Category: Uncategorized

Why Obama lost the debate

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By Alan Bean

My guess is that Mitt Romney will soon be neck-and-neck with the president in most swing states.  Nationally, the GOP candidate may soon move a point or two ahead.  Debates don’t always such deep impact, of course, but this one was different.  Barack Obama’s lead in the polls was based on two factors: a Democratic convention where everyone stayed on message, and an infamous video that made Romney look like a heartless, out of touch, let-them-eat-cake plutocrat.  Romney sank in the polls because he looked like a jerk.

Last night, Romney redefined himself. (more…)

Weird political predictions

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By Alan Bean

John Hagee, the San Antonio preacher whose endorsement John McCain sought then rejected in 2008, is making bold predictions about the consequences of a second Obama term.

“I have said it before and I will say it again: the election on Nov. 6, 2012 for the office of president is the day of decision for America. Four more years of Obama will bring absolute socialism to America. Our children and grandchildren will never know the greatness of America that we have experienced.

“This must not happen! … I am asking the Christians of America to join us in 40 days of prayer for this presidential election. These 40 days of prayer will begin on Sept. 28, 2012. You can do it individually or in groups, but prayer is the most powerful force God has given us to bring our nation back to righteousness. I’ll be saying more about this as the year progresses, but mark it on your calendar and start telling your family, friends, and church members now about the 40 days of prayer.”

To place this in context, let’s remember James Dobson’s predictions about how America would look if Obama got a first term.  Dobson, the erstwhile head of Focus on the Family, is a far more responsible source than Hagee, yet as Fred Clark notes, every single prediction he made in his “Letter From 2012 in Obama’s America” was dead wrong.   (more…)

Where corporations are persons and the undocumented are not

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By Alan Bean

With the first presidential debate looming, Mitt Romney has moved to the center on the immigration issue.  He still promises to oppose the DREAM act, if elected, to veto the bill if it passes congressional muster.  But Romney now says he would honor the work visas which, at President Obama’s direction, are currently being awarded to young undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children.

As Ross Douthat (with admirable cynicism) pointed out in a recent column, when it comes to the immigration issue, presidential aspirants can win votes by exhibiting compassion (George W. Bush, Rick Perry) or by playing mean (Mitt Romney during the primary season), but there is no advantage to waffling between these two strategies.  Like most right-leaning pundits, Douthat favors using immigration as a wedge issue:

 Taking a more restrictionist position and using the issue to portray the Democrats as beholden to their party’s ethnic interest groups and out of step with blue collar Americans’ concerns.

The wise course, in other words, is to drive a wedge between hardworking Latinos and Anglos.  Nice, Ross.  A self-proclaimed “Christian” columnist advocates this sort of nastiness and no one cries “for shame!”  That’s the America we live in.  Christianity, it seems, has no moral application unless we’re talking about abortion.

Texas politicians like George W. Bush and Rick Perry are “soft on immigration” because their support base includes a lot of agribusiness people who couldn’t survive without cheap undocumented labor.  Alienating Latino voters might benefit Republicans in the short-term; but it is a long-term loser.

It is also devilish, but hey, in American politics you’ve got to give the devil his due.

Romney and Obama are both waffling on the immigration issue.  Obama claims to be working for comprehensive immigration reform (known as CIR in immigration reform circles), but he also deported a record 400,000 undocumented immigrants last year, three-quarters of them to Mexico.  To put that in context, that’s the same number of undocumented residents the United States deported between 1908 and 1980. In theory, the feds are deporting criminals, “the worst of the worst”.  In reality, half of the deportees have no criminal record and most of the “criminals” represent little threat to American public safety.

Historically, American politicians of both parties have waffled on immigration, bouncing between compassion and demagoguery.  In 1986, Ronald Reagan signed a bill that exchanged amnesty for many undocumented immigrants for assurances that the border would be closed to new arrivals.  Typically, the approach has been to privilege on group of undocumented Americans at the expense of other undocumented groups.  The DREAM act, for instance, would allow young people who came to the United States as children to obtain work permits and apply for citizenship, but their parents, and children who arrived too late, would be out of luck.

This good-immigrant-bad-immigrant approach is fundamentally unfair and utterly unworkable.  We gain nothing by kicking the immigration can down the road.

Politicians like Obama and Romney can’t be more progressive (or regressive) than the American middle.  A new poll suggests that the majority of Americans now favor providing a path to citizenship over mass deportation.  This shift occurred, I suspect, because Barack Obama found the courage to protect (albeit temporarily) DREAM act young people from immediate deportation.

Few of us think our way to an opinion.  We listen to what significant others are saying and follow suit.  We don’t all march to the same drummer, but few of us supply our own drum track.  True reform will come when both major parties realize that they can get one of their people elected president, or they can enrage the Latino electorate, but they can’t do both.

