From the OTHER wall

Photograph: Suhaib Salem/Reuters. Palestinian children take part in a human chain protest, near the Erez crossing, against the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip.



Gazans form human chain along Israeli border in protest at blockade

Mark Tran and agencies
The Guardian - London
Monday February 25 2008

Palestinians today formed a human chain in protest at Israel's blockade of Gaza as Israel deployed thousands of troops and police officers along the border.

About 5,000 people, many of them women, schoolchildren and university students, joined the chain outside the town of Beit Hanoun, about four miles from the border.

The crowd hoisted banners in English and Arabic, saying "End the siege of Gaza now", and "Your siege will not break our will".

One of the organisers, an independent MP, Jamal al-Khoudary, said the protesters did not plan violent action. "This is a peaceful event aimed to send a message to the world that the people of Gaza want to live in freedom," he said.

Organisers had hoped to form a chain running the length of the 25-mile Gaza strip, but turnout was well below expectations.

After the protest some 2,000 Hamas loyalists marched to a checkpoint several kilometres away from Erez. However, Hamas police blocked the main road leading to the Erez checkpoint and called on loyalists to obey the law.

Hamas organised the event to protest at chronic shortages of vital supplies in Gaza because of Israeli restrictions. The group said the event would be peaceful and marchers would not reach the border.

Israel took no chances and deployed troops and police to prevent any repeat of scenes that occurred recently at the Gaza-Egypt border.

"I hope that, ultimately, they understand that we are deployed and ready, that this will not be a repeat of what happened in the Philadelphi Corridor (Egypt border) a few weeks back," the deputy defence minister, Matan Vilnai, told Israel Radio.

Hamas blew open Gaza's border wall with Egypt last month, allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to cross into Egypt and stock up with food, petrol and other basic necessities. But Israel voiced fears the flood of people included Islamist militants intent on carrying out attacks, and Egyptian security forces rounded up hundreds of suspects.

"We don't plan to fool around in this regard," Vilnai said. "We will use measures in the way we deem necessary to prevent people breaking into the state of Israel's territory."

Israeli radio and TV stations devoted their morning news coverage to the event, warning of a mass exodus of Gazans.

"It's absolutely clear that among them will be people with explosive charges, there will be those among them who will be ready at any moment to blow up the border fence," an ultra-nationalist MP, Effie Eitam, told Israel Radio, reflecting a widespread sense of alarm.

"Suddenly there will be a big hole in the fence somewhere, there will be explosions, injured soldiers and the mob will stream into our territory. If that happens it will be the end of the state of Israel."

Last month, Israel tightened the blockade on Gaza, home to 1.5 million Palestinians, limiting supplies of fuel and other goods in response to cross-border rocket fire by militants.

Militants say the attacks are in response to Israeli raids and would stop if Israel lifted Gaza's blockade. Hamas is treated as a political pariah by Israel and the west for not recognising Israel. It has, however, offered Israel a conditional, long-term ceasefire.

Some Palestinians have advocated a strategy of non-violent resistance to Israel similar to the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, and the worldwide impact of Gazans rushing into Egypt appears to have prompted Hamas to try and replicate such tactics on Gaza's border with Israel.

for link to Guardian article click the title of this post

The American Renaissance of White Racial Preservation

The American Renaissance Conference was held this weekend at a hotel near Dulles Airport just outside of Washington, D.C. According to the WP those attending the conference "promote the belief for white racial preservation."

A spokesman for the group told reporters that the "theme of the conference was the intersection of immigration and race, which he said is reflected in the presidential campaign" - well at least it was reflected in the campaign until Tancredo, Guiliani and Romney left the race. So little is said about Huckabee these days, his anti-immigration rhetoric is significantly muted, at least in the media.

The "intersection of immigration and race" is made clear by the demographic changes in the U.S. currently represented by the two Democratic front runners, an African American man and a white woman. It makes sense that a group of people who deeply believe in white nationalism would be concerned enough attend a conference on racial issues. With over 12 million undocumented immigrants, millions more here with visas, and the strong possibility of a president that won't reflect those wanting "white racial preservation" -- it would not be an exaggeration to assume that these people are terrified.

Kudos to the WP for reporting on this conference (an the accompanying protest). It is very important for information of this type to circulate publicly - otherwise it remains myth.

I do not fault these white renaissance men. Everyone is entitled to finding his own answer. For those of us not in this elite group, it is good to know what people are saying about "the African mind" and the Mexican personality.


p.s. One more thing; next time someone announces that the immigration problem is not about race, I'll mention the American Renaissance Conference.


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Protest at a Conference on Race
Demonstrators Aiming to Disrupt Meeting Are Halted by Police

By Eric M. Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 24, 2008; C04

Fairfax County police yesterday blocked a group of protesters who sought to enter a hotel near Dulles International Airport to disrupt a conference of people who promote belief in the need for white racial preservation.

Inside the Crowne Plaza Dulles Airport Hotel in Herndon were more than 100 attendees, most of them white men, of the American Renaissance Conference. Among the seminars were "Understanding the African Mind" and "Mexico From the Inside: Who the Mexicans Are and Why They Do What They Do.'' For sale outside conference rooms were neckties decorated with Confederate emblems and books such as "Race Differences in Intelligence'' and "Zoological Subspecies of Man.''

On the sidewalk outside -- just off the Dulles Toll Road -- stood a young, racially mixed group of three dozen protesters with megaphones and drums. They carried posters decrying Nazism, racism and fascism as they tried in vain to pass a police phalanx and enter the hotel to disrupt the conference.

Police firmly but gently pushed the protesters off hotel property and into an area marked with orange cones and yellow tape in a lane of the street in front of the hotel.

The protesters were relegated to yelling across the parking lot and spitting at a person who emerged from the conference to give interviews.

The leader of the protest, Marco Del Fuego, said he was involved in a similar demonstration against an American Renaissance conference two years ago at another Dulles area hotel. He said one objective of yesterday's protest was to pressure Crowne Plaza management to avoid hosting such conferences in the future.

The conference was sponsored by the New Century Foundation, which was launched by Jared Taylor, who calls himself a "race realist." Taylor spoke with a reporter about the conference in the hotel. Taylor, who lives in the Oakton section of Fairfax County, has been described by civil rights organizations as a "white nationalist" who espouses racism.

Taylor said a theme of the conference was the intersection of immigration and race, which he said is reflected in the presidential campaign. "The country is catching up with us,'' he said.

Taylor decried the attempt to disrupt the conference.

"And they call us Nazis?" he said.

Del Fuego said the people meeting in the hotel shared philosophical ties with anti-immigrant and racist groups.

"They promote violence against people of color,'' he said. "How can I stand for that kind of speech? You cannot compromise with people like that.''

Staff writer Fredrick Kunkle contributed to this report.

for link to WP article click the title of this post

Hearing on ICE misconduct: February 25, Washington, D.C.

UFCW Hearing on ICE Misconduct

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union's National Commission on ICE Misconduct & Violations of the 4th Amendment will hold its first hearing tomorrow,

February, 25, 2008 - 12:30 pm Eastern Time
Hay Adams Hotel
800 - 16th Street, NW.
Washington D.C.


