Sunday, December 02, 2007

While You Were Watching Football...

The Democratic candidates were in Des Moines at the Brown-Black Forum discussing the political issues that most affect minority Americans. The forum organizers also invited the Republican candidates to attend, but none of them accepted. That fact alone speaks volumes. Immigration policy was on every one's mind. Both Obama and Clinton accused the Republicans of demagoguery on the issue. Clinton, in a rare moment of candor, said that Republicans were misleading the country if they actually thought it was possible to deport 12 million workers. Governor Richardson complained that while Washington talked a good game about "immigration reform", he was actually dealing with the problem. He issued state drivers licenses to migrants. The traffic fatalities among Latinos went down while the number of insured drivers went up. Joe Biden, who came on stage well into the discussion after a slippery drive from Chicago ("I don't have a plane"), countered that Americans would do the work aliens take if they were paid enough. And the increasingly humorous Dennis Kucinich asked himself a question about health care since no one else did. His serious pitch for "not for profit" health care drew a guffaw from Lady Hillary.

Here is a quote pious Republicans might want to consider as they ponder the security problem of undocumented aliens crossing our porous borders or deciding whether to issue them drivers licenses: When an alien resides with you in your land, do not molest him. You shall treat the alien who resides with you no differently than the natives born among you; have the same love for him as for yourself; for you too were once aliens... Mitt Romney or Mike Huckabee would recognize the source of the quote. I am not sure Rudolpho would. It is of course, Leviticus 19, 33-34.