A rare bright note amidst the general pounding that Western civilization (and its future prospects) took on Election Day 2008 was the resounding defeat of Arizona’s mendacious and cynical Proposition 202, the weasel-in-sheep’s-clothing “Stop Illegal Hiring Act.” (VDARE’s Marcus Epstein provided a systematic explication of Prop. 202 well in advance of the election.)

About 2.06 million Arizonans voted on Prop. 202–not far below the 2.19 million participating in the Presidential sweepstakes–with 1.22 million (i.e. more than 59%) voting against.

(Each of the eight measures on the Arizona ballot attracted about 2 million votes, so the turnout on Prop. 202 wasn’t extraordinary. But Prop. 202’s purveyors won’t be able to spin it that only a small fraction of the electorate participated.)

I’ve not come up with definitive figures for the money spent by the Prop. 202 shysters and that spent by our side. However, this page at the Arizona Secretary of State’s website leads to mid-October numbers of about $15k by “us” and $900k [!!!] by the shysters. (At the linked page, use the drop-down menus to insert “2008″ and “202 - Stop Illegal Hiring” in their respective slots and then click the “Compare” button.)

I’ll guess that final figures were about $1 million by the greedheads and $100k by “us,” as FAIR and TeamAmerica PAC stepped up with some significant late donations, shown here and here.

(And, yes, I, too, stepped up with $125 sent directly to the Arizona-based No on Prop 202 organization!)

That there was such a clean landslide against the nefarious 202 despite its sponsors’ overwhelming monetary advantage speaks, I hope, to the salience of our cause and testifies, for sure, to the heroic efforts Arizonans on our side made to earn this (defensive) victory, a victory that’s significant for the whole nation in the fight against illegal immigration.

(However, one of my Arizona sources thinks that, in writing a proposition intended to gull inattentive voters, the Prop. 202 sponsors may have shot themselves in the feet while their feet were in their mouths. My source told me of an encounter with a bleeding heart who voted against Prop. 202 because she believed the sponsors’ smoke cloud about the measure’s toughness on hiring illegal aliens! As my other Arizona insider remarked upon hearing this anecdote, “That’s what happens when you lie!”)

So who are the “Heroes of NO on Proposition 202″? Don Goldwater, Arizona Republican heavyweight and nephew of the late U.S. Senator, has put together a list. The individuals on his list are:

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas
Senate Majority Leader Thayer Verschoor
Representative Russell Pearce
Representative Rick Murphy
Representative Jerry Weiers
Senator Elect Al Melvin
Representative Elect David Gowan
Representative Elect Frank Antenori
Representative Elect Steve Montenegro
Bruce Jacobs, KFYI talk show host
JD Hayworth, KFYI talk show host
Rob Robb, columnist for The Arizona Republic
Laurie Roberts, columnist for The Arizona Republic
Tim Rafferty
Buffalo Rick Gaener
Larry DeMarco
Willa Key
Don Goldwater
Chris Simcox
Gene Cafarelli
Randy Pullen

Yes, the list includes Goldwater, himself!

He also names organizations that were important in the “NO” effort and concludes by noting that Prop.202 was defeated in each of Arizona’s 15 counties, in most cases by large fractional margins.

My two Arizona contacts both told me that they thought the three leaders among our pantheon of heroes in the list above were Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Representative [now State Senator Elect] Russell Pearce, and Arizona Republican Party Chair Randy Pullen.

Of Pearce, one of my Arizona friends told me, “He’s like Tom Tancredo: He’ll go anywhere, anytime to support the cause.” More particularly, Pearce was lead sponsor of HB2779, which, since becoming law, is known as the “Legal Arizona Workers Act.” It is this Act that passage of Prop. 202 would have gutted.

I know Randy Pullen in person. Based on this exposure, I’ll guess that he has a very global concern about The National Question, far beyond a narrow focus on illegal immigration. But that’s just an admirer’s informed guess, not a commitment on Mr. Pullen’s part!

“Sheriff Joe,” of course, is famous.

So … my “thanksgiving” proposal to VDARE readers: Let’s flood Arpaio, Pearce, and Pullen with postcards expressing our appreciation for their leadership against Prop. 202.

Why postcards?

1.) They’re tangible, unlike ephemeral email. (And one of my contacts tells me that Sheriff Arpaio reads every piece of mail he receives.)

2.) It takes more of a commitment to put a postcard in the mail than it does to dispatch a brief email note.

3.) The messages they can hold are short enough that reading a bunch of them won’t be a burden.

I suggest signing such postcards with your name, city, and state. (Omission of your street address makes it clear that no reply is expected.)

Here are the mailing addresses for our esteemed triumvirate:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio
100 West Washington
Suite 1900
Phoenix, AZ 85003

Representative Russell Pearce
House of Representatives
1700 W. Washington
Room 114
Phoenix, AZ 85007

Mr. Randy Pullen
Arizona Republican Party
3501 North 24th Street
Phoenix, Arizona 85016

My three Montana picture postcards, bearing brief messages of thanks, are in the mail. I hope lots of VDARE readers will do the same with postcards from their states.

