Klansman James Ford Seale gets 3 life terms for '64 killings

Seale gets 3 life terms for '64 killings (by Emily Wagster Pettus, AP - 8.24.07)

JACKSON, Miss. - James Ford Seale, a reputed Ku Klux Klansman, was sentenced Friday to three life terms in prison for his role in the 1964 abduction and murder of two black teenagers in southwest Mississippi.

Seale, 72, was convicted in June on federal charges of kidnapping and conspiracy in the deaths of Charles Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee, two 19-year-olds who disappeared from Franklin County on May 2, 1964.

The young men's bodies were found two months later in the Mississippi River.

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Photo #1: A 1964 photo of James Ford Seale who went on to become a Mississippi Sheriff's Deputy. Mississippi Highway Dept.

Photo #2: James Ford Seale at the Jackson, Mississippi federal courthouse, June 15, 2007, after being found guilty of murdering two young African American men, Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee. AP

Hall of Shame: Ann Coulter - A Proud Bigot

A self-described "Christian Conservative Bigot", Ann Coulter's acidic tongue has earned her the moniker Annthrax. In 1 DOWN, 11,999,999 TO GO, Coulter offers this observation: "[Elvira] Arellano is part of the advance wave of left-wing, Third World colonization of America. If they have their way, there will be two Latin Americas."

A Nativist War at Home

Immigration debate gets angrier: Groups loudly press for state, local crackdowns.
(by Dave Montgomery - SacramentoBee - 8.19.07)

1) Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and stealth Republican presidential candidate recently declared "a war here at home" against illegal immigration, which he says is as important as the US-Iraq War.

2) "Even though immigration is always unsettling and somewhat controversial, we haven't had this kind of intensity and widespread, deep-seated anger for almost 100 years," said Doris Meissner, a senior fellow with the Migration Policy Institute and former commissioner of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

3) The Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups, said the number of "nativist extremist" organizations advocating against illegal immigration has grown from virtually zero just over five years ago to 144, including groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan supremacists.

4) Eighty-three percent of immigrants from Mexico and 79 percent of immigrants from Central America believe there is growing discrimination against Latin American immigrants in the United States, according to a poll conducted by Miami-based Bendixen & Associates.

5) As prospects for congressional action appeared increasingly in doubt this year, all 50 states and more than 75 towns and cities considered -- and in many cases enacted -- immigration restrictions, even though initial court rulings have declared such actions unconstitutional intrusions on federal responsibilities.

RightWing Media Killed Immigration Reform

The Politico has an interesting article on a Project for Excellence in Journalism study confirming that rightwing radio/cable helped defeat immigration reform.

The report found that unlike mainstream media and liberal radio which devoted very little time to the immigration debate, rightwing talkers spent the spring and summer trashing immigration reform proposals.

Lou Dobbs was the leader of the anti-immigration reform pack that included Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and Michael Weiner Savage.

What the study doesn't mention is that rightwing radio/cable fomented anti-Latino racism as a way to kill immigration reform. Or that the rightwing wanted the immigration dust-up in order to distract people away from the $500 billion travesty that is the US-Iraq War.

Read Talk radio helped sink immigration reform (The Politico - 8.20.07).

Hall of Shame: Michael Weiner (i.e., Michael the Savage)

Michael Weiner (aka, Michael Savage)is a rightwing radio screecher with a habit of calling for the deaths of people with whom he disagrees. For example, he's called for killing 100 million muslims. And he believes that having American Latino college students die from starvation would help fix the immigration problem.

GOP Candidates Alienate Latino Voters

GOP Candidates Alienate Latino Voters (by Paul Waldman, The American Prospect - 8.15.07)

Republicans, who just a few short years ago were trying to court Latino voters, are going to come to regret the anti-immigration one-upmanship they've exhibited in the primary campaign.

"One thing that has become clear in this race is that whatever the GOP base wants to hear, Mitt Romney will give it in portions so big they won't be able to clean their plates Hate abortion? Mitt's right there with you, with the fervor of the converted. Think America's terrorism problem is because we aren't being tough enough? Say hello to Mr. Double Guantanamo. And if it's immigrant-bashing you want, Romney will give Tom Tancredo a run for his money as the most anti-immigrant of the candidates.

There is no doubt that Romney and the rest of the Republican field will find an audience for anti-immigration rhetoric in the primaries. But by indulging this particular corner of the Republican id, they could be doing monumental, long-term damage to their party."

