: LynCKos for the title and for alerting me to Scott's tweet.

Unabashed Maddow fan girl geekitude time

By GottaLaff

Please indulge me. I'm a geek. I'm a Maddow fan girl. I admit it.

You can't imagine how proud ZenShadow and I are right now:

Our pals at the Political Carnival bring the awesome with this human response to Arizona's "Papers, please" bill.

You can view the video here. Click on above image to enlarge.

I am truly honored.

Okay, moment of fan girl geekitude is over. Regular posting will resume shortly.

VIDEO- Special BLUNT: "Do I Look Illegal?"

By GottaLaff

This webisode of Blunt was a bigger collaborative effort than usual, and for that, ZenShadow and I thank you.

ZenShadow is the one who came up with the concept for this amazing collection of videos, and I edited them together, and then some.

We put the word out on Twitter, and before I knew it, I had 60-plus videos filling my inbox. My video program couldn't handle the load, so sadly, some had to be cut. I apologize deeply for that, because I know the feeling that went into them.

Thank you to every single contributor. You may recognize some faces, and other ones you'll wish you knew better. All are wonderful, caring people.

But the trick question is, which ones are "illegal"?



Blunt is a lot like letters to the editor. YOUR take, short, to the point.

You have a voice, now use it.

(Click on image to enlarge)

For more information about Blunt, follow this link. If you think a video file is too big to email, then go here and use YouSendIt.com.

Please include a name you'd like to use, and a "title", if any, in your e-mail, as you'll see in the video graphics.

Remember: Try to keep the videos at 20 seconds or under.

It's your turn. Go.

Fear of a raid dampens Cinco de Mayo in Arizona

I don't blame them, it would be a perfect opportunity for the jackboots to ask for papers. Pretty easy to have "probable cause" when people are partying.

MESA - Rumors circulate of an immigration raid at Cinco de Mayo festivities. Markets normally bustling with customers preparing for the celebration are quiet. Family picnics are scaled back.

Many Hispanics in Arizona - both legal and illegal - are increasingly anxious about being targeted under the state's tough anti-illegal immigration law
. Some are afraid to leave their homes, even on the day when the nation celebrates Hispanic heritage.

Some have left the state, and some of those who remain wonder if they should follow.

"They don't want to go to the park or clubs to celebrate because they're scared," said George Cortez, a 24-year-old U.S. citizen from Mesa, as he took a break from sweeping hair clippings at Eagle's barbershop in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood in Mesa.

The Best Anti-Arizona Protest Signs

Spot on. Via Buzz Feed, a lot more there.

Bonus Cartoons of the Day

Click to enlarge, via.

Widow of officer slain by illegal immigrant criticizes new Arizona law

By GottaLaff

Julie Erfle

The new Arizona "Papers Please" law has placed new emphasis on footwear, but doesn't do much to prevent real crime. In fact, the law itself is a real crime:

The widow of a Phoenix police officer [Nick Erfle] who was fatally shot three years ago by an undocumented immigrant said Arizona's new law would have done nothing to save her husband's life had it been in place in 2007.

She's right.

Julie Erfle believes that policymakers need to cut through the "rhetoric" and "fear-mongering" and that the police would not be protected from violence... or from accusations of racial profiling, either.

She's right again.

Seems she's more concerned about the safety of police officers than those who claim to be concerned about the safety of police officers.

"My concern with this bill, though, is what it does to law enforcement [...] This bill puts them under a microscope. I feel it's a no-win situation for an officer. I don't think it keeps officers safe. [...] "My opinion on it is that this isn't the solution, that we need something on the federal level"

Erfle said that her husband would be "infuriated" by Arizona's politics.

Many of us are too.

Julie is very wise. But she is also very ticked that supporters are exploiting her husband to get political donations.

She said [state Sen. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, who sponsored the bill] wrote to her in 2007 to ease her frustration about how her husband's memory was being used in the media, but she didn't feel the response was adequate.

"My response to (Pearce) was that it was inappropriate, under any circumstances, to use someone's murder to promote yourself financially or politically," she said.

But a little thing like that won't stop 'em.

Bush, Slave Labor and Arizona

By GottaLaff

Your Daily Dose of BuzzFlash, brought to you by the one and only Mark Karlin:

The draconian Arizona Anti-Mexican Immigrant law -- this legislation is not aimed at white immigrants -- would not have passed and been signed under Bush; Karl Rove would have made sure of that.

