They go through a lot of trouble just to be exploited ! Who is being exploited; the illegal worker or the American taxpayer?

oh my God this dummy's still messing with the same over and over. I'll tell you again and write a thesis on this. THERE IS NO EXPLOTATION of Mexicans or anybody else. ILLEGALS ARE CRIMINALS, why? because THEY CHOOSE to jump over the fence, sneak into my country like thieves in the night, the women CHOOSE to cross the border and drop their puppies right there on the ground but is guaranteed all types of benefits that belong to us.

ILLEGALS are CRIMINALS because even before they reach our country they decided to break all the laws and use our country to wipe their behinds. How? by not following OUR RULES and OUR LAWS. They don't go to our consulates around the world, take a number, and wait their turn. They CHOOSE to jump over the fence, hide in ships, pretend to be TOURISTS, and so on. Therefore, NO TO AMNESTY!!! SEND ALL ILLEGALS BACK!!!

Mexican children filling U.S. schools
01:58 PM CDT on Sunday, April 29, 2007
Associated Press

HOUSTON – Thousands of Mexican children are flocking across the U.S. border to attend school, sparking a debate in towns along the border over whether U.S. taxpayers should have to bear the costs of educating them.

The border crossing is so common in El Paso that officials opened a special lane just for students this month. The Houston Chronicle reported Sunday that more than 1,200 people passed through that lane from Mexico on a recent morning. Some were college or private school students, but many were coming to attend public schools.

The influx has prompted complaints from those opposed to spending U.S. tax dollars to teach students from Mexico. The issue is especially timely in El Paso, where the school district – which expects to take in 10,000 new students in the next five to eight years – is preparing for a $230 million bond election for new schools next month.

Elaine Hampton, a professor at the University of Texas-El Paso, says the strained state of public education in Mexico pushes many students across the Rio Grande, just as the hope of better jobs entices their parents.

The growth of Mexican border towns like Ciudad Juarez far outpaces the government's ability to build schools, Hampton said, forcing many to turn away students. Mexican schools also can be too expensive for some parents, charging fees for books, photocopies and sometimes even the cost of administering a test.

Although many school officials are unhappy about the situation, they say there are few ways to control the number of Mexican residents attending their schools. As long as a parent or guardian has proof of residency in that school district – such as a water bill or lease – their child can attend. Many of the students were born in U.S. hospitals, making them U.S. citizens who live in Mexico. Others use the addresses of American friends or relatives.

Community pressure has pushed other districts to crack down on those who violate residency requirements. Susan Carlson, a spokeswoman for the United ISD in Laredo, said her district's schools are extra vigilant with residency checks and recently began fining students found breaking residency rules. Luis Villalobos, a spokesman for the El Paso Independent School District, said the district has seven officers checking out potentially false addresses.

NEWS World:
Mexico

MEXICO CITY – Mexican journalists have grown impatient as more of their colleagues are murdered, kidnapped or threatened because of their work. Increasingly, the media have directed their frustration toward the office designed to provide them justice: the Special Prosecutor for Crimes Against Journalists.

Created amid fanfare in 2006 by then-President Vicente Fox, the office is now seen by many media organizations as a toothless entity without the resources or political will to successfully prosecute crimes committed against journalists.

The sense of urgency increased this month after the fatal shooting in Acapulco of Amado Ramirez, a reporter for Televisa, Mexico's largest television network. Ramirez was shot weeks after airing an investigation on drug traffickers, and his slaying prompted hundreds of journalists to rally for greater protections.

On Wednesday, the Vienna-based International Press Institute reported that Mexico's seven murders in 2006 made it the second-deadliest nation for journalists, behind Iraq. Media watchdogs said the violence is tied to warring drug cartels, often in league with corrupt police, who hope to intimidate journalists from reporting their activities.

In his first interview with the foreign press, Special Prosecutor Octavio Orellana defended his office's accomplishments but acknowledged he could use more manpower. Orellana said he often has to borrow investigators from the Attorney General's office because his budget is limited.

