Arizona Republicans Working To Make The State Unattractive To Companies That Need Even A Minimally Educated Work Force

Arizona fressers: noted Nazi, J.T. Ready & state Senate Pres. Russell Pearce

A few weeks ago, alarmed Arizona business leaders pulled the Republican rug out from under Arizona's blatantly racist Senate President, Russell Pearce.

The state legislature's focus on illegal immigration is hurting the state, a group of 60 Arizona business leaders said Tuesday.

"We strongly believe it is unwise for the Legislature to pass any additional immigration legislation," said a letter to state Senate President Russell Pearce, signed by executives from around the state.

The letter said that immigration issues, including changing the 14th Amendment's guarantee of birthright citizenship, are best left to Congress.

The state's move to enact immigration legislation has hurt Arizona's economy and brand, the letter said.

Almost instantly, Pearce's 5 most recent racist immigration bills were defeated. Racism is something that Arizona Republican Party dearly loves, but they know where their bread gets buttered and when Business speaks, Republican hacks listen... and jump. Pearce went down fighting, of course: “The lack of political courage is the only impediment to step up pressure on illegal immigration." His goal is to make Latinos feel unwelcome in Arizona and to drive them out of the state. Businessmen have noticed that this is nothing short of economic suicide.

One of the bills would have required hospitals to report people who lack insurance and cannot demonstrate legal status. Another would require schools to report on enrollments of illegal immigrant students. The fifth would have made it a crime for illegal immigrants to drive in Arizona.

And speaking of business leaders, pressure on the lunatic fringe of the GOP, and education, Tucson Congressman Raúl Grijalva has been fighting to keep jobs in Arizona and to protect the state's fragile and deteriorating education system. Like the other powermad Republican governors attempting to wreck public education, Jan Brewer and her right-wing legislature has been undermining the state's education at every level. Grijalva sent me this article from the Arizona Daily Star yesterday:

The former chief executive of Intel Corp. told legislative and business leaders Tuesday Arizona won't be a real magnet for new business until it turns out more qualified high school and college graduates.

"The educational system in the United States and in Arizona in particular is not particularly attractive," Craig Barrett told the Arizona Commerce Authority. The situation is so poor, he said, that if Intel were looking for a site to build an entirely new operation, as opposed to expanding its $10 billion Arizona presence, Arizona would not even be on the list of Top 10 choices.

He was not alone in his comments.

"The education system here is very weak," said Doug Pruitt, chief executive of Sundt Construction. And Judy Wood, who runs Contact One, a small call center, said even her firm, which does not need college graduates, is having trouble finding Arizona high school graduates who can properly compose a sentence.

Their audience included Gov. Jan Brewer, who co-chairs the authority and is proposing to cut state aid for universities by $170 million, or about another 20 percent.

Pearce has forced through a budget that cuts another quarter billion dollars from K-12 education, which fits his short-term vision of targeting Latinos but leaves Arizona vulnerable to further economic collapse in the future. Of course, even in the short run, Brewer's and Pearce's education cutbacks are an unmitigated disaster for Arizona.

Several hundred jobs could be cut as the University of Arizona struggles to manage deep budget cuts proposed by state leaders.

This comes on top of more than 600 jobs eliminated since 2009 as the state cut 25 percent of its appropriation to the UA.

Gov. Jan Brewer wants the UA to take a $67 million state budget cut next year.

The Arizona Board of Regents ordered the UA to absorb $39 million of that in reduced spending. The UA plans to make up the rest by raising tuition and spending reserves.

If Pearce, Brewer and the Arizona Republican Party share a vision to stop growth, it looks like they've found the way to do it. Meanwhile, this morning I got an e-mail from Bill Moran, who is directing an effort to mount a recall against Brewer based largely on her anti-education jihad.

Arizona university students are getting the shaft along with university faculty and staff.

They are being asked to bear the brunt of drastic cuts to the state’s budget initially proposed by Governor Jan Brewer, and subject to further increases under a recent proposal by the state Senate.

The Governor appears to be exploiting the larger cuts proposed by the Senate to prop up support for her cuts as a "reasonable" plan. "What’s "reasonable" about:

* Tuition increasing up to $9,000 a year for in-state students and up to $21,807 a year for out-of-state undergraduates – with even high tuition for graduate students?

