100,000 Protestors... Angry mobs of students...

[innerSpaceman]

(cough)Abdul Rachman(cough).


Of course, blacks were commonly lynched if they were involved with white woman in the early days of interracial relationships in the U.S., so who knows.

But I've a feeling the KKK is akin to a gradeschool bully when compared to Islamist mullahs who determine violations of Koranic law.

[Alex]

Islam is already broken in dozens of major sects. Sunnis and Shiites are just the two major ones. It breaks down from there and that is why you can generally find someone of sufficient rank to issue a fatwa against whatever someone wants a fatwa against.

If further sectation does happen I think it will be in the direction of radicalism rather than integration.

[innerSpaceman]

But bringing the subject back to current U.S. immigration issues ...

The Kennedy/McCain bill adopted by the Senate Judiciary Committee looks to be the most liberal position that is going to be on the table ... with a final bill likely more conservative. Not only does the Senate bill have to be reconciled with the draconian House bill, but it's rumored that Senator Frist will introduce a conservative immigration bill in the Senate, trying to get ahead of consideration of the Kennedy/McCain bill.

Seeing that Kennedy/McCain already contains some pretty tough stuff, I think the massive protests should continue unabated for the foreseeable future. While the bill purports to provide some means for illegals to eventually become citizens, the devil is in the details. The immigrant must be employed as a "guest worker" for six consecutive years to be eligible for a green card, but any fraud committed in gaining such employment bars citizenship. As I understand it, minor fraud committed by both employee and employer is common when hiring illegals (the boss providing the false social security numbers for the employee to use in his job application, for example).

I'm sure there are other details requiring quite a bit of study to comprehend and take stock of. So I can hardly expect everyone protesting to be 100% clear on the issues. A schoolteacher friend of mine tells me that most of the kids in his classes who participated in yesterday's walk-out had only the most vague idea of the issues at hand.

Nonetheless, if the eventual bill is likely to be even more draconian than Kennedy/McCain, I hope there are more protests and more walk-outs, and even French-style striking society to its knees for a while until our legislators get the message that fair immigration overhaul is the only kind that will be tolerated.

[Alex]

The problem with "French-style striking society to its knees" is that this is federal legislation in a very big country where most of the country would not be seriously hampered by such behavior.

Sure, parts of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Florida, and New York City would be hampered but that would likely only strengthen the resolve of the rest of the country that this is a problem requiring extreme solutions. When you go to Minneapolis there is a surprising sight for this person grown used to California: restaurant bus boys and dish washers are white (or, more likely, black). Gardeners are white (or also likely legal post-Vietnam legal immigrants).

If every illegal immigrant disappeared tomorrow there would be parts of the country hampered but most of the country would go on with little short-term effect. If this were a California bill I could see such protests having a desired effect (but similar experience during the debate over 187 shows otherwise), but I don't see it having anything other than a negative effect at the national level.

[innerSpaceman]

There was a film awhile back whose title I cannot recall (alas, I did not see it) - where all the latinos in Los Angeles disappeared overnight, and havoc ensued.

With little offense meant to our brethren in Minnesota, Kansas City, Helena, and Bismark ... bringing L.A. and NY alone to their knees would cripple the economic picture of the entire nation. I'm really glad to hear that there are many places where the home-grown underclass must do the undesireable jobs ... but in most places where substantial financial activity takes place, it's the latino immigrants who handle all the dirty work.

A few days out of the month with Los Angeles, New York, Phoenix, Atlanta, Houston, Miami, and D.C. brought to a standstill will get the message loud and clear to the businesses who hold the strings of the legislators for the entire nation. Minnesota need not participate ... but their solidarity would be appreciated.

[Alex]

I think you're wrong in your assessment (both of the impact protests could have on the overall economy and in what the reaction would be) but there is only one way to find out which one of us is right.

Hopefully it won't come to that.

[€uroMeinke]

So what is the penalty for inciting to riot?

But - I have to wonder about just how "white" the midwest remains, my understanding is immigrant communities are just not along the Southern borders anymore.

[Alex]

They're there for sure (particularly populations of non-Mexican illegal immigrants) but not to the same effect as in LA. But worst case is that overall immigrants are about 4% of U.S. population and heavily concentrated in border states and the largest urban areas otherwise (New York City, Chicago, Seattle, etc.).

[innerSpaceman]

That may be overall immigrants, but what about the percentage of the sympathetic latino citizen population? If whites are set to become the minority race in the U.S. within 20 years, I suspect latino population is pretty huge right now.







(And increasing at an appropriately alarming catholic rate, I might add. Now, if we could only get the latinos to emmigrate to Europe, we could have a grand battle of the birthrates for world-domination between the catholics and the muslims!)

[tracilicious]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

There was a film awhile back whose title I cannot recall (alas, I did not see it) - where all the latinos in Los Angeles disappeared overnight, and havoc ensued.

It was A Day Without a Mexican. I recommend it. It was very good.