"I am satisfied that the work is being done, but I am not satisfied because we would always want more results," said Orellana, a lawyer and criminologist who assumed the post in March. "Like everything in life, if you have more human elements, a larger budget, you think you can do more."

Journalists have been under siege for decades, especially near a U.S. border region that remains a trouble spot. Just last week, the body of crime reporter Samuel Noe Martinez of the newspaper Interdiario was found wrapped in a blanket after he had been kidnapped from a town on the Arizona border.

Journalists hailed the creation of the special prosecutor's office as recognition that the violence had become a national crisis. But political analyst Jorge Zepeda said that the move created a false sense that the Mexican government took the problem seriously.

"The prosecutor was created by Fox as a demagogic, rhetorical attempt to lower the pressure in the public over the violence against journalists," said Zepeda, a former editor at newspapers in Mexico City and Guadalajara.

Jose Antonio Calcaneo, a newspaper editor in the city of Villahermosa, complained that President Felipe Calderon has not been any more willing than Fox to take on the issue. Calcaneo has seen the threats up close. An investigative reporter at competitor Tabasco Today, Rodolfo Rincon, was kidnapped in January, reportedly after receiving threats.

"Calderon declared himself against this wave of violence, but in his deeds, this has translated into nothing. Absolutely nothing," said Calcaneo, president of FAPERMEX, a national federation of media organizations. "They have practically made the special prosecutor disappear."

Calcaneo also said Orellana, the special prosecutor, has "shirked his responsibility" by not staking out his jurisdiction over crimes against journalists.

Orellana said he prefers to hand over cases in which journalists appeared to have been victims of organized crime to SIEDO, an arm of the Attorney General's office that investigates those groups. In defending his performance, he also noted that many cases remain at the state level and never make it to his office.

Without giving details, Orellana said his office could close some cases soon.

Orellana said he would support making crimes against journalists automatic federal cases. He said many reporters are threatened because they are investigating state authorities, and that the public generally has more confidence in the integrity of federal prosecutors.

"Sometimes, journalists complain that the ones who are complicating their work are the local authorities themselves," Orellana said.

Carlos Lauria, Americas program director at the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, said the special prosecutor has not achieved any "breakthrough results," but blamed a generally "dysfunctional" justice system. Lauria noted progress in some investigations and said a federal prosecutor was still an improvement over state authorities who often are corrupt or inefficient.

Some colleagues of Ramirez, the slain Acapulco reporter, have complained that state investigators in Guerrero have botched the probe. Two men were arrested days after the killing but were released on bail.

Orellana said his office will push efforts to prevent, not merely prosecute, crimes against journalists. Staffers are training reporters how to preserve threatening e-mails and text messages that could later be used in criminal prosecutions, for example. About half of the office's 68 investigations in 2006 involved threats.

NEWS World:
Mexico
May 1, 2007
ATF agent: 5 planned to attack Mexicans

Bail denied after raids netted grenades, arrests of self-proclaimed militia

11:15 PM CDT on Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Associated Press

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Five members of a self-styled militia were denied bail Tuesday after a federal agent testified that they planned a machine gun attack on Mexicans.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Armstrong said he could not grant bail to the five because of the agent's testimony and the amount of weapons – including about 200 homemade hand grenades – seized in raids Friday in northeast Alabama.

"I'm going to be worried if I let these individuals go at this time," he said.

Adam Nesmith, an agent with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, testified that the five planned a machine-gun attack on Mexicans in Remlap, just north of Birmingham, and went there on a reconnaissance mission April 20. The five are Raymond Kirk Dillard, 46; Adam Lynn Cunningham, 41; Bonnell Hughes, 57; Randall Garrett Cole, 22; and James Ray McElroy, 20.

During the raids last week, agents recovered 130 homemade hand grenades, a grenade launcher, about 70 hand grenades rigged to be fired from a rifle, a machine gun, a short-barrel shotgun and 2,500 rounds of ammunition, authorities said.

