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Being Illegal August 3, 2010

Posted by admin in : Irrelevant, Political/Editorial , add a comment

Here’s a problem with the language of the immigration reform debate: the general acceptance of the phrase “illegal immigrant.” I know this phrase pre-dated the tea partiers and minutemen and was not necessarily conceived as a racist message. But it sure plays into that use.

If I run a stop sign, you might say I ran a stop sign. I drove illegally that day. Guilty as charged. But does that make me an “illegal driver”?  No. The thing I did is not generally assigned to me as a status of my person.

But boy, if you cross a border illegally one time, you bear the mark of freaking Cain! You didn’t do an illegal thing. You ARE illegal.  People allow themselves to view you as essentially a non-person, because it is a mark of your essential being now. YOU are illegal.

That is a huge rhetorical problem, because it allows people to get on a high horse about the technicality of legality. Legality and moral character are magically interchangeable. An illegal person is an immoral person, a non-person. Non-persons can be denied all rights, not just the rights of citizenship, but increasingly, it seems, basic human rights.

An “illegal immigrant” is seen as a person getting away with something, somehow taking something away from the rest of us “legals”. The illegal immigrant is a criminal, and that just gets the goat of law-abiding citizens. A person who needs money can choose to work, or choose to steal, and that is a choice. But a person who wishes to enter a country does not have an equally viable path to legal entry if the entry process is made difficult by quotas or other laws discouraging immigration. If the legal status of persons is the real issue, why keep making new laws which will produce more illegal immigrants? How about making laws which produce fewer illegal immigrants, like making it easier to enter the country legally?

I propose that we drop “illegal immigrant” in favor of  “migrant workers”, since contrary to the scare tactics of the immigration freakouters, most do in fact come here to work, not get white babies hooked on drugs while raping them. That migrant workers may or may not have entered the country illegally tells you about as much about that person’s moral character as the fact that I once bought beer in a wet country and then drank it in a dry county tells you about my moral character. Furthermore, one could easily turn the moral character angle completely around. If you are a farmer, or a farm laborer, and are unable to work due to economic conditions in your country, and you knew of work across the border, and obtaining this work could help you provide for your family, but in order to enter that country, you had to do so illegally, what would be the moral, Christian thing to do? Let your family starve, on the principle of not entering a country illegally? Or take some personal risk to provide for them? Isn’t it clear that the moral thing to do would be to disregard the immigration law in favor of your family’s economic security? Of course it is — therefore what defines people in this predicament is that they are migrant workers, not illegal immigrants.

Migrant workers with no legal rights are the least enfranchised people in our country. Far from being the cause of any problem, they are the victims of economic and labor policies and discrimination perpetrated against them by very well enfranchised, well connected political elites in both countries. Bringing the full measure of the state down upon the very least enfranchised members of our society — besides being cruel — is guaranteed to accomplish nothing and please no one. It’s like trying to cure leukemia by arresting cancer victims.

Hetch Hetchy thoughts August 10, 2009

Posted by admin in : Environment, Outdoors/Travel, Political/Editorial , 1 comment so far

One slightly negative thing about my Lyell Canyon hike: One person that I had spammed to ask for support for my “Restore Hetch Hetchy” pledge hike decided to reply to that by being a dick. A dick is not someone who declines to support, or even who disagrees with the goal. A dick in this case is someone who decides to pick a fight with me about it, imply that I’m uninformed (but he of course knows everything), that I am trying to “destroy” the water supply, that my position is “crapola”, etc. I mean it was totally unnecessarily aggressive and insulting. Compounded by the fact that it’s a “family” person (not my family, but an in-law) so he created this new awkwardness. He ends his email with “Please do not bother me with this crapola again” yet sent me a second email along the lines of  “and another thing…” So I spent a good deal of time on my hike last week mentally arguing with this guy. That was both negative but had its value. I guess if I’m going to do an activist thing (doing this pledge hike) I need to be prepared for challenges and questions. So working it out in my head helped me clarify my position with regard to Hetch.

His basic objection was that Hetch Hetchy reservoir is a major (but not the only) source of water for the city of San Francisco and if the dam (which is in dire need of earthquake proofing upgrades) were to be destroyed by an earthquake, it would be catastrophic, disrupting the water supply at a time of drought, etc.

Well of course. The objective of restoring Hetch Hetchy is NOT about “destroying” anything, or allowing the dam to deteriorate. It is about revisiting the problem. The problem the turn of the century engineers and policitcians were trying to solve was: “How can we provide water for the current and fast growing population?” They solved that problem with the dam. But we in the 21st century are trying to solve a new problem: “How can we provide water for the current population, allowing for a reasonable degree of growth, in a sustainable manner with low impact on fragile eco-systems?” That problem was not at all solved by damming Hetch Hetchy, nor would it be solved by damming Yosemite valley, or all the valleys of the high sierras. We are trying to solve a new problem with new values and new technology. We need not be beholden to bad decisions made a hundred years ago by engineers and politicians long dead. The fact that the reservoir is currently in use is merely a variable in the equation, not a reason to accept the status quo.