The members of the commission include Joe Hansen, President, UFCW, Dennis Hayashi, Esq., Rev. Samuel "Billy" Kyles, Maria Elena Durazao, LA County Federation of Labor, Bill Hing, Professor of Law, UC Davis, Susan Gzesh, Human Rights Progrom, Univ. of Chicago, Oscar Chacon, Salvadoran American National Network, Tom Vilsack, Former Gov. of Iowa, Mary Bauer, Southern Poverty Law Center, William Spriggs, Dept. of Economics, Howard Univ.

12:30-3:00 PUBLIC SESSION—COMMISSION HEARING

Opening Statement: UFCW President Joe Hansen
Commissioner Introductions & Statements
An Overview of ICE Enforcement Nationwide
Arnoldo Garcia, Director, Immigrant Justice & Rights Program,
National Network of Immigrant Rights

Legal Briefing on ICE Enforcement: Constitutional Framework, Detainee Rights, and Obligations of Enforcement Officials
Jeanne Butterfield, Esq, Executive Director, American Immigration
Lawyers Association

An Analysis of ICE Enforcement
Monica Guizar, Esq.
National Immigration Law Center

Protecting Workers’ Rights: The UFCW’s Response
Peter Schey, Esq.
Swift workers:
Pasqual Talamantes, Grand Island, NE
Sonia Mendoza, Cactus, TX

Concluding Remarks
UFCW President Joe Hansen


previously posted on Immigration Prof Blog

Looking at the Texas and Ohio Primaries

From the Washington Post
February 24, 2008






















for link to WP article click the title of this post

IRAQ Veterans Waiting on U.S. Citizenship

photo: CBS/AP


The following article is about immigrant soldiers returning from Iraq and waiting too long for their citizenship - which is an absolute travesty. Think of how soldiers have to face such a terrible situation there - how many return with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome (and the military balking at their treatment) As long as the United States continues to neglect its promise to our immigrant soldiers can we really say we are proud of our country?


With the current situation regarding this delay - what would have happened if the DREAM Act would have passed and thousands and thousands of DREAMERS enlisted then finding the promise of citizenship might not be an honest one.

It is very likely that the DREAM ACT will pass in the next presidential administration - if so will the same problem continue?

February 24, 2008
After the War, a New Battle to Become Citizens
By FERNANDA SANTOS

Despite a 2002 promise from President Bush to put citizenship applications for immigrant members of the military on a fast track, some are finding themselves waiting months, or even years, because of bureaucratic backlogs. One, Sgt. Kendell K. Frederick of the Army, who had tried three times to file for citizenship, was killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq as he returned from submitting fingerprints for his application.

About 7,200 service members or people who have been recently discharged have citizenship applications pending, but neither the Department of Defense nor Citizenship and Immigration Services keeps track of how long they have been waiting. Immigration lawyers and politicians say they have received a significant number of complaints about delays because of background checks, misplaced paperwork, confusion about deployments and other problems.

“I’ve pretty much given up on finding out where my paperwork is, what’s gone wrong, what happened to it,” said Abdool Habibullah, 27, a Guyanese immigrant who first applied for citizenship in 2005 upon returning from a tour in Iraq and was honorably discharged from the Marines as a sergeant. “If what I’ve done for this country isn’t enough for me to be a citizen, then I don’t know what is.”

The long waits are part of a broader problem plaguing the immigration service, which was flooded with 2.5 million applications for citizenship and visas last summer — twice as many as the previous year — in the face of 66 percent fee increases that took effect July 30. Officials have estimated that it will take an average of 18 months to process citizenship applications from legal immigrants through 2010, up from seven months last year.

But service members and veterans are supposed to go to the head of the line. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President Bush signed an executive order allowing noncitizens on active duty to file for citizenship right away, instead of having to first complete three years in the military. The federal government has since taken several steps to speed up the process, including training military officers to help service members fill out forms, assigning special teams to handle the paperwork, and allowing citizenship tests, interviews and ceremonies to take place overseas.

At the same time, post-9/11 security measures, including tougher guidelines for background checks that are part of the naturalization process, have slowed things down.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, which checks the names of citizenship applicants against those in its more than 86 million investigative files, has been overwhelmed, handling an average of 90,000 name-check requests a week. In the fiscal year that ended in September, the F.B.I. was asked to check 4.1 million names, at least half of them for citizenship and green card applicants, a spokesman said.

“Most soldiers clear the checks within 30 to 60 days, or 60 to 90 days,” said Leslie B. Lord, the Army’s liaison to Citizenship and Immigration Services, the federal agency that processes citizenship applications. “But even the soldier with the cleanest of records, if he has a name that’s very similar to one that’s in the F.B.I. bad-boy and bad-girl list, things get delayed.”

Such explanations are why Mr. Habibullah has decided that once he does become a citizen — if he ever becomes a citizen — he will change his name.

“I figured that’s part of the reason things got delayed,” he said. “You know, that I have a Muslim name.”

Thousands of Muslim civilians have also found themselves waiting months or years for background checks, and have filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court in Denver. But advocates for the immigrant service members said that those with pending applications are from a variety of backgrounds and that they do not suspect a pattern of discrimination against Muslims.

Some 31,200 members of the military were sworn in as citizens between October 2002 and December 2007, according to the immigration service, but a spokeswoman, Chris Rhatigan, said she could not determine how long it took for them to be naturalized since the agency does not maintain a database tracking military cases.

Over all, 312,000 citizenship or green card applications are pending name checks, including 140,000 that have been waiting more than six months, immigration officials said. This month, immigration authorities eased background-check requirements for green cards, saying that if applicants had been waiting more than six months, they could be approved without an F.B.I. check, and approvals could be revoked later “in the unlikely event” that troubling information was found.

After hearing complaints from at least half a dozen service members over the past three months, Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York has drafted a bill to create a special clearinghouse to ensure that applications from active and returning members of the military are processed quickly and smoothly. A spokesman said several other lawmakers reported hearing many similar stories.

“These are men and women who are risking their lives for us,” Mr. Schumer said in a telephone interview. “They’ve met all the requirements for citizenship, they have certainly proved their commitment to our country, and yet they could lose their lives while waiting for a bureaucratic snafu to untangle.”

In interviews, immigration lawyers and military officials said that in general, the naturalization process takes service members between six months and a year, which is about half the current average wait for civilians. But some cases drag on much longer because of background-check delays or because applications are misplaced, or notices are mailed to stateside addresses after an applicant has been deployed, causing appointments to be missed.

“You try to resolve these things amicably, reaching out to the military, reaching out to immigration officials, but you hit roadblock after roadblock,” said David E. Piver, a Pennsylvania lawyer who filed at least six petitions in federal court over the past five years on behalf of service members experiencing longer than usual delays on their citizenship applications.

“It’s usually not any substantive issue that’s causing those delays,” he said. “What it boils down to are bureaucratic snafus.”

Feyad Mohammed, an immigrant from Trinidad and Tobago who lives with his parents in Richmond Hill, Queens, was naturalized last month — four years after he filed the first of four citizenship applications, and six months after his honorable discharge from the Army as a sergeant.

