Moral Difference: Identity Theft or Illegal Immigration?

Well, as we've been debating moral differences here at American Power, what do folks think about this editorial from the New York Times, on illegal immigration?

Anyone who has doubts that this country is abusing and terrorizing undocumented immigrant workers should read an essay by Erik Camayd-Freixas, a professor and Spanish-language court interpreter who witnessed the aftermath of a huge immigration workplace raid at a meatpacking plant in Iowa.

The essay chillingly describes what Dr. Camayd-Freixas saw and heard as he translated for some of the nearly 400 undocumented workers who were seized by federal agents at the Agriprocessors kosher plant in Postville in May.

Under the old way of doing things, the workers, nearly all Guatemalans, would have been simply and swiftly deported. But in a twist of Dickensian cruelty, more than 260 were charged as serious criminals for using false Social Security numbers or residency papers, and most were sentenced to five months in prison.

What is worse, Dr. Camayd-Freixas wrote, is that the system was clearly rigged for the wholesale imposition of mass guilt. He said the court-appointed lawyers had little time in the raids’ hectic aftermath to meet with the workers, many of whom ended up waiving their rights and seemed not to understand the complicated charges against them....

No one is denying that the workers were on the wrong side of the law. But there is a profound difference between stealing people’s identities to rob them of money and property, and using false papers to merely get a job. It is a distinction that the Bush administration, goaded by immigration extremists, has willfully ignored.

I have highlighted the relevant sentence.

For the New York Times, there's a benignity to the lawlessness of aliens who come to the United States, who are breaking various federal statutes to do so, and then who are exploited by unscrupulous employers shaving massive overheads costs with their under-the-table employment practices?

It looks to me that the Times is using this example as a chance, once again, to take pot-shots at the administration. If the Justice Department's at fault, it's for allowing illegal alien employment markets to get this out of hand in the first place.

See also, Christopher Jencks, no bloodthirsty neocon, and his balanced essay, "The Immigration Charade," where he argues that Americans will not truly be serious about immigration reform until there's a crackdown on the demand side.

See also the Camayd-Freixas paper, "Interpreting after the Largest ICE Raid in U.S. History: A Personal Account."