Here’s the results of the CNN poll: (more…)

Imprisoned by the walls that divide us

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By Alan Bean

The United States of America is an uncommonly religious nation.  More to the point, we are an uncommonly Christian nation, at least insofar as stated religious affiliation is concerned (whether we actually reflect the soul of Jesus Christ is another matter altogether).  In the midst of startling ethnic diversity, three great cultures dominate: Latino, African American and Anglo.  Many things divide these three segments of the human family, but religion is not one of them.  Brown, Black and White, we are all overwhelmingly Christian.  In theory, we should all moralize and vote in a distinctly Christian fashion.  We should share a common moral discourse.

But we don’t.

Latinos, Blacks and Whites are all divided by internal political and ideological disputes, of course, but valid generalizations are possible.

For instance, Latinos, as a group, are deeply concerned about mass deportation, Blacks agonize over mass incarceration, and Whites, for the most part, give little thought to either issue.

Stout walls have gone up between us. These fortifications simplify our moral worlds by ensuring that we don’t have too much worry on our plates. But the walls lock us into tiny, constricted worlds.  We are deep in denial, imprisoned by fear and self-imposed ignorance.

There is nothing surprising in this.  Humans have a limited capacity for pain and complexity.  We worry more about our dogs and cats than the plight of the poor and the prisoner because puppies and kittens rub against our legs and demand our attention.  We love our immediate families with a singular intensity because we share a common history and anticipate a shared destiny.  We don’t care so much about other people’s kids because we don’t know them and most likely will never know them. (more…)

In Memoriam: Charles Workman

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Slain Hearne civil rights leader Charles Workman

By Alan Bean

News reports describing the tragic murder of Charles Workman invariably point out that he was a former city councilman, an active member of the Democratic party, a leading member of the Hearne NAACP and president of the Columbus Village Residents’ Council.  But Workman was also a key figure in the fight to reverse a bogus drug sting in the central Texas community of Hearne that became the inspiration for the film American Violet.  

Those who were intimately involved in the fight for justice in Tulia, Texas (the event that sparked the creation of Friends of Justice) will know that the Tulia and Hearne stories were linked as twin examples of drug war injustice.  Mark Osler, now a Friends of Justice board member, worked closely with defense counsel representing key Hearne defendant Regina Kelly.

The picture above was taken in January of 2005 when I met Charles in a Hearne diner.  Friends of Justice made five separate trips to Hearne between 2000 and 2005, most recently in support of the ACLU’s successful civil suit filed on behalf of the Hearne defendants and their families.

The poor African American community in Hearne had been victimized by seasonal drug busts that usually targeted public housing developments.  Charles Workman’s son was one of the people swept up in the 2000 version of this dismal process.  Each of twenty odd defendants had been arrested on the uncorroborated word of Derrick Megress, a self-confessed crack addict who agreed to cooperate with the local Sheriff and DA in return for a sweetheart deal.  Megress eventually admitted that he had faked all of the drug buys he had allegedly made over a period of weeks.

John Paschall, the Robertson County District Attorney, threatened Megress with an arranged prison rape if he failed to cooperate.  When Megress confessed, Paschall was initially unwilling to drop charges on defendants who had already taken plea deals.  Scott Henson at Grits for Breakfast was working for the ACLU during the Hearne-Tulia fight.  Scott doubts that John Paschall can be trusted to investigate the murder of a man associated with a case that subjected the DA to national ridicule.

Persons of interest have emerged in connection with this case, but no clear motive has surfaced.  A young man allegedly burned Workman’s 2000 Jaguar after a failed attempt to sell the vehicle, but the strength of the evidence is uncertain at this point.

I distinctly remember going door-to-door with Mr. Workman in Hearne’s housing projects trying to whip up support for a church meeting planned for later that evening.  Everyone said they’d be there, but almost no one from the affected community showed up.  How tragic it would be if the assailant turns out to be one of the beneficiaries of Charles Workman’s advocacy.  We will keep you posted as this story develops.

Private prisons for immigrants attacked by advocacy groups

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By Alan Bean

This Texas Tribune article touches on a topic dear to all Friends of Justice, the use of underfunded and inept private prisons to house immigrants.  We have had long conversations with many of the people quoted below in recent weeks because they are the experts on this distressing topic.

