Come Hither

Sometimes you have to find out the truth, get past the perception, the expectations.  And all this time I thought Arizona's SB 1070 was about targeting suspected immigrants so they could be locked up and deported. 

The reality is more complex than that, from what I can glean by listening to the Supreme Court's oral arguments this week.  Joint enforcement is not easy.

The way it works is - someone is arrested for some garden-variety infraction - like speeding.  An officer of the law asks that person if they can prove they are here legally.  If not, then they place a phone call to a federal support center.  The support center searches through 8 databases looking for the person.

If they had a legal visa, or green card, or State-Department issued passport, they would be found.  If they are not found, then this call is a notification to the feds.  Hey, we found an illegal, come do something!  Come hither!

If the feds don't do anything, then the state can lock up someone and take action.  The same action the feds would take.

But what if they don't find someone in a federal database, and that person isn't carrying anything to prove they are a citizen?  OK so I have a passport, I'm sure I am in a database someplace.  Also a social security number.  But what if I didn't have a passport.  Or didn't have proof that the SSN number I claim is mine is really mine.

Ah, that becomes, as the Supreme Court justices say, "the citizen problem".  There is no way to prove that the average person is a citizen.  No citizen database.  Just a way to suspect that you aren't one.

So of course the logical solution is to have a citizen database.  For every individual born in this country, and hence a citizen, to be tagged (like my cat, so in case I go off wandering one day due to Alzheimer's, that they can scan my embedded microchip and figure out who I am, and where to return me).  Then every citizen is accountable.  Non-citizens would not have this tag.  That is, until they develop fake microchips..

2 Hours Later

I swear, the price at Shell on Cornell Road was $4.09, then 2 hours later it shot up to $4.15. But that is very local. Perhaps some problems can be solved locally.

In Portland the rage is (was? so 2 hours ago?) chickens. People and their love for having chickens in their yard. I know that I don't wish to live in a neighborhood that doesn't allow chicken cages in the yard. Maybe chickens are easy to solve. Though not for some of my family members without good fences, not a pretty picture. Well, chickens have finite lives, so that problem eventually solves itself.

How nice! Some problems cycle over and over. As Ron Paul put it - our Congress fights about "who should pay for birth control pills". Indeed. Did that seem like a small enough problem that they could solve? In light of the massive budget debt problem that seems intractable. More likely it is just idealoguing, scoring points with their favorite political base.

The Supreme Court arguments this week were sure interesting. Well, after the first day, which took a while for me to get into the groove. Kind of like the spinning class I took tonight. The 5 minute warmup nearly killed me, but I kept going, and did get into the groove. Supreme Court arguments must be like watching a Shakespeare play - have to stick with it and learn the language.

I know that if I grow wheat for my own consumption this is illegal. Since wheat is a publicly traded commodity and hence the government can control its production, and pricing. Well, that is for professional farmers, not for me specifically. Since I am not registered as a farmer, I can go forth and grow all the wheat I want.

Tomorrow I hear that the Supreme Court will decide on this week's debate on the constitutionality of Obama's Health Care Reform (some people are offended by the term 'Obamacare'). But they won't announce the decision till June, after writing about it. True enough, writing something brings out what you really think.

Well after hearing all those arguments I am convinced that I don't want my government involved in an amazing scheme to force people to buy products from insurance companies. Its bad enough they've taken away "free TV" and force you to get a digital box or some type of service. Radio is still free. Growing my own wheat is still free. I am free to tell every person I run into what I think.

I am reminded that "freedom is not free", but something we have to keep fighting for. Time for a new direction America! This year, we are cursed, but eventually we will climb out of our complete gridlock, 3 month infrastructure spending bills, scoring political points, and growing chickens. On that day, we will set free to solve problems.