To Be Announced...

Bias? We don't have any...

The big news of the day is the arrest of "x" number of illegal aliens in Marshalltown by federal authorities. Both news items are posted today on the NewsFeed area of the website, but I thought it would be kind of fun to disect both of them.

First up, the Washington Post:

Illegal Workers Arrested In 6-State ID Theft Sweep

Federal agents targeting illegal immigrants raided meatpacking plants in six states yesterday, arresting hundreds of workers on the uncommon charge of identity theft and shutting down the world's second-largest meat processing company for much of the day.

About 1,000 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents with search warrants entered plants owned by Swift & Co., of Greeley, Colo., charging that "large numbers" of workers illegally assumed the identities of U.S. citizens or legal residents by using their Social Security numbers to get work, ICE officials said.

THAT'S a new one. Charging them with identity theft. So far, no charges against the company. Corporate responsibility only goes so far, apparently.

Swift officials were not charged, despite recent administration vows to get tough on companies as well as workers.

Although many illegal workers by definition commit document fraud to get jobs, the government's use of identity theft charges could reframe the immigration debate for the public and spotlight how sharing Social Security data could fight such abuses, she said.

In a brief teleconference with reporters, Julie L. Myers, assistant secretary of homeland security for ICE, said that "the signal we're intending to send here is, 'We're serious about work site enforcement, and those individuals who steal identities of U.S. citizens will not escape action from us.' " She said the government would also pursue vendors of fake documents, former workers and legitimate residents who sold their Social Security numbers.

That's the first time I've seen the word ILLEGAL defined by the media. Usually, it's "undocumented" workers. Later, the Des Moines Register straightens things out for us dopes in Iowa who don't understand how beneficial it is for us to have such "diversity" involved in our economy. But that's the punchline for later.

I wonder how many Iowan's sold their Social Security numbers in order to make money off of them later. Just think - if you have a home in Marshalltown, you may want to rent it out to some illegal aliens looking to cut meat at the local processing plant. What better way for you to get your rent paid than to give them a Social Security number to use while you soak up the sun in Arizona on the rent checks. And heck, Social Security benefits are for beer money for most of those folks, so it's no big loss.

But I digress...Let's continue searching for some company responsibility here:

ICE spokesman Marc Raimondi said investigators will decide whether those arrested will face immediate deportation, prosecution or detention pending other legal proceedings. U.S. officials noted the participation of the Federal Trade Commission, which routinely shares data on identity theft victims with federal and state law enforcement agencies.

And while they're waiting for their "hearings"...they'll skip town and work somewhere else. It's what always happens anyway. Either that, or they get a free plane ride back to where they came from.

In 1998, similar raids at 40 meatpacking plants in and around Nebraska found that nearly 20 percent of workers had invalid documents. The vast majority disappeared before questioning.

See?

Worker advocates condemned yesterday's raids, which came without warning. They advised detainees to remain silent and contact attorneys.

"These actions today by ICE are an affront to decency," said Mark Lauritsen, a spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers union, which sought an injunction in court to halt the raids and planned protests around the country. Federal agents essentially stormed plants "in an effort designed to terrorize" workers, he said.

It should be pointed out that many unions only recently changed their charters to allow illegal aliens and "undocumented" workers to join. They pay their dues, expand their membership, but the unions don't really have to protect them since they're breaking the law anyway...so they can hang out at the union hall and play pool while their slaves do work for them. What a bunch of scumbags.

In an interview, Swift's president and chief executive, Sam Rovit, also criticized the arrests. He said that his firm's practices are similar to those of its competitors and that "everyone in the whole agriculture sector should be worried."

"Swift has played by the rules and relied in good faith on a program explicitly held out by the president of the United States as an effective tool to help employers comply with applicable immigration laws," said Rovit, whose company reported $9.4 billion in sales in 2006. "Swift believes that today's actions by the government . . . raise serious questions as to the government's possible violation of individual workers' civil rights."

Rovit cited promises made by the government to protect employers who voluntarily submit information about workers to a federal program called Basic Pilot, which confirms the authenticity of Social Security numbers against federal databases. Swift has run all new U.S. hires through the program since 1997.

Call me a cynic, but how many of you believe they don't wink and nod while they "follow the rules"?

