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| ICE raids on dozens of 7-Elevens natiionwide |
WHICH
SOUNDS LIKE a notion that ought to be a joke; a bad punchline; something along the
lines of a third-rate “The Simpsons” episode in which long-time Kwik-E-Mart
operator Apu Nahasapeemapetilon gets deported.
Immigration
and Customs Enforcement officials actually did raid some 100 7-Eleven
convenience stores on Wednesday – of which 5 were in Chicago. The point was
that immigration officials went into each joint, disrupted the sale of Slurpees
and other junk food, and went out of their way to verify that every single
person working in that particular store actually had the proper work permits
required of non-U.S. citizens.
Officials
made a point of saying they weren’t looking to do large-scale arrests on Wednesday,
but that fines or criminal charges could arise against people who couldn’t show
the proper papers.
The
Associated Press reported that ICE officials described Wednesday’s activity as “the
first of many” and “a harbinger of what’s to come” as ideologue-minded people
seek some sort of act implying that we’re kicking foreigners out of jobs and
trying to make their lives here so uncomfortable that they’ll want to leave
this country.
PERSONALLY,
I FIND the whole concept more laughable than anything else. It borders on
harassment. It is something that if we think about it too much, it ought to
make us ashamed of ourselves.
So,
of course, the ideologues prefer not to think about it too much!
A
part of me wonders if Wednesday’s actions were an off-the-cuff reaction to the
immigration policy rhetoric of Tuesday.
President
Donald Trump engaged in his cheap-talk of a “bill of love” to create a wall
along the U.S./Mexico border, which I’m sure he intended to be tough talk to
appease the more narrow-minded of our society who can’t handle the presence of
anyone who isn’t exactly like themselves.
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| Is our society safer as a result? |
So
after being told his initiative to get rid of DACA is full of caca, federal officials respond by doing
third-rate crackdowns meant to make it seem they’re protecting our nation from
Indian nationals who are working the convenience stores of our society.
The
ones providing the over-priced and over-taxed cigarettes that some of us seem
to demand in our lives. Seriously, whenever I stop in a convenience store to pick
up a newspaper or an occasional can of Coca-Cola, it seems all the people ahead
of me in line are getting their “smokes” – and invariably complaining about the
ridiculous prices charged these days.
Are
these jobs ringing up a convenience store cash register the ones that “foreigners”
are stealing from “real Americans?”
OR
WAS THIS all about giving Trump types a sense of “victory” on the issue of immigration,
rather than have them focus on how Trump’s efforts to eradicate the Barack
Obama-era DACA policy (meant to allow young people making a contribution to
society to remain in this country) have been thwarted, and it most likely that
the inability of Congress to figure out how to resolve the issue long-term
means nothing will change for the foreseeable future.
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| How many bad Apu imitations were done Wednesday? |
Then
again, even The Simpsons managed to find a little bit of sense when addressing
the issue. For let’s not forget that when Apu finally broke down and took the
citizenship test, his knowledge of our nation wound up being better than that
of the long-time natives of the cartoon-land of Springfield.
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