Fear and Hate Policies Along the Border: R.I.P.

SOURCE:

Arizona Watch

New America Media, Commentary, Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez, Posted: Feb 03, 2009

Editor’s Note: Just as President Barack Obama has ordered a review of the cases at Guantanamo, it is high time that he take a look at the immigrants who have been convicted in sham trials and housed within the U.S. borders, writes Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez. Rodriguez writes the column Arizona Watch for New America Media.

TUSCON, Ariz. -- For those who favor militarization and strict border enforcement along the U.S.-Mexico border, the Bush era has now become the “good ol’ days.” Yet, it is not yet certain that when it comes to immigration, President Barack Obama represents a radical change – or any change at all.

What is certain is that the previous fear- and hate-based approach was ineffective. More importantly, the Obama administration’s examination of Bush’s immigration policies will show that the approach was not simply wasteful and a massive drain on the national budget; it also did not produce any wealth. The same could be said for the entire Department of Homeland Security. Born out of fear, this department symbolizes both the failure of the Bush administration and the epitome of big (brother) government.

Nothing symbolizes Bush's failure more than building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. An official from Customs and Border Protection recently announced that the 669 miles of fencing along the border – as ordered by ex-president Bush – is now almost complete at the cost of nearly $3 billion since 2006. Half of it is built along the Arizona border. It is a perverse idea that necessarily begs the question: Why 669 miles, as opposed to the full-length of the
U.S.-Mexico border? And more importantly, why not a wall along the U.S.-Canada border, or impregnable barriers along the U.S. coastlines? Not coincidentally, Bush exempted the fencing of the border from many federal laws, including those involving environmental protections.

In Arizona, the walls are tragicomic and appear to be anachronistic and more, a monument to fear and hate. With the advent of the Obama administration, the border hence has become a symbol of the past struggling to survive in the future. Its only chance appears to be more fear and more hate.

Several weeks prior to Obama being sworn in, I went to witness for myself "Operation Streamline" – a mockery of a judicial proceeding that generally convicts 70 migrants every day in federal court in about one hour. Generally, the migrants, mostly men, are sentenced to a private prison and then deported. Since Obama’s inauguration, I've gone back and the sham trials continue. And the money flowing to the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) private prison continues unabated to the tune of $11 million per month.

Just on the basis of the nation's massive economic crisis, this operation should be terminated immediately. We now are faced with the shameless slashing of education budgets nationwide while jail and prison budgets explode through the roof. In the meantime, this nation continues to fight two costly wars on borrowed credit.

Fear, hate and irrationality lost the election. President Obama knows this better than anyone. This is why he was quick to order the closure of Guantanamo and why he has called for the end to torture.

This is a good beginning. However, to truly create a new nation, the changes have to come not simply in the realm of U.S. policies overseas. Here, in the United States, there is an entire detention system set up to house thousands of migrants, including women and children. They are generally incarcerated without rights, without due process and without trials. In Texas, the Hutto detention facility (also operated by CCA) continues to inhumanely imprison migrant children, separating them from their families. According to the recently released "Unseen Prisoners" study, by researchers from the
University of Arizona, some 300 migrant women were being held in 2007-2008 in three detention centers (two are operated by CCA), subjected to unwarranted and inhumane conditions.

These facilities are not abroad, just as Operation Streamline does not operate overseas. And just as the president has ordered a review of all of the cases at Guantanamo, it is high time that even before pondering the possibility of immigration reform, he should examine not simply the walls, the militarization of the border, the immigration raids, the detention facilities and the sham trials, but also the entire premise of his predecessor's fear-based immigration and border enforcement policies. More than examining them, similar to Guantanamo, they should be suspended and most of them should be remanded to the trash bin of history.

The president should examine the fear in this country that has produced the highest rates of incarceration in the "civilized" world.

Rodriguez can be reached at XColumn@gmail.com

Related Articles:

The Delusion of a Secure Border

Bush's Border Folly

Rage rising on the McCain campaign trail

CNNPolitics.Com

From Ed Henry and Ed Hornick
CNN

(CNN) -- With recent polls showing Sen. Barack Obama's lead increasing nationwide and in several GOP-leaning states, some Republicans attending John McCain-Sarah Palin campaign rallies are showing a new emotion: rage.

At a rally in Minnesota on Friday, a woman told McCain: "I don't trust Obama. I have read about him and he's an Arab."

McCain shook his head and said, "No ma'am, no ma'am. He's a decent family man...[a] citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues. That's what this campaign is all about."

One man at the rally said he was "scared of an Obama presidency." McCain later told the man he should not fear Obama.

"I want to be president of the United States, and I don't want Obama to be," he said. "But I have to tell you, I have to tell you, he is a decent person, and a person that you do not have to be scared as President of the United States."

McCain's response was met with boos from the crowd.

When asked about these outbursts, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said that he didn't know who those people were and if they were there as supporters or to disrupt the rallies.

A day earlier, the same type of hostility toward Obama was evident at McCain-Palin rallies.

"When you have an Obama, [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and the rest of the hooligans up there going to run this country, we have got to have our head examined. It's time that you two are representing us, and we are mad. So, go get them," one man told McCain at a town hall meeting in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

Another man was more pointed.

"And we're all wondering why that Obama is where he's at, how he got here. I mean, everybody in this room is stunned that we're in this position," another man said at Thursday's rally.

