Friday, April 07, 2006
More on AIPAC article
Here's some more comment on the AIPAC article: Globalist 1; Globalist 2. The best thing is that it is a reply written by a Jew, but it does not accuse the authors of anti-Semitism.
Thursday, April 06, 2006
Proposed Senate Immigration Bill Is Amnesty
The proposed Senate immigration bill as reported by the New York Times is an amnesty for illegal aliens. Anything that rewards them for an illegal act is an amnesty, and this bill proposes to do that for aliens who have been in this country for more than five years, i.e., the worst offenders.
This bill is racism at its worst. It favors Mexicans over all other races and nationalities because they are the main people who sneak over the border illegally. Sure, there are illegal Africans, Asians, and South Americans, but they mainly have to come in by the planeload and clear immigration at an airport. A few, but very few, non-Mexicans come sealed in shipping containers or by other unorthodox methods. Of the millions of aliens under consideration, the vast majority are Mexican. Indians, Russians, and Chinese be damned, especially if they have Ph.D.s or are highly skilled. The Senate doesn't want them! It wants uneducated Mexicans who sneak across the border.
The main thing that bothers me is the disregard of the rule of law. We have immigration laws, but now the Senate says they are only hortatory. I was upset at Republican disdain for international law early in the Bush administration, but now -- with increasing domestic acceptance of torture, denial of habeas corpus, warrantless wiretapping and other horrible things that it took the common law and the Constitution hundreds of years to outlaw -- deciding that there is no immigration law is consistent with the general Republican disdain for law. No wonder Enron's Ken Lay and company were good friends of the President, and they probably will be again when the press spotlight dims.
Perhaps I am upset because of my past job as a consular officer in Brazil issuing American visas. It breaks your heart to refuse a visa to someone, for example, who wants to visit his mother who is working illegally in the States, and whom he has not seen for years. But under the law, he is almost certain to stay and work in the US as his mother did, and thus, he is not eligible for a visa. But if he were Mexican, he could just sneak across the border. Why should there be one law for Mexicans and another for Brazilians (and Poles, and Thais, and Nigerians)? What's the point of breaking his heart, and yours, if Congress doesn't really care?
This bill is racism at its worst. It favors Mexicans over all other races and nationalities because they are the main people who sneak over the border illegally. Sure, there are illegal Africans, Asians, and South Americans, but they mainly have to come in by the planeload and clear immigration at an airport. A few, but very few, non-Mexicans come sealed in shipping containers or by other unorthodox methods. Of the millions of aliens under consideration, the vast majority are Mexican. Indians, Russians, and Chinese be damned, especially if they have Ph.D.s or are highly skilled. The Senate doesn't want them! It wants uneducated Mexicans who sneak across the border.
The main thing that bothers me is the disregard of the rule of law. We have immigration laws, but now the Senate says they are only hortatory. I was upset at Republican disdain for international law early in the Bush administration, but now -- with increasing domestic acceptance of torture, denial of habeas corpus, warrantless wiretapping and other horrible things that it took the common law and the Constitution hundreds of years to outlaw -- deciding that there is no immigration law is consistent with the general Republican disdain for law. No wonder Enron's Ken Lay and company were good friends of the President, and they probably will be again when the press spotlight dims.
Perhaps I am upset because of my past job as a consular officer in Brazil issuing American visas. It breaks your heart to refuse a visa to someone, for example, who wants to visit his mother who is working illegally in the States, and whom he has not seen for years. But under the law, he is almost certain to stay and work in the US as his mother did, and thus, he is not eligible for a visa. But if he were Mexican, he could just sneak across the border. Why should there be one law for Mexicans and another for Brazilians (and Poles, and Thais, and Nigerians)? What's the point of breaking his heart, and yours, if Congress doesn't really care?
Replies to AIPAC Article
The Christian Science Monitor picks up more comment about the article on AIPAC's extraordinary influence on US politics. Alan Dershowitz weighs in for a Harvard rebuttal of a Harvard colleague. One of his worst arguments (on page 15) is, "Several years ago, I challenged those who made similar accusations to identify a single Jewish leader who equated mere criticism of Israeli policy with anti-Semitism. No one accepted my challenge, because no Jewish leader has made such an absurd claim." Dershowitz's paper is just the thing he claims does not exist. He attacks his Harvard colleague as an anti-Semite for daring to criticize Israel.
Everybody attacks the original article because David Dukes of KKK fame agreed with it. But does that necessarily make it wrong? If David Dukes said the sky was blue, would that necessarily mean that it was green? The fact that someone who is frequently wrong says that something is right does not logically mean that he is wrong in this case. The argument should be judged on its truthfulness, not on some kind of guilt by association.
Everybody attacks the original article because David Dukes of KKK fame agreed with it. But does that necessarily make it wrong? If David Dukes said the sky was blue, would that necessarily mean that it was green? The fact that someone who is frequently wrong says that something is right does not logically mean that he is wrong in this case. The argument should be judged on its truthfulness, not on some kind of guilt by association.
Thursday, March 30, 2006
Supreme Court Hears Vienna Convention Case
According to the New York Times, yesterday the US Supreme Court heard arguments in a case involving the Vienna Convention, which grants access by home country consular officials to people arrested in a foreign country. When I was a US consular officer in Brazil, I considered this the best guarantee against mistreatment, even possible torture, of arrested American citizens.
The virtue of this convention for Americans is not so much what it does for foreigners in the US, but the protections it affords Americans overseas. Similarly, the virtue of the Geneva Conventions is not so much the restrictions against torture that it places on American soldiers (although why the American government should embrace torture is beyond me), but rather that adhering to the Convention is a protection against torture for American soldiers captured by foreigners.
The report in the Times indicates that the Supreme Court may not find that any enforceable rights are created in US courts by the Vienna Convention, but the very idea that the issue made it to the Supreme Court, and that the Court may encourage local police and defense lawyers to notify the appropriate consuls is progress.
From the Supreme Court calendar, these cases, one from Oregon and one from Virginia, appear to be Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon and Bustillo v. Johnson. A more legalistic report of the case is on the Northwestern University web site.
The virtue of this convention for Americans is not so much what it does for foreigners in the US, but the protections it affords Americans overseas. Similarly, the virtue of the Geneva Conventions is not so much the restrictions against torture that it places on American soldiers (although why the American government should embrace torture is beyond me), but rather that adhering to the Convention is a protection against torture for American soldiers captured by foreigners.
The report in the Times indicates that the Supreme Court may not find that any enforceable rights are created in US courts by the Vienna Convention, but the very idea that the issue made it to the Supreme Court, and that the Court may encourage local police and defense lawyers to notify the appropriate consuls is progress.
From the Supreme Court calendar, these cases, one from Oregon and one from Virginia, appear to be Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon and Bustillo v. Johnson. A more legalistic report of the case is on the Northwestern University web site.
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