Local and federal officials returned to the area Tuesday because authorities got information that explosives could be hidden in a cave.

At the hearing, Agent Nesmith said Mr. Dillard told an undercover agent that the group, which calls itself the Alabama Free Militia, viewed government agents as "the enemy" and had a standing order to open fire if anyone saw government agents approaching.

The judge approved $10,000 bail for a sixth defendant, 30-year-old Michael Wayne Bobo, at a later hearing. Mr. Bobo, who is being kept in custody until at least today, was charged with being a drug user in possession of a firearm. The other five were charged with conspiring to make a firearm.

Meth production flourishes south of the border

11:51 PM CDT on Friday, April 27, 2007
By LAURENCE ILIFF / The Dallas Morning News
liliff@dallasnews.com

MEXICO CITY – The anti-drug operation was in the works for months. And the news would be big, officials said. But when Mexican police burst into a plush home in the capital's exclusive Lomas de Chapultepec neighborhood last month, guided in part by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, they were taken aback.

They found stacks and stacks of crisp, green U.S. $100 bills. In closets, in drawers, and suitcases. The attorney general's office arranged the bills into a huge, bed-shaped platform, with Ben Franklin beaming from a thousand eyes. The first estimate by authorities put the take at $100 million. Then the bill-counting machines came in and the figure topped $200 million. It was the biggest drug cash seizure ever.

There was another surprise. The money did not belong to one of Mexico's powerful drug cartels, nor did it represent profits from the sale of traditional drugs such as Colombian cocaine, Mexican marijuana and black-tar heroin.

Rather, authorities said, it was amassed by a naturalized Mexican from China, Zhenli Ye Gon, who is accused of using his Asian contacts to illegally import the precursor drugs to make the new star of the U.S. and Mexican drug markets: methamphetamine.

As a U.S. crackdown against meth labs and precursor chemicals has been drying up domestic production in recent years, the Mexican cartels are enthusiastically filling the void, U.S. and Mexican officials say. Moreover, officials say, meth has advantages for the cartels over even highly profitable cocaine. It is a highly addictive drug that can be made at home, smuggled easily and reap huge profit margins.


Authorities seized weapons and $205 million last month – the biggest drug seizure ever – from a home in Mexico City. Agents believe the fortune was amassed by importing drugs that are used to make methamphetamine. Like the nonamphetamine designer drug "cheese" that is causing deaths in the Dallas area, cheap meth distributed through existing drug channels may be the coming nightmare on both sides of the border.

In September, police in Fort Worth reported a record seizure of methamphetamine: more than 48 pounds, with a street value of $3 million. In March, a convicted methamphetamine dealer was charged with the fatal shooting of a Dallas police officer, Senior Cpl. Mark Nix.

Mexican cartels are not just supplying demand for meth, a Mexican official said, but creating it as well.

"What we are seeing is a manipulation of the drug markets," said Santiago Vasconcelos, deputy director of international and legal matters for Mexico's attorney general's office.

"It is a diabolical plan by these criminal organizations" to increase sales of homemade amphetamines as an alternative to South American cocaine, which must be grown, processed, and transported thousands of miles.

"The lesson we get from this is very painful," said Mr. Vasconcelos. "The American people have yet to wake up from the nightmare of synthetic drugs, especially the nightmare that has brought them to methamphetamines."

It costs 20 cents to make a dose of meth that garners $20, he said in an interview.

Amphetamines can be taken as a pill, smoked as "ice," snorted as "crystal," or dissolved in water like the club drug "ecstasy," or MDMA. Some of the varied forms are old, some are new, but together they threaten to create new U.S. addictions and financially strengthen the Mexican cartels and their war against each other and the government.

DEA concerns
"Methamphetamine is something we're very concerned about, because we go back to our history in the early '80s when cocaine was not a big deal here," said Steven M. Robertson, DEA special agent for congressional and public affairs.

