My Quiet Life

I have a lot more to say on some of the debate in the blogosphere surrounding Claudia Nunez, but I’m pretty swamped today, and we can pontificate forever. Right now, what we can’t do forever is sign this.

We have until the end of the day to fill this petition with signatures before it’s delivered tomorrow. If you’ve read my blog and made a mental bookmark to sign it but never got around to it, now is the time. Tell your friends. Tell your enemies.

Tell everyone at the voting polls! If you need convincing, however, let me know. Bring it on.

Quick update: we’ve launched a website to contain information and updates on the situation with Claudia Nunez.

If you’d like to link to it on your website/blog (please do!), feel free to use this handy little button:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.saveclaudia.com/button.js">
</script>

It will give you a nice button that looks like this:

Don’t forget to sign the petition.

A quick update, here:

It’s our understanding that the authority to defer deportation for Claudia Nunez lies with Stella Jarina, the district director of the New Orleans field office of the USCIS.

We have created a petition, addressed to Stella Jarina, imploring her to reconsider the case. Please give it a look, and hopefully, your signature!

UPDATE: There is now a website.

When Sarcastro, Aunt B, and I all agree on something, you know it’s something you can really get behind.

Meet Claudia Nunez and her family. Claudia is in the process of deportation from Nashville back to El Salvador. Despite residing in the country for years. Despite her 3 year old daughter and her 4 year old daughter — both U.S. citizens by birth. Despite her husband, also a legal resident. Despite all this, she’s being sent back to El Salvador, where, beyond being stripped of her family, she’ll have to deal with these guys. What family of four did she murder, you ask? Well, actually, she just overstayed her visa (which, incidentally, is not a crime).

I am not going to re-hash the whole story, since Sarcastro and Aunt B have already done a good job on that. But I will be talking about it. A lot. I’ll probably use a graph. You know how I do. But you’ll be hearing a lot about this case from others, as well. This is a test case for a lot of things: our tolerance for inflexible bureaucracy; our tolerance for counterproductive, exploitive immigration law; our, well, intolerance and xenophobic hysteria. It’s a test case for how far we’ve strayed from the inscription at the base of the statue of liberty:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

At least, I think that’s what it says. Maybe it’s “Don’t let the golden door hit your ass on the way out.” I forget.

More to come on this..

UPDATE: See Sean Braisted and John H on this as well.