Mr. Mohammed first applied in 2004, after he returned from the first of his two tours in Iraq. But the application seemed to have been lost; when he checked after a few months, he said, no one at the immigration service could tell him where it was or even if it had been received. He filed again in 2005, but missed his interview several months later; it had been scheduled in Iraq, during his second combat tour, but he was home on leave on the appointed day.

After he was discharged in July 2007, Mr. Mohammed filed another application. The paperwork was returned because he had not included a check covering the processing fee, he said, ignoring a Bush administration initiative that exempts combat veterans from application fees for up to a year after discharge. It was then that Mr. Mohammed reached out to Senator Schumer’s office, which helped him file a fourth, and final, time.

When he was sworn in Jan. 25 at the federal courthouse in Downtown Brooklyn, Mr. Mohammed said, he felt “relieved.”

“I was a citizen,” he said. “I could finally move on with my life.”

But Sergeant Frederick, a 21-year-old immigrant from Trinidad, would be awarded citizenship only posthumously, on the day of his burial. He is one of more than 90 immigrant service members to be naturalized after losing their lives in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Sergeant Frederick’s mother, Michelle Murphy, said that he had filed his citizenship application a year before he was deployed to Iraq in 2005, but that his application was sent back to her Maryland home three times — once because of incomplete biographical information, again because he had left a box unchecked, and once more because he had not paid the fee.

Finally, Ms. Murphy said, Sergeant Frederick received a letter saying that the fingerprints he had included with his application could not be read and that he needed to submit new ones. She contacted immigration officials, who arranged for him to submit a new set of fingerprints on Oct. 19, 2005, near his base in Tikrit. On the way back from the appointment, his convoy hit a roadside bomb.

“If somebody is fighting for a country, if he’s deployed, if he’s in the middle of a war, it shouldn’t be that hard for them to become a citizen,” Ms. Murphy, 42, said in a telephone interview.

After his death, the immigration service began accepting enlistment fingerprints with service members’ citizenship applications, provided applicants authorized the military to share their files with immigration officials. A bill to make such sharing automatic has been passed by the House and is pending a final Senate vote.

In the meantime, Mr. Habibullah is working as an aircraft hydraulics mechanic in Connecticut, though he hopes to get a better-paying job in the federal government once he is naturalized. In October, Mr. Habibullah’s father and grandmother became citizens in separate ceremonies, though they applied fully two years after he did.

Mr. Habibullah has passed the citizenship test and been interviewed, and he said he does not know what to do to move his application through the backlog faster.

“Every time I ask about it, I get the same answer: it’s pending the background check,” Mr. Habibullah said as he looked over his military medals, which are displayed on a wall in the Mount Vernon, N.Y., apartment he shares with his wife and 1-month-old son. “I’m at the point right now that I’ve almost given up on it.”



Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

for link to NYT article, click the title of this post


photo: http://wwwimage.cbsnews.com/images/2003/07/03/image561669x.jpg

Riot at Immigrant Detention Center in Mexico

Migrants traveling to the U.S. by crossing Mexico in trains
AP photo, from La Jornada




"A group of 159 undocumented immigrants held in a center meant for only 89 in Villahermosa, Tabasco (Mexico) rioted in the early morning hours of Friday, Feb. 22. Seven were able to escape. They were being held at the Instituto Nacional de Migración (INM). Most were from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. The riot was reported due to insufficient space. Protestors demanded they be immediately returned to their countries of origin."




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Migrantes centroamericanos, víctimas del hacinamiento
Motín de indocumentados en instalación del INM en Tabasco
LA Jornada - Mexico City

René Alberto López (Corresponsal)

Villahermosa, Tab., 22 de febrero. Un grupo de 159 indocumentados que estaban detenidos en un espacio diseñado para 80 personas en las instalaciones del Instituto Nacional de Migración (INM), en el municipio tabasqueño de Tenosique, se amotinaron en las primeras horas del viernes. Se estima que al menos siete de de ellos lograron huir y se pidió el apoyo de la Policía Federal Preventiva (PFP) para controlarlos, según reportó un noticiario de la radio local.

La protesta de los indocumentados ocurrió en este municipio ubicado en la frontera con Guatemala, a unos 200 kilómetros de Villahermosa. Al parecer el descontento se inició porque estaban hacinados en un espacio insuficiente y exigían que se les deportara inmediatamente a sus lugares de origen.

El número de migrantes fue aumentando en el transcurso de la semana. Estaban confinados en una garita y los autobuses que los trasladarían no llegaban, la situación se complicó y según emisoras de radio locales, comenzaron a quemar colchones y colchonetas. Sin embargo, el portal electrónico Noticias sin Fronteras de ese municipio aseguró que fue un hecho accidental, porque la colilla de un cigarro provocó el incendio de un solo colchón.

Las autoridades del INM pidieron el apoyo de la PFP, cuyos elementos sometieron a los inconformes y apoyados por efectivos del Ejército instrumentaron un operativo en la zona fronteriza para tratar de localizar a quienes lograron evadirse.

De acuerdo con el portal Noticias sin Fronteras, los indocumentados denunciaron que están en una situación de crisis en el área de aseguramiento del INM, y que debido a la saturación, uno de ellos, accidentalmente, prendió un colchón con la colilla de un cigarro. El lugar se llenó de humo y empezaron a gritar, exigiendo salir del área hacia la parte trasera de las instalaciones, donde algunos de los que sufrieron intoxicación fueron atendidos por paramédicos de la Cruz Roja.

Agrega el portal que entre ellos estaban siete cubanos y seis brasileños, los restantes eran de El Salvador, Guatemala y Honduras. La misma fuente detalló que entre la noche del viernes y la madrugada del sábado se repatriaría a los migrantes a sus lugares de origen.

Este viernes arribaron a Tenosique defensores de los derechos humanos, así como personal diplomático del consulado guatemalteco con sede en la frontera sur para vigilar que no se violen las garantías individuales de los indocumentados.

La delegación de la Procuraduría General de la República en la entidad informó que agentes de la PFP detuvieron a un presunto traficante de personas, quien transportaba a tres nicaragüenses indocumentados, a la altura del kilómetro 041+300 de la carretera Cárdenas-Coatzacoalcos.

for link to Jornada article click the title of this post

Undocumented immigrants can't drive - but they really do pay taxes

Texas Observer cartoon




As I was looking around the web for an image that would help emphasize the post on the border wall I found this cartoon about immigration - which reminded me of Obama's statement during the Texas presidential debate on February 22nd. As he said he supported immigration reform - he also stressed that securing the borders was a must -- then he went down a list of what immigrants had to do to regularize -- pay big fines, learn English, etc etc.

Lets hope that Obama includes the driver's license so people can get to their English classes. Having a license would also help people make it to the immigration office so they can pay their fines for being undocumented...