So - all in all - a pretty fair and balanced news story. Now, the Des Moines Register provides us some comedy for today's post. It has everything...race, brutality, sympathy, bias, and much more:

Raid nets scores of Swift workers

Marshalltown, Ia. — Federal immigration agents arrested scores of workers Tuesday at Swift & Co. packing plants in Marshalltown and five other facilities in the country.

The raids disrupted operations at one of the nation's largest meatpackers and divided families in Marshalltown.

"There are many children who came home and didn't have any parents. How will they get along?" asked Marcelo Merida, a meatcutter at Swift whose wife was among those placed on buses and driven to unknown locations.

Oh - whoa is me - the Register starts priming us for the sympathetic angle. That should be sympathetic.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff warned of a crackdown on companies that hire undocumented immigrants. On Tuesday, a spokesman for the department would not say whether other meatpackers would be targeted.

"Why did they have to do this two weeks before Christmas?" asked Linae Brush, joining a crowd of about 100 employees and family members outside the plant to support her neighbors, who work for Swift. "I think they're sending a message, a nasty message."

Cue the violins...everybody repeat after me - "Whoa is me..."

Swift's chief executive, Sam Rovit, said the company knew that the raids were coming but didn't know when.

Wanna bet? A friend of mine from Marshalltown told me that they warned the workers in advance and many left in busses BEFORE the eventual raid took place.

The agents herded the workers into the plant cafeteria and then divided the crowd into different groups - "U.S. citizens on one side, Mexicans on the other," said Juvenal Navarro, 20, a Texas resident who works at the facility.

The race-card is now in play...

And the idea of using the word "herded" at a meat-packing plant can't be totally unplanned to play on your subconsious, can it?

The first definition in the dictionary: A group of cattle or other domestic animals of a single kind kept together for a specific purpose.

According to Wikipedia: The term herd is also applied metaphorically to human beings in social psychology, with the concept of herd behaviour. However both the term and concepts that underlie its use are controversial. The term is often used carelessly and applied to a range of situations that have little in common either with each other or with the behaviour of animals in herds.

They couldn't use a Thesaurus?

I don't know about you, but I'm getting a little angrier the more I read of this story...but it's a long one, so let's continue:

"Everybody was going crazy, everybody was crying," Navarro said. "Lots of people were using their cell phones, calling their families."

Yes, I'm crying too...Boo hoo...

Mark Lauritsen, a union representative, said the raids were "designed to terrorize the work force."

Rovit, Swift's CEO, said the massive raids cost the company $3 million, including about $500,000 at the Marshalltown facility, which slaughters 18,000 hogs each day.

Swift officials said the company had done all it could do legally to verify the legality of its workers. The company believes it will be protected from civil or criminal penalties because it relied on a government-run verification system to check workers' IDs.

"We have followed the letter and spirit of the law in terms of hiring," said Rovit. "We are as much a victim as the people whose identities have been taken."

He said he did not know how many workers were arrested.

I'm sorry, my bullshit detector is going off like gangbusters here. I find it very hard to believe that the company carries no responsibility here at all.

The immigration agency subpoenaed worker eligibility records from all workers at the Marshalltown facility in March and later obtained records for all of the company's other workers.

So they knew something was up back in March, eh? They even sought a judges decision to block the raid...so they did nothing else to stave off the potential shut down of the plant? (bullshit detecter starts smoking)

Workers at Marshalltown described the scene Tuesday morning as chaotic. Later, outside the plant, Alisa Rodriguez-Cardenas showed a bruise she said she received when she was hit on the shoulder by a female agent.

"The woman from ICE was yelling. She was very mad," said Rodriguez-Cardenas, who has worked at the plant since 2002.

"I said, 'Don't yell at us,' and she said, 'Be quiet,' and started to hit us, me and two others."

Now, the police brutality card is dealt...

About 100 people lined up outside the plant entrance Tuesday, some carrying placards that said, "We are not criminals. We value our jobs."

Other signs read, "This is a free country, freedom of speech." When three buses carrying detained workers rolled out, the crowd chanted in Spanish, "Si se puede!" - which means "Yes, you can!" - and "Estamos con ustedes!" - or "We are with you!" At least two other buses had already left the plant, officials said.

Yes...we are a free country. But the people at Arlington and other war-related cemetaries are the ones that paid for it. So I would appreciate it if you folks would stop the "giant sucking sound" from dishonoring their sacrifice.

And in case anyone is counting...NO WHERE in the article is the word "illegal" used in reference to the "workers"