Take heart Arizona.. justice will eventually be done.

Here we sit, a few days past the date when the controversial Arizona SB1070 went into effect and then a couple of days after some judge decided that she knew better than the Arizona assembly and voters what should be done about illegal immigration. I know the knee-jerk attack from opponents of this law is to call anyone who supports it "racist" and "anti" this or that. But that's just a very lame copout. Arizona, by virtue of enacting this law, has attempted to correct a problem, which affects its citizens every day. The judge who overturned key components of the law rightly ruled that the power and responsibility for regulating immigration rests with the Federal Government. But anyone who has been paying attention has noticed the Feds are not even remotely interested in dealing with this problem and holding up their end of the bargain. What this ruling does is essentially sent the message to states that not only is the Federal Government not going to enforce its immigration laws but they don't want anybody else doing it either.

Lest it go unnoted, Arizona hardly has a spotless record in race relations. They were famously the last state to ratify the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday and they had that asinine episode where some idiots demanded that a black face on a mural on the side of an elementary school be lightened. Clearly there are some idiots in Arizona when it comes to race. And I'm am sure some of the people supporting the law absolutely hate Mexicans. Period. But that's not the issue here. There are tons of people in all walks of life who are racist. Get over it. This isn't about a few narrow minded jerks. This is about the law. A nation without laws is not a nation at all. We have immigration laws on the books which are being flouted by our neighbors to the south. We are spending billions and billions of dollars in additional law enforcement, health care, education and other services for these folks. It also bears noting that the amnesty route, which is favored by many who lobby in favor of the immigrants, has been tried before. Some 10-12 million illegals were granted amnesty 20 years ago. Clearly all that did was empower the next generation to ignore our immigration laws.

What angers me most is that these politicians who use the issue to make political hay during the election cycle and then basically let it drop once that time has passed. We have between 12-20 million people living underground in this country illegally. I don't care which side you fall on the issue of immigration, you cannot sanely argue that this is a good thing. There is additional crime, there is additive stress on services, schools etc. Yes America is the richest country in the world, but this notion that we have trillions of dollars to keep giving away forever and ever needs to be checked. In reality, we don't. We have trillions of dollars worth of our own problems that need solving, Mexico can get in line with the rest of the other countries we give aid to. Isn't the amount of money we are wasting in Afghanistan, Iraq and other places around the world one of the rallying points from the left? Don't we hear from them that we need to get out of these other countries and let them handle their own business? Why then is it acceptable to be spending between 100 and 150 billion a year on Mexico's and Latin American's "problems?"

I know I know.. "Ronnie you are just racist against Brown people!!" right? Wrong.. I live in a hugely Mexican area, and acknowledge readily that Mexicans are the hardest working people on the planet. They are also fiercely family oriented which I love and they have a strong religious bent. And oh yeah, I have two half Mexican children from my marriage to a Mexican woman. So save the "racist" accusations. I aint.. Period. But I AM criminalist. As in thoroughly anti- criminals. Particularly criminals who cost me money. And despite all the hard working Latinos and Latinas who come here and bust their humps for a better life, the fact that damn near half of all jail inmates in my state are illegal aliens, a large percentage of murders, rapes and other violent crimes here are committed by illegal aliens tells me, no screams at me, this is a problem and it needs to be addressed. Instead of brow-beating Arizona for trying to address it, we need to be applauding them for calling out the Federal government for not doing its job. Whether people admit it or not, their laxity in this area is placing all of us in grave danger in addition to the dollars it's costing us. All I know is, if some illegal alien breaks into my house and rapes and murders my wife and child as happened recently in Oregon, I might be tempted to finish what Al Quaida tried to do on 9/11 and fly a damn plane into the Capital Building while Congress is in session.

Okay that would be extreme. But clearly our legislators need to get the message that this is serious. I think it's happening. Arizona is just the start I think. I suspect other border states are considering similar measures. Even if they won't talk about it openly. This country cannot survive if it continues down this path of open border-ism. And I think people are starting to wake up to that fact. Not everyone will agree. Some will continue to maintain that we just welcome everyone with open arms and spend as much money and effort as it takes to do so. That's a nice pollyana-ish view but it simply is not practical. My goal is to simply keep voices raised so that the politicos hear us. So all together Arizona, "Hey you guys in D.C. , how about we enforce our immigration laws!??!'