Islands of Exemption
By Mitch Berg
Senator Norm Coleman defends last week’s attempt in the Senate to shut down the preening arrogance of the “sanctuary cities” movement – a group of cities who’ve ordered their police to stop cooperating with immigration authorities. The “movement” includes Minneapolis and Richfield, and might expand to Saint Paul before too long.
These “sanctuary cities,” which currently include Minneapolis, offer the perfect setting for people determined to hurt us by offering them protection from immigration-related questions. In several cities local law enforcement are forbidden from asking during their routine police work whether a person is in the United States lawfully, thereby evading their legal responsibility to report their suspicions to the federal government. Essentially, the philosophy is “don’t ask, don’t tell” — don’t ask suspects about their immigration status, so you then don’t have to tell the federal authorities about them.
Scores of law enforcement officers have chafed at the gag order. Many say they routinely come into contact with dangerous persons they know have been deported already — yet their local sanctuary policies prevent them from being able to do anything about it. A few chilling examples include Mohammed Atta, the leader of the 9/11 hijackers, who was stopped and ticketed for driving without a license in Broward County, Florida, in early 2001. His visa had expired. Nobody asked, so nobody told.
These cities – universally led by left-of-center extremists – believe that their issues with immigration enforcement (all of which generally trace back to “Democrat influence peddling” and “political correctness”) trump national security.
Just this month we saw a terror plot unfold in Fort Dix that might have been prevented sooner, had the local officials who pulled the suspects over on numerous traffic violations been able to inquire about their immigration status. Make no mistake — this is a national security issue.
For this reason, I have put forth a proposal in the Senate to simply make it clear that a police officer has a right to ask immigration-related questions of a suspect, and to report his or her suspicions to federal authorities through already established channels. The amendment will lift the gag order on our local law enforcement and make these sanctuary policies illegal. I’m not asking local cops to conduct raids; I’m just asking that they be allowed to use their good judgment.
Here’s an idea, Norm; start spreading the rumor that anti-abortion activists, televangelists and NRA members are sneaking across the border.
You’ll see Democrat calls for fences along both borders and the coastline and no-knock raids on illegal immigrants’ households faster than you can say “Algore”.
You’re welcome.
May 29th, 2007 at 7:07 am
I guess you wingnuts only trust local governments when they’re banning evolution and keeping Huck Finn out of libraries.
May 29th, 2007 at 7:29 am
“”I guess you wingnuts only trust local governments when they’re banning evolution and keeping Huck Finn out of libraries. “”
Ooooo, that’ll leave a mark!
Flash
May 29th, 2007 at 8:10 am
Ooooo, that’ll leave a mark!
Yeah. A mark in my “yet another provincial snark” log.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:20 am
Don’t blame me for being provincial, Mitch. Angryclown didn’t have the advantage of growing up in Little House on the Prairie land, where the neighbors range all the way from funny-talking white people to really funny talking white people.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:41 am
Funny AC, but in my city it was PC liberals who recently sought to banish Huck Finn from the school libraries. Never the let the facts get in the way of a good snark.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:41 am
I thought angryclown regarded spending his formative years “under the big top” as an advantage, one fit to lord over all of us from “Little House on the Prairie land”.
I see now that is not so.
Poor, poor angryclown. *tears*
May 29th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Mitch said,
“Here’s an idea, Norm; start spreading the rumor that anti-abortion activists, televangelists and NRA members are sneaking across the border.
You’ll see Democrat calls for fences along both borders
Why would we do that? If they want to sneak across the border into Mexico and Canada, great. The last thing I would want would be to keep those nutjobs here.
May 29th, 2007 at 10:09 am
Going by the same principles a city somewhere in the US could adopt a sanctuary policy about industrial polluters. The people who setup those kind of businesses will love it, and the local people will get jobs. Screw those bastards who live in cities downstream from the plant.
May 29th, 2007 at 10:34 am
Terry blathered: “Going by the same principles a city somewhere in the US could adopt a sanctuary policy about industrial polluters.”
Guess you’ve never been to Alabama.
May 29th, 2007 at 11:18 am
that’d make two of you.
May 29th, 2007 at 11:36 am
Been to Alabama twice. Minnesota three times.
May 29th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
“”Funny AC, but in my city it was PC liberals who recently sought to banish Huck Finn from the school libraries.””
http://www.startribune.com/462/story/1071200.html
Ken Gilbert read the story of Huckleberry Finn in the late 1960s in a segregated black North Carolina school, . . . . When daughter Nia was assigned to read it in her 10th-grade honors class, his memories of a racially volatile childhood came surging back. Now Gilbert and his wife, Sylvia, are reviving a century-old debate by asking St. Louis Park High School to remove the novel from the required-reading list.
Now, here’s those pesky facts:
For Gilbert, a 52-year-old small-business owner, there’s not much question: While no word should be banned entirely, he said, he believes it should not be tolerated in informal conversation or popular entertainment. For blacks, he said, “There’s no word that brings you to a lower level. … It makes children feel less than equal in the classroom.”
He does not seek to ban the book from the school. “I don’t care if all of America reads the book,” he said, but he doesn’t want it to be required classroom reading.
= = = =
So no one is seeking to ban the book, just have it removed from required reading. This ‘small business’ owner has some legitimate concerns.
At least now I know how the Right defines PC Liberals.
Flash
May 29th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
From the “funny talking white people” comment above, angryclown, should I assume you kept your eyes closed the whole time you were in Minnesota?