[...] Bush and Cheney were basically heirs to the slavery tradition of low wage labor and believed that corporate America should have access to the cheapest possible labor market -- legal or otherwise.

[...] Without a Republican in the White House to protect the right of corporations to exploit illegal labor, the Republican Governor of Arizona signed the law [...] and became a right wing populist hero even if it will probably cause her state hundreds of millions of dollars in boycott revenue and litigation costs.

The Republicans still have a split in their party between the corporatists who are happy to employ illegal immigrants at sub-living wages and the white Tea Party populist base that is upset that whites are becoming a minority [...]

That's the Republican dilemma; corporatist profits and slave wages over jobs for Americans and the bigot vote.

Bush was on the side of the corporatists, so the worst of the GOP immigration bills, a la Arizona, never passed during his administrations [...] because big business wanted a continued supply of rock bottom low wage labor. [...]

Americans who have lost their jobs cannibalize themselves by shopping at Wal-Mart because it's -- well -- cheap, and they don't have much money to spend because their jobs were sent overseas or filled here by illegal immigrants.

And who do the Wal-Mart shoppers blame: Obama?

Sometimes you just can't buy stupid.

More here.

White People Masks For Nervous Brown People

You knew it would come to this. Via Wonkette.

Cartoons of the Day

Click to enlarge, via.

Poll-itics: Majority Support Arizona's Immigration Law

By GottaLaff

Head-scratcher of the day week month year:

A slim majority of Americans support the new Arizona immigration law, 51% to 36%, according to a new New York Times/CBS News poll.

An overwhelming majority of respondents also believe the nation's immigration laws should undergo an extensive overhaul.

A Gallup poll last week found similar results.

Do the people who were polled understand what the law says? Have the people who were polled ever been stopped by the police because of the color of their skin... or what their shoes looked like? Do the people who were polled have relatives, living or dead, who came to America from another country?

An law requiring an education may be in order.

There is a God: Arpaio's A No-Go for Arizona Governor

By GottaLaff

From the Dep't. of I Am Now a Believer:

[Maricopa County Sheriff Joe] Arpaio -- whose jurisdiction includes Phoenix, the capital and population center of the heavily Hispanic border state -- announced Monday afternoon that he will not join the crowded Republican primary for governor, and will instead run for a sixth term in his current high-profile position.

Oh goody! He just increased Gov. Janet "Papers Please" Brewer's chances! Weeee!

Well at least this way, he can continue his pursuit of those who Breathe While Mexican, keep booking American citizens for imaginary crimes, and keep booking himself on Larry King Live. Why give all that up for a bigger residence and mandatory luncheons?

What a guy.

Conservative Latinos Rethink Party Ties

It's WSJ, subscription only, but even this teaser just floored me. Finally, they see what the Republicans are really up to. Thank you very much Tea Baggers!!

Adam Bustos, a third-generation Mexican-American, has voted Republican since Ronald Reagan ran for president. But he has been reconsidering his party affiliation since Arizona State Gov. Jan Brewer signed the nation's toughest immigration law last month.

"I've been thinking I might leave the party," said Mr. Bustos, a 58-year-old Arizona native. "A lot of my Latino Republican friends have been talking about it after this law."

Frank Rich: If Only Arizona Were the Real Problem

By GottaLaff

(via Barry Blitt)

Reminder:

Please note that posting could be light today. Paddy is gone for a few hours, I'm on no sleep and have a huge video project ahead of me that got a bigger response than I ever expected, and that's a good thing. Between editing and Paddy's absence, things will be a little slower today.

That said, today's Frank Rich excerpts:

[T]o label this development “Arizona’s folly” trivializes its import and reach. The more you examine the law’s provisions and proponents, the more you realize that it’s the latest and (so far) most vicious battle in a far broader movement that is not just about illegal immigrants — and that is steadily increasing its annexation of one of America’s two major political parties. [...]

To be angry about illegal immigration is hardly tantamount to being a bigot. But the Arizona law expressing that anger is bigoted, and in a very particular way. The law dovetails seamlessly with the national “Take Back America” crusade that has attended the rise of Barack Obama and the accelerating demographic shift our first African-American president represents. [...]