"Then, all of a sudden, it took off, and we were playing catch-up. DEA has learned from the cocaine flood in the '80s and we're saying, OK, [with] methamphetamine, we don't want to get to the point where they're bringing in thousand-kilo amounts," he said in an interview.

The effects in Dallas, and across the U.S., could be devastating over time. Meth addicts are infamous for their obsessive addictions and failure to care for themselves, which causes their teeth to fall out and leaves their emaciated bodies susceptible to illness. This is especially true among those who inject or smoke the drug.

In contrast, ecstasy, an amphetamine derivative taken as a pill, is best known as a "club drug" that causes hours of energy followed by lethargy.

Use of amphetamines has not exploded in the U.S., but the promise of a drop-off due to the U.S. crackdown on precursor chemicals and drug labs has not materialized – because of increased Mexican supply.

Rising addictions
And hard-core addiction seems to be rising quickly.

The U.S. Justice Department's "National Methamphetamine Threat Assessment" found that while the total number of meth users had stayed steady from 2002 to 2004 at about 600,000, the percentage of addicts within that group had increased significantly.

The number of people admitted to programs for treatment of methamphetamine-related drug use rose from about 68,000 in 2000 to nearly 130,000 in 2004, the report said.

One reason, it suggests, is the influx of Mexican ice methamphetamine, similar in its addictive qualities to crack cocaine.

"Smoking methamphetamine may result in more rapid addiction to the drug than snorting or injection, because smoking causes a nearly instantaneous, intense, and longer-lasting high," the report said. Seizures of ice along the Southwest border rose from 260 pounds in fiscal 2003 to nearly 1,500 pounds in 2005.

U.S. and Mexican officials do not agree on Mexico's role in meth production.

A.J. Turner, section chief for the FBI's criminal investigative division, said in an interview that Mexican cartels are the source of 85 percent to 90 percent of the methamphetamine in the U.S., according to the agency's intelligence. "The supply is on the Mexican side; the demand is on the United States side," he said.

Mr. Vasconcelos said suggestions that Mexico had become the dominant supplier to the U.S. were false. While U.S. meth lab seizures number in the thousands each year, Mexico raids about 100 labs annually, he said.

He described Mexico as an "incipient" producer that is now cracking down on the illegal import of precursor chemicals, such as ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. Mexico needs about 70 tons a year of pseudoephedrine for legal drugs but has imported as much as 240 tons year. It is now getting a handle on imports, although China remains a problem, he said.

Likewise, all ephedrine and pseudoephedrine coming into Mexico – 100 percent – passes through U.S. ports such as Long Beach before arriving in Mexico. Finger-pointing by U.S. officials, Mr. Vasconcelos said, only plays into the cartels' hands.

"The challenge here is to see ourselves as the community that we are; to see ourselves as neighbors," he said.

More labs in Mexico
According to the U.S. government's 2007 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, more methamphetamine labs are turning up on Mexican soil, and increasing amounts of the drug are being seized.

"Seizure statistics for cocaine and methamphetamine during 2006 demonstrate Mexico's significance as a production and transit country," the report says.

The suspect in the huge cash seizure in mid-March, Zhenli Ye Gon, was an important middleman for Mexican cartels because he was importing massive quantities of pseudoephedrine, a common cold medicine that can be easily transformed into amphetamine, Mexican authorities said.

Mr. Vasconcelos said the suspect appeared to be a legitimate businessman who found a profitable side business diverting pseudoephedrine to Mexican and U.S. meth producers. The fact that he was unable to launder the $205 million found in his home shows that Mexican bank controls are working.

Zhenli Ye Gon, the attorney general's office said, ran a pharmaceutical company, Unimed Pharm Chem de México, that illegally imported more than 60 tons of pseudoephedrine, which he processed into its purest form. Authorities say he was building a 45,000-square-foot laboratory near Mexico City, which officials have now dismantled.