* Eliminating the state’s contribution to the Arizona Financial Aid Trust, a vital financial aid program that students will need to rely on more than ever?

* The likelihood of larger class sizes, reduced programs and faculty lay-offs that will almost certainly diminish the quality of the education that students will now be paying premium prices for?

* Increased numbers of students unable to complete their degree in 4 years.

* Quality Educators leaving the state to seek employment in a more "education-friendly" state. (Previous budget cuts at already have resulted in layoffs, mandatory furloughs, early retirement incentives, streamlined majors and discontinued programs.)?

* Even greater challenges competing for jobs with the real or perceived devaluation of an Arizona university degree?

DON’T BE FOOLED BY GOVERNOR BREWER'S SPIN MACHINE!

Gov. Brewer’s spin machine is showcasing her proposed cuts to state university funding as the "better alternative" to the Senate proposal when, in fact, it is nothing more than the "lesser of two evils." Neither proposal is good for Arizona’s university students, faculty, staff or academic reputation!

RECKLESS TRACK RECORD THAT SPEAKS FOR ITSELF

Over last 2 years, on Gov. Brewer’s watch, higher education cuts have totaled $200 million which the Governor has signed into law. During the last 5 years, tuition at the state's public universities has risen a whopping 73.3% at U of A, 48.1% at ASU and 55.1% at NAU. Two+ yearsof these hikes have been Governor Brewer's watch.

Rallies, protests and letters to state legislators are unlikely to change anything!

BUT THERE IS A GENUINE ANSWER . . .ONE WITH "REAL TEETH."

Shareholders in a business exercise their right to vote out an ineffective and irresponsible leader. If you are a registered Arizona voter (or would like to register to vote online right now by clicking here!)

– You can do the same by helping us FIRE Gov. Jan Brewer!

She got this ball rolling. She signed all the previous budget cuts resulting in the drastic tuition hikes at our state universities over the last three years. She refuses to hold down tuition by cutting non-essential programs that do not affect Higher Education, or to consider raising revenues by supporting a sales tax on luxury services such as spa treatments or country club memberships.

She prefers proposals that take from students, the sick and the needy. Some feel this is merely because she does not feel they have the wherewithal do anything about it!

YOU CAN HELP US "FIRE" GOV. JAN BREWER BY SUPPORTING OUR RECALL!

Students, faculty and staff who are registered Arizona voters can sign our official petition to RECALL Gov. Jan Brewer. If we gather enough signatures by the legal deadline of May 28, 2011, the voters will have an opportunity to remove her from office through the election process just as they voted her in!

Help us send the strongest message possible, one with real teeth, to the elected officials and policy makers who are dictating Arizona’s future. By successfully recalling Gov. Brewer, we are giving notice that who we elect, we can un-elect. We are taking back lost ground.

SUPPORT OUR EFFORT BY VOLUNTEERING TO CIRCULATE RECALL PETITIONS, SPREADING THE WORD ONLINE AND DONATING WHAT YOU CAN!

Even if you are not an Arizona registered voter, you can help by volunteering to circulate our recall petitions, help to take our effort viral by spreading the word through online social networking and by helping us to expand our effort with a small donation of $20, $15 or even just $10. (If you can do more, that would be great!).

CLICK HERE TO DONATE! | CLICK HERE TO SIGN PETITION!

Students made history by stopping a war and changing the world just a generation ago. We believe you can help us change the world again. Unlike Gov. Brewer, we do not underestimate what you are capable of! Please support our effort in every way that you can. The world will take notice. They will know you did it!

Help us gather 100,000 recall petition signatures from Arizona’s university campuses today!

And, be sure to visit our website at www.recallgovernorbrewer.com to see how else you can support our effort!

Dispatch From The Inferno State: The Boys Are Back In Town

-by Doug Kahn

In news of fresh disasters, the Arizona Legislature is back in session, and State Senate Republican leader Russell Pearce is in charge. But we have good news too: Citizens for a Better Arizona is gathering signatures for Pearce’s recall.