Practical reminder: A postcard needs a 27-cent stamp.

Here’s the description of Chinese alleged gunman Jing Hua Wu, while he was still sought by the police, while police had reason to believe he was still on the loose, by Sandra Gonzales, [Send her mail] in the San Jose Mercury News.

Wu is described as 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighing 170 pounds, with black eyes and black hair.

Mountain View man sought in triple homicide, By Sandra Gonzales,
Bay Area News Group, San Jose Mercury News,

November 15, 2008
12:15:10 AM PST

Notice anything missing?

Here’s the same description by Mike Baron of Postchronicle.com with an earlier height estimate, possibly from an eyewitness who was being shot at. (People always look bigger when they’re shooting at you.)

Police are asking people in the area to look out for Wu, considered armed and dangerous. He is an Asian man, 5 feet 11 inches tall, 170 pounds, with black hair and black eyes.

Wu may be driving a silver four-door Mercury Mariner sport utility vehicle with California license plate No. 6CJU602.
Brian Pugh, Sid Agrawal Killed By Jing Hua Wu In SiPort Shooting,
by Mike Baron, Postchronicle.Com, November 15, 2008

Yes, that’s right. The San Jose Mercury News seems to have removed the word “Asian” from the police description, possibly in deference to the AP Stylebook. It never seems to occur to them that this information might actually be useful in saving lives.

Indo-Asian News Service reports:

An electrical engineer from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, Agrawal was the CEO and director of SiPort, when gunned down by his former employee. [Indian American shot dead in Silicon Valley, November 16th, 2008]

IIT’s include the most selective educational institutions in India-and the producer of a large number of extremely astute and wealthy businessmen.

What kinds of conditions created this tragedy? Nicholas Carlson quotes Alaska Miller in the Silicon Alley Insider:

# The working conditions are hellish: “When people describe startups before the go-go days of dotcoms (late 80’s and 90’s you punk kids) these chip companies were the sh-t that they were talking about. People sleeping under their desks. 90 hour workweeks. You eat, sleep, and die by your company.”
……
# Imported labor is common. MIller says firms like Intel snap up American engineers before they get out of college. “The second and third tier engineers lack the experience, you need people with master degrees sprinkled with Ph.Ds, to actually research and develop an entire chip by themselves. so what’s one to do? import. h1bs.”

# Imported labor “is codeword for slavery.” Miller writes that the advantage of imported labor isn’t that its good, it’s that its cheap and easy to control. “Once they’re brought here you can basically put them into ‘corporate housing’ which basically amounts to slum apartments that you rent in Milpitas or Fremont. And since the company has sponsored them, their ability to stay in the USA is completely in your hands.”

# People snap: “Those with the circumstance to be able to pick up another job will just move on. For them, the lull in between is meaningless. But those that can’t — those without money and no freedom earned, suffered through the insane production schedules — those people will snap. People in their late forties who have immigrated to this country in hopes of making it big will outright f-cking snap. [ What It's Like Where Alleged Murderer Jing Wu Worked Nicholas Carlson | November 15, 2008]

Traditionally, there was always work for displaced engineers. What I started noticing in Silicon Valley in 2000 was folks like a 40 something Cornell EE graduate driving a cab. I’ve also seen first hand just how extreme the rivalries between Indians and East Asians can be in Silicon Valley companies-and had coworkers tell me that they were only being offered funding for a project in a Fortune 100 Corporation if they agreed to “play ball” with Indian tribal nepotism. With companies like Sun Microsystems that helped lead the charge in ramping up H-1b expansion laying off 19% of their workforce, I can imagine the situation is looking rather grim these days in Silicon Valley. When H-1b got ramped up, I saw my own earning power plummet. I’m lucky in that I have a variety of work skills–and can integrate into the general labor pool in the US. I expect the situation for someone like Jing Wu would be utterly unbearable.

I don’t think US businesses should be in the business of slavery–in any form, no matter how you dress it up. As I have argued before, I think we need a lot fewer immigrants–and a much better deal for those immigrants that are allowed and for American workers as a group. The only form of familial immigrant I think should be allows is that of a spouse and children under age 18. Even there, I think we need to look at raising the fees substantially to cut back on fabricated relationships. When I lived in San Francisco, the going rate for a marriage to a gay man willing to facilitate immigration of a Chinese woman was $10,000. That leads me to think fees of $20,000 per fiancee Visa might still be a bargain. I think these measures could combine to get US immigration to the level of current out migration for a policy of zero net immigration.

If US elites continue to practice slavery, they must expect slave rebellions–and there will be a limited period in which they can count on overseers being the only targets. We’ve seen other incidents of recent immigrants committing suicide-and killing their families because of economic conditions. Jing Wu was someone going up the food chain a bit-and that is what we must expect from someone with literally nothing to lose. I really doubt the violence will stop there.

The architects of H-1b expansion like Harris Miller might do well to repent the evil they have inflicted on the world, consider beefing up their private security or maybe just going someplace else where their safety can be better assured than in the United States.