The suspect got the attention of U.S. and Mexican officials in a big way in December when they seized 19 tons of pseudoephedrine in the port of Lázaro Cárdenas, the biggest Mexican seizure ever. The ship carrying it came from China and had passed through the port of Long Beach on its way to Mexico.

The ensuing investigation, "Operation Dragon," led officials not only to the $205 million and the laboratory under construction, but also to seven suspects and additional residences.

Zhenli Ye Gon remains a fugitive while Mexican authorities divide up the confiscated cash, one-third of which is to go toward drug treatment.

DRUG USE: A SNAPSHOT

According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, methamphetamine is second only to marijuana of illegal drugs used most frequently in many Western and Midwestern states. Nationwide, it still trails cocaine among regular users.

Number of regular drug users: 19.7 million

Marijuana users: 14.6 million

Cocaine users: 2.4 million

Methamphetamine users: 600,000

"Ecstasy" (MDMA) users: 500,000

SOURCE: 2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

DEFINITIONS

Amphetamines: A general term used to describe a family of synthetic drugs that boost energy and stimulate brain activity, enhancing mood and alertness. They have been used legally as mental stimulants and as diet pills. Currently, their legal uses in the U.S. include treatment of attention deficit disorder and narcolepsy.

Methamphetamine: A highly potent stimulant with long-lasting effects that make it very addictive, like cocaine. It is the most popular illegal amphetamine and takes several forms, such as pills, a white powder, or clear chunky crystals that can be snorted or smoked (known as "crystal" or "ice").

•According to the 2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 10.4 million Americans 12 and older had tried methamphetamine at least once.

"Ecstasy": Also called MDMA for its chemical name (the "a" stands for amphetamine), ecstasy is a stimulant that also has some of the hallucinatory effects of mescaline, the active ingredient in peyote. It is often called a "club drug" or a "love drug" for the energy and positive mood it creates.

•More than 11 million people have tried MDMA at least once, according to the 2004 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

SOURCES: National Institute on Drug Abuse; U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration

Border Patrol agent charged with killing unarmed migrant

Shooting at Az. border was in January

08:59 PM CDT on Monday, April 23, 2007
Associated Press

PHOENIX – A Border Patrol agent was charged Monday with first-degree murder in the shooting of an unarmed illegal immigrant at the border in January.

An investigation found that Agent Nicholas Corbett's killing of Francisco Dominguez-Rivera, of Puebla, Mexico, was not legally justified, said Cochise County prosecutor Ed Rheinheimer.

Corbett is also charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide. A judge will determine which of the charges the evidence supports best, Rheinheimer said.

"We have concluded that the evidence shows that at the time he was shot, Mr. Dominguez-Rivera presented no threat to agent Corbett," Rheinheimer said.

His attorney, Daniel Santander, didn't immediately return a message left Monday afternoon by The Associated Press. The Border Patrol said it would make a statement Tuesday.

The shooting, which drew condemnation from the Mexican government, occurred while Corbett was trying to apprehend Dominguez-Rivera and three others who were trying to enter the country illegally.

In the days after the shooting, the Border Patrol said that a scuffle had led to it and that the agent had "feared for his life."

More than 300 pages of documents later released by prosecutors revealed that Corbett's account didn't match witness testimony or forensic evidence.

Amarillo Globe-News
Friday, May 04, 2007

Letters: Mexican truckers will be bane of U.S. highways

Mexican truckers will be bane of U.S. highways
The U.S. Department of Transportation is poised to open the border for trucks from Mexico to operate throughout the U.S.

The DOT says safety and security programs are in place. This is a joke!

U.S. truckers must have a valid commercial driver's license and 10 years' driving history. We don't know whether their Mexican counterparts are trained as truckers or terrorists.

U.S. truckers must be tested for drugs and alcohol and follow hours of service regulations for driving time. No such regulations exist in Mexico.

DOT says every truck will be inspected at the border. Not likely. They inspect fewer than 4 percent right now.

