Emma Lazarus' Memorable Words on Lady Liberty

[Jcrowley]

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"



The Racist War on Immigrants

By Stephen Lendman

03/29/07 "ICH " -- -- Emma Lazarus' memorable words on Lady Liberty's pedestal once had meaning as a new nation grew. No longer in a country hostile to the tired, the poor, the huddled masses, the wretched refuse, the homeless and many others not making the grade in a white supremacist Judeo-Christian state worshiping wealth and privilege. No welcome sign is out for the unwanted poor and desperate. At best, they're ignored to subsist on their own. At worst, they're scorned and abused, exploited and discarded like trash or labeled "terrorists" in a post-9/11 world of mass witch-hunt roundups aimed at Muslims because of their faith or country of origin and Latinos coming north to survive the fallout from NAFTA's destructive effects on their lives.

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Still they come from need, not choice in a risky, dangerous journey starting with what it costs for help getting here. It's plenty extorted by Coyote smugglers and other predatory intermediaries treating them like pollos (chickens) once on their way north. They get crammed in trucks and cars, travel after dark, and aren't prepared for the hazards they'll face including 115 degree or higher summer temperatures crossing an unforgiving desert that end up killing hundreds each year from exposure who when found are just anonymous John Does leaving families behind never knowing what happened or what to do next.

And handling those risks depends on getting past heavy DHS/ICE border security in place post-9/11. They're ready and waiting with video cameras, state of the art motion sensors, infrared goggles, other security electronics and helicopters with forward-looking infrared (FLIR) scopes plus an unforgiving thuggish army of 6000 or more National Guard troops as part of Operation Jumpstart. They supplement the Border Patrol agent staff of 12,349 heading for 17,819 proposed for FY 2008, double the number it had in FY
2001.

Add to this army an extremist well-funded volunteer force in place called the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps (MCDC) or "Minutemen" for short. Their name comes from those "ready in a minute men" dating back to the mid-1600s when volunteers were trained to be first on the scene to defend their communities in case of conflict. Today's Minutemen on our southern border are for offense, not defense. All they defend is white supremacy and racial hatred against poor, desperate people unable to survive at home. Left no other choice, they come north, but doing it pits them against these ultra-hard right volunteer paramilitary thugs licensed to kill. They man the southern border by the thousands hunting down and terrorizing anyone caught entering the country without visas.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17445.htm