Anti-immigration nonsense

I can't believe they said this.

'Let the prisoners pick the fruits'

I'm so glad these Republican yahoos are holding press conferences to spout their ignorance. The public really needs to see what kind of people we have running the House today.

UPDATE
Here is my conservative friend Mark Harden’s response from comments:

"Let the illegal aliens pick up the trash along the highways" instead of community service prisoners, then.

One thing about those protest marches. Wait, two things. First, they were about as "spontaneous" as an Imam-inspired crowd of Muslims storming out of the mosque after Friday prayers to scream "Death to the Jews!". Particularly high school students cutting class to be involved. How amazing they would do that! Second, some claim it's not possible to deport 11 million illegals - maybe we can start by rounding them up 400,000 at a time at these marches. Third, the comparison to civil rights marchers is logically flawed. Blacks marched in the 60s for civil rights that were due to them, which they were not receiving. These people are illegally here...they currently have no civil rights that are being unfairly denied them. So, you can say they are marching to convince legislators to provide them these rights, but they are not marching in the same sense as the civil rights marchers. [Preemptive response: maintain proper distinction between civil rights and human rights. Yes, we should be kind to these illegals...as we deport them.]

OK, so that was three things. So arrest me. Besides, laws aren't meant to be enforced if enough people ignore them.

First, they probably would pick up the trash along the highways if we would pay them a fair wage. Second, the idea of using prisoners to pick fruit would be an unprecedented use of forced labor to benefit a private enterprise - unprecedented at least since the time of slavery and indentured servitude. That is unless Dana Rohrabaher and his supporters are really communists and are calling for nationalization of our agricultural industry.

Now as to the marchers, no, of course they were not spontaneous. These people don’t pay that close of attention (or any at all) to what is going on in Washington. They had to be riled up - in this case by Spanish-language radio stations. But once aroused, the crowds are responding angrily to what they perceive as an attack on their heritage and their worth as human beings. This business of carrying the Mexican flag, which has gotten many on the right riled up, is no different than those good ol’ boys down south running around waving the Rebel flag from the back of their pickup trucks. It’s a symbol of defiance and cultural pride mixed into one, not an attack on the U.S.

Finally, I think there is a valid comparison between these protests and the ones for Civil Rights for blacks. In each case, you have a large segment of our society that is or was used for cheap labor, that has subsequently been left disenfranchised. In one case, the cheap laborers were forcibly brought to this country, in the other case they came on their own. Either way, they are here to stay whether we like it or not.