And what will these trucks haul into the U.S.? Could be people, or drugs, or dirty bombs. We won't know.

Why the rush to open the border? Money.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce believes we need more trucks and cheaper labor. So, safety is compromised and American drivers lose their jobs.

Doesn't sound like anyone in this country wins.

Right now, we have more questions than answers. Until the DOT can assure the public that Mexican trucks are just as safe as U.S. trucks, the border must stay closed.

Tell your elected officials to keep the border closed!

Rick Lafosse
Fritch


Loss of U.S. sovereignty just the beginning
I've always had an uneasy feeling about the North American Free Trade Agreement. I'm hard pressed to see how socialist Canada and corrupt Mexico have enhanced America's commerce.

The undoing of the United States will commence with the proposed NAFTA Superhighway, which will cut a 400-yard-wide swath from the Mexican border at Laredo to the Canadian border north of Duluth, Minn., effectively dividing this country.

Canada, Mexico and the U.S. could then be incorporated into what would be called the North American Union.

The sovereign United States will cease to exist. This alone is bad enough, but the nightmare continues.

A Cana-Mex corridor that will span the West from Mexico to Canada, through Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Idaho and Montana, and Trans-Texas Corridor 69, which will run from Houston to Memphis, Tenn., to Port Huron, Mich., to Toronto - eliminating any form of border separating the three countries - also is planned.

Tens of thousands of personal properties could be destroyed through eminent domain while U.S. taxpayers foot the $183 billion construction bill.

If these under-the-radar plans disturb you, let Washington - including the president - hear from you a resounding: "What are you people thinking?"

Mary Chumbley
Canyon

UNION-TRIBUNE
March 4, 2007

BORDER PATROL CONVICTION

Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz shares with his students a three-pronged strategy for successfully defending cases. If the facts are on your side, Dershowitz says, pound the facts into the table. If the law is on your side, pound the law into the table. If neither the facts nor the law are on your side, pound the table.

And it's not just in a court of law that this happens. Apparently, the same tactics apply in the court of public opinion.

Take those who are rallying around former Border Patrol Agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean. The pair became cult heroes with immigration restrictionists after they were convicted of shooting a fleeing drug smuggler on the Texas-Mexico border in February 2005 and then covering it up by tossing the shell casings and not reporting the incident.

It turns out that sort of thing is not only a violation of Border Patrol policy, but it's flat out against the law. Yet Mary Stillinger, the attorney for Ramos, considers the case one of Monday-morning quarterbacking. She told The Associated Press that what's really at issue is the contradiction between “the reality on the riverbank and the bureaucracy of regulations.”

Some Americans agree, including one reader who, after an earlier column on the case, wrote me and suggested: Why not be like Mexico? “They shoot people who invade their territory,” he said, “but we can't?”

No, we can't – because, in these matters and in most things, the United States should strive to achieve a higher standard than Mexico. Thanks to federal sentencing guidelines, Ramos and Compean were handed lengthy prison sentences – 11 years for Ramos and 12 for Compean.

As she seeks to overturn her client's conviction, Stillinger has charged in the media that prosecutors failed to show the defense a potentially exculpatory piece of evidence – a memo from a Department of Homeland Security investigator that says supervisors either knew of, or heard about, the shooting. Stillinger says if supervisors knew about the incident, it could undermine the claim that there was a cover-up. It would also mean the supervisors lied in court when they testified that the first time they heard of the shooting was when Homeland Security investigators showed up and began asking about it.

Stillinger claimed the memo is “Brady material” that should have been provided to the defense, and she's demanding a new trial. The term refers to the Supreme Court's 1963 ruling, in Brady v. Maryland, that the prosecution must turn over to the defense any exculpatory information.