So to be clear, my position is that it is possible and desirable to restore Hetch Hetchy valley while not disrupting the water supply to the users downstream.  That is also the position of the Restore Hetch Hetchy organization which I am attempting to raise money for. No one anywhere is lobbying to stick it to the city of San Francisco. No one favors allowing the dam to deteriorate.

The only reasonable questions that can be argued over are:

  1. Can it be done, from an engineering perspective?
  2. How much will it cost, really?
  3. Is it worth it?

To question 1, I believe the answer is of course. If we can dam water upstream, we can also move water to a downstream reservoir. No question about it really.

To question 2 — well there’s a lot of numbers to argue over I suppose. But when you factor in real, meaningful water conservation efforts, the cost of upgrading the current dam, and other number crunching one could do, I believe a realistic number could be arrived at (FAQ says $1-3 billion).

To question 3, well, this is a value judgment. My feeling is that reasonable, sustainable growth is better than uncontrolled growth, that low impact environmental solutions are better than high impact ones. I believe the valley is a precious and very special resource that was destroyed by short sighted minds and is worth restoring. I can’t argue with a person who does not share those values.

But please be assured, the goal to restore Hetch Hetchy is a proposal to embark on a civil engineering project that solves 21st century problems with 21st century values and solutions, NOT an attempt to protect a spotted owl at the expense of jobs. If anything, a large civil engineering project like this could be viewed as a very timely stimulus which would create jobs.

So whenever my dick in-law tries to engage me again, I’ll be ready for him.

If you share my concerns about this cause, or if you merely want to stick it to the dicks of this world consider donating to my pledge drive.

Bush legacy BS January 14, 2009

Posted by admin in : End Of The World, Political/Editorial , 2comments

I like how people trying to defend Bush’s record, including W himself, like to emphasize how no 9/11 size attack has happened since 9/11 and that was his administration’s priority, and since none has occurred therefore he was successfull at his main objective.  The one thing that he did not royally fuckup was something that didn’t happen. He was also incredibly effective at protecting America from an meteor collision, since that also didn’t happen. And Mt. St. Helens has not blown up in the last eight years. Way to go! A 9/11 size attack most certainly DID happen while he was the president. One just hasn’t happened *lately*, so his record was a success. Bush’s record was a success because it hasn’t killed me yet. Wonderful!

Whatever dude. I’m done with you.

Hummer December 5, 2008

Posted by admin in : End Of The World, Environment, Lies, Political/Editorial , 1 comment so far

If we’re gonna bailout GM, we should use some of the money to buy back every Hummer and replace them with something more economical in GM’s line, say Aveos. The Hummers could then be ritually beaten into ploughshares. For us to bailout a company which sold Hummers during the Iraq war is hard to justify, and only if it means leverage for us to force them to go fully and truly green should we consider it.

8 November 5, 2008

Posted by admin in : Political/Editorial , add a comment

Inspired by the passage of prop 8 defining marriage as between a man and a woman, I humbly propose for the next election that we amend the consitution to define childhood as between a boy and his dog.

Praise Hindu, Buddha and Allah! November 4, 2008

Posted by admin in : Political/Editorial , 1 comment so far

Our god is greater than their god!

Reverse Bradley October 28, 2008

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Or something.

For every person who claims he’ll vote for Obama then secretly votes for McCain, I’m sure there’s also a person who publicly claims to support McCain who will really vote for Obama. Right? I mean, isn’t this idea of people who make public statements then secretly do the opposite something that happens all the time, in all directions, for all kinds of different reasons? And doesn’t the fact that it does happen in both directions tend to dampen any statistical significance?

You know there are people who don’t want to publicly reveal they have changed their mind about McCain and will vote for Obama.

No on 4 October 23, 2008

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Here’s my new angle on why we should not restrict women’s access to safe, legal abortion facilities, whether it’s Prop 4 or overturning Roe v. Wade, etc.

Guess what? It puts the government — some bureaucrat in Washington — between a patient and her doctor. A doctor and a patient may agree on a medical procedure, but they cannot perform that procedure because some bureaucrat in Washington won’t permit it.

Conservatives and Libertarians are supposed to not like that sort of thing, right?

One small political comment October 10, 2008

Posted by admin in : End Of The World, Irrelevant, Political/Editorial , add a comment

As ever, I have little to contribute to the current political discussion since other people who care more and are better skilled have already got it covered.

But this is one observation I’d like to make:

McCain/Palin attacks on Obama just make them look worse. Not because it’s so obviously desperate mean-spirited and cynical. Even if you believe every word they say about Obama, it makes McCain/Palin look worse. They are running against a liberal, secret Muslim opponent named Barack Hussein Obama who pals around with terrorists and would gladly give a platform to our worst enemies.

And they still can’t beat him.

People must really not want you to be the president if they’d rather have a Muslim terrorist president instead.

John McCain looks like the guy standing next to the guy… August 1, 2008

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John McCain looks like the guy standing next to the guy who’s running for president. Even when he’s the only guy on stage.