Lastly, thank goodness they won't need a car to get to the IRS to pay back taxes, they won't have to make the trip because most of them had taxes taken out of their pay checks -- you may not know this but most undocumented immigrants work for registered companies or corporations ... who have them on the payroll (a very few percentage wait outside of Home Deport waiting for potential employers).. You may argue that these type of jobs don't count because undocumented people use a social security card with the wrong name... but this doesn't matter! The IRS will accept money from you no matter what name you use. Just ask any undocumented immigrant who has recently obtained a green card...

cartoon: http://www.texasobserver.org/archives/zro_071116/images/danziger-immigration.jpg

The Border Wall and Selective Fencing: Part II

construction of wall between Texas and Mexico
photo from notexasborderwall.com



continued

The Observer called Homeland Security in Washington to find out how it had decided where to build the fence. The voice mail system sputtered through a dizzying array of acronyms: DOJ, USACE, CBP, and USCIS. On the second call a media spokesperson with a weary voice directed queries to Michael Friel, the fence spokesman for Customs and Border Protection. Six calls and two e-mails later, Friel responded with a curt e-mail: “Got your message. Working on answers…” it said. Days passed, and Friel’s answers never came.

Since Homeland Security wasn’t providing answers, perhaps Congress would. Phone conversations with congressional offices ranged from “but they aren’t even building a wall” to “I don’t know. That’s a good question.” At the sixth congressional office contacted, a GOP staffer who asked not to be identified, but who is familiar with the fence, says the fencing locations stemmed from statistics showing high apprehension and narcotic seizure rates. This seems questionable, since maps released by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers showed the wall going through such properties as the University of Texas at Brownsville—hardly a hotbed for drug smugglers and immigrant trafficking.

Questioned more about where the data came from, the staffer said she would enquire further. The next day she called back. “The border fence is being handled by Greg Giddens at the Secure Border Initiative Office within the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office,” she said.

Giddens is executive director of the SBI, as it is called, which is in charge of SBInet, a consortium of private contractors led by Boeing Co. The group received a multibillion dollar contract in 2006 to secure the northern and southern borders with a network of vehicle barriers, fencing, and surveillance systems. Companies Boeing chose to secure the southern border from terrorists include DRS Technologies Inc., Kollsman Inc., L-3 Communications Inc., Perot Systems Corp., and a unit of Unisys Corp.

A February 2007 audit by the U.S. Government Accountability Office cited Homeland Security and the SBInet project for poor fiscal oversight and a lack of demonstrable objectives. The GAO audit team recommended that Homeland Security place a spending limit on the Boeing contract for SBInet since the company had been awarded an “indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract for 3 years with three 1-year options.”

The agency rejected the auditors’ recommendation, saying 6,000 miles of border is limitation enough.

In a February 2007 hearing, Congressman Henry Waxman, a California Democrat and the chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, had more scathing remarks for Giddens and the SBInet project. “As of December, the Department of Homeland Security had hired a staff of 98 to oversee the new SBInet contract. This may seem like progress until you ask who these overseers are. More than half are private contractors. Some of these private contractors even work for companies that are business partners of Boeing, the company they are supposed to be overseeing. And from what we are now learning from the department, this may be just the tip of the iceberg.”

Waxman said of SBInet that “virtually every detail is being outsourced from the government to private contractors. The government is relying on private contractors to design the programs, build them, and even conduct oversight over them.”

A phone call to Giddens at SBI is referred to Loren Flossman, who’s in charge of tactical infrastructure for the office. Flossman says all data regarding the placement of the fence is classified because “you don’t want to tell the very people you’re trying to keep from coming across the methodology used to deter them.”

Flossman also calls the University of Texas at Brownsville campus a problem area for illegal immigration. “I wouldn’t assume that these are folks that aren’t intelligent enough that if they dress a certain way, they’re gonna fit in,” he says.

Chief John Cardoza, head of the UT-Brownsville police, says the Border Patrol would have to advise his police force of any immigrant smuggling or narcotic seizures that happen on campus. “If it’s happening on my campus, I’m not being told about it,” he says. Cardoza says he has never come across illegal immigrants dressed as students.

Flossman goes on to say that Boeing isn’t building the fence, but is providing steel for it. Eric Mazzacone, a spokesman for Boeing, refers the Observer to Michael Friel at Customs and Border Protection, and intercedes to get him on the phone. Friel confirms that Boeing has just finished building a 30-mile stretch of fence in Arizona, but insists other questions be submitted in writing.

Boeing, a multibillion dollar aero-defense company, is the second-largest defense contractor in the nation. The company has powerful board members, such as William M. Daley, former U.S. secretary of commerce; retired Gen. James L. Jones, former supreme allied commander in Europe; and Kenneth M. Duberstein, a former White House chief of staff. The corporation is also one of the biggest political contributors in Washington, giving more than $9 million to Democratic and Republican members of Congress in the last decade. In 2006, the year the Secure Fence Act was passed, Boeing gave more than $1.4 million to Democrats and Republicans, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

A majority of this money has gone to legislators such as Congressman Duncan Hunter, the California Republican who championed the Secure Fence Act. In 2006, Hunter received at least $10,000 from Boeing and more than $93,000 from defense companies bidding for the SBInet contract, according to the center. During his failed bid this year for the White House, Hunter made illegal immigration and building a border fence the major themes of his campaign.

In early February 2008, Chertoff asked Congress for $12 billion for border security. He included $775 million for the SBInet program, despite the fact that congressional leaders still can’t get straight answers from Homeland Security about the program. As recently as January 31, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee members sent a letter to Chertoff asking for “greater clarity on [the Customs and Border Protection office’s] operational objectives for SBInet and the projected milestones and anticipated costs for the project.” They have yet to receive a response.

Boeing continues to hire companies for the SBInet project. And the congressional districts of backers of the border fence continue to benefit. A recent Long Island Business News article trumpeted the success of Telephonics Corp., a local business, in Congressman King’s congressional district that won a $14.5 million bid to provide a mobile surveillance system under SBInet to protect the southern border.

While Garza and Tamez wait for answers, they say they are being asked to sacrifice something that can’t be replaced by money. They are giving up their land, their homes, their heritage, and the few remaining acres left to them that they hoped to pass on to their children and grandchildren.

“I am an old man. I have colon cancer, and I am 76 years old,” Garza says, resting against a tree in front of his home. “All I do is worry about whether they will take my home. My wife keeps asking me, ‘What are we going to do?’”

Besides these personal tragedies, Eagle Pass Mayor Foster says there is another tragedy in store for the American taxpayer. A 2006 congressional report estimates the cost of maintaining and building the fence could be as much as $49 billion over its expected 25-year life span.

“They are just going to push this problem on the next administration, and nobody is going to talk about immigration reform, and that’s the illness,” Foster says. “The wall is a Band-Aid on the problem. And to blow $49 billion and not walk away with a secure border—that’s a travesty.”

for link to complete Texas Observer article, click the title of this post

The Border Wall and Selective Fencing: Part I

The Isreali - Palestinian wall under construction (is there a similarity between this wall and the one being constructed between Texas and Mexico?)




The inequity of our new Border Fence was highlighted by the Texas Observer. Two examples of the unfair and unethical policies of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security emerges as the fence is being built (or not built) in south Texas.

'"While the border wall will go through her backyard and effectively destroy her home, it will stop at the edge of the River Bend Resort and golf course, a popular Winter Texan retreat two miles down the road. The wall starts up again on the other side of the resort.

“It has a golf course and all of the amenities,” Tamez says. “There are no plans to build a wall there. If the wall is so important for security, then why are we skipping parts?”

