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blue bits. red rocks.
Sunday 30 March 2008

Let’s be clear: this historic wave of illegal immigration badly destabilized Arizona. It turned middle-class subdivisions into linear slums, added huge strains to the schools and health care system, and stirred the cultural tensions from a large minority appearing seemingly overnight in what has been a heavily Anglo city (Phoenix). Along with the equally destabilizing white migration from the Midwest, it swept away my old city of citrus blossoms and poetry. Many Mexican-Americans are profoundly ambivalent about the newcomers, even if they can’t say so publicly for fear of encouraging the anti-immigrant thugs. But again, in an economy built on the cheap, built to attract newcomers to crapola subdivisions in the sun, the illegal immigrants were not only inevitable, they were indispensable. From tourism to restaurants to the all-important housing industry, Arizona’s economy runs on illegal labor. Rogue Columnist

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