Author: mopress

How do we respond to the news from the Boston Globe? Just read the chapter on Civil Rights in Dime’s Worth of Difference. It’s all there.

Civil rights hiring shifted in Bush era
Conservative leanings stressed

By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff | July 23, 2006

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration is quietly remaking the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, filling the permanent ranks with lawyers who have strong conservative credentials but little experience in civil rights, according to job application materials obtained by the Globe. Like we say, nothing more to add.

“I happen to still believe in the open records law in Texas,” says Mayor Will Lowrance of Hillsboro, 55 miles south of Dallas. He’s referring to the Governor’s steadfast refusal to disclose “proprietary” documents related to planned construction of the Trans-Texas Corridor.

The Mayor says he’d like to see the documents before making an informed decision on the mega-highway-railroad-real-bad-news-for-racoons plan.

Meanwhile, “Grandma” Carole Keeton Strayhorn is also dogging the Gov at mega-highway hearings, criticizing him “for his ‘secret contract with a foreign company’ — the U.S.-Spanish consortium that the state has approved to build and operate the $184 billion corridor, which would parallel Interstate 35. The Perry administration is now battling an attorney general’s ruling to fully disclose the contract.”

Which reminds us that we also would like to see some documentation from the Governor’s office: plans for Operation Jump Start. We agree wiith the Mayor: citizens ought to be able to watch their democracy at work, the better to tinker with it as they see fit.
If the Governor is going to tell everybody that Operation Jump Start is on schedule, and if the Governor is going to retain formal command of the troops, then doesn’t it follow that the Governor should show us the schedule we’re on? Instead, he says he doesn’t have one.

We were just about to give up on higher principles during the coming campaign season. Thanks, Mayor. Thanks, Grandma.

See AP story: “Corridor could be roadblock for Perry: Plan nettles more than just farmers, but aide dismisses campaign risk” posted at WFAA com.

Also: “Strayhorn becoming a regular at highway public hearings.” Tuesday, July 25, 2006. By Noelene Clark. Waco Tribune-Herald staff writer.

Report Shows Laredo “Superjail” Unnecessary, Group Calls For No Action Alternative

Report Also Questions Impact of Superjail on Region’s Economy

LAREDO, TX – On July 24, 2006 Grassroots Leadership released “Ground Zero: The Laredo Superjail and the No Action Alternative,” a new report showing that the controversial 2,800 bed US Marshals Service detention center near Laredo is largely unnecessary. Analyzing US Marshals data, the report confirms that spikes in detention levels in the Laredo region are largely due to disproportionately increased prosecution of non-violent immigrants, and could be avoided with a shift in prosecutorial emphasis.
“This report concludes the USMS prison expansion in or near the Laredo area is unnecessary, and the best course of action is the no action alternative,” said Nicholas Hudson, the report’s author. “The data analyzed in this report indicates immigration-related detention is disproportionately represented compared to every other type of offense in the Texas South USMS district.”

The report also questions the assertion of the draft EIS that the region’s economy would benefit from the construction and operation of the detention center.

“The most authoritative evidence indicates the Laredo superjail would have no positive economic impacts on any of the proposed sites,” said Bob Libal, field organizer for Grassroots Leadership. “The region could experience detrimental economic impacts.”

KEY FINDINGS

⇒ A dramatic increase in prosecution for low-level immigration charges is primarily responsible for the increased levels of USMS detention in Texas south. In 2003, 53% of USMS detainees in Texas South were held on immigration charges. By 2004, almost two-thirds (62%) of the individuals detained in Texas South by the US Marshals were there on immigration-related charges.

⇒ Many of these detainees are held on “illegal entry” charges, and serve an average of 30 day sentences before being deported. Detainees on immigration charges made up 90% of the detention growth in the Texas South USMS region. http://www.stoppcoalition.org/

We expected better from the Christian Science Monitor. A July 27 overview of troops at the border asks: “The question now is, will this latest US crackdown be enough?”

Yet the question of “will the crackdown be enough” ignores the evidence raised in the same article: that the crackdown may be wrongheaded.
Speaking to sources from the human rights community, the CSM article reports that “The one thing that can be said of the long US effort to curtail illegal immigration, they say, is that it has made crossing the border more dangerous.”

“As illegal immigrants have channeled into rural areas, one result has been rising numbers of deaths in the desert. Arizona saw a record 473 deaths last year – and human rights groups say that statistic is probably a fraction of the actual number, because many deaths go unreported.”

So instead of posing the question in terms of “crackdown enough?” the evidence in the article suggests other frameworks, such as: “is the latest US crackdown wise?” Is it just? Is it the best use of taxpayer money when addressing the issues of economics, immigration, and human rights?

In addition we would pose the question: is the latest US crackdown legal? As far as we can tell from our documentary explorations, the legal technicalities of Operation Jump Start are a shell game of undocumented military actions.

As readers of this Review well know, missions for Operation Jump Start in Texas are supposed to be pre-approved by the Governor, but the Governor says there are no documentary records to that effect. The Governor says the mission is going according to plan and that he is commander of Texas forces, yet the commander of Texas forces doesn’t have a copy of the plan.

CSM is a production of words, and those words suggest an orientation of mind. In the face of evidence contained in the CSM article, the leading question is poorly posed. Embedded journalism has come home to roost.