It has taken some time for me to comment on the recent issues with Arizona. It reminds me of the freeway shootings that happened in California in the late 80s. For those who may not remember there were a few incidents of freeway shootings that occurred on LA highways. It was probably about five in a ten day period but speculation ran rampant as to the cause of them. Everything from gang initiations to road rage was considered. About as soon as is started it stopped, yet the whole summer there was fear it was going to happen again.

In that year some friends and I went to Europe for a backpacking vacation. We ended up in a small town in Wales and the bed and breakfast was run by this retired London police officer. When we got there and he learned we were from California, he asked if everyone carried guns in their cars. We had to explain we lived in San Diego, it was a big state and not everyone carried guns in their cars. The police officer was like the casual observer we all are on news; we hear bits and pieces of information and things get jumbled up unless we closely follow them. The news rarely does follow up so in many cases what we initially hear, for good or bad, is what we remember and go by.

Right now I’m sitting by my window, which is open. It’s getting a little hot, the fan is blowing and I have the TV on mute so I can concentrate while I type. I can hear the birds singing outside but I can’t hear the traffic, which is only a few buildings away. I have a large grocery store across the street call Mercado. There is a large Hispanic population in my apartment, and this area, to put it kindly, is a working poor neighborhood. Knock on wood there have not been police raids, shootings, drug smuggling or human trafficking. There isn’t a lot of graffiti on the walls in the area I live in and there is absolutely none on the block I live on. It is a typical, working poor neighborhood.

Just like the shootings on the highway in LA, the portrayal people have given who supports this legislation is a portrait of a state that is under siege. You would think that Arizona is a lawless land, which is why the governor, according to the supporters, had to pass this law. Think about this little bit of information; in the past few years there have been laws passed in Arizona allowing people to carry guns into bars, allowed to get guns without a background check if the guns were made in Arizona and a new law was just passed which will eliminate ethnic studies in k-12 schools.

Arizona isn’t under siege from Mexico. The economy has Arizona under siege. The whole fear people have in this state about losing jobs and who is taking the jobs stems from economics. The problem is instead of attacking the system that is causing the problem; we are attacking the victims of the system, which in turn attacks us. Another perfect example of this is my mother has been begging me to move to South Carolina. I had a friend who has been begging me to move to California. I know someone whose mother is also trying to get him to move away from here. When I ask the question what jobs are out there, silence is heard, because there are no jobs in the area. So the decision is very simple, if there aren’t jobs in the new area, why would I leave this area, where I have a job, to go to a new area where there isn’t a job? Yes, if it were maybe five years ago it might make sense to branch out because without the security of a job it would be possible to get a job in a month or two. Today people have been out of work for years.

The laws that have been passed go after us, the regular people and that’s what makes folks so uncomfortable. You can say it goes after the illegal immigrants but it does nothing to go after the people that give them jobs, that give them shelter. If those things aren’t available, why would they stay? The same argument came up ten years ago in San Diego. The illegal border crossing was getting out of hand. With a combination of securing the fence and enforcing the laws against employers, the border crossing trickled down as people moved east to try and gain entrance to the country and to find work. In other words, they went to Arizona. Obviously it’s easier to go after people who don’t vote than to people that do, and it’s easier to go after people who don’t have power. That’s why the new law goes after illegals yet does nothing to go after employers.

The people that have put the fear about drug trafficking, smuggling and other ills front and center are using scare tactics. Evidence shows that illegal border crossing has decreased in the past few years because our economy is bad. Now you can’t tell the diehard people this. Just listen to radio broadcasts or look at comment pages on sites that talk about immigration and you will see people giving stories of neighbors who have seen drug busts or illegal flop homes. The impression, again, is that the whole state is under siege yet the evidence doesn’t support it, but it will be impossible to convince the people otherwise.

It seems irresponsible that employers aren’t under fire for this. It is the employers that give the job, that pay under the table. I have grown tired of comments and radio talk about construction sites where the employer will pay illegal workers under the table, thus hurting the wages of ‘honest Americans’ yet the same Americans who claim to be so proud of their freedom don’t have the nerve to call the police or call immigration to stop it. I’m tired of hearing people saying how difficult it is to check the books of employers. It’s like before they even try they have convinced themselves it’s not worth the effort so they should go after the illegal people because they broke the law. Yes, I agree they broke the law but the employers did too, so why should they get off easy?

Like a stubborn person unwilling to accept they made a mistake, there are many who are stubbornly sticking to the new law. Employers are being boycotted, conventions have been moved and revenue has been lost, but many would rather stand behind a flawed law than admit to making a mistake.