Riehl World View

DOJ Concerned About Discrimination, Sues Sheriff Arpaio

No politics involved here, of course. Just Holder doing his job, I guess. Oh, wait, politics is his job. I forgot.

PHOENIX (AP) -- The U.S. Justice Department sued Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Thursday, saying the Arizona lawman refused for more than a year to turn over records in an investigation into allegations his department discriminates against Hispanics.

The lawsuit calls Arpaio and his office's defiance "unprecedented," and said the federal government has been trying since March 2009 to get officials to comply with its probe of alleged discrimination, unconstitutional searches and seizures, and having English-only policies in his jails that discriminates against people with limited English skills.

Arpaio had been given until Aug. 17 to hand over documents it first asked for 15 months ago.

Maybe AZ Gov Jan Brewer Has A Point About Libya

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer was recently outraged over a Clinton State Department decision.

Gov. Brewer Outraged over Clinton's UN Report, Will Libya and Cuba Get to Decide if AZ 1070 is Right or Wrong?

As I said to someone via Twitter the other day, if nothing else, it will allow Libya to weigh in on American domestic law. Perhaps they will feel we're treating illegals too harshly. I suppose we could simply send them home, making them promise to not do it, again. In fact, even if deported, I don't believe we even do that.

An organization run by one of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's sons says authorities have released from prison 37 Islamic militants, including a former inmate of the U.S.-run Guantanamo Bay prison, Cuba. The Gadhafi International Charity and Development Foundation says the militants had agreed to give up their extremist ideology and violence before they were released. (AP)

But did they cross their hearts and hope to die? Could be, could be.

Smart: Border Fence Bookended By Two Wide Open Foot Bridges Into US

The AP has a photo to go along with the article. So, we built $2.4 billion of fencing and ended it at two obvious and wide open foot paths, or bridges, to simply walk into the US at leisure. But technically they aren't called bridges, so, ... oh well.

These are the same people that will be running your health care folks. It is as stupid, and laughable as it is infuriating. Rule number one in government, we must demonstrate our incompetence. It's the DC way!

ACALA, Texas (AP) -- On each side of a towering West Texas stretch of the $2.4 billion border fence designed to block people from illegally entering the country, there are two metal footbridges, clear paths into the United States from Mexico.

The footpaths that could easily guide illegal immigrants and smugglers across the Rio Grande without getting wet seem to be there because of what amounts to federal linguistics. While just about anyone would call them bridges, the U.S.-Mexico group that owns them calls them something else.

"Technically speaking it's not a bridge, it's a grade control structure," said Sally Spener, spokeswoman for the International Boundary and Water Commission, which maintains the integrity of the 1,200-mile river border between the U.S. and Mexico. The structures under the spans help prevent the river - and therefore the international border - from shifting.

Leak Test: Joe The Plumber vs. Obama's Illegal Aunt

Equal treatment under the law? Two leaks from the 2008 election have made it through the courts. One involved Joe the Plumber:

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A federal court in Ohio has dismissed a lawsuit that claimed former state employees violated the constitutional rights of a man Republicans dubbed Joe the Plumber by illegally accessing his personal information.

The U.S. District Court said Wednesday the retaliation claims weren't concrete enough and the privacy claims didn't amount to constitutional violations.

One involved Obama's illegal aunt.

Shapiro found that a federal government official disclosed Onyango's immigration status and her relationship to Obama to The Associated Press three days before the November 2008 election in which Obama was elected as the first black president.

Shapiro called the disclosure "a reckless and illegal violation of her right to privacy which has exposed her to great risk," and he criticized the official for using the information for political reasons.

NYC Seeing Surge In Anti-Hispanic Violence, By Blacks

When I saw the headline, I was afraid it was some of those racist Tea Party folks I'm always reading about.

Attacks against Mexicans inflame tensions in NYC

Recorded by a store's surveillance camera, the assault was the first of 11 suspected anti-Hispanic bias attacks in a Staten Island neighborhood, re-igniting years-old tensions between blacks and Hispanics in New York City's most remote borough.

Residents of Port Richmond - where an influx of newcomers from Latin America over the past decade has transformed the community - alternately blame the attacks on the economy, unemployment and the debate over Arizona's immigration law.

And although most of the suspects were described as young black men and investigated for bias crimes, a grand jury has indicted only one of seven people arrested on a hate-crime charge.