May 29th, 2007 at 1:56 pm
Flash-
I like the way you just happen to leave this pesky fact from the Strib story out:
Ken Gilbert said he is a former member of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense in North Carolina.
You’re right that liberal is probably not the right word for him. More of a true leftist really.
May 29th, 2007 at 1:59 pm
No Troy, woulda bumped into too many fat people that way. You Minnesota folks sure do love the animal fat.
Repeat after Angryclown; “No thank you. Two servings of bacon is enough for me.”
May 29th, 2007 at 2:27 pm
Isn’t “fat” one of those offensive and naughty words no one is supposed to use? 😉
Watch out, angryclown. You are becoming more like Ann Coulter all the time.
May 29th, 2007 at 3:00 pm
Dat a noo yawkker wud quol ENNYwun “funny-twoakin'” is friggin’ hi-LAIR-ious. I mean, in Noo Yock, Too-ul and Coo-ul and Foo-ul aw two-syllabul woids.
Dooshbayg. Fugeddaboudit.
May 29th, 2007 at 3:07 pm
You betcha, boy howdy!
May 29th, 2007 at 4:19 pm
Chad:
I left nothing germain out. Mitch is proof that past ideology is no indicator of future leaning. In fact, he says the best conservatives are former liberals and touts himself as living proof. My point was that A) It wasn’t PC craze that began the debate, and B) no one was trying to ban anything.
Flash
May 29th, 2007 at 5:23 pm
Flash:
funny how the PCers overlook the fact that Huck Finn is the most anti-slavery novel ever written in their zeal to banish it for one certain word.
And before you call me racist, I’m black.
May 29th, 2007 at 8:00 pm
The problem Paul is that you are not authentic black. Otherwise you would be in the banish huck finn camp. Please stop thinking for yourself.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:00 pm
Mark Twain is old stuff. Check out this article from The Nation about how award winning Hawaii writer Lois Yamanaka (no republican) has changed her writing after being criticized for her portrayal of Filipino men: http://www.thenation.com/doc/19990301/pennybacker
In 1998 the Association of Asian American Studies gave her their fiction award and then rescinded it after complaints from Filipino intellectuals.
May 30th, 2007 at 6:06 am
Paul said: “funny how the PCers overlook the fact that Huck Finn is the most anti-slavery novel ever written in their zeal to banish it for one certain word.
And before you call me racist, I’m black. ”
Well it’s one of the greatest American novels, but “the most anti-slavery novel ever written?” Not exactly. Considering it was written 20 years after slavery was abolished at the point of federal bayonets. And that “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” while not in the same literary category as Huck Finn, help bring on the war that freed the slaves. But it’s nice to know that black wingnuts are as prone to overstatement as white wingnuts.
May 30th, 2007 at 7:33 am
angryclown criticized someone else for being prone to overstatement.
Now that is entertainment! *applauds*
May 30th, 2007 at 7:34 am
Flash-
This guy wants to have one of the great American novels removed from high school reading lists because he doesn’t like a word in it. That’s PC by any definition.
That and the fact that he was a former Black Panther makes me pretty confident that he is not a conservative. Being a Black Panther wasn’t like belonging to Young Democrats. They were a radical organization that supported the overthrow of the US government (and unlike Mark Giselson, there was no question that they had the ‘nads for it).
While he’s not trying to ban the book outright, I can only imagine the cries of “censorship” that would come forth if a religious conservative was trying to have a book removed from a school’s reading list. My point was that while AC can snark (and you can chortle along) about phantom wingnuts banning Huck Finn, the closest examples you can find to such actions in real life are likely to be instigated by the left.
May 30th, 2007 at 7:48 am
True enough, Chad. It’s leftwing idiots who mostly try to ban Huck Finn. It’s rightwing idiots who try to ban Harry Potter, Heather Has Two Mommies, Catcher in the Rye, anything with sex or occult themes, Charles Darwin…
May 30th, 2007 at 8:12 am
Please give some “reality based” examples of these bans by “rightwing idiots” angryclown.
I just want to know if the circumstances are similar, or if you are, perhaps, overstating your case. 🙂
May 30th, 2007 at 8:24 am
Sure, Trojan Man. From the American Library Association:
http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek/bbwlinks/challengesbytype20002005.pdf
Complaints that books are anti-ethnic, insensitive, racist or sexist? Probably leftwing kooks. But look at all the other complaints: homosexuality, anti-family, sexually explicit, abortion, occult/satanism? Those have “wingnut” written all over ’em. Do the math. Wingnut challenges far outdistance those from lefty kooks.
May 30th, 2007 at 8:58 am
So based on “probably” and your judgment of what is “written all over ’em”, I am supposed to do some math?
Your comments have “assumption” written all over ’em, angryclown. 🙂
May 30th, 2007 at 9:13 am
Angryclown’s judgment is worth more than that of 20 wingnuts, Trojan Man. It makes Angryclown sad that you don’t understand. But if you were intelligent, you wouldn’t be a kooky wingnut, now would you?
May 30th, 2007 at 10:02 am
I do not wish to make angryclown sadder still, but I must contest the value of angryclown’s judgment.
I believe that wisdom, not intelligence, breeds good judgment.
I don’t question angryclown’s intelligence, but I do question his wisdom exactly because of the judgment he displays. On the other hand, I question mine too. *shrug*