Randy Parraz, a labor organizer who ran in the Democratic Senatorial primary to choose a McCain opponent last year, told me shortly after last November’s election that he was convinced we needed to go directly at Russell Pearce, the author of SB1070. (SB1070 is the new Arizona law that purports to legalize racial profiling.) I wanted to know if he’d run for the U.S. House in 2012, thinking that the essential task in Arizona is to replace racist representatives (state and national) with progressive Latin@s. (Please pardon the designation; many of the Dream organizers I’ve been working with use it in text as a non-gendered adjective for people of Hispanic origin.)

I’m always thinking about getting progressives into Congress. But Randy knows Arizona and Arizonans better than I, and thinks that people here, especially Latin@s, desperately want to let the rest of Americans know that Arizonans can take care of business, if given a chance. And that he should take responsibility for doing what he knows best: organizing people to demonstrate they have the power to change their own circumstances. He wants to get results long before November 2012. So he’s helping people on a petition drive to put State Senator Russell Pearce on a recall ballot.

Citizens for a Better Arizona kicked off in January, and will certainly get the required signatures. (There’s another recall committee, run by some perennial gadfly Republicans, but Citizens for a Better Arizona is the progressive one.)

Randy told me yesterday that

“We need to gather 7,756 signatures by May 31st, a goal we’ll meet easily, based on the progress so far. Go to RecallPearce.com if you want to see what we’ve accomplished. Just 22 days into the campaign, over 100 volunteers have joined us, we’ve hired staff, and we’re are out in District 18 right now gathering signatures.”

He believes we need to show how pumped up Arizonans are to show they’re not like Russell Pearce, and we can do that by getting the signatures by the end of March, so we’ve hired a petition contractor to work on areas and during hours the volunteers need help. Randy reported cash-on-hand of $8300 at our meeting on Friday, and just told me it’s gone over $10,000. Getting to 7,756 signatures by March 31st will take another $10,000 in the next two weeks, he said.

If you want to go beyond boycotting Arizona (still essential) and do something positive, please give something at RecallPearce.com. I figure (if you discount about $20,000 in pledges properly) we still need to raise ~$14,000, for a goal of $34,000. This is based on paying professional petition circulators a generous $3 per signature, letting us reserve all volunteer-gathered signatures for a cushion to make up for possible rejected signatures.

We not only want to remove the man from the leadership of state government, but also damage his chances of winning a Republican primary for Congress, where it’s rumored he’d like to head next. Arizona will have 9 seats in the House next session, and redistricting has made electoral politics here a game of musical chairs. One of the reasons is that nearly every sitting Congressperson here has expressed interest in running for the U.S. Senate.

Because Senator John Kyl has announced his retirement. Every local news outlet is scratching around for prospective candidates. This kind of story is perfect filler material, and will make the lives of countless news editors less stressful for the next year, no actual fact or interview required, just file photos or video. Of course what they find is people who like to get their names in the paper.

Basically, any semi-literate Mongo-like unit (think former radio-ranter and US Representative J.D. Hayworth, who primaried John McCain last year) can get a mention if he’s willing to invent a new threat from Mexico. I notice the former State Schools Superintendent Tom Horne, who just got elected State Attorney General, was heard recently blapping about an imminent conflagration involving Mexicans (of course), machine guns, drugs, enslavement of the innocents, etc. I haven’t seen his name mentioned for the Kyl seat, but it should have been. He’s just won his second state-wide election, so would be the immediate front-runner in the Republican primary. And he has the requisite big mouth. Being a person of very little brain, his speech at the Border Security Expo and Conference (a wingnut affair last week in Phoenix) should be sampled sparingly:

It does not appear to be widely understood that continued consumption of Mexico-sourced drugs is the direct root cause of the erosion of the free democracy in Mexico and ultimately of the economy of North America.  Young people forego tuna that has not been harvested with adequate care for dolphins. They are acutely aware of the indirect consequences of their consumer decisions.  Yet they continue to buy Mexico-sourced drugs as if there were no consequences for these decisions.

Goddamned hippies are going to be responsible for the erosion of the ‘free democracy’ of Mexico! (We civilized people north of the border have more refined values, so democracy is for sale here.) And who in hell is he calling “young people,” anyhow?