For U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton, whose office prosecuted the case against the Border Patrol agents, these types of challenges are to be expected. “It's not uncommon,” he told me, “(for defense attorneys) to say, 'They should have told us this, this is vital, this is Brady, this would have totally changed everything if I had this.' ”

But, Sutton contends, the material in question was provided to defense attorneys. “To our knowledge,” he said, “the United States Attorney's Office complied with all of its discovery obligations in this case. And I believe that we, in fact, on several occasions made that memo available to all defense counsel as well as a great deal of other information in the file.”

Besides, he argued, the memo in question doesn't say what defense attorneys and their supporters claim it says. It reads that the investigation found “that the following BP agents were at the location of the shooting incident, assisted in destroying evidence of the shooting, and/or knew/heard about the shooting” and then includes on the list the names of two supervisors, Robert Arnold and Jonathan Richards.

“Maybe that's an inartful way to put it,” Sutton said of the way the memo is phrased. “I was at the location of the shooting incident as well . . . months and months later, just as Arnold and Richards were at the location of the shooting incident after it was all over.”

He said all the evidence presented at trial – including Compean's handwritten notes and the testimony of fellow agents – confirmed that the supervisors arrived at the scene after the fact.

For Sutton, all this second-guessing comes with the job. “Prosecutors have to follow the facts,” he said, “and sometimes the facts lead to unhappy places to be – like the unhappy place of prosecuting a police officer. Prosecutors never like to do that. It's always uncomfortable. But the fact is, when they violate the law, and it's a provable case, we can't let it slide.”

Why not? I bet they would in Mexico.

Navarrette can be reached via e-mail at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.

LA mayor condemns rally violence

By ANDREW GLAZER, Associated Press
Last updated: 10:14 p.m., Friday, May 4, 2007

LOS ANGELES -- Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa shortened a foreign trade mission Friday, returning home to condemn a police clash with demonstrators and journalists at an immigration rights rally.

"Like every Angeleno I was deeply, personally troubled by the events of May 1st," the mayor said after cutting short his mission to El Salvador and Mexico, during which had seen TV reports of the violence.

"Those images hit me in the gut," he said at a City Hall news conference. "As I've said, every American has a right to due process, but we don't need a long and lengthy investigation to stand up and speak to the truth. What happened on May 1st was wrong, was wrong."

Villaraigosa's early return underscored the seriousness of the fallout from Tuesday's melee in MacArthur Park, where police beat reporters and demonstrators with batons and fired more than 240 rubber bullets into a crowd that included children. Officers say they responded after being pelted by rocks and bottles.

No one was seriously hurt, but images of officers swinging batons and knocking people to the ground have been played repeatedly on cable TV newscasts, ramping up the pressure on Villaraigosa to return from the trade mission. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo on Friday announced the conviction of one demonstrator, who pleaded no contest to throwing a bottle at a vehicle.

The police response to the demonstration is the subject of four investigations, including one by the FBI.

State legislators, immigration activists and others gathered Friday at MacArthur Park to denounce police conduct during the altercation, which occurred at the end of a large immigrant rights demonstration.

"There are no excuses; a simple apology is not going to suffice," said state Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, a Democrat and close ally of the mayor. "To say we are outraged is an understatement. We want those responsible in the highest levels of the LAPD to pay consequences."

The department's handling of the rally should be considered in determining whether Police Chief William Bratton is given another five-year contract, Nunez said.

"I don't think you heard anybody say Chief Bratton is immune to any of this," Nunez said.

Bratton has expressed "grave concern" about what happened and promised a full investigation. He has said the use of force began while officers were dealing with 50 to 100 "agitators" who threw objects. At the news conference, he said he was "embarrassed for this department and embarrassed for the city we serve."

Meanwhile, KTTV television news camerawoman Patti Ballaz filed a claim for unspecified damages against the city and Police Department, alleging civil rights violations.

Ballaz suffered a fractured wrist and injuries to her ankle and was hit in the breast with a police baton, said Kathy Pinckert, a spokeswoman for Ballaz's attorneys.

There was no official tally of how many reporters were struck by police. Local media groups said they would meet this weekend to determine how to proceed.

