Brad's Tiny World

Self Righteous American Citizens Must Obey The Law Too

Posted on 23. Feb, 2009 by Brad in Politics | Twitter: @bradhart |

There was once a time when America was a shining hope of the world.  It was a land that welcomed the tired, the hungry, the poor that is until the waspish power mongers decided they didn’t want to lose power or become a minority.  Enter the fear mongering demagogues who have done everything in their power to halt immigration legal or otherwise. In today’s Washington Times we get to see the short sighted rabble at work again.

Arizona rancher Roger Barnett initially faced the possibility of paying $32 million to compensate several illegal immigrants he stopped at gunpoint on his land. He walked away instead with a verdict that rejected any notion he violated the trespassers’ civil rights and affirmed that U.S. citizens can still detain aliens crossing the border.

What remains to be seen, though, is what impact the $77,800 in damages that a jury Tuesday ordered Mr. Barnett to pay will have on America’s larger immigration debate and the efforts of some illegals to get compensation from a country they aren’t even allowed to enter.

Whether a fair ruling or not you would assume from the attitudes of the commentators that Roger Barnett should have just shot and killed these people.  Here are just a few of the tame quotes:

By: deancc
Where is the ethical and moral back bone of our so called “System?” The U.S. Government should jump to the ranchers’ defense and also give him a big reward. Of course, we all understand, the Justice Department (Southwest District) under Mr. Sutton, is only working for the Mexican Government. I always wondered if he was geting paid off in drug money.

or

By: mascmen7
TROUBLING THAT A MAN MAY LOSE HIS PROPERTY BECAUSE US GOVERNMENT WILL NOT PROTECT HIM BUT SIDES WITH INVADERS. I AM USUALLY MEXICAN FRIENDLY BUT THIS CASE HAS AN OUTRAGEOUS OUTCOME.

I have a feeling by “Mexican friendly” he is amiable towards Taco Bell.

By: jnrdava
This sickens me. I do not understand how anyone that calls themselves American could allow this to happen. I do not understand why the judge even entertained this case in his court. I do not understand how anyone in their right mind would feel that Mr. Barnett owes these people something. Civil Rights??? They have none. Where is the logic in this? What a waste of time. Things like this make me angry and they should make all of us angry… white, black, liberal, conservative, christian, muslim… anyone that is an American Citizen should be angry! WHY???

It isn’t just the white republican nationalist xenophobes who feel this way. I know plenty of otherwise liberal people who haven’t got a clue how in the wrong they and the immigration policy has been for nearly a century.  Never once do these people ask why so many will risk life, limb and everything they have to get to this country.  Do the people coming across the border or being shipped across the sea in freight containers know it is illegal?  Sure they do, but to them it is worth the risk.  For most of them it is not the rewards they reap themselves that matters but the chance that they will have children and grandchildren born in this country with inviolable citizenship.  Ask yourself what you would do to give your children a better life?

What leaves me most concerned though is the last commentator who believes these people have no civil rights.  If civil rights are to mean anything to the people of this country, everyone on its soil, nea the world should be treated as though they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.  To say these people have no rights is the same as saying “Look there’s a foreigner he ain’t gots no rights, get ‘em!” and following it up with “Oops, my bad” when it turns out the mob you incited killed an American citizen.

In the end what all of these people who side with Roger Barnett fail to realize is he was convicted of assault, which from his other encounters with Latinos isn’t hard to believe.  I am sure some of those people who have come to his defense no doubt believe it is okay to rough up a perp in custody, but they are wrong. It doesn’t matter if it is a beat cop making an arrest or Roger Barnett affecting a citizens arrest the law forbid you from attacking brutalizing the prisoner.  If Roger Barnett wants to play border cop, he must be held to the same standards as every other border cop, or he is nothing but a vigilante breaking the law every bit as much as anyone illegally crossing the border.

Join me in tomorrow in part two of This Immigration Article series.

Part II: Fix the Economy by Fixing Immigration

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