Fear walks the streets of Phoenix - Aug 2010
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Phoenix, Arizona (CNN) -- It was an ethnic twist on an American classic, the kind of thing that some people consider appealing and others frightening. Pinto beans, diced tomatoes, salsa and jalapenos top a hot dog that's grilled to perfection. It's 10 o'clock on a Saturday night at ground zero in the immigration debate. The hot dog vendor, a woman from the Mexican state of Sinaloa, would normally be doing a brisk business. Her cart is across the street from a popular Latino dance club that used to be frequented by Mexican-Americans but is now normally crammed with Mexican immigrants.
No mas.
"The city feels abandoned," the woman tells me in Spanish. "Everyone has left."
It sure looks that way during a drive though the city's predominantly Latino west side, with its
abandoned buildings, deserted homes and empty parks. Since April, when Gov. Jan Brewer signed SB 1070 to
punish illegal immigrants for the sins of the employers who hire them, estimates are that tens of thousands of illegal immigrants have left Arizona for a warmer climate in Utah, Colorado, Texas or New Mexico.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton struck down four of the most grotesque and illogical parts of the law, including the requirement that local police attempt to determine the immigration status of individuals they suspect of being in the country illegally and language making it a crime to solicit work. They should have gone back to Mexico, but they'd already put down roots in Phoenix, where the husband could earn at least 10 times what he could make in Mexico. We talked about how some conservatives insist that illegal immigrants take jobs from U.S. workers:
"They're spoiled. They think it's easy to come to the United States legally, and they speak from
ignorance."
You've heard how Arizona tried to empower local police to arrest gardeners and housekeepers to crack down on Mexican drug dealers. Baloney. That's just how the state's anti-immigrant efforts are packaged for public consumption. What are nativists supposed to do? Convince Arizonans that the nannies they give their babies to every day are dangerous, that the gardeners to whom they volunteer their security code are a threat. You need drug dealers in this dialogue. Who else are people going to be afraid of?
Not a hot dog vendor. Think about where that woman was from -- Sinaloa. That state is the capital of the Mexican drug trafficking industry. It's quite simple. If you're from Sinaloa and you sell drugs, you can
live a luxurious life in Mexico. If you sell hot dogs, you work long, hot nights in the desert. Arizonans are ginning up
fear of one to rid their state of the other.
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:2 cents: Arizona: What a nice place to live. :1orglaugh