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Hall of Shame: Freepers

Freepers are what members of Free Republic--a rightwing chat site--call themselves. Anti-Latino hatred is a common feature among the anonymously posted commentary. For example, Candor7's response to Homeland Czar Chertoff's prediction that the immigration crackdown will impact certain industries is typical:

Americans, including me, would rather do their own landscaping, mow their own lawns, do their own laundry, pick vegetables and fruit and pay higher prices for real wages, end indentured illegal alien servitude, and keep America from turning into a bilingual nation with the Hispanics not caring a bit about the patriotism and nation hosting them, nor wanting to learn the English language and assimilate culturally.

Running Latinos Out of Town in Carpentersville, Illinois

Our Town: All Immigration Politics Is Local (by Alex Kotlowitz, NYTimes Magazine - 8.5.07)

Even though 40% of Carpentersville, Illinois' 37,000 residents are Latino, it has not stopped local politicians from running on anti-Latino platforms and winning.

Gaining power by pitting Whites against Latinos, village trustees have enacted a series of employment and housing codes aimed at beating back the rising Latino population.

Residents of Latino heritage--many which are long-time residents--are shocked and dismayed by the anti-Latino animus of the new village trustees and their supporters.

Unfortunately, the racists appear to have won a short-term victory: American Latinos are leaving town.

Sign the ¡Ya basta! Petition.

Also see PORTRAIT OF A SMALL TOWN'S WAR ON IMMIGRANTS by immigration attorney and blogger Greg Siskind.

Racism Killed Immigration Reform (by Jon Garrido)

The following are excerpts from Latino Businessman and Activist Jon Garrido's Racism Killed Immigration Reform (Hispanic News - 7.31.07):

A federal judge dealt a decisive blow against a dangerous trend of freelance immigration policies by local governments. Judge James M. Munley of the central Pennsylvania district, struck down ordinances in the town of Hazleton that sought to harshly punish undocumented migrants for trying to live and work there, and employers and landlords for providing them with homes and jobs.

In the year 2097, 50% of the entire United States population will be Hispanic...5% will be white...''

The browning of America is inevitable. No one can stop it.

The ruling was a well-earned embarrassment for Mayor Louis J. Barletta and his proclaimed goal of making Hazleton ''one of the toughest places in the United States” for migrants. In doing so, Judge Munley laid down basic truths.

Basic truths that every American should remember

First, immigration is a federal responsibility. State and local governments have no right to usurp or upend a vast, ''carefully drawn federal statutory scheme” that governs who enters the country and the conditions under which immigrants stay, study, work and naturalize. Congress may be botching the job, but has not delegated it.

Herein lies the crux of the problem, racism was the major contributing factor that killed immigration reform

An Hispanic friend, Sen. Barack Obama said the recent Senate immigration debate ''was both ugly and racist in a way we haven't see since the struggle for civil rights.''

Even Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina in the well of the U.S. Senate said, ''There’s no shortage of plain old racism in this issue.''

Every brown face in America is suspect

If you think conservative Republican talk radio, cable television and other Americans focus only on migrants, you must be living in a cave for every brown face in America is suspect.

Citizenship

Hispanics cast 5.6 million votes in the 2006 midterms elections which represented only 13 percent of the total Hispanic population compared to the 27 percent of all blacks who cast votes and 39 percent of all whites who voted — a disappointing turnout attributed to a population too young to vote or ineligible because of citizenship status.

Working on getting out the vote will help but this is not enough. We need to go on the offense. We need to launch a local campaign to identify, name and shame those who systematically bash Hispanics. Then we need to launch a nationwide campaign.

The only consolation

The only consolation is a population projection from the Unites States Census Bureau: In the year 2097, 50% of the entire United States population will be Hispanic, 30% will be black, 13% will be Asian, 5% will be white, and 2% will be ''other.'' The browning of America is inevitable. No one can stop it.

Latinos Face 'Time for Confrontation'

MIAMI -- The Senate's failure to pass immigration reform sent Latinos the message: fend for yourselves, said Janet Murguía, head of National Council of La Raza, at its recent 2007 conference in Miami. A vocal minority of shock jock radio hosts fueled a mob that overcame Congress, Murguía said.

"We thought we were having a debate on immigration policy," she said. "But it was really a debate about who decides what it means to be an American." While Latinos have been trying hard to be civil and fair, she said, "some of our opponents have taken a different tack," using hatred and bigotry.

In politics, she said, there is a time for coorperation and a time for confrontation -- and Latinos have been cooperating long enough.

Democracy, Murguía said, challenges Latinos now to "ask the tough questions" such as, "What does it mean to be an American?" or "Will you stand up and reaffirm the best of America?"

Integration and further participation in American civic, social and economic life is the only way for Latinos to level the playing field, she said. Voting and mobilizing more voters through the recently announced Ya Es Hora (Now is the Time) campaign, Murguía added, represent the best option for their community to triumph over bigotry.

Click here for the full text (pdf) of Janet Murguía's speech at the 2007 NCLR conference.