There is a way for immigrant workers to come to the US legally…it’s called [legal] immigration.  Fill out the paperwork (available in convenient PDF format), pay the fees and wait, like everyone else does.

Thousands of immigrant rights advocates marched in front of a county jail in Phoenix Saturday in a protest that was aimed at Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s immigration efforts and was marked by a clash between a small group of protesters and police officers.

Organizers say the protest was meant to show officials in Washington that Arpaio shouldn’t handle immigration enforcement, and that Congress and the Obama administration need to come up with a way for immigrant workers to come to the country legally.

Source/Full Story: Yahoo! News

The vast majority of people in Italy would like all immigrants seeking citizenship to take a test of Italian civic values, according to a poll by Arnaldo Ferrari Nasi. 80.2 per cent of respondents share this view.

Additionally, 76.9 per cent of respondents say immigrants who do not share Italian values or commit crimes should be stripped of their citizenship. On the other hand, 79.2 per cent of respondents want immigrants who contribute to a city’s economy to be allowed to vote in municipal elections.

	Agree	Disagree	Not sure
Immigrants who play a role in the economic life of a city, after a number of years, must have the right to vote in municipal elections	79.2%	15.4%	5.4%
All immigrants should take a course in Italian and civic values before being regularized	80.2%	18.5%	1.3%
Italian citizenship should be revoked if an immigrant is found to not share our values or commits crimes	76.9%	17.7%	5.4%

Source/Full Story: Angus Reid Global Monitor

More than a thousand African workers were put aboard buses and trains in the southern Italian region of Calabria over the weekend and shipped out to immigrant detention centers, following some of the country’s worst riots in years.

The clashes began Thursday night in Rosarno, a working-class city amid citrus groves in Calabria, the toe of Italy’s boot, after a legal immigrant from Togo was lightly wounded in a pellet-gun attack in a nearby city. It is not clear who pulled the trigger — the authorities said they were investigating whether organized crime had provoked the riots — but the consequences were severe.

Blaming racism for the attack, dozens of immigrants burned cars and smashed shop windows in Rosarno in two days of riots, throwing rocks at local residents and fighting with the police. More than 50 immigrants and police officers were wounded, none seriously, and 10 immigrants and locals were arrested before the authorities began sending the immigrants to detention centers elsewhere in southern Italy on Saturday.

The images emerging from Calabria over the weekend — of torched cars and angry African immigrants hurling rocks — were the most vivid example of the growing racial tensions in Italy, which have been exacerbated by an economic crisis whose depth has only recently been acknowledged in the national dialogue. Both the official and underground economies increasingly rely on immigrants, while Italy remains torn between acceptance and xenophobia.

Source/Full Story: NYTimes.com

Near the end of the hit film “Avatar,” the villain snarls at the hero, “How does it feel to betray your own race?” Both men are white — although the hero is inhabiting a blue-skinned, 9-foot-tall, long-tailed alien.

Strange as it may seem for a film that pits greedy, immoral humans against noble denizens of a faraway moon, “Avatar” is being criticized by a small but vocal group of people who allege it contains racist themes — the white hero once again saving the primitive natives.

Since the film opened to widespread critical acclaim three weeks ago, hundreds of blog posts, newspaper articles, tweets and YouTube videos have made claims such as that the film is “a fantasy about race told from the point of view of white people” and reinforces “the white Messiah fable.”

Source/Full Story: Yahoo! News

The top Democrat in the U.S. Senate apologized on Saturday for comments he made about Barack Obama’s race during the 2008 presidential bid.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada described then-Sen. Barack Obama as “light skinned” and “with no Negro dialect.” Obama is the nation’s first African-American president.

“I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words. I sincerely apologize for offending any and all Americans, especially African-Americans for my improper comments,” Reid said in a statement released after the excerpts were reported on the Web site of The Atlantic.

“I was a proud and enthusiastic supporter of Barack Obama during the campaign and have worked as hard as I can to advance President Obama’s legislative agenda.”

In a written statement Saturday, Obama said he accepted Reid’s apology “without question because I’ve known him for years, I’ve seen the passionate leadership he’s shown on issues of social justice and I know what’s in his heart.”

“As far as I am concerned, the book is closed,” he added.

Reid spokesman Jim Manley says the Senator reached out to other Democratic and African-American leaders, including the Rev. Al Sharpton, NAACP Chairman Julian Bond and others.

“About a dozen in all,” Manley said.

Source/Full Story: FOXNews.com

Two officials said Thursday night they have been subpoenaed to answer questions next week before a federal grand jury about a high-profile Arizona sheriff who gained attention for aggressively cracking down on illegal immigration.

In statements read by a county spokesman, Maricopa County Manager David Smith and Deputy County Manager Sandi Wilson said they met with a federal prosecutor to discuss the case and will testify Wednesday.

Wilson said the general subject of the inquiry was abuses by Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s office. Neither Wilson nor Smith offered specifics, said county spokesman Richard de Uriarte, who spoke with the two officials Thursday night.

Arpaio is widely known for tough jail policies and pushing the bounds on local immigration efforts. He has led a dozen crime and immigration sweeps, some in heavily Latino areas.

Source/Full Story:  FOXNews.com

Troy Knapp’s killing was 10 years in the making, a gradual death by inches and degrees.

His brutal beating at the hands of an angry mob sparked outrage and spurred marches a decade ago. But long after the headlines faded, Knapp soldiered on in a battered and broken body that no longer responded to his commands.

Bedridden, in chronic pain and saddled with seizures, Knapp hung on until Nov. 6, when his body finally gave out for good. At age 43, he became North Charleston’s 11th homicide of 2009, the victim of a slow-motion killing too old to carry the possibility of a murder charge.

Knapp died as a result of severe injuries he suffered in his October 1999 beating,

Charleston County Coroner Rae Wooten said. But there is nothing more police can do. South Carolina law won’t allow a murder prosecution in a case where the victim lives more than three years after his injuries were inflicted.

Six men were convicted of lynching in the attack on Knapp. Just two remain in prison, though they are expected to be released within the year.

That doesn’t sit right with Knapp’s family.

“I think it sucks,” said Angela Knapp, his sister and caretaker. “Their lives are just getting started as his is ending. I think they should at least have to pay to bury him.“

Knapp, a former auto mechanic, was 34 when he and friend Gary Thornburg were attacked while riding their bicycles near Bexley Street and South Rhett Avenue. Thornburg escaped serious injury, but Knapp was beaten so badly he was in a coma for weeks.
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Police initially charged 16 suspects between the ages of 14 and 22. The case stoked racial tensions, as the suspects are black and the two victims white. But police have said robbery, not race, appeared to be the motive for the assault.
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Knapp’s family went into debt to pay for his funeral, his sister said. He never got a dime of the restitution money his attackers had been ordered to pay, and no life insurance company would touch him. If his aunt hadn’t offered a burial plot next to his grandparents, Knapp’s family might not have had a place to lay him to rest, Angela Knapp said.
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Source/Full Story:  The Post and Courier