He continued:

Some have proposed legalizing drugs as a panacea by which the violence could be stopped and the strength of Mexico’s representative government restored, deflecting the threat to the economy.  This is not possible.  Consider the economics of, say, a hypothetical “National Cocaine Corp.”

Please, make it stop! I prefer to look on the sunny side. He’s not the Superintendent of Schools any more.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio gets mentioned again, as he always does when there’s a statewide election looming. He won last week’s polling of Republican wannabes, but with only 21%. Of course the lead in all the media coverage was that “America’s Toughest Sheriff” is the frontrunner. The real story is that 4 other candidates got 51%, and “none of the above” won with 28%. Representative Jeff Flake got 17%, as did former Representative J.D. Blowhard. I think this has to do with all the federal investigations, the suspension of Arpaio’s top deputies, and the fact that in his public appearances over the past year, he seems, well, not with it. We* all have to get old, and Joe is 78.

(*Does not include me.)



Example: Joe and a posse of deputies and volunteer gun nuts went out in the desert to round up Brown People on July 16 2010, in the run-up to the July 29th effective date of SB1070. To show the press just how tough they were, they carted along a 50-caliber belt-fed machine gun that Joe bought 7 years ago. Joe told reporters the gun could shoot accurately up to one mile. I suppose you have to pardon the media dimwits for not questioning this, since the temperature that day reached 113º degrees, and they were probably baked. Of course I mean, you know, not ‘baked’, but very hot. The cunning Mexican desperados displayed just how devious they were by staying indoors, out of the heat. Our Gang, 100 strong (which includes the volunteer gun-toters), didn’t make any arrests, but according to the Sheriff, miles away from the war zone his deputies did arrest two freeway drivers on traffic violations, probably reckless driving. In a tragic accident, one deputy was rushed to a hospital after inhaling powdered sugar emanating from a crate of doughnuts the boys took along.

“I am trying to send a message to Mexico,” he said. “We will not take anyone hurting our deputies. We will fight back.”

The 7-year-old gun has not yet been used, Arpaio said. “It is more for defense.” Nor have any of his deputies yet been harmed in a border scuffle. “We have been very lucky,” he said.

We’ll be luckier once we get rid of Joe Arpaio and Russell Pearce and their nativist allies. See if you can’t help out.

I have to run off to the Capitol Building to figure out SB1611, which we heard yesterday was an omnibus Racist/Nativist/Secessionist Bill that Russell Pearce put together in secret, and is planning on ramming through the Senate Appropriations Committee at 2pm. He’s been trying to get some of this stuff through the Judiciary Committee, where it belongs, but a brave soul, Republican Senator Adam Driggs, opined that he thought it might be a good idea to remain one of the United States a bit longer, just for laughs. A report on Legislative Follies tomorrow.

Dreamers confront Russell Pearce last fall:



UPDATE: And Arizona Republicans Are Still Busy Making Their State The Most Extremist Of All

Right Wing Watch reports this morning that the racial profiling law was only the beginning of Arizona's descent into unconstitutional disrgard for human rights.

Republicans in the State Senate Appropriations Committee just approved a flagrantly unconstitutional bill that would eliminate citizenship by birthright, a right protected by the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.

As recently as 1982 in Plyler v. Doe, the Supreme Court ruled that undocumented immigrants are protected by the 14th Amendment, which guarantees birthright citizenship. The debate over the citizenship bill may even show signs of splintering inside the Republican Party, with one leading anti-immigrant State Senator accusing the state’s Chamber of Commerce of supporting “‘open borders’ because you like cheap labor.”

In addition to the legislation that would directly challenge the 14th Amendment, the committee also passed a bill that would force public schools to report to law enforcement officials on children’s parents if they’re undocumented, make it a crime for undocumented immigrants to drive in the state, and ban undocumented immigrants from attending state colleges and universities.

“If we’re going to stop this invasion-- and it is an invasion-– you’re going to have to stop rewarding people for breaking those laws,” said State Senate President Russell Pearce, a champion of the two bills and the architect of SB 1070.

The GOP Isn’t Interested In Helping The Economy As Long As A Democrat Is In The White House

The title above is a direct quote from yesterday's Paul Krugman column in the NY Times. It's quite extraordinary when you think about it. Steve Benen had something similar to say last week but yesterday, one of the most distinguished economic thinkers in the world, a columnist for the most important newspaper in the world just leveled a charge akin to treason against a major political party. In fact, he did it several times in the column, just in case anyone is skimming and missed it once.