The private prison industry notes, correctly, that the real issue here is American immigration policy.  But the assertion that companies like CCA and Geo Group have no interest in the immigration policy debate is absurd.  As a National Public Radio investigation discovered, the private prison industry leans heavily on The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).  ALEC is a shadowy organization that drafts legislation for state legislators and then hosts lavish conferences where state politicians are encouraged to back these bills.  For instance, SB 1070, the controversial Arizona anti-immigration legislation, was drafted by ALEC.  While the link between ALEC and the private prison industry is difficult to document (this is a highly secretive organization), private prisons, and the anti-immigration movement that sustains them, are central to the punitive, anti-government legislative policy of this powerful legislation-drafting organization.  ALEC is the voice of the corporate world (I was going to say “corporate America”, but that phrase is becoming an anachronism), and private prisons are just one more way for private investors to feed at the government trough.  First you foment a paranoid anti-immigration panic through the dissemination of misleading propaganda; then you sell the politicians a cheap way of getting tough on immigrants.  The private prison industry doesn’t have to lean on ALEC; the industry is ALEC’s brainchild.

Private prisons are cheap because, as Krystal Gomez argues below, they cut corners on staff, medical care, maintenance, food and every other budgetary item.  Immigration prisons are heavily privatized and the consequences for inmates have been horrendous.  Gomez has interviewed scores of inmates in these prisons so she knows whereof she speaks. (more…)

A shocking report targets Operation Streamline

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By Alan Bean

What is Operation Streamline, you ask.  A post from a couple of months ago described our heart-rending encounter with Streamline in a federal courtroom McAllen, Texas.   Until 2005, undocumented immigrants detained at the US-Mexico border were simply deported; now they are tried in federal court for the crime of illegal entry.  If they have crossed the border more than once, the undocumented can be prosecuted for illegal re-entry, a felony charge carrying a maximum sentence of twenty years in prison.

When reformers speak of “crimmigration,” Operation Streamline heads the list of abuses.

Operation Streamline cases are clogging dockets in federal courtrooms along the border, detracting prosecutors from crimes involving massive fraud and violence.  But for the poorest members of the Latino community, the consequences of this wrongheaded policy have been devastating.

Recently, Grassroots Leadership, an immigration reform organization, released a report called Operation Streamline: Costs and Consequences that will tell you everything you need to know about the criminalization of immigration.  Not only is Operation Streamline ineffective as a deterrent, the report concludes, it is obscenely expensive and socially destructive.

In addition to draining resources and burdening the courts system, Operation Streamline imposes a devastating human cost, especially upon the Latino community. Latinos now represent more than half
of all individuals sentenced to federal prison despite making up only 16% of the total U.S. population. Increased enforcement measures also drive migrants to employ the services of professional smugglers and to attempt crossings in more obscure and dangerous areas.  As a result, immigrant fatalities along the border have become increasingly common, reaching totals more than four times those in 1995.
 Friends of Justice is designing a narrative campaign that will illuminate the abuses highlighted in the Grassroots Leadership report.  Our goal is to humanize and personalize the plight of the men and women who continue to cross and recross the border without documentation.  We will be asking who these people are, where do they come from, and why are they willing to repeatedly violate the laws of a sovereign nation?  The answers will shake you up.

The girl from the garbage dump

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Mike Seiffert with the Equal Voice Network lives just across the river from Matamoros, Mexico.  In this story he explains what this means: Paloma, a girl who lives in a garbage dump, just won a national prize in mathematics.  If anyone belongs to Mitt Romney’s 47%  it is Paloma.  She is poorer than any American citizen, however destitute, can even imagine; yet she has much more to offer the world than the world has offered her.  Please read Mike’s post.

Giving God a Bad Name?

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The Almighty

By Alan Bean

Republicans and Democrats are fighting about God.  The GOP scored points by publicizing the fact that the blue team’s platform doesn’t mention the Almighty.  Democrats responded by putting God back in their policy document and ensuring that virtually every speaker at this week’s convention referenced religion at some point during their presentations.

This Convention-as-Godfest idea didn’t sit well with all delegates.  Big-tent Democrats don’t want to exclude the non-religious or privilege any particular religion.  Moreover, the manipulation of God-talk on the right makes a lot of liberals uncomfortable with religious references of any kind.  This explains why sticking the Creator back into the party platform wasn’t easy.

Should the name of God be associated with party politics?  Let’s face it, both parties are working overtime to spin the issues in their favor.  Party conventions are about translating pretty faces and fancy words into votes.  Truth telling isn’t a big issue.  I’m not complaining; that’s the nature of the political process.  At least no blood is spilled.

Electioneering is a species of sales.  On two occasions I have tried to sell things.  First it was the Encyclopedia Britannica.  Then I tried to hawk high-end cook wear.   I’m not a good pitchman.  The guys who sold lots of books and pots were never on good terms with the truth.  Frankly, they would say whatever it took to move the product.  Some were outright liars; those with winning personalities just sold themselves.  It is no different with party politics.  It’s a form of rhetorical roller derby where a good elbow to the trachea always gets style points. (more…)