Angle Cancels As Tea Party, Illegal Immigration Activists Gather On AZ, Mexican Border

It's hitting the wires as a Tea Party event. But there does also seem to be other groups involved, as well. About 400 attended, Hayworth hit McCain on immigration. Sharron Angle stayed home, probably a smart move. She needs to be in Nevada, not Arizona.

LAS VEGAS — Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle has canceled her scheduled appearance at a weekend tea party rally near the Mexican border in Arizona.

Angle spokesman Jarrod Agen says the logistics of getting Angle to the United We Stand for Americans border coalition event in Hereford, Ariz., on Sunday couldn't be worked out. He says Angle will appear Saturday at a Republican picnic in Elko, Nev., and Sunday at fundraisers in Las Vegas.

AZ Law Fall-Out, More Illegals Seek Drivers License

If you're pro-illegal immigrant, is this a bad thing? OTOH, if you're anti and live in one of those three states, you're experiencing an increase in illegals coming into your state.

More immigrants getting licenses

BURIEN, Wash. (AP) -- Carlos Hernandez packed up his family and left Arizona after the state passed its sweeping immigration crackdown. The illegal immigrant's new home outside Seattle offered something Arizona could not: a driver's license.

Three states - Washington, New Mexico and Utah - allow illegal immigrants to get licenses because their laws do not require proof of citizenship or legal residency. An Associated Press analysis found that those states have seen a surge in immigrants seeking IDs in recent months, a trend experts attribute to crackdowns on illegal immigration in Arizona and elsewhere.

"It's difficult being undocumented and not having an identification," said Hernandez, of Puebla, Mexico. "You can use the Mexican ID, but people look down on it." An American driver's license is also a requirement for many jobs.

Harry "Who Am I?" Reid

The other day I pointed how how Reid is quietly pushing a broad energy tax that will hurt small business and the middle class based upon bogus environmentalist arguments.

Here's his evolving view on illegal immigration over the years. As with so many DC politicians, Reid has forgotten who he went there to serve and now serves himself to  whatever political position helps advance his own career.

Senator Reid v. Senate Democrat Whip Reid

“When it comes to immigration reform, Senator Harry Reid has been nothing but a hypocrite. As a rank-and-file senator, Reid authored a bill to alter the 14th Amendment’s birth right clause, because he felt illegal immigrants were ‘freeloaders’ and ‘scam artists.’ Then in 1999, after Senator Reid became the Democrat Whip in the Senate, he quickly shifted his position on immigration. Nevadans deserve a senator like Sharron Angle who will stand up against illegal immigration, not a political opportunist like Senator Reid who abandoned his beliefs to further his political career.”

Maverick McCain Splits With Leadership, No Amendment Change On Citizenship

My, what a straight-shooter. Let's see, I think I can get away with playing border cop. But I don't want to go too far and take a principled stand I might actually have to do something on one day. Calculating hack. He'll be back denouncing conservatives as racist and xenophobic within three months of being re-elected, if he is. That would be NRO endorsed John McCain I'm talking about.

PHOENIX (AP) -- Breaking with Republican leaders in the Senate, U.S. Sen. John McCain says he is not requesting hearings into the constitutional amendment that grants automatic citizenship to babies born in the United States, and doesn't support changing the Constitution.

McCain told The Associated Press that, despite a statement he made last week that was widely interpreted as meaning he supported hearings on the 14th Amendment, he remains unconvinced that a change in the Constitution is needed. Instead, he argued that fully securing the border would help to solve the problem.

Splendid: Immigrant's Dream Ends With Genocide Allegation, Bankruptcy

We must have one hell of an immigration and naturalization service to allow this to happen. Count her as one of the unfortunates American citizens whose mortgage is underwater, too.

Authorities say she was an extremist Hutu who killed and enabled the rapes of untold Tutsi victims - not the innocent refugee she claimed to be in 1995 to gain U.S. entry, when she applied for a visa and for citizenship.

Her dream life apparently ended, it started falling apart years earlier. She filed for bankruptcy in May 2008, walking away from hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt: a $222,000 mortgage, $14,125 in student loans, $4,198 in municipal taxes and fees and $30,000 in credit card and other unsecured debt.

"She lived here for probably two years without paying her mortgage; she didn't pay her bills for a good two years," said Tom Prince of Manchester, who lived across the street from Munyenezi. "We all feel she took advantage."

In early 2003, she was sworn in as a U.S. citizen and bought a three-bedroom home on Howe Street for $190,000 in November, according to city records. She refinanced it three years later for $235,000.