"I'm mad. I'm really mad. And what's going to surprise you, it's not the economy. It's the socialists taking over our country," one said. Watch more of the anger at the rallies »

Don't Miss

• McCain to voters: 'Who is the real Sen. Obama?'
• Second debate comes amid nasty campaigning
• Election Center 2008

More of the story....

McCain urged his supporters to be respectful of Obama.

"We want to fight and I will fight. But we will be respectful," he said. "I admire Sen. Obama and his accomplishments. I will respect him and I want everyone to be respectful, and let's make sure we are." Watch McCain address attacks on Obama »

CNN contributor David Gergen, who has advised Democratic and Republican presidential administrations, said Thursday that the negative tone of these rallies is "incendiary" and could lead to violence.

"There is this free floating sort of whipping around anger that could really lead to some violence. I think we're not far from that," he said. "I think it's really imperative that the candidates try to calm people down."

On Friday, Obama said the "barrage of nasty insinuations and attacks" was a result of the Republican nominee's failed economic ideas.

"They can run misleading ads, they can pursue the politics of anything goes. It will not work. Not this time. I think that folks are looking for something different this time. It's easy to rile up a crowd, nothing's easier than riling up a crowd by stoking anger and division. But that's not what we need right now in the United States. The times are too serious," Obama said at a rally in Chillicothe, Ohio.

Recently, McCain's campaign launched a string of ads that question Obama's judgment and character.

The McCain campaign calls Obama "too risky for America" in a new Web ad that focuses on his political relationship with Bill Ayers, a founding member of the radical Weather Underground.

"Barack Obama and domestic terrorist Bill Ayers. Friends. They've worked together for years. But Obama tries to hide it," the announcer said in the 90-second ad.

The now-defunct Weather Underground was involved in bombings in the early 1970s, including attacks on the Pentagon and the Capitol. Obama was a young child at the time of the bombings.

Obama and Ayers, now a university professor, met in 1995, when both worked with a nonprofit group trying to raise funds for a school improvement project and a charitable foundation. CNN's review of project records found nothing to suggest anything inappropriate in the volunteer projects in which the two men were involved. CNN Fact Check: Is Obama 'palling around with terrorists'?

Obama, in an April debate during the primaries, called Ayers "somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8."

At a rally Tuesday in Clearwater, Florida, Sarah Palin said Obama was being "less than truthful" about his ties to Ayers. "His own top adviser said they were 'certainly friendly.' ... I am just so fearful that this is not a man who sees America the way that you and I see America -- as the greatest source for good in this world," she said.

Palin told the crowd that she sees "a pattern in how our opponent has talked about one of his most troubling associations." Watch more of Palin's comments »

One member of the Palin audience in Jacksonville, Florida, Tuesday shouted out "treason." And at another rally in the state Monday, Palin's mention of the Obama-Ayers tie caused one member to yell out: "kill him" -- though it was unclear if it was targeted at Obama or Ayers.

At several recent rallies, Palin has stirred up crowds by mentioning the "liberal media." Routinely, there are boos at every mention of The New York Times and the "mainstream media," both of which are staples of Palin's stump speech.

Some audience members are openly hostile to members of the traveling press covering Palin; one crowd member hurled a racial epithet at an African-American member of the press in Clearwater, Florida, on Monday.

And at a McCain rally in New Mexico on Monday, one supporter yelled out "terrorist" when McCain asked, "Who is the real Barack Obama?" McCain didn't respond. Watch as McCain ramps up his criticism of Obama »

Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, a Democrat, on Friday told voters that the McCain-Palin campaign "would want you to be afraid of Barack Obama."

Some Republicans have also been critical of the McCain campaign.

Former Michigan Gov. William Milliken, a Republican, told the Grand Rapids Press he was "disappointed in the tenor and the personal attacks on the part of the McCain campaign."

"He is not the McCain I endorsed," Milliken said Thursday.

Some anger found at McCain-Palin rallies is directed at McCain for a different reason. Watch analysts weigh in on the recent attacks »

"I am begging you, sir, I am begging you, take it to him," another supporter said to the Arizona senator at the Wisconsin rally.

McCain, however, seems torn. On one hand, he is going negative on the Ayers controversy.

"The point is, Sen. Obama said he was just a guy in the neighborhood. We know that's not true," he said at the rally in Wisconsin. "We need to know the full extent of the relationship because of whether Sen. Obama is telling the truth to the American people or not."

On the other hand, McCain is trying to focus on the economic downturn plaguing the country.

"But I also, my friends, want to address the greatest financial challenge of our lifetime with a positive plan for action," he added.

Also, the McCains said months ago they didn't want their son Jimmy -- a Marine serving in Iraq -- dragged into the campaign.

But on Thursday, Cindy McCain brought up her son.

She criticized the Illinois senator for voting against a bill to fund troops in Iraq, a regular line of attack from her husband's campaign.

"The day that Sen. Obama cast a vote not to fund my son when he was serving sent a cold chill through my body, let me tell you," she told a Pennsylvania crowd before introducing her husband and his No. 2.

The vote Cindy McCain is referencing came in May 2007, when Obama was one of 14 senators who voted against a war-spending plan that would have provided emergency funds for American troops overseas.

A CNN fact check deemed the charge that Obama voted against troop funding "misleading." Obama supported a different version of the troop-funding plan -- one that McCain spoke against. Fact Check: Did Obama vote to cut funds for the troops?