The GOP Seeks to Score Political Points with the Newark Slayings

The recent focus on illegal immigration and crime because of the Newark slayings is nothing more than politics. The slayings in Newark were brutal and there is no question about that. Families are grieving because of senseless murders certainly by psychopathic behavior.

Adding illegal immigration to this debate is to score points politically, period. Tom Moran's current column chastises those who seek to do this and blasts O'Reilly and the Republicans for their hypocrisy. But, quite frankly this is all nonsense.

First, anyone who has studied criminal behavior among immigrants and especially Latino immigrants know that criminality of illegal immigrants is far below that of the general population. We at the Subversive Garden recently gave Newt Gingrich Assclown of the Week for his comments on immigration and trying to score political points with the Republican base by calling the "war against immigration" a much more important war than Afghanistan and Iraq.

What is more the war against immigrants came into full swing with the contract with America (led by none other than Newt Gingrich) and illegal immigrants or legal immigrants can be deported for almost any crime. In 1996 Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) which expanded grounds for deportation. More than 50 crimes were designated as an "aggravated felony" some of which are "neither aggravated nor a felony." Immigrants can now be deported for crimes of "moral turpitude" which can be crimes that are not even prosecutable.

We do not need tougher immigration laws corralling prisons and city streets looking for immigrants, that would be a travesty. Those charged with committing these heinous acts should have already been caught as part of the system. The system failed for some reason and tragedy occurred. This debate is only to score political points and derail an immigration bill that seeks to treat immigrants as human. Let us not let one tragedy derail an entire policy initiative. Acts by those who are here illegally are no less heinous than native born Americans and that occurs at a much more alarming rate.