by Jerome du Bois
Hundreds.
Not thousands, and not hundreds of thousands. Here in Phoenix, illegal immigrants and their supporters "marshalled" a few "human chains" at three or four scattered locations across the Valley. I wondered why cable news basically skipped over Phoenix in its "coast-to-coast" coverage, and why the local coverage was so spotty. There was nothing much happening, apparently. (The best local shot was of some dipstick reporter interviewing an illegal under the Do Not Pick Up Day Workers sign at the Home Depot.)
The human chain fell short a few links, too. According to one report, before the Big Day,
In Phoenix, organizers hope to form a 25-mile long human chain.
It turned out to be more like .25 miles, if you put the scattered links together.
Methinks tienen las cabezas mas grandes, no? And grand ambitions. Como se dice "hot air" in Spanish?
And this adds a layer of prophecy to the photo in this posting. I now add the caption:
La Fiesta es finito, and it's not even Cinco de Mayo.
Despite the fact that Roberto Reveles, head of a "nationwide" group with the lying name of We Are America (Somos America), is based here, and despite the fact that supposedly 100,000 illegals and their tearjerkers marched in Phoenix less than a month ago, and despite the huge nationwide turnout elsewhere, people in Phoenix stayed away yesterday. I wonder why. A local restaurant manager has an explanation:
At Z'Tejas Southwestern Grill in Chandler, general manager Bill Hovey said "it really didn't affect us today." "All the guys that participated on April 10 felt that was enough for them."
Now, I know Mr. Hovey can't really speak for "all the guys," but if he's interpreting their behavior correctly, they sure don't appear to be men of principle, do they? Willing to risk a lot to make a stand? Willing to sacrifice for a greater good? No, one day's enough. What does that say about their character, their integrity? Not much.
By the way, if Mr. Hovey is knowingly employing illegals, as he seems to be implying here, shouldn't somebody be looking into that?
A local hotel exec had a different experience:
But Ben Bethel, partner of the Clarendon Hotel + Suites in Phoenix, found himself cleaning rooms when half his housekeeping staff didn't show up. He supported his employees' participation in the April 10 rally because they gave him notice. Monday's absences were a surprise.
"They didn't even call," he said.
Bethel said he would not fire the six employees because their jobs are hard to fill, though the absences could factor into who is let go in the slow summer months.
Well, that accounts for six of them. And maybe their jobs are hard to fill because he pays them peanuts for a job "Americans won't do."
On that subject, Rich Lowry demolished that inflated argument back on March 14th in "Jobs Americans Won't Do?" He writes:
President George Bush, a strong supporter of the guest-worker program, has long said that "family values don't stop at the Rio Grande." We are supposed to believe, however, that the work ethic does stop there — it is only south of it that people can be found who are willing to work in construction, landscaping and agricultural jobs. So, without importing those people into our labor market, these jobs would go unfilled, disrupting the economy (and creating an epidemic of unkempt lawns in Southern California).
This is sheer nonsense. According to a new survey by the Pew Hispanic Center, illegals make up 24 percent of workers in agriculture, 17 percent in cleaning, 14 percent in construction, and 12 percent in food production. So 86 percent of construction workers, for instance, are either legal immigrants or Americans, despite the fact that this is one of the alleged categories of untouchable jobs.
(About the lawns: the average American, unlike the average national and state lawmaker, TV talking head, or mayor, or governor, does not employ a gardener --or a nanny, or a housekeeper, or a cook. We do it ourselves.)
Read it all for many more details, such as this one:
The average "consumer unit" in the U.S. spends $7 a week on fresh fruit and vegetables, less than is spent on alcohol, according to Martin. On a $1 head of lettuce, the farm worker gets about 6 or 7 cents, roughly 1/15th of the retail price. Even a big run-up in the cost of labor can't hit the consumer very hard.
Mr. Reveles should get some of this simple math into his head, edging out the visions of new voters dancing there.
Although I'm glad the Big Anti-American Walkoutpalooza fizzled in Phoenix, I can't help but think that there's something screwy here.
Let me begin with an anecdote. There's an Asian food market a few miles from my home. I've been going there once or twice a month for a couple of years, for soup ingredients. Up until recently I used a major thoroughfare, and so I was able to notice the changes over the months, the Mexification of the street. I won't go into details, but it looks like at least one huge sweatshop operates just behind a major intersection; and there's a corner house --again, fronting the major thoroughfare-- which is alternately deserted or jammed with all types of vehicles, which constantly change. A few months ago I decided to go two miles out of my way to avoid that street. Too dangerous. I didn't want to be part of a staged accident, or the victim of an uninsured drunk driver, or have to dodge whole families on foot trying to cross five lanes without bothering to go down to the intersection.
Oh, but they couldn't all be illegal, could they? No --but one is too many. And they couldn't all be legal, either; the scene grew too fast. And here are some other facts to consider:
Arizona is the key state in the whole illegal immigration drama. More illegals come up from the Arizona border than anywhere else. All the moves are being made here. The Minutemen are based here. The waterjug people are based here. Loudmouth Salvador Reza is based here. The Governor has declared a state of emergency. Yesterday, the very Dia Sin, Republican state legislators introduced a very strong anti-illegal immigration measure, "a $100 million package that would deploy National Guard troops to the desert border with Mexico and use radar to track anyone trying to sneak across the border." The Governor is expected to veto it, but the Republicans are ready and determined. The national congressional delegations are split on the issue. If ever there was a time and place for the biggest showpiece, it was in Phoenix yesterday.
And it flopped. Nobody even showed up at the Capitol to protest the Republican move --an obvious location and built-in TV spot. Why? Two quick theories: blowback from the big local march three weeks ago, with the message going out to let the other cities take the weight, we'll keep our heads down.
Maybe, but I don't buy it. My other theory is much darker, and it's based on the premise that these people are illegal. In other words, they view the law with contempt; the law is just something to either avoid or use, but never honor or obey. There's a hell of a lot of shady operators who feel just this way servicing that flood of criminal fools pouring endlessly up from the border.
And I think they're making so much money --from check-washing, chop-shopping, drug-dealing, false-document-preparing, and human smuggling-- that they've sent the word out --filtered through ever-cleaner channels-- to not queer the deal.
And the local political activists seem to be going along with it, floating down the rio --just like they sold us.
Posted by Jerome at May 2, 2006 11:20 AM | TrackBack