I thought this about summed up what I was thinking about the present day "guest workers" in our country. I'm planning to send it to my Senators and Congressman. Hugs BD

This is a very good letter to the editor. This woman made some good points. For some reason, people have difficulty structuring their arguments when arguing against supporting the currently proposed immigration revisions.

This lady made the argument pretty simple. Not printed in the Orange County Paper. Newspapers simply won't publish letters to the editor which they either deem politically incorrect (read below) or which does not agree with the philosophy they're pushing on the public. This woman wrote a great letter to the editor that should have been published; but, with your help it will get published via cyberspace.

From: 'David LaBonte'



My wife, Rosemary, wrote a wonderful letter to the editor of the OC Register which, of course, was not printed. So, I decided to 'print' it myself by sending it out on the Internet.

Pass it along if you feel so inclined. Written in response to a

series of letters to the editor in theOrange County Register:



Dear Editor:

So many letter writers have based their arguments on how this land is made up of immigrants. Ernie Lujan for one, suggests we should tear down the Statue of Liberty because the people now in question aren't being treated the same as those who passed through Ellis Island and other ports of entry.

Maybe we should turn to our history books and point out to people like Mr. Lujan why today's American is not willing to accept this new kind of immigrant any longer.

Back in 1900 when there was a rush from all areas of Europe to come to the United States, people had to get off a ship and stand in a
long line in New York and be documented. Some would even get down on their hands and knees and kiss the ground. They made a pledge to uphold the laws and support their new country in good and bad times.

They made learning English a primary rule in their new American households and some even changed their names to blend in with their new home.

They had waved good bye to their birth place to give their children a new life and did everything in their power to help their children assimilate into one culture. Nothing was handed to them. No free lunches, no welfare, no labor laws to protect them.

All they had were the skills and craftsmanship they had brought with them to trade for a future of prosperity.

Most of their children came of age when World War II broke out. My father fought along side men whose parents had come straight over from Germany, Italy, France and Japan. None of these first generation Americans ever gave any thought about what country their parents had come from. They were Americans fighting Hitler, Mussolini and the Emperor of Japan . They were defending the United States of America as one people.

When we liberated  France , no one in those villages was looking for the French-American or the German-American or the Irish-American. The people of France saw only Americans. And we carried one flag that represented one country. Not one of those immigrant sons would have thought about picking up another country's flag and waving it to
represent who they were. It would have been a disgrace to their parents who had sacrificed so much to be here. These immigrants truly knew what it meant to be an American. They stirred the melting pot into one red, white and blue bowl.

And here we are in 2008 with a new kind of immigrant who wants the same rights and privileges. Only they want to achieve it by playing with a different set of rules, one that includes the entitlement card and a guarantee of being faithful to their mother country. I'm sorry, that's not what being an American is all about. I believe that the immigrants who landed on Ellis Island in the early 1900's deserve better than that for all the toil, hard work and sacrifice in raising future generations to
create a land that has become a beacon for those legally searching for a better life I think they would be appalled that they are being used as an example by those waving foreign country flags.

And for that suggestion about taking down the Statue of Liberty, it happens to mean a lot to the citizens who are voting on the immigration bill. I wouldn't start talking about dismantling the United States just yet.

(signed) Rosemary LaBonte

Can I get a big FUCKENEH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Jimmers

nani wrote on Feb 27^th, 2009 at 11:14pm:


I dont care who wrote it, its the truth!

The Washington Times
Monday, February 9, 2009
16 illegals sue Arizona rancher
Claim violation of rights as they crossed his land

An Arizona man who has waged a 10-year campaign to stop a flood of illegal immigrants from crossing his property is being sued by 16 Mexican nationals who accuse him of conspiring to violate their civil rights when he stopped them at gunpoint on his ranch on the U.S.-Mexico border.

Roger Barnett, 64, began rounding up illegal immigrants in 1998 and turning them over to the U.S. Border Patrol, he said, after they destroyed his property, killed his calves and broke into his home.

His Cross Rail Ranch near Douglas, Ariz., is known by federal and county law enforcement authorities as "the avenue of choice" for immigrants seeking to enter the United States illegally.

