by TChris

The knee-jerk conservative response to immigration policy -- kick 'em out if their documents aren't in order -- ignores the plight of people like Manuel Bartsch.

Bartsch, 18, has lived in Gilboa, Ohio, for nearly half his life, but only learned he was there illegally in December when he was jailed after trying to find out his Social Security number so he could take a college entrance exam. He is to graduate high school next month and has been accepted at the University of Northwestern Ohio.

Toby Deal brought Bartsch to the U.S. on a 90 day visa when Bartsch's grandmother died, but didn't adopt him or process his immigration papers. Fortunately, Ohio Sen. Mike DeWine put aside his right-wing instincts long enough to go to bat for Bartsch.

by TChris

Economic inequality and its relationship to racial inequality was big news for two or three days after Katrina. Perhaps the Urban League's annual report, "State of Black America 2006," will reawaken interest in one of the nation's most pressing problems.

The report, which assessed factors including home ownership, income, unemployment, poverty rates and net worth, said the economic status of blacks in 2006 is 56 percent of that of white Americans, 1 percentage point worse than last year.

by TChris

Do immigration authorities have nothing better to do than this?

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is seeking to deport a 38-year-old Rochester Hills woman who fled Colombia 22 years ago. Returning to Colombia would endanger Rosa Rodriguez, a mortgage service representative, and her 6-year-old U.S.-born daughter. Government lawyers should drop these senseless proceedings.

The case against Rodriguez is flimsy. Immigration officials say she married under false pretenses 16 years ago to become a permanent U.S. resident. No agents testified about the accusations in immigration court. Conversely, the couple, along with nine witnesses called by Rodriguez's lawyer, William Dance, said the marriage was valid.

This is a woman who works, pays taxes, and raises her daughter (an American citizen by birth). Why is ICE wasting its limited resources on her?

by TChris

They didn't quite apologize, but the members of Washington's state legislature passed a resolution expressing their "deepest sympathy" to the descendents of Louie Sam for a lynching that occurred 122 years ago.

Sam, who belonged to the Sto:lo First Nation whose homelands lie in the Fraser Valley, east of Vancouver, was falsely accused in the 1884 murder of a shopkeeper near Sumas, Wash.

A mob rode across the border, snatched Sam from Canadian police custody and hung him from a tree.

Canadian investigators later determined that he never committed the crime and was framed by two white Americans who stirred up the mob.

by TChris

This isn't the most consequential Supreme Court news of the day, but it's good to see the Court admonish the Eleventh Circuit for its dismissive view of the evidence of discrimination presented in a lawsuit against Tyson Foods. Two African American superintendents at Tyson's poultry plant were denied promotions. Ash won at trial, but the district court took the victory away, concluding that he failed to prove that the denial was discriminatory.

Ash relied in part on evidence that the plant manager referred to the two men as "boy." That wasn't enough to prove a discriminatory animus, the Eleventh Circuit said, because "[w]hile the use of 'boy' when modified by a racial classification like 'black' or 'white' is evidence of discriminatory intent, the use of 'boy' alone is not evidence of discrimination." The Supreme Court concluded that juries need not be so blind to the history of racially derogatory language.

by TChris

Speaking out:

Hyim Jacob Ross chained himself to a park bench in Oakland on Monday in what he said was the start of a five-day fast to protest the prevalence of inequality and injustice in America when the country is spending so much on a war.

Ross, a musician, teaches music at Coronado Elementary School in Richmond and ethics, spirituality and inter-personal communication at two synagogues in the East Bay.

"The war in Iraq is putting our nation into incredible debt and draining enormous financial, social, economic, industrial and political resources," said Ross, who is in early 30s and was born in San Francisco and raised in Oakland.

Ross isn't part of an organized protest. He's trying to make a difference, and he has a use-them-or-lose-them attitude about his First Amendment rights.

by TChris

When Bibaldo Rueda discovered his house was ablaze, he thought the firefighters who responded would put out the fire. Only then did he learn that the Monett, MO fire department only serves individuals who paid membership dues. Rueda offered to pay, but he was told that the department has no policy for "on-the-spot billing." State law permits rural membership fire departments to put out fires and then bill the occupant after the fact, but nobody mentioned that to Rueda. Instead, the firefighters stood around and watched as Rueda was burned while he tried to fight the fire himself with a garden hose.

Responding to Rueda's complaint that he should have been notified that his taxes don't pay for fire protection, Monett Rural Fire Department Chief Ronnie Myers "said he would make an effort to explain the membership policy to the area's new Hispanic residents." You're doing a heck of a job there, Ronnie.

by TChris

In a speech at Wendy's corporate headquarters yesterday, the president "took on critics" of his plan to expand health savings accounts. Countering charges that the plan benefits the wealthy while giving no relief to 45 million uninsured Americans, the president said "It's kind of like saying, 'If you're not making a lot of money, you can't make decisions for yourself'."

No, it's more like saying, "If you have a low-paying job at a fast food chain like Wendy's that doesn't provide you with a comprehensive health insurance benefit, you're screwed because you can't save enough in a health savings account to cover your medical bills."

by TChris

Helen O'Donnell argues that a larger story underlying the Abramoff scandal has been overlooked:

Years after taking this country away from Native Americans and herding them onto reservations to live mostly in poverty and despair, it ought to bother us that we still think so little of them as human beings that further exploitation of American Indians is somehow "business as usual" in Washington without rising to meet the real challenges that still face our American Indian sisters and brothers.

by TChris

An elementary school in Brockton, MA suspended a 6 year old for sexually harassing another student. This is the "sexual harassment": "officials said he put two fingers inside a girl's waistband, touching her skin, during a class."

Bugging other students (of either gender) is normal 6 year old behavior. Is it sexual harassment? Not by any meaningful definition of the term.

"[W]hen we think of sexual harassment, we think of somebody who is approaching somebody inappropriately as a sexual threat, and a 6-year-old's probably not capable of that level of plotting," [Elizabeth] Englander said. ... Englander, [a] psychologist, said children are naturally curious and very physical, and almost any kind of touching may be considered "normal" unless it is sexualized or mimicking sexual acts.

The school's policy defines sexual harassment as "repeated, unwanted, or unwelcomed verbalisms or behaviors of a sexist nature related to a person's sex or sexual orientation." A single, innocent touch by a 6 year old doesn't come close to meeting that definition. The school should be ashamed of its overreaction to the incident.

by TChris

What does it mean to achieve "justice for all"? Nancy Moore shares her thoughts.

I hope everyone will re-aquaint themselves today with the extraordinary words of wisdom, vision and passion of Martin Luther King, Jr. It takes only a minute to watch this video. It features excerpts from Dr. King's 1967 Vietnam War speech, and ends with an appeal to take part in a Global Day of Protest on the one-year anniversary of the Iraq War.

Alternet has an excellent compilation of some of Dr. King's most memorable quotes. Here are the links to the full text of just a few of his speeches.

• I Have a Dream speech

• Declaration of Independence from the War in Vietnam
  

• Letter from the Birmingham Jail