...In early February 2008, Chertoff asked Congress for $12 billion for border security. He included $775 million for the SBInet program, despite the fact that congressional leaders still can’t get straight answers from Homeland Security about the program. As recently as January 31, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee members sent a letter to Chertoff asking for “greater clarity on [the Customs and Border Protection office’s] operational objectives for SBInet and the projected milestones and anticipated costs for the project.” They have yet to receive a response.'


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The Texas Observer
Holes in the Wall
Homeland Security won’t say why the border wall is bypassing the wealthy and politically connected.
Melissa del Bosque | February 22, 2008 |


As the U.S. Department of Homeland Security marches down the Texas border serving condemnation lawsuits to frightened landowners, Brownsville resident Eloisa Tamez, 72, has one simple question. She would like to know why her land is being targeted for destruction by a border wall, while a nearby golf course and resort remain untouched.

Tamez, a nursing director at the University of Texas at Brownsville, is one of the last of the Spanish land grant heirs in Cameron County. Her ancestors once owned 12,000 acres. In the 1930s, the federal government took more than half of her inherited land, without paying a cent, to build flood levees.

Now Homeland Security wants to put an 18-foot steel and concrete wall through what remainsWhile the border wall will go through her backyard and effectively destroy her home, it will stop at the edge of the River Bend Resort and golf course, a popular Winter Texan retreat two miles down the road. The wall starts up again on the other side of the resort.

“It has a golf course and all of the amenities,” Tamez says. “There are no plans to build a wall there. If the wall is so important for security, then why are we skipping parts?..”

Along the border, preliminary plans for fencing seem to target landowners of modest means and cities and public institutions such as the University of Texas at Brownsville, which rely on the federal government to pay their bills.

A visit to the River Bend Resort in late January reveals row after row of RVs and trailers with license plates from chilly northern U.S. states and Canadian provinces. At the edge of a lush, green golf course, a Winter Texan from Canada enjoys the mild, South Texas winter and the landscaped ponds, where white egrets pause to contemplate golf carts whizzing past. The woman, who declines to give her name, recounts that illegal immigrants had crossed the golf course once while she was teeing off. They were promptly detained by Border Patrol agents, she says, adding that agents often park their SUVs at the edge of the golf course.

River Bend Resort is owned by John Allburg, who incorporated the business in 1983 as River Bend Resort, Inc. Allburg refused to comment for this article. A scan of the Federal Election Commission and Texas Ethics Commission databases did not find any political contributions linked to Allburg.

Just 69 miles north, Daniel Garza, 76, faces a similar situation with a neighbor who has political connections that reach the White House. In the small town of Granjeno, population 313, Garza points to a field across the street where a segment of the proposed 18-foot high border wall would abruptly end after passing through his brick home and a small, yellow house he gave his son. “All that land over there is owned by the Hunts,” he says, waving a hand toward the horizon. “The wall doesn’t go there.”

In this area everyone knows the Hunts. Dallas billionaire Ray L. Hunt and his relatives are one of the wealthiest oil and gas dynasties in the world. Hunt, a close friend of President George W. Bush, recently donated $35 million to Southern Methodist University to help build Bush’s presidential library. In 2001, Bush made him a member of the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, where Hunt received a security clearance and access to classified intelligence.

Over the years, Hunt has transformed his 6,000-acre property, called the Sharyland Plantation, from acres of onions and vegetables into swathes of exclusive, gated communities where houses sell from $650,000 to $1 million and residents enjoy golf courses, elementary schools, and a sports park. The plantation contains an 1,800-acre business park and Sharyland Utilities, run by Hunt’s son Hunter, which delivers electricity to plantation residents and Mexican factories.

The development’s Web site touts its proximity to the international border and the new Anzalduas International Bridge now under construction, built on land Hunt donated. Hunt has also formed Hunt Mexico with a wealthy Mexican business partner to develop both sides of the border into a lucrative trade corridor the size of Manhattan.

Jeanne Phillips, a spokesperson for Hunt Consolidated Inc., says that since the company is private, it doesn’t have to identify the Mexican partner. Phillips says, however, that no one from the company has been directly involved in siting the fence. “We, like other citizens in the Valley, have waited for the federal government to designate the location of the wall,” she says.

Garza stands in front of his modest brick home, which he built for his retirement after 50 years as a migrant farmworker. For the past five months, he has stayed awake nights trying to find a way to stop the gears of bureaucracy from grinding over his home.

A February 8 announcement by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the agency would settle for building the fence atop the levee behind Garza’s house instead of through it, which has given Garza some hope. Like Tamez, he wonders why his home and small town were targeted by Homeland Security in the first place.

“I don’t see why they have to destroy my home, my land, and let the wall end there.” He points across the street to Hunt’s land. “How will that stop illegal immigration?”

Most border residents couldn’t believe the fence would ever be built through their homes and communities. They expected it to run along the banks of the Rio Grande, not north of the flood levees—in some cases like Tamez’s, as far as a mile north of the river. So it came as a shock last summer when residents were approached by uniformed Border Patrol agents. They asked people to sign waivers allowing Homeland Security to survey their properties for construction of the wall. When they declined, Homeland Security filed condemnation suits.

In time, local landowners realized that the fence’s location had everything to do with politics and private profit, and nothing to do with stopping illegal immigration.

In 2006, Congress passed the Secure Fence Act, authored by Republican Congressman Peter King from New York. The legislation mandated that 700 miles of double-fencing be built along the southern border from California to Texas. The bill detailed where the fencing, or, as many people along the border call it, “the wall,” would be built. After a year of inflamed rhetoric about the plague of illegal immigration and Congress’s failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, the bill passed with overwhelming support from Republicans and a few Democrats. All the Texas border members of the U.S. House of Representatives, except San Antonio Republican Henry Bonilla, voted against it. Texas Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn voted for the bill.

On August 10, 2007, Chertoff announced his agency would scale back the initial 700 miles of fencing to 370 miles, to be built in segments across the southern border. Chertoff cited budget shortages and technological difficulties as justifications for not complying with the bill.

How did his agency decide where to build the segments? Chad Foster, the mayor of Eagle Pass, says he thought it was a simple enough question and that the answer would be based on data and facts. Foster chairs the Texas Border Coalition. TBC, as Foster calls it, is a group of border mayors and business leaders who have repeatedly traveled to Washington for the past 18 months to try to get federal officials to listen to them.

Foster says he has never received any logical answers from Homeland Security as to why certain areas in his city had been targeted for fencing over other areas. “I puzzled a while over why the fence would bypass the industrial park and go through the city park,” he says.

Despite terse meetings with Chertoff, Foster and other coalition members say the conversation has been one-sided.

“I think we have a government within a government,” Foster says. “[This is] a tremendous bureaucracy—DHS is just a monster...”

for link to entire Texas Observer article click the title of this post


previously reported on Democracy Now

photo:
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://lh3.google.com/_aBTtkCbUGVY/RJ1s0MSTABI/AAAAAAAAAO8/KQejkimObsE/s800/_23_0021.jpg&imgrefurl=http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/4ohopjQ-d3Q8T6EhbYZ2gw&h=534&w=800&sz=159&hl=en&start=1&sig2=6TXIDYxvJ5Hat9b_wANr-A&um=1&tbnid=-cX0a5VKXjzHyM:&tbnh=95&tbnw=143&ei=x1HAR9aqPJmYoQSE97HvDQ&prev=/images%3Fq%3Disraeli%2Bpalestinian%2Bwall%2Bconstruction%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DG

Obama in South Texas

Obama is not as popular in south Texas as he is in other parts of the state. There haven't been overflow crowds like there were in Houston.