Trial continues Monday in the federal lawsuit, which seeks $32 million in actual and punitive damages for civil rights violations, the infliction of emotional distress and other crimes. Also named are Mr. Barnett's wife, Barbara, his brother, Donald, and Larry Dever, sheriff in Cochise County, Ariz., where the Barnetts live. The civil trial is expected to continue until Friday.

The lawsuit is based on a March 7, 2004, incident in a dry wash on the 22,000-acre ranch, when he approached a group of illegal immigrants while carrying a gun and accompanied by a large dog.

Attorneys for the immigrants - five women and 11 men who were trying to cross illegally into the United States - have accused Mr. Barnett of holding the group captive at gunpoint, threatening to turn his dog loose on them and saying he would shoot anyone who tried to escape.

The immigrants are represented at trial by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), which also charged that Sheriff Dever did nothing to prevent Mr. Barnett from holding their clients at "gunpoint, yelling obscenities at them and kicking one of the women."

In the lawsuit, MALDEF said Mr. Barnett approached the group as the immigrants moved through his property, and that he was carrying a pistol and threatening them in English and Spanish. At one point, it said, Mr. Barnett's dog barked at several of the women and he yelled at them in Spanish, "My dog is hungry and he's hungry for buttocks."

The lawsuit said he then called his wife and two Border Patrol agents arrived at the site. It also said Mr. Barnett acknowledged that he had turned over 12,000 illegal immigrants to the Border Patrol since 1998.

In March, U.S. District Judge John Roll rejected a motion by Mr. Barnett to have the charges dropped, ruling there was sufficient evidence to allow the matter to be presented to a jury. Mr. Barnett's attorney, David Hardy, had argued that illegal immigrants did not have the same rights as U.S. citizens.

Mr. Barnett told The Washington Times in a 2002 interview that he began rounding up illegal immigrants after they started to vandalize his property, northeast of Douglas along Arizona Highway 80. He said the immigrants tore up water pumps, killed calves, destroyed fences and gates, stole trucks and broke into his home.

Some of his cattle died from ingesting the plastic bottles left behind by the immigrants, he said, adding that he installed a faucet on an 8,000-gallon water tank so the immigrants would stop damaging the tank to get water.

Mr. Barnett said some of the ranch´s established immigrant trails were littered with trash 10 inches deep, including human waste, used toilet paper, soiled diapers, cigarette packs, clothes, backpacks, empty 1-gallon water bottles, chewing-gum wrappers and aluminum foil - which supposedly is used to pack the drugs the immigrant smugglers give their "clients" to keep them running.

He said he carried a pistol during his searches for the immigrants and had a rifle in his truck "for protection" against immigrant and drug smugglers, who often are armed.

A former Cochise County sheriff´s deputy who later was successful in the towing and propane business, Mr. Barnett spent $30,000 on electronic sensors, which he has hidden along established trails on his ranch. He searches the ranch for illegal immigrants in a pickup truck, dressed in a green shirt and camouflage hat, with his handgun and rifle, high-powered binoculars and a walkie-talkie.

His sprawling ranch became an illegal-immigration highway when the Border Patrol diverted its attention to several border towns in an effort to take control of the established ports of entry. That effort moved the illegal immigrants to the remote areas of the border, including the Cross Rail Ranch.

"This is my land. I´m the victim here," Mr. Barnett said. "When someone´s home and loved ones are in jeopardy and the government seemingly can´t do anything about it, I feel justified in taking matters into my own hands. And I always watch my back."

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The Washington Times
Friday, February 13, 2009
Deported for drugs, illegal sues rancher

One of the 16 illegal immigrants allowed by a federal court to sue an Arizona rancher for stopping them at gunpoint after they sneaked across the U.S.-Mexico border is a convicted felon deported from this country after a 1993 arrest by U.S. authorities on drug charges, court records show.

Gerardo Gonzalez, described in a lawsuit brought by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF) as a 38-year-old Mexican citizen, was convicted in September 1993 for possession of a controlled substance for sale and ordered deported to his home country.

Gonzalez, whose illegal re-entry after removal under U.S. law would be another felony, is among five women and 11 men detained by Roger Barnett, owner of the Cross Rail Ranch near Douglas, Ariz.