The fact is that one of our two great political parties has made it clear that it has no interest in making America governable, unless it’s doing the governing. And that party now controls one house of Congress, which means that the country will not, in fact, be governable without that party’s cooperation-- cooperation that won’t be forthcoming.

Elite opinion has been slow to recognize this reality. Thus on the same day that Mr. Simpson rejoiced in the prospect of chaos, Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, appealed for help in confronting mass unemployment. He asked for “a fiscal program that combines near-term measures to enhance growth with strong, confidence-inducing steps to reduce longer-term structural deficits.”

My immediate thought was, why not ask for a pony, too? After all, the G.O.P. isn’t interested in helping the economy as long as a Democrat is in the White House. Indeed, far from being willing to help Mr. Bernanke’s efforts, Republicans are trying to bully the Fed itself into giving up completely on trying to reduce unemployment.

And on matters fiscal, the G.O.P. program is to do almost exactly the opposite of what Mr. Bernanke called for. On one side, Republicans oppose just about everything that might reduce structural deficits: they demand that the Bush tax cuts be made permanent while demagoguing efforts to limit the rise in Medicare costs, which are essential to any attempts to get the budget under control. On the other, the G.O.P. opposes anything that might help sustain demand in a depressed economy-- even aid to small businesses, which the party claims to love.

Right now, in particular, Republicans are blocking an extension of unemployment benefits-- an action that will both cause immense hardship and drain purchasing power from an already sputtering economy. But there’s no point appealing to the better angels of their nature; America just doesn’t work that way anymore.

And opposition for the sake of opposition isn’t limited to economic policy. Politics, they used to tell us, stops at the water’s edge-- but that was then.

These days, national security experts are tearing their hair out over the decision of Senate Republicans to block a desperately needed new strategic arms treaty. And everyone knows that these Republicans oppose the treaty, not because of legitimate objections, but simply because it’s an Obama administration initiative; if sabotaging the president endangers the nation, so be it.

How does this end? Mr. Obama is still talking about bipartisan outreach, and maybe if he caves in sufficiently he can avoid a federal shutdown this spring. But any respite would be only temporary; again, the G.O.P. is just not interested in helping a Democrat govern.

My sense is that most Americans still don’t understand this reality. They still imagine that when push comes to shove, our politicians will come together to do what’s necessary. But that was another country.

Krugman's immediate concern is the "mainstream" Republican Obama appointed to the Deficit Commission, Alan Simpson, who seems to take great pleasure in public displays of derangement. His latest was a shrill cry for "the blood bath in April... When debt limit time comes." Krugman points out that the Republican strategy is to "probably try to blackmail the president into policy concessions by, in effect, holding the government hostage; they’ve done it before. Now, you might think that the prospect of this kind of standoff, which might deny many Americans essential services, wreak havoc in financial markets and undermine America’s role in the world, would worry all men of good will. But no, Mr. Simpson “can’t wait.” And he’s what passes, these days, for a reasonable Republican."

The question for the rest of us is why is Obama appointing saboteurs like Alan Simpson? A Democratic Member of Congress-- until recently one of Obama's most fervent and public defenders, someone who is so disillusioned with him that he now says he'll vote for him in 2012 as the lesser of two evils-- told me last week that Obama isn't just willing to do the bidding of the ruling elite on Social Security, but that he wants to. Obama sees himself leading a great conservative coalition of the center, between Republican-dominated reactionaries and incoherent teabaggers on the one hand and progressives of his own party on the other hand.

Howard Dean, Alan Grayson and Dennis Kucinich have all said they will not primary Obama. Will Bernie Sanders? In that case he'll continue moving inexorably to the right. That isn't just a label. It will mean more of everything we hated about the Bush Regime-- from the national security state to the dismantling of the American social contract. Alan Simpson wants blood. He's liable to get it when ordinary Americans get pushed too far over the edge to not react. Arizona's Republican death panels are for real. And what they come down to is now standard GOP political philosophy-- better to condemn the poor to death than ask the wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes.