Some people are still saying that he is not really interested in the well being of Latinos. I am not quite sure what he has done to make people feel this way, but there is a sizable population out there that hasn't been convinced yet.

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In South Texas, Obama Focuses On Hispanic Voters

By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 23, 2008; A07

CORPUS CHRISTI, Tex., Feb. 22 -- Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) campaigned through heavily Hispanic South Texas on Friday, attempting to make inroads into one of the most important constituencies in the state's key March 4 primary.

In previous primaries and caucuses, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) has consistently won the Hispanic vote, and Texas will show whether Obama's post-Super Tuesday winning streak has increased his appeal among a bloc of voters essential to the Democrats' hopes of winning the White House in November.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll this week showed Clinton and Obama running even overall in Texas. But Clinton led Obama 59 percent to 36 percent among likely Latino voters, who will make up one-third or more of the Democratic primary electorate.

Obama is a stranger in South Texas, compared with Clinton, who has been coming to the region for three decades, first to help register voters in the 1972 presidential campaign, later to help her husband, former president Bill Clinton, in his 1992 and 1996 campaigns. He tapped her Texas network to raise money for her two Senate campaigns. She also got a head start on Obama for the primary here, opening her Texas campaign on the night she was losing primaries in Maryland, Virginia and the District with a rally in El Paso and the next day a series of stops in South Texas.

Obama brought his standard themes of hope and unity to his opening events in South Texas, but also some tailor-made messages and lines aimed at wooing voters. He called for the creation of a new Veterans Administration hospital to deal with the health needs of the sizable population of military veterans in the area, who now must drive many miles to receive care. "We need a VA hospital right here in the [Rio Grande] Valley," he said. "People don't need to be driving 200 miles [for health care]."

He also talked of about changes in trade policy that would be good for both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border, and he soft-pedaled his support for building a fence along the border designed to curb the flow of illegal immigrants. A fence alone, Obama said, is "not going to work" to solve the nation's immigration problems.

During a rally at the University of Texas-Pan American in Edinburg, Obama offered a brown-black connection with the largely student audience with references to Martin Luther King Jr. and Cesar Chavez, who organized the United Farm Workers Union in California. King, he said, had once written to Chavez to say their causes were one.

Obama also spent 45 minutes with about two dozen students from the university talking about the problems of financing the cost of college. He touted his proposal for a $4,000 annual tax credit for students, saying it would nearly wipe out the average college debt that Texas students accumulate, and, to a military veteran, said he would like the G.I. Bill updated and expanded to meet the needs of all veterans, whether from the active duty military or the National Guard and Reserves.

"Just be careful about those credit cards," he told the students toward the end. "Don't eat out so often."

Before leaving for an event in Corpus Christi, Obama appeared at the corner of the press filing center. "Crank it up, guys," he said to the reporters huddled over their laptops. "Words matter. Don't listen to Hillary." Then he added, "That's a joke."

When a reporter asked him to respond to a statement from Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the likely Republican presidential nominee, criticizing Obama on Cuba policy, Obama, saying he was not familiar with what McCain had said, quickly disappeared behind a blue curtain.

In Corpus Christi, Obama opened his rally by asking for a moment of silence for the police officer in Dallas who was killed earlier Friday while helping with traffic control for Clinton's arrival. He said the same officer had been on duty when he was in Dallas earlier in the week.

Obama found sizable crowds Friday -- an estimated 5,500 at UT-Pan American and 6,500 in Corpus Christi -- but they were smaller than he had earlier in the week in other parts of the state. He was planning to return to Austin late Friday for what aides expected would be one of his largest rallies of his campaign here.

There are six districts in South Texas where Hispanics make up more than half of the registered voters, and they will be at the heart of the competition between Clinton and Obama. Those six districts will award 22 of the 126 delegates that will be awarded through the primary on March 4. Clinton has more endorsements among Hispanic politicians in the state, but Obama has picked up the backing of some younger Hispanic politicians.

Obama advisers believe that, with more time to campaign in Texas than in some other states with large Latino populations, their candidate can improve his percentages against Clinton. "There's a familiarity gap we have to close," communications director Robert Gibbs said.

for link to Washington Post article click the title of this post

Sen. Arlen Spector: Too expensive to hold detained immigrants

There are so many thousands of immigrants currently detained in the United States, it is interesting that Specter would say "criminal aliens" (such an ugly phrase) are too expensive to hold in detention.

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The Philadelphia Inquirer

February 19, 2008 Tuesday
CITY-D Edition

Specter decries cost to hold deportable alien criminals;
He spoke at the Chester County Prison. He wants an efficient plan to send them back to their home countries.

By Michael Matza and Kathleen Brady Shea; Inquirer Staff Writers


Up to 1,000 deportable aliens are incarcerated in Pennsylvania lock-ups on any given day, costing $20 million a year - which could be saved if the offenders were efficiently expelled, U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter said yesterday during a visit to the Chester County jail to spotlight the broader national costs of illegal immigration.

While states are federally reimbursed for the cost of incarcerating undocumented immigrants, the toll ultimately is borne by all taxpayers.

"The financial burden is very substantial," Specter said yesterday at the Chester County Prison in West Chester, where he met with Warden D. Edward McFadden and officials from the Department of Homeland Security's office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

"We have an enormously serious problem at the national level," he said.

The Department of Homeland Security has estimated that in 2007, about 302,000 "removable aliens" were admitted to state and local jails.

"Most . . . incarcerated aliens are being released into the U.S. at the conclusion of their respective sentences" because of lack of federal resources, the agency said.

Specter, the top-ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been touring state facilities "to better understand the issues surrounding the identification and deportation of criminal aliens," his office said in a news release.

Earlier this month, he visited the state correctional facility at Camp Hill.

Specter said he chose Chester County for yesterday's visit because the prison has a substantial number of illegal immigrant inmates. Chester County is home to thousands of migrants who work in the mushroom industry.

The prison has an average population of about 950. Records showed 63 illegal immigrant inmates yesterday in the prison population.

McFadden said prison statistics showed that one out of 15 inmates had a charge or detainer from ICE.

Citing a 2006 report by the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general, Specter said a substantial number of aliens who have committed crimes that would make them deportable often are released rather than deported due to inadequate resources to identify and hold them.

Critics of the removal effort have called it "catch and release." ICE spokesman Michael Gilhooley said yesterday that the agency was making headway and was able to check the immigration status of "100 percent of the names" brought to its attention by local officials.

Among the difficulties Specter cited were a shortage of beds for immigrants facing removal, inaccurate recordkeeping, and problems compelling their native countries to repatriate them.

Of 774,112 illegal aliens apprehended nationwide between 2003 and 2006, 36 percent were released because of shortages in processing personnel, bed space, and the funding needed to detain them while their immigration status was adjudicated, according to the federal report.

Specter said he would like to see the secretary of state use her power to limit visas to those nations that do not readily take back convicted aliens. He also suggested withholding foreign aid from countries that were uncooperative.

