Ubaldo Jimenez Detained in AZ As Illegal

In cop speak, laws are either primary or secondary.
So if it is a primary law violation, they can pull you over, if it is a secondary violation, if you are pulled over for something else, you could then be ticketed if found to breaking that law.
In some places states have given cops a wide berth on primary violations like making not wearing your seat belt a primary violation, but in most places, thankfully, you can't be pulled over because the cop thinks you aren't buckled up.
I haven't seen the Arizona law broken down in those terms, but it sounds like it is a secondary violation. The cop either catches you in the act or thinks you are doing something illegal, then checks your papers (Isn't that what the Nazis did?) and if found to be illegal, then taken into custody and eventually deported. And that's pretty much how it works now anyway.
Dubious at best, but probably able to withstand legal challenges because that's fairly well established.
If the law is designed as a primary law violation, it won't last long because it will get struck down by the courts, I'd think.
Because being brown isn't a crime and the law would seem to imply that it is, if it is, in fact, designed to be a primary violation.
While it might appeal to the red meat loving lunatic fringe, but imagine the scene of taco truck with a crowd of people around it. All brown and buying lunch. If a primary violation, cops could swoop in, thrown them all down on the ground and start cuffing and stuffing with the idea that they'll check the papers later.
Not good.
And what makes this particularly stupid is that most first generation immigrants, legal or otherwise, are the targets of crime, not committing crime.
Cops call them "ATMs" because they always carry a ton of cash on them because they don't have a bank and they regularly get robbed. The legals report the crime but the illegals don't, so the robbers think they've got a decent chance of getting away with it.

Also of note, in my state, the legislature made littering a primary law violation. Huge fine, like ten grand, and it came with jail time. Not a single ticket was written, or maybe just one. The problem was, most people don't intentionally litter now. If you see a cup come flying out, it is just as likely for it to have been dropped on accident as on purpose and that makes for a pretty good defense.
Plus, the fine was so large, no cop wanted to write the ticket because it was too much.
The punishment didn't fit the crime.
So working quickly, the state changed it back to a secondary violation and the fine dropped to something like fifty bucks.

 

Just a few random thoughts on this, from Ground Zero in the immigration melee...

• The email from viewers on this stuff is beyond disheartening. 90% includes the line "What part of ILLEAGLE don't you understand??" Illegal is always in caps, and it is always misspelled.
  
• I've probably read 200 emails on this, and 195 of those are in support of the law. Literally not one of them understands what the law actually does or why people are opposed. Today we got one that said "If Shakira loves being a Mexican so much why is she trying so hard to look like a white woman?" We got a soundbite from a woman today who says "Hispanics need to go back to wherever they're supposed to be and quit taking our food." Honestly, I'm starting to lose all faith in humanity.
  
• Every time something like this flares up, protesters make the same mind-bogglingly stupid mistake: they march through the streets waving Mexican flags, pissing off the people organizing the protests and anyone who may have been sympathetic to their cause.
  
• The guy who wrote this bill insists that the only people who oppose it are "Illegals and open border anarchs." He also publicly bemoans the fact that he couldn't call it Operation Wetback.
  
• The local sheriff, a folk hero among the talk show crowd for his fight against illegal immigrants and self-proclaimed "toughness", insists he does not do racial profiling. In his words, he simply targets "people who look like they may not be from here" and detains them because "we can always find some kind of violation." When a judge or county supervisor criticizes that, he raids their offices and arrests them. When that arrest is thrown out, he alerts the FBI that the judges and supervisors are engaged in a massive conspiracy against him. When the police chief of Mesa criticized him, the sheriff's SWAT team raided city hall at midnight to demand papers from the cleaning crew. They were legal residents.
  
• For all the talk about how this is giving police the tools they need, the Phoenix Police Chief says it's a bad law and he wants no part of it. And it's worth noting that while this has been solely the "brainchild" of Arizona Republicans, from what I've seen, not one major national figure in the Republican party has said it's a good law. That includes John McCain and Jon Kyl. Tom Ridge, the Homeland Security Secretary under Bush, says it's a bad law. Phoenix was the favorite to get the 2012 Republican convention, and I would guess the city now has no shot.
  
• You know those polls that show 70% support for the law? The polling sample was 11% Hispanic, in a region that's 33% Hispanic. A different and seldom-quoted poll put the support at 39%. And for all the talk of the governor's support skyrocketing, the latest poll suggests she would lose to the most likely Democratic nominee in this year's election.
  
• That rancher that was killed a few weeks ago? Supporters of the law keep insisting he was killed by an illegal immigrant crossing into Arizona. In reality, he was almost assuredly killed by an advanced scout for a smuggler. Those are the people who are far and away the greatest threat, and this law won't do a damn thing to stop them. The thing that is desperately needed is an armed federal response to prevent drug and human smuggler from crossing the border. An effort to fuck with all people who look Latino in hopes they can bust a gardener here illegally is offensive.
  
• If there is a more pathetic state legislature out there somewhere, I'd love to know where it is. In the last few weeks they:
  

Passed the immigration bill
Eliminated health care for poor children
Passed a bill banning animal-human hybrids
Passed a bill allowing guns in bars
Passed a bill allowing concealed weapons without a permit

However, in an unprecedented show of restraint, the bill requiring President Obama to present the REAL birth certificate before he could be on the 2012 ballot actually failed. It passed one side of the legislature, but fell a couple of votes short on the other side.

 

Thanks for the perspective, PC. Also worth noting that Tom Tancredo doesn't support the Arizona law. Yes, that Tom Tancredo.

 

Damn, what kind of peckerwoods do Arizonans elect to represent them??

 

It's funny -- I'd like to think the people responsible for this would look around and see the lack of support from their own party and start wondering what the hell they just did.

Tancredo's against it? That's pretty remarkable.

 

It's a pretty astounding bunch -- particularly from the rural districts, where they're just flat-out batshit crazy.

There was a legislator running for reelection a few years ago. She told an audience "My opponent and his wife have been married for 23 years and don't have any children. You know what that means!" She may even have put that line in her campaign literature. Her opponent's wife was a uterine cancer survivor and was unable to have children. The legislator still won reelection.

And don't forget, this is the state that elected Ev Mecham governor. Among his claims to fame:

--Canceled the MLK holiday
--Told black leaders "You people don't need a holiday, what you need is jobs"
--Called black children "pickaninnies", then defended the term
--Said he hired black people if they were the best people "for the cotton-pickin' job"
--Said high divorce rates were caused by working women
--Said America is a Christian nation. He was speaking to a Jewish group at the time.
--Said that when he told a group of Japanese businessmen how many golf-courses there are in Arizona, they went "round-eyed"

I love living here, but man, is our state government a freak show.

 

I read that exact same idea in a Cal Thomas column, and I found myself agreeing with him, which was a first for me.

 

They just said on the news that Texas may pass a similar bill soon.

 

Or not:

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/stories/2010/04/26/daily64.html

 

I also think Newt! That Florida Senate candidate Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush have also criticized the bill.

 

This is a sad and silly country.

 

Rubio said on Hannity the other night that he fully understands why Arizona passed the bill, but said he would have done it differently.