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The Washington Times
Monday, February 16, 2009
EDITORIAL: Illegal-alien outrage

Few cases better illustrate how dysfunctional this country's immigration and "justice" systems are today than that of Roger Barnett - a Cochise, Ariz., man who is being sued in federal court by a group of illegal aliens who accuse him of violating their "civil rights" for holding them at gunpoint after catching them trespassing on his property.

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The Washington Times
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Rancher cleared in rights case

A federal jury in Tucson ruled Tuesday that an Arizona rancher did not violate the civil rights of 16 Mexican nationals he stopped after they sneaked illegally into the United States.

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The Washington Times
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Rancher ruling adds to border debate

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.

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF), an immigrant-advocacy group that helped bring the lawsuit, had claimed Mr. Barnett violated the civil rights of 16 illegal immigrants he stopped crossing his border property after they had illegally sneaked into the United States. MALDEF sought $2 million in actual and punitive damages for each of the plaintiffs.

The outcome fell far short of the advocacy group's wishes.

U.S. District Judge John M. Roll, for starters, dismissed the claims of 10 of the illegals because they did not testify at trial. He then tossed related conspiracy complaints against Mr. Barnett's wife, Barbara, and his brother Donald, saying illegal immigrants had no constitutionally protected right to travel in the United States.

Judge Roll said the Barnetts, who live in close proximity to the border, could reasonably assume that large groups of people they encountered hiding or trespassing on their property were doing so with the aid of smugglers.

He said entering the United States illegally was a federal felony, for which a citizen's arrest was authorized under Arizona law.

Ultimately, the jury of four men and four women decided that Mr. Barnett did not violate the civil rights of the remaining six plaintiffs and was not guilty of false imprisonment, battery and conspiracy as charged in the suit.

"Citizens who live along the border, like citizens anywhere in the country, have a right to act in such instances," said David T. Hardy, one of Mr. Barnett's attorneys. "The vindication of the Barnetts should clear the way for other Americans to act responsibly without fear of specious and politically motivated lawsuits."

The jury awarded $17,802 to the six remaining illegal immigrants on their claims of assault and the infliction of emotional distress - $7,500 each to two, $1,400 each to two others and $1 each to the remaining pair. It also ordered Mr. Barnett to pay $60,000 in punitive damages.

MALDEF lawyer David Urias told reporters in Tucson his clients were disappointed with the verdict, "but I think that overall this was a victory for the plaintiffs." A co-counsel, Nina Perales, called the verdict "a resounding victory that sends a message that vigilante violence against immigrants will not be tolerated."

But Mr. Hardy saw it differently, describing the verdict as an "80 percent victory" for the Barnetts, adding that he planned to appeal the decision based on what he called "solid grounds."

A 2006 Arizona constitutional amendment bars awards of punitive damages to illegal immigrants, and Mr. Barnett's attorneys are expected to argue that the jury was given flawed instructions by the judge, which led to the award of those damages.

Carmen Mercer, vice president of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps (MCDC), said the verdict showed that citizens have a right to protect their property. She said she would hardly call the jury verdict a victory since "the plaintiffs are only getting a small fraction of what they were seeking."

Ms. Mercer, a business owner in Tombstone, Ariz., and a naturalized U.S. citizen from Germany, said those who live on the Southwest border find it "emotionally distressing" to see the daily destruction caused by illegal immigration.

She also noted that five of the plaintiffs in the Barnett lawsuit are now living in the U.S. with visa applications pending, "which tells me that as of this moment, they are still illegally in this country.

"What, pray tell, is our government asking of them in terms of paying a fine for breaking the law by entering this country unlawfully?" said Ms. Mercer. "Instead, they are being rewarded by getting a visa."

Glenn Spencer, president of the American Border Patrol, a private organization that uses high-tech equipment to highlight what it calls the "crisis of illegal immigration," said he worked with Mr. Barnett for more than 10 years and knew he had been "very careful when dealing with the illegal trespassers."

A resident of Sierra Vista, Ariz., Mr. Spencer called the lawsuit "a malicious prosecution," but said it had shed light on the fact that the federal government has failed to protect the nation's borders.

