July 10, 2010
Gov. Brewer: We cannot afford all this illegal immigration and everything that comes with it, everything from the crime to the drugs to the kidnapping and the extortion and the be-headings...

Governor Jan Brewer and the John McCains of Arizona are pushing the most disgusting lies about border violence to justify their race hating immigration law. In republican circles, if you repeat a lie long enough they believe it to be fact. I mean, how can any poll of Americans consider President Obama to be a socialist? But, that's conservatism for you. Jan Brewer is doing her best to match Sarah Palin, Sharron Angle and Rand Paul in her effusive lying about illegal immigration violence.

Washington Monthly:

We talked a week ago about Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) trying to defend her anti-immigrant policies, prompting her to argue that immigrants entering the U.S. illegally are responsible for "beheadings." All available evidence suggests Brewer just made it up, and her office hasn't been able to substantiate the claim.

But Brewer seems to be leading a larger crusade among Arizona Republicans, making it seem as if their state is on the verge of immigrant-based anarchy, overrun with immigrant drug trafficking, kidnappings, and police shootings. The more the rest of the country hears about these nightmare scenarios, the more they're inclined to support measures like the odious Arizona immigration law.

Dana Milbank explained today, "Last year gave us death panels and granny killings, but compared with the nonsense justifying the immigration crackdown, the health-care debate was an evening at the Oxford Union Society."

Two months ago, the Arizona Republic published an exhaustive report that found that, according to statistics from the FBI and Arizona police agencies, crime in Arizona border towns has been "essentially flat for the past decade." For example, "In 2000, there were 23 rapes, robberies and murders in Nogales, Ariz. Last year, despite nearly a decade of population growth, there were 19 such crimes." The Pima County sheriff reported that "the border has never been more secure."

FBI statistics show violent crime rates in all of the border states are lower than they were a decade ago -- yet Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) reports that the violence is "the worst I have ever seen." President Obama justifiably asserted last week that "the southern border is more secure today than any time in the past 20 years," yet Rush Limbaugh judged the president to be "fit for the psycho ward" on the basis of that remark.

The "beheadings" lie was amusing in its hyperbole, but we're reaching a point at which nearly every claim made by Arizona Republicans and their allies is simply, demonstrably wrong. Violence from Mexican drug cartels is spreading north? There's no evidence of that. Phoenix, according to McCain, is the "No. 2 kidnapping capital of the world"? No, it's not. Most immigrants from Mexico are drug mules? That's wrong, too. Most law-enforcement shootings are at the hands of undocumented immigrants? Total bunk.

John McCain embarrassed himself during the general election when he sucked up to such right wing extremists as Pastor John Hagee. The very people that he once considered "lunatics" when he ran for president in 2000:

McCain, who had been courting the endorsement for over a year, said that he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.”

Demonstrating how wildly out of the American religious and political mainstream Hagee’s views are, McCain’s acceptance of Hagee’s endorsement was condemned today by conservative William Donohue, president of the Catholic League. Calling Hagee a “bigot,” Donahue said the right-wing pastor has waged “an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church” by “calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’”

If a far right religious zealot like Bill Donohue was appalled, what does that say about John McCain? And why is he a weekly guest on all the Sunday Talk Shows? I predict the ex-maverick will be pushed into the Aztlan theory very soon. Maybe Brewer and McCain will appear at the next white supremacist rally put together by Barbara Coe.

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