Instead of trying to save the lives of these people, who had been told that they had a chance to spend a few more years with their families, the Arizona legislature has chosen to take away their hope in order to save an estimated $4.5 million.

Facing a projected $1.5 billion budget deficit, the state of Arizona has decided to make poor people pay with their lives instead of making rich people pay with their treasure.

This didn't have to happen. In a special election in January 2010, the people of Oregon (a state with a comparable average income as Arizona) decided to raise taxes on the wealthy and on corporations instead of cutting essential services. Despite an all-out effort to convince voters that taxing the rich would hurt the poor, voters approved Measures 66 and 67, raising tax rates on those most able to pay and allocating the money to preserve state services.

Our economy for the past decade or more has been built on lies. Superfueled by greed and so-called "innovation" in the financial sector, it finally careened off the road and slammed head-on into the cement wall of reality. Instead of taxing the people who caused and profited from this situation, our political system has bailed them out, buried their crimes and passed the costs onto the most vulnerable-- people like the 98 poor men and women who were told their lives might be saved, only to have that hope taken away.

I don't think anyone's going to shoot anyone because a TSA agent gropes their junk... but what happens when members of your family as condemned to die? How many Arizonans would love to take a potshot at Jan Brewer or Russell Pearce about now?

Russell Pearce-- A Disgrace To The State Of Arizona

Mormon bigot Russell Pearce; not all Nazis wear swastikas all the time

Neo-nazi sympathizer, Mormon and Arizona state Senator, Russell Pearce (R), wants to undermine the U.S. Constitution again, this time by tearing up the 14th Amendment, which states that anyone born in the U.S.-- despite skin color or religion or ethnic background or gender or whatever is unpopular at the moment-- is born a citizen. Pearce, a vicious America-hater who disguises his contempt for our country by wearing American flags done up as outfits draped over himself like a freak, seems to want to ignore that our Constitution says that "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." And it says that right after declaring in words even a fascist slob like Pearce can understand that "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."

In fact, Pearce's plans to do away with the kids nativist, anti-immigration wackos call "anchor babies" has been stewing in his hateful noggin for some time. Back in 2008, when I dubbed Pearce "Mr. Ethnic Cleansing," he had a whole slew of Nuremberg-type laws he was trying to push through the legislature.

My pal Roland teaches in a public school in Compton and most of his students are Mexican-Americans. He loves his kids and tells me how eager their parents are for them to learn and to be Americans. They are always respectful, well-scrubbed, and curious about the world around them. He sent me these lyrics last night, a song he found that was written in 1915 by Margaret Rowe Clifford, 32 years before Pearce was born.

Come to this land of sunshine
To this land where life is young.
Where the wide, wide world is waiting,
The songs that will now be sung.
Where the golden sun is flaming
Into warm, white shining day,
And the sons of men are blazing
Their priceless right of way.

chorus

Come stand beside the rivers
Within our valley broad.
Stand here with heads uncovered,
In the presence of our God!
While all around, about us
The brave, unconquered band,
As guardians and landmarks
The giant mountains stand.

chorus

Not alone for gold and silver
Is Arizona great.
But with graves of heroes sleeping,
All the land is consecrate!
O, come and live beside us
However far ye roam
Come and help us build up temples
And name those temples "home."

chorus

Sing the song that's in your hearts
Sing of the great Southwest,
Thank God, for Arizona
In splendid sunshine dressed.
For thy beauty and thy grandeur,
For thy regal robes so sheen
We hail thee Arizona
Our Goddess and our queen.

It's the Arizona state song and it's very inviting. In fact, it was an open invitation for people to come-- a word used over and over in the song-- to live in Arizona. It was a different Arizona, a pre-Russell Pearce Arizona. But it's the Arizona that still exists, in the person, for example, of Arizona's most beloved Congressmember, Raul Grijalva:



Meanwhile, it's becoming clearer and clearer that the immigration law backfired and the state's economy is screwed. But the ethnic cleansing thing is working well. Businessmen there are turning on the GOP; and even Pearce-- that neo-Nazi guy-- thinks he may have made a mistake, at least in terms of not having enough workers to make Arizona function like part of the civilized world. Watch the short news clip at the hot link ("ethnic cleansing") above.