[This] is often the same crowd still demanding that the president produce a document proving his own citizenship. [...]

With the whole country now watching Arizona, that “birther” bill was abruptly yanked Thursday.

The legislators who voted for both it and the immigration law were exclusively Republicans, but what happened in the Arizona G.O.P. is not staying in Arizona. Officials in at least 10 other states are now teeing up their own new immigration legislation. They are doing so even in un-Arizonan places like Ohio, Missouri, Maryland and Nebraska, none of them on the Department of Homeland Security’s 2009 list of the 10 states that contain three-quarters of America’s illegal immigrant population. [...]

What a difference the Tea Party makes. [...] McCain, like other mainstream conservative Republicans facing primaries this year, is now fighting for his political life against a Tea Party-supported radical. [...]

McCain, like Arizona, shouldn’t be singled out for censure: He is far from alone in cowering before his party’s extremists. [...] There are few profiles in courage among the leaders in this G.O.P. — only a lot of guys hiding under their desks.

McKinnon and Rove know well that Latino-bashing will ultimately prove political suicide in a century when Hispanic Americans are well on their way to becoming the largest minority in the country and are already the swing voters in many critical states. [...]

It’s also hard to maintain that the Tea Party’s nuttier elements are merely a fringe of a fringe. [...]

The angry right and its apologists also keep insisting that race has nothing to do with their political passions. [...] So how does that profiling work without race or ethnicity, exactly? [...]

In this Alice in Wonderland inversion of reality, it’s politically incorrect to entertain a reasonable suspicion that race may be at least a factor in what drives an action like the Arizona immigration law. Any racism in America, it turns out, is directed at whites. [...]

The rage of 2010 is far more incendiary than anything that went down in 1988, and it will soon leap from illegal immigration to other issues in other states. Boycott the Diamondbacks and Phoenix’s convention hotels if you want to punish Arizona, but don’t for a second believe that it will stop the fire next time.

Please read the whole thing here.

Quickie: Twofer edition

By GottaLaff

Today's Quickie is a twofer, and they both come by way of Greg Sargent:

* Today’s prize for bucking the Beltway-approved narrative goes to Jonathan Alter, for making an audacious suggestion: Rather than asking whether the Gulf spill is Obama’s Katrina, let’s ask whether it should give new momentum to energy reform.

* Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, a gung-ho backer of the Arizona immigration law, says he will decide whether to ride his tough-on-immigration notoriety to launch a run for higher office, commenting thusly:

“I am not running for governor now until I decide over the weekend with a glass of wine and my wife, since my mother and father came here from Italy, with a little spaghetti and meatballs.”

Well now, those are two hefty little Quickies. One relates back to this post, in which I complained about the Katrina meme that the pretend news insists upon pushing.

As for Arpaio, I posted about him here. He's hopeless and has no business being in the public eye or in public office, let alone anywhere else.

That was today's Quickie Twofer. Was it good for you?

Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez arrested at Washington immigration rally

By GottaLaff

Los Angeles surpassed its 100,000 count at their immigration rally, per CNN. Gutierrez was in D.C.:

Police arrested Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez at an immigration rally outside the White House on Saturday.

As for Los Angeles:

Several people interviewed said they had not been to a pro-immigration march since the massive protests in 2006, but that Arizona's law compelled them to come out.

Arizona is compelling people to do a lot of things they might not ordinarily do.

Arizona Watch: Racial profiling is a reality

By GottaLaff

Racial profiling has been going on for some time in Arizona, thanks to Sheriff Joe Arpaio, as we've posted over and over. Today the L.A. Times is reporting that very same thing, and it's not pretty:

[...] Latino activists and civil rights attorneys contend that profiling is already a reality in the Maricopa County, where two-thirds of the state's residents live. [...]

Since 2008 [Arpaio] has sent hundreds of his deputies and sworn volunteers on "sweeps" through immigrant-heavy neighborhoods, where they stop jaywalkers or drivers with broken taillights and ask for identification and immigration information. An analysis by civil rights lawyers found 70% of those arrested in these operations have Spanish surnames. Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and Scottsdale, is only 31% Latino, the majority of whom are legal residents or U.S. citizens.

Arpaio's tactics, which he says are necessary to suppress crime, have made him wildly popular in Arizona.