Nicole Thompson, a State Department spokeswoman assigned as duty officer on President's Day, said she did not have enough information at hand to immediately comment on Specter's suggestions.

The 2006 inspector general's report, however, does make mention of a joint State Department, Homeland Security and National Security Council "Sanctions Working Group" that has put pressure on noncooperating countries to speed up the issuance of the travel documents that are needed when an alien is removed from the United States and returned to his or her native land.

The problem has persisted, especially with removals to Jamaica and certain countries in Asia.

"As a result of these barriers to removal," the report found, 14 percent of allotted detention beds were filled by illegal aliens whose countries were either slow or unwilling to issue the necessary paperwork. A recent agreement with Vietnam is expected to speed up the process regarding Vietnamese nationals.

Specter also said that district attorneys who prosecute criminal cases have the discretion to include deportation language in plea agreements with inmates who are willing to return home in exchange for shorter sentences.

University of Pennsylvania Law School professor Sarah Paoletti, director of Penn's Transnational Legal Clinic, which represents immigrants in asylum cases, said the plea-bargain idea sounds reasonable but is prone to pitfalls.

"Criminal defense attorneys aren't trained in immigration law," she said, so their clients could end up signing documents without understanding the full consequences.

Following deportation, an immigrant is ineligible to seek legal reentry to the United States for at least 10 years.

Arlen Spector talks about illegal aliens and the New England Patriots' signal-stealing scandal on video available at http://go.philly.com/specter

Contact staff writer Michael Matza at 215-854-2541 or mmatza@phillynews.com.

from Lexus Nexus Database

4oth Anniversary of 1968 Walk-Outs

I wish I could've been there 40 years ago...I watched the movie portraying the events of that era, It was very inspiring -- WALKOUT 2006 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452703/.

I remember in high school, we wanted to walk-out because the administration didn't want to allow us to have PROM in Galveston's Moody Garden...which was out of the norm for any high school in Houston. We made our case and we got what we wanted... not so much significant like allowing Chicanos to go to college..

Young adults- Chicanos have paved the way for many and gave all Latinos an opportunity to go to college and be treated equally. I recommend the movie, check it out...but

