Thread: Socialist Party: Not happy w/freedom for Ramos/Compean

The Party for Socialism and Liberation...gee, they aren't happy that two Hispanic Border Patrol agents who were maliciously prosecuted by an overzealous U.S. attorney at the behest of the corrupt Mexican government officials.....are free. Yet, they completely mischaracterize the illegal alien Mexican drug smuggler as an "immigrant". Word to the author..check your facts....Aldrete-Davila was NEVER an "immigrant" to this country...he was a known, career illegal alien drug smuggler working for the Mexican drug cartels....the Border Patrol agents were wrongly convicted by the bought testimony of illegal alien drug smuggler who was sought out in Mexico and granted immunity for his crimes. Aldrete-Davila then went on to continue his cross-border drug smuggling during the trial and got caught once again.


Bush rewards border agents who shot immigrant in the back
Sunday, January 25, 2009
By: Enrique Vasquez

A farewell gift to fascist, anti-immigrant forces

In one of his final acts as president, George W. Bush commuted the sentences of two former U.S. Border Patrol agents in prison for the February 2005 shooting of an unarmed Mexican immigrant. The two men tried to cover up the incident and lied in their testimony.

Lou Dobbs on CNN blasting immigration
The viciously racist Lou Dobbs
ranked among the high-profile
backers of Ramos and Compean.
"There was obstruction of justice; they shot a man in the back," said a former Justice Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of criticizing the president. "I am speechless. These are terrible clemency cases." (Los Angeles Times, Jan. 20)

José Alonso Compean and Ignacio Ramos fired a combined 15 shots at Osvaldo Aldrete-Davila following a foot pursuit. Wounded, Aldrete-Davila managed to escape across the Rio Grande. Fully aware of what they had done, Ramos and Compean disposed of the shell casings in an attempt to conceal what had happened.

When the story surfaced, Ramos and Compean were charged with seven and nine counts, respectively. Their testimonies were full of contradictions, and eventually they were found guilty on all counts except one. Each was sentenced to more than 10 years in prison, but now they will be released within two months after serving only 14 months in total.

The former agents from El Paso, Texas, have been a cause célèbre among racist, anti-immigrant groups such as the Minutemen Project, as well as right-wing politicians and bigots. Rather than condemning their criminal behavior, the right wing turned the two men into martyrs. Sympathizers were featured on talk shows repeatedly stating that the men were "just doing their jobs." (Associated Press, Jan. 19)

Among their highest profile defenders was right-wing CNN anchor Lou Dobbs. After getting hold of the story, Dobbs dedicated countless hours of his unabashedly anti-immigrant "Lou Dobbs Tonight" to popularize the lies peddled by the apologists for Ramos and Compean. (Salon.com, Sept. 7, 2007)

The Minutemen Project also began rallying support for the two shooters. Minutemen rallies frequently featured placards with slogans calling for "justice" for Ramos and Compean. The Minutemen are primarily known for their armed, vigilante-style persecution of immigrants at the border.

A common thread runs through the cast of characters that backed Ramos and Compean: virulent racism. Those were the forces that aggressively pushed for pardons for the two men. The fact that their cries have been heard reveal much about government and the justice system under capitalism.

Capitalist politicians and the corporate media continuously demonize and dehumanize immigrants, turning them into second-class citizens whose labor can be easily super-exploited. Under their reactionary discourse, undocumented immigrants are, by definition, criminals. Any use of force against them by the border patrol is reducible to "law enforcement agents just doing their job"—even if that means shooting an unarmed man in the back.

It should come as no surprise that the indictment, much less conviction, of a border patrol agent, police officer or any other functionary of the state is the exception and not the rule. The exploitative relationship between the owners of capital and the working class would be short lived if the state was not free to use violence as a means of oppression. This is particularly true when it comes to the most oppressed workers, including immigrants and people of color. The commuting of Ramos’s and Compean’s sentences may be utterly repulsive, but it is not shocking.

There is no shortage of prisoners who should not spend another single day behind bars: Mumia Abu-Jamal, Leonard Peltier, the Cuban Five, and countless others. Ramos and Compean do not belong in those ranks.

http://www.pslweb.org/site/News2?page=N ... _iv_ctrl=0

Ramos and Compean do not belong in those ranks.

Your right, they don't. They should never have been there to begin with because they aren't in the ranks of people like that.

Ramos and Compean don't belong in the ranks alongside Mumia, a convicted cop-killer who killed Philly Police officer Danny Faulkner and became an infamous "cult hero" amongst the ultra-radical, looney left-wing including Ed Asner, Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins and other Hollywood nit-wits.

Aren't Ramo and Compeon hispanic. How can they be racist?

Probably the worst crime Ramos and Compean commtted was allegiance to the American laws, not showing preference to law breakers that happened to belong to the "race".

Just more of the same old blather. Anti-immigrant my azz, Lou Dobbs (and we here) continually recognize the rights of Legal Immigrants. Racists? Well if supporting the rule of law is racist then yes I am.