Victor Narro, an attorney with the National Lawyers Guild who helped organize Tuesday's demonstration, said that police had promised to keep him abreast of any potential trouble but that his liaison, a police captain, was unreachable.
The guild is reviewing videotape and considering whether to sue the department. He noted that in one tape he saw police fire a rubber round at a boy who appeared to be 10 and "toss him aside like a piece of meat."

John Mack, president of the Police Commission, the civilian overseers of the Police Department, told reporters that the clash was "a terrible breakdown" and that the panel wants to get to the bottom of who was in charge at the time.

"We have a responsibility to protect individuals while they're expressing themselves," Mack said.

Column: Virgil Van Camp: North American Union would be disastrous for U.S.

migrant n. 1. A person, animal, bird or fish that moves from one region to another by chance, instinct or plan.
immigrant n. 1. A person who migrates to another country, usu. for permanent residence.
- American Heritage Dictionary

President Bush visited Mexico recently to meet with that country's president, Felipe Calderó®® In a joint news conference, Bush referred to our large and growing Mexican population as "migrants."

Not illegal immigrants, guest workers nor undocumented workers.

Was this just a slip of the tongue or a new attempt to soften the image and redefine the 12 million to 20 million aliens who have invaded our country? Another approach to amnesty?

Far right-wing blogs and publications routinely promote the idea that there is a conspiracy among one-world government elitists to erase national borders. At one time, the United Nations was to be the vehicle for their plan. That organization has become so corrupt and ineffectual that the conspirators have modified their goals. Now their sights have been lowered to create the North American Union, similar to the European Union. Some blogs suggest that this shadowy group also is responsible for the EU.

This plan has been implemented in stages, starting with the North American Free Trade Agreement, first making it an economic and free trade issue. What could be wrong with stimulating trade by removing tariffs and facilitating unfettered movement of products?

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is supposed to be a part of the conspiracy, promoting a trans-Texas corridor that might become the biggest highway project in the world.

Starting in Mexico, it would go through Central Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, and end in Canada. Perry has floated the idea that the superhighway could be financed privately and paid for with tolls.

The Bush administration announced plans in February to permit Mexican trucking companies to travel beyond the present 20-mile mile limit from the border. Critics say that Mexican trucks are poorly maintained, not properly insured and that the drivers need to demonstrate English proficiency and be better trained for driving on our highways.

When we have accomplished the unconstrained movement of goods and workers across the border, it will be time for Phase 2: freedom of movement for the citizens of the three countries of North America. Americans and Canadians should be concerned that the movement would mostly be to the north from Mexico.

Could the North American Union idea work?

We have lived in relative peace for many years. There has been friction and even two wars with Mexico. Canada has been a good neighbor and ally in two world wars and during the Cold War with the former Soviet Union.

We have drifted apart in recent years, especially on foreign policy in the Middle East and the war on terror.

The biggest obstacle is likely to be language. Even though the French are a decided minority, Canada made many concessions to its French-speaking citizens to keep them from seceding. As a result, everything - street signs, products instructions, legal documents - in Canada is printed in two languages. Recently, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper answered questions in French at a news conference in the United States. His native tongue is English.

Talk about political correctness.

Imagine what a mess it would become with Spanish introduced into the mix.

The United States has created, possibly by accident more than design, something unique in the history of the world: a population of tolerant and diverse citizens who get along with their neighbors; a society that provides a high standard of living for most of its citizens; a safe and civil society based on just laws; a society with a common language.

A North American Union with corrupt Mexico and socialist-leaning Canada likely will destroy us.

Virgil Van Camp can be contacted in care of the Amarillo Globe-News, P.O. Box 2091, Amarillo TX 79166, or letters@amarillo.com. His column appears every other Friday.

If they are deported then they will no longer be exploited. What is your problem; make up your mind; do you want them to be deported or exploited???? You can't have both ! She says that anyone who disagrees with her is a bigot. What a moron.