Selective Memory

I had to laugh when I started reading today's op-ed by Paul Rolly in the Salt Lake Tribune.

Federal agents swooped in on dozens of unsuspecting peaceful folks who were minding their own business and doing their jobs and ripped them from their families.

They handcuffed them and dragged them from their workplace. They threw them in jail and then public officials had a press conference to boast about it. The raid on illegal artifact peddlers in San Juan County?

Nope. The one I'm talking about occurred at the Salt Lake International Airport in December 2001 when federal and state officials wanted to show the world how safe Salt Lake City was for the 2002 Winter Olympics and ended up scattering the families of non-threatening dishwashers, floor sweepers and cargo handlers. None of those arrested had committed a crime other than being in the country illegally.

Yep - Rolly spends the rest of this column taking our esteemed Senators to task for being "inconsistent" on law enforcement while blithly ignoring the inconsistencies in his own rant.

And Utah Sens. Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett didn't say squat about the heavy-handed tactics of law enforcement in that raid. Nor did they complain about the raid that broke up the families of dozens of workers at the Champion Safe Co. in Provo, which eventually led to that company's move to Mexico.

Nor did they complain about the Gestapo-like tactics that netted dozens of harmless workers at the Swift meat packing plant in northern Utah.

The people arrested, wrenched from their families and eventually deported in those raids, were breaking the law because they had come into the United States illegally.

Except that one of the big problems that many conservatives have with Senator Bennett is his rather wobbly stands on immigration reform and enforcement of the current immigration law! While he voted "Yes" on English as the official language of the US and on building the border fence, he has voted for a guest worker program (without a path to citizenship) and for allowing more migrant farm workers into the country - something that is a bit of an issue for many on both sides of the debate. Senator Hatch has voted consistently for enforcement of our existing immigration law and against many of the forms that would allow those who are already here illegally an easy way to citizenship. So essentially Rolly does have a point with Senator Hatch....

However, he selectivly ignores his own inconsistency. He is for (you can tell by the tenor of the article) harsher treatment of those who stole the Native American artifacts, yet he wants everyone to look the other way to illegal immigration (as you can tell from his previous columns and blog postings where anyone who is anti-ILLEGAL immigration is simply referred to as "anti-immigration").

However, the biggest problem that I have with Rolly's column and arguement is the fact that he is totally ignores the biggest difference between those that broke the law in the artifacts case and those who broke the law in the case he brings up from 2002. In the latter, the people arrested were NOT AMERICAN CITIZENS and in the former case all of the accused were AMERICAN CITIZENS. There is a difference in court of law!

Me??? I think both the illegal immigrants and the artifacts smugglers should be held accountable for their actions. I certainly don't care that they have been smuggling artifacts (in that region of the country) for generations....just because it has been done for generations does not make it right. It is still theft!

The moral of the story is pretty clear - if you don't want to be arrested in a humiliating fashion - don't break the law. It's a pity Mr. Rolly couldn't see that simple fact.....