Arpaio even pulls over his supporters. What better way to maintain popularity with your base?

U.S. citizens? Pfft. Arizona is an equal opportunity persecutor. Take 64-year-old Dan Magos, for example. He had a gun inside his truck, which is legal, nor had that never concerned the police before. Magos was pulled over for (supposedly) not having a license plate on the trailer he was pulling:

[T]he deputy made him wait 10 minutes before letting him go with the words: "I don't want you to think this has anything to do with racial profiling."

Of course not, why would anyone think that?

The Times describes a few more instances like that one.

Remember when Arizona was a vacation destination, a place where people went to relax?

The new Arizona law in effect orders every Arizona law enforcement officer to respond like Arpaio's deputies.

That new Papers Please law should be quite a boon for the tourism industry.

Call me crazy, but I have a feeling getting arrested for Driving While Ethnic just isn't the draw Arizona hopes it will be.

Cartoon of the Day

Click to enlarge, via.

VIDEO: Arizona deputy shot by alleged undocumented immigrant, officials say

By GottaLaff



Things are bound to get worse now. This is not a good sign:

A sheriff's deputy in central Arizona was shot Friday afternoon by an alleged illegal immigrant, authorities said. [...]

The Pinal County deputy, who was not immediately identified, contacted authorities after being wounded in the desert, saying he had been shot by an illegal immigrant with an AK-47, said Lt. Tammy Villar, a sheriff's spokeswoman. [...]

The shooting is sure to heat up the debate around the new Arizona law.

Watch the supporters of the Papers Please law use this as justification for racial profiling. Nobody is defending the bad guys, but even an event as horrible as this one does not provide an excuse to arrest someone for Breathing While Mexican.

Un-American: Special Comment by my 72-year-old friend

By GottaLaff

My impassioned 72-year-old Twitter pal, who goes by the name 42bkdodgr, would like to share his feelings about the Arizona "Papers Please" law and comparisons to Nazi Germany. I am more than happy to oblige.

But first, a personal note from 42bkdodgr:

Many of you may wonder why I chose to use the “ 72 year old friend” as the introduction to my Special Comments. I selected the moniker so readers could see that from my age and life experiences I give a different perspective to the issues of today.

Now for his Special Comment:

Un-American

Chris Matthews in his segment “Let Me Finish” on April 28, spoke about the use of such words as Nazism and Hitlerism by liberals and conservatives when objecting to laws and policies adopted by the federal or state governments they believe to be un-American.

One of the examples Chris used was the recent law enacted by Arizona relating to illegal immigrants. Chris stated that there is a big difference between what Arizona is trying to do-- preventing people from entering America illegally-- and what Hitler did, killing people who were trying to flee Germany.

There is one basic item that is the same in both policies.

The Arizona police may stop anyone for reasonable suspicion who they believe may be in the country illegally. That is the same tactic used by the Gestapo in Germany, by asking people for their papers, with no reasonable cause, only to see if they had proper identification papers to be where they were.

German citizens had to carry their identification papers with them at all times, which is the same requirement under the Arizona law for its citizens.

There are two other examples I believe come under Nazi type tactics.

A GOP congressional candidate proposes installing microchips on illegal immigrants. Doing something like that, would be a modern day version of Hitler requiring patches to be worn on clothing to identify those Germans who were Jewish, Communists, homosexuals or political opponents.

Then we have Duncan Hunter Jr., who stated at a tea party rally in California, that children born in the United States whose parents came to this country illegally should be deported.

In the 1930s, Hitler passed laws that natural born Jewish Germans weren’t considered citizens of Nazi Germany, and among other things, couldn’t hold public office, be a judge, a doctor or teach in the public school system or universities.

The scary part is Duncan Hunter favors deporting natural born citizens of the United States, even though promoting such a policy is in direct violation of the Amendment XIV of the U.S. Constitution.

Conservative Republicans, like Duncan Hunter, love to say the Constitution is the law of the land and it should be obeyed, but they sure like to tear it apart when it gets in the way of their ideology.

While the policies enacted and those being advocated are in no way as evil as those used in Nazi Germany, I just feel the basic foundation of those policies are the same used in Germany.

Many thanks again for another thorough, relevant piece, 42bkdodgr. You often say what many of us are thinking and feeling, and we thank you for your unique perspective.