Alito and Border Fences

Unfortunately I haven't taken the time to connect the two, but I did write this out in case I was asked to speak at a press conference this Monday outside Dianne Feinstein's office ...

It is no surprise that the Lawyers Guild is opposed to the nomination of Samuel Alito, but more than mere opposition, we are gravely concerned that his confirmation would do enormous damage to our privacy rights and to racial, ethnic and gender equality for decades to come. We are barely fighting off the Bush administration’s attacks on privacy rights, and Alito’s confirmation could be the death blow. This is the most important fight that most Senators and Representatives will face while in office, because this is an appointment for life. Bush is a failed, unpopular President, but he may yet have a significant legacy by obliterating the Bill of Rights through his federal court nominations. What will the legacy of Diane Feinstein be?

The government is already interfering too much in the private decisions made by women and their doctors. The government is already interfering too much in the private communications and associations of Americans, particularly with Bush, Cheney and Attorney General Gonzales driving executive power beyond all checks and balances. Alito’s confirmation will mean that all the legislative battles over these issues in the future will be for not because an activist Supreme Court with a right-wing agenda will always have the last word.

People have said that we should not oppose a qualified court nominee based on purely ideological grounds. But there are hundreds of qualified judges. The reasons Bush chose Alito are purely ideological. Bush wants to put someone on the High Court who will carry out his political agenda, and that is why politics and ideology are at the center of this debate, because of Bush not because of us.

I am hopeful that Americans will understand how important this nomination is as the hearings move forward this week and they will let their representatives know they want to see a fight.

And I sent this to the Editors of the San Francisco Chronicle ...

Proposals about building fences or walls along our border with Mexico are inspired by racist and xenophobic forces who would have such barriers be permanent and impenetrable if they thought they could convince the public of such lunacy. Surely the rest of us understand that at some point borders will become irrelevant or at least only as significant as the border between California and Nevada. The question we should be debating is whether this process will take 10 years or 100. I would argue that it should happen before 2015 and the reason is one you missed in your Editorial "Border Madness."

You attempt to argue that the kind of enforcement proposed by some in Congress may counterintuitively lead to more illegal immigrants in the U.S. So you agree with the underlying assumption of those in Congress that illegal immigration is a problem and reducing the number immigrants is highly desirable. In fact many well-researched and respected studies show that the influx of immigrants into this country in recent decades has helped more than hurt our economy. There simply is no border emergency. The solution to the "problem" of illegal immigration is to legalize many more immigrants and begin minimizing other immigration restrictions. It is unfortunate that right-wing hysteria has pushed this solution out of the mainstream.