"I was in Washington, D.C., 10 years ago when Roger Barnett submitted testimony to a congressional committee describing the terrible situation on the border," Mr. Spencer said. "Now, 10 years later, Roger is sued by open-borders activists, while at the same time the federal government is constructing a vehicle barrier along the border south of his ranch and lying to the public by saying it is a fence.

"Roger Barnett is a hero and a victim - a victim of a duplicitous government that has no intention of protecting the border with Mexico," he said.

Shannon McGauley, founder and president of the Texas Minutemen, called the verdict "a very important ruling," saying it reaffirmed the "Castle Doctrine," now applicable in both Arizona and Texas. The doctrine protects people who use force to defend themselves from an intruder by presuming that a person defending their property "acted in self-defense."

"On our border watches, we've been very careful to just observe and report illegal aliens to prevent such suits," he said.

Michael Hethmon, another of Mr. Barnett's attorneys, said MALDEF and other illegal-immigrant advocacy groups have threatened local governments and citizens for years with lawsuits to intimidate them from protecting their communities and property.

"But the Barnett family are Americans who refused to be intimidated," he said.

The lawsuit was based on a March 7, 2004, incident in which Mr. Barnett approached a group of illegal immigrants while he patrolled his 22,000-acre Cross Rail Ranch near Douglas, carrying a gun and accompanied by his dog. The ranch has become a major corridor for armed drug and immigrant smugglers.

The suit charged the Barnetts "engaged in a private campaign and conspired with each other and others to 'hunt' and detain against their will, and at gunpoint, Latino migrants or presumed migrants such as plaintiffs."

But Mr. Hardy argued that the Barnett ranch is frequently crossed by illegal immigrants and drug smugglers and his client was checking for damages when his dog started barking and ran off into the desert. He said Mr. Barnett followed and came across a large group of people "apparently trying to hide."

"Since drug smugglers are frequently armed, I drew my handgun," Mr. Barnett said in an April 18, 2007, deposition. "I holstered it after assuring myself they were not armed."

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The Illegal Immigration Invasion..

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KingOfPain wrote on Feb 28^th, 2009 at 11:55pm:


King, this video should be required viewing for all Americans!

I'm not sorry - some of the links in this thread have some of the most racist comments and its sickening.  Go spew this crap somewhere else. 
I understand people want to protect their "own" land.  But I guess it does show how lack of education, ignorance and poor mentality exists in big parts of this country. 

I AM AN AMERICAN but I don't subscribe to that bullshit!

Pissed off,
Pepp

Immigration has become a lightning rod for people to rally around. But is it really immigration that's the problem? Or is it OUR fault because of our stupid laws..passed by the same people who have given us our screwed up economy and courts?

People from Hitler, to Sadaam Hussein, to Rush Limbaugh have succesfully used these simplistic arguments to appease simple minded people and turn their attention away from corrupt goverments for centuries.

Kill all the Jews, they've been stealing your money and THAT'S why the economy sucks. Kill all the Kurds, THAT'S whose stealing all of your money, kill all the mexican immigrants, THAT'S whose stealing all of your money. It's a nice simplistic argument. People love problems that can be solved in 30 seconds or less.

Those illegal immigrants wouldn't be able to sue those ranchers if our laws weren't so screwed up. So let's not work to change the laws, lets start hate rallies against the immigrants. Those billions in welfare wouldn't be paid out if we had intelligent laws to decide how you obtain citizenship. But working to change the laws....heck that's work. Much easier to spew hatred against those people trying to escape oppressive, corrupt countries.

I really wish people would direct some of this energy they waste on hate, and direct it towards THEIR  lawmakers to make substantive changes to OUR laws to protect us. But no, this year they'll pass another 100 laws to "protect our children against sexual predators" as those are the only laws you can pass these days without offending anyone. (There are already hundreds on the books, most written so poorly they are completely unenforceable!!)

One of the few times Joe will get sucked into political threads. As I've also learned, people don't visit these threads to have their opinions changed. Only to spout theirs......as I just did!!! Love y'all....well most of you anyways


Joe

Guiseppi wrote on Mar 3^rd, 2009 at 10:37am:

And just wait until the masses make it the children's fault that the economy is as bad as it is - that it's the children who are stealing all of your money.

Won't we be havin' some fun then....