Imagine if all immigrant students would rise to demand a path to citizenship? Educated Latinos, Asians, Middle Easterners and Europeans who have lived in the US all their lives could be able to revolutionize poor immigration reform...but only so few show this type of emotion mainly caused by wanting freedom...the rest are still unaware of their status or are living in fear.


~~~~~~~~~~

VOTE EARLY & MEET LA MAFIA!!!

& Oscar de la Rosa

Invite you to GET out TO VOTE Early

Saturday, February 23rd

10a-2p

Houston Community College Southeast Campus

6815 Rustic Houston, Texas

(I think they might be there, I'm not sure)

Obama says that our DREAM is a 'Top Priority'

Last night i watched the debate as many of us did. The Washington Post condenses the essence of the debate here.

What got me really excited however was the words of Obama:


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OBAMA: Well, this is an area where Senator Clinton and I almost entirely agree. I think that the key is to consult with local communities, whether it’s on the commercial interests or the environmental stakes of creating any kind of barrier. And the Bush administration is not real good at listening. That’s not what they do well. (LAUGHTER)

And so I will reverse that policy. As Senator Clinton indicated, there may be areas where it makes sense to have some fencing. But for the most part, having border patrolled, surveillance, deploying effective technology, that’s going to be the better approach. The one thing I do have to say, though, about this issue is, it is very important for us, I think, to deal with this problem in terms of thousands of — hundreds of thousands of people coming over the borders on a regular basis if we want to also provide opportunity for the 12 million undocumented workers who are here.

Senator Clinton and I have both campaigned in places like Iowa and Ohio and my home state of Illinois, and I think that the American people want fairness, want justice. I think they recognize that the idea that you’re going to deport 12 million people is ridiculous, that we’re not going to be devoting all our law enforcement resources… (APPLAUSE) … to sending people back.

But what they do also want is some order to the process. And so, we’re not going to be able to do these things in isolation. We’re not going to be able to deal with the 12 million people who are living in the shadows and give them a way of getting out of the shadows if we don’t also deal with the problem of this constant influx of undocumented workers.

And that’s why I think comprehensive reform is so important. That’s the kind of leadership that I’ve shown in the past; that’s the kind of leadership that I’ll show in the future.

One last point I want to make on the immigration issue because we may be moving to different topics: Something that we can do immediately that I think is very important is to pass the Dream Act, which allows children who through no fault of their own are here but have essentially grown up as Americans, allow them the opportunity for higher education.

I do not want two classes of citizens in this country. (APPLAUSE) I want everybody to prosper. That’s going to be a top priority.... (APPLAUSE)

Read entire debate here

Will Obama give us our DREAM?

Mana speaks for immigrants at Premios lo Nuestro

Last nite was the annual Premios Lo Nuestro presented in Univision. Premios lo Nuestro is the version of MTV Video Music Awards for Spanish television.

I must admit that i never really sit to watch these shows, but last night i changed the channel as Mana, the mexican rock group won artist of the year. Everything looked normal and ordinary until Fher, the singer of the band spoke for immigrant rights by saying that the United States had to recognized the need for the dignity of immigrants and the need for an immigration reform. I was shocked and was expecting Univision to cut the sound at any second. The crowd did not react much.

Mana is known for its efforts in environmental activism worldwide and for having talks with Irish band U2 in contributing musically, but i must say that last nite certainly came as a surprise.

I also found this article in Univision where Mana sympathizes with Hillary Clinton in women and immigration issues. Worth reading.

On another different note, did u guys watch the democratic debate last night? Senator Obama mentioned the need for the DREAM Act!!!

Stopping immigration raids in the new presidential administration?

Tonight, in the Texas debate between Obama and Clinton, Univision newscaster Jorge Ramos asked the two candidates if they would stop immigration raids. Neither clearly said they would stop the raids. Clinton mentioned the problem of babies left without caretakers when their mother's were detained. Obama said that protecting the borders was primary (as did Clinton) but he did not respond to Ramos' question about stopping the raids.

Some advice for both of the campaigns. If you really want the Latino vote, you need to be very clear that the raids would stop.

U.N. Human Rights chastises U.S. on record of racial discrimination

"GENEVA -- U.N. human rights experts told the United States on Thursday to step up efforts to combat racial discrimination in the detention of African-Americans and Hispanics and questioned the treatment of illegal immigrants."

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UN to US: Do More Against Racism

By ELIANE ENGELER
The Associated Press
Thursday, February 21, 2008; 4:48 PM
Washington Post

GENEVA -- U.N. human rights experts told the United States on Thursday to step up efforts to combat racial discrimination in the detention of African-Americans and Hispanics and questioned the treatment of illegal immigrants.

U.S. Ambassador Warren W. Tichenor said United States had made great strides toward equality but he conceded that "we still have significant work to do."

The United States was making its first appearance since 2001 before the experts of the U.N. panel on the elimination of racial discrimination. The 18 independent experts, who are unpaid, periodically review the performance of countries that have signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

Linos-Alexander Sicilianos, who led the questioning, said there was overwhelming evidence of police brutality against African-Americans, Arabs and Muslims, Hispanics and other minority groups.

"You need to intensify your efforts at all levels to combat this very alarming phenomenon," Sicilianos, a Greek lawyer on the panel, told the U.S. delegation.

Grace Chung Becker, a U.S. assistant attorney general, told the committee that U.S. law prohibits the use of excessive force by any law enforcement officer against any individual in the United States. The offenders can be punished under criminal law or the victims can bring a civil lawsuit, she said.

Sicilianos said he was pleased that the United States was committed to protect the rights of foreigners regardless of their immigration status, but he said there were numerous failures in living up to its commitments.

"Especially since 9/11, immigrants and refugee communities in the United States have been subjected ... to a range of systematic human rights violations directed by the federal government, local county and state governments, law enforcement agents, employers and private actors," he said.

Sicilianos said he based the accusation on evidence submitted by a large coalition of American human rights groups.

Several other experts on the panel said people of color suffer from racial profiling _ being stopped, searched and arrested by police much more than whites are.

"Especially Muslims are suffering from this, and measures are necessary to prevent this from continuing," said Kokou Mawuena Ika Kana Ewomsan, a human rights expert from Togo.

Becker noted that President Bush has said racial profiling "is wrong and we will end it in America."

"The current administration was the first to issue racial profiling guidelines for federal law enforcement officers," she added.

As one of the 173 countries which have ratified the treaty, the United States was taking its turn before the committee this week. A second session is planned for Friday. The United States has submitted a 119-page report to the panel.

for link to Washington Post article click the title of this post

Having the Dream Blues

Sometimes i feel like i should just prolong my time in school. Leaving the university will only take me to a "now what" stage. Graduate school is very feasible actually here in Texas, but the money is hard to put together if you are a DREAMER. However, in Texas it is undoubtedly easier than it is in California to attain financial help and go to school, but it is a challenge nonetheless if you are a DREAMER. I have had to take more than two semester off as well to put money together and be able to pay for school. Sometimes i also feel like i am not fully part of the whole college experience by dropping by for a couple of semester in a row and then taking some time to work and save the money.

Today i read Stephanie's story and unlike her, i have never been mad at my parents for being undocumented, I'm actually thankful to them for everything- they made a choice to come to this country because it is their job to give me and my brother a better life and they have done a wonderful job. I have become the person that i am because of them, i am stronger because of them and they are stronger because of me.

Every day we live not knowing what is going to happen, we live with the reality of the little things that remind us that we are undocumented. This country has a sure way of flicking you in the head and making you internalize fear, anger, sadness. Easy trips such as wanting to join the local gym and having them reject you for not having a state ID is quite a trip really.

I still have the dream that one day i will wake up and not be scared, sad, or upset. The day that i along with my brother and the thousands of dreamers in this country will celebrate our freedom. The day that justice will knock our door.

Struggling with noncitizen status
Hardships of being an undocumented immigrant force student to work long hours to finish school

* Jessica Chou, Daily Bruin staff
* Published: Wednesday, February 20, 2008

They finally broke the news to her after 18 years.

Stephanie Solis’ parents had hoped to hold back for as long as any secret could stay hidden, but it was only a matter of time before they had to tell the fourth-year English student the truth.

Solis was not in the United States legally.

For Solis, who only spoke English and had little recollection of her native Philippines, the notion that she wasn’t legally an American shocked her.

“I don’t feel very Filipino,” Solis said. “I’m told I’m not an American. But the only thing that still rings true to me is the English language.”

Her youth so far had been American in so many ways.

In the living room, her father listened to Rush Limbaugh. In the kitchen, her mother read Us Weekly.

Perhaps the only foreign connection to the Philippines that could have been found in her home was the homemade avocado ice cream in the freezer.

Solis felt so betrayed by her parents for having kept her immigration status from her for so long that she moved out and set out on her own.

Solis remembers sitting at a bus stop roughly a year later watching the cars go by as she waited for the bus that would take her to the train that would whisk her to a job making cardboard boxes.

Her life had become one of compromises – commuting six hours a day on public transit because she couldn’t get a driver’s license and saving up to pay for school.

By 2005, Solis started at UCLA, but because of her immigration status, paying for school was a major burden. Undocumented students are ineligible for financial aid, scholarships and many other types of financial assistance to help pay the fees.

Instead, many undocumented students are forced to pick up odd jobs to pay for their education.

Solis, like many undocumented students, has taken an unusually long time to get her degree.

“I’m in a position where I can’t consistently go to school,” she said.

Forced to take time off from work between quarters of school, Solis has been in college on and off for the last six years.

“There is that inconsistency which removes me from the standard college experience. I don’t feel like I’m integrated into it. I drop in when I can, and I visit when I can afford to for a quarter, and I’m there for 3 months, and I leave,” Solis said.

“And by the time I come back, everybody who was at the same level with me and everybody that I knew has already moved on or has graduated. There is that sense that I’m not going to college with my group – with my peer group. I’m going to college just with myself because I am my only peer group because everyone else is moving along at normal speed.”

Due to her hectic and stressful schedule, she woke up at odd hours and slept very little.

But it was the smaller realities of being undocumented – such as trouble cashing checks and getting a library card – that really got to her.

“It is the subtle things that flick me on the forehead reminding me that there is something wrong with who I am,” Solis said.

With her graduation finally imminent, Solis feels uneasy about what’s to come.

Like many undocumented college graduates, Solis will have difficulty finding a job without proof of legal residence, despite her degree from a top undergraduate program.

“The irony about that is that there is a sense of wanting to continue to prolong being in college simply because once I’m out and I have my degree, there’s nothing that I can really do with it.”

Image obtained here

Texas' Two-Step

By now, we're pretty sure you know that Texas has a 2-step process for selecting delegates on Election Day Tuesday, March 4, right?

While primary voting allocates 2/3 of the delegates to the national convention, another 1/3 of the delegates are selected at precinct caucuses that occur at your polling place at 7:15 p.m. March 4. (the # of voters will determine who gets 42 at-large delegates and 25 pledged-party and elected official delegates)

To have the maximum impact, you need to do both.

The Obama campaign has created a very detailed cheat-sheet with precint guidelines...you should contact your local field office across for more information.

Hillary on the other side is focusing on EARLY VOTING...

Turnout on March 4 is expected to set records. We strongly encourage you to vote early February 19-29. You may attend your precinct caucus even if you vote early.

PS..have you gone to OBAMAS website? its amazing!!

Pew Hispanic Center Releases Fact Sheets on Latino Electorate in Texas

2/20/08

Advisory
Pew Hispanic Center Releases Fact Sheets on Latino Electorate in Texas, Hawaii, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island

The Pew Hispanic Center today released fact sheets on the demographics of Hispanic eligible voters in the states of Texas, Hawaii, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. Each state fact sheet contains data on size and social and economic characteristics of the Hispanic and non-Hispanic eligible voter populations. These fact sheets are based on the Center's tabulations of the Census Bureau's 2006 American Community Survey.

All Hispanics in the 2008 Election fact sheets are available on the Center's website at www.pewhispanic.org

The Pew Hispanic Center, an initiative of the Pew Research Center, is a non-partisan, non-advocacy research organization based in Washington, D.C. and is funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts.