17 June 2007

A local echo of the amnesty fight

A few days ago the federal authorities raided two workplaces in my home city of Portland, Oregon, and arrested 167 suspected illegal aliens. Mayor Tom Potter, who apparently supports the amnesty bill currently under consideration in the US Senate, condemned the raids. In a massive response, the Mayor's office was inundated with more than 800 phone calls and e-mails. As best I can tell from this story in the Portland Tribune (whose editorial position also favors the amnesty bill), most of these communiqués attacked the Mayor's position.

The story notes that this response was "the most e-mails we’ve ever gotten on a single subject”. The fact that it was the Mayor's mere expression of opinion (not even an act of office) that drew such criticism suggests to me that the public's feelings on the issue are running high -- and that the people are primed and ready to launch the onslaught of calls and e-mails which will be needed to stop the Senate from reviving the amnesty bill this week.

As another point of interest, I should also note that Portland's main newspaper The Oregonian is much given to running pro-amnesty editorials and sympathetic human-interest stories about illegal aliens, and that nearly all the letters to the editor which appear in response to these pieces are hostile to the illegal-alien cause, even though Portland is generally quite a liberal city.

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6 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I firmly believe I was beaten out of a job opportunity at Del Monte in Sleepy Eye, MN years ago because, and remember, this is purely my own belief, they were hiring illegal aliens. That's sure what it seemed like in the employment office. So hearing this about their Portland plant does not come as much of a surprise.

What the heck is Potter thinking? To even verbally undermine ICE and INS when they do their jobs well is a disgrace and a danger.

17 June, 2007 22:23  
Blogger Infidel753 said...

Like the old Soviet central planners, the political establishment here sort of lives on its own planet far away from the one the rest of us inhabit.

It will be interesting to see if Del Monte is careful to hire citizens now.

18 June, 2007 06:46  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"blah blah blah AMNESTY blah blah blah AMNESTY blah blah blah."

That's the entire "contribution" the racist right has made to trying to solve the immigration problem in the USA. More fear and harassment isn't going to solve anything.

18 June, 2007 21:43  
Blogger Infidel753 said...

As anyone who has followed the numerous links in my postings on this subject knows, the opposition to the amnesty bill has made many solid and logical arguments for why it would be both unjust and harmful. If the commenter had actually been paying any attention to the battle, he/she/it would know that most of the opposition has nothing to do with racism and much of it is not coming from the right.

Of course, when you can't address people's actual points, it's easiest to just dismiss them and call them names.

19 June, 2007 05:30  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

So what race is it exactly do you have to be to be an illegal? Being against illegal immigration is not racist as anybody can be here illegally. People from Poland, China, Japan, Africa, Australia, Peru can all be deported. There is no single country where all illegals come from.

20 June, 2007 16:43  
Blogger Infidel753 said...

Being against illegal immigration is not racist as anybody can be here illegally.

Exactly so. I don't know why Anonymous #1 above fails to understand this. I addressed the issue here as explicitly as I know how.

Hey, Chell, did you know you're part of the "racist right"? I didn't think they even accepted liberal pagans as members.

20 June, 2007 19:03  

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