Thread: Mexico-trolling Arnold wants unarmed Minutemen?

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... &cset=true

Governor Promises Closer Ties to Baja
# Meeting for the first time, leaders of the two states discuss immigration, the border and other issues.

By Louis Sahagun, Times Staff Writer

MEXICALI, Mexico. â€â€

I thaught he was on our side?

Here's some more articles.

Arnold is really showing what a pandering wimp he is becoming and he wonders why his poll numbers are falling. We voted for you in California because you promised to be a tough governor with a backbone. You are quickly becoming another Gray Davis.

His idea of the unarmed minutemen is totally ludicrous. Why don't you go to the border yourself to see what these people have to endure from protesters and smugglers. I'm sure you would quickly change your stance of going unarmed when the issue is more about protecting yourself from thugs. American citizens also have the right to keep and bear arms according to the second amendment. Arnold needs to learn American history.





http://www.leadingthecharge.com/stories ... 76784.html

Schwarzenegger Meets Counterpart in Mexico
Staff and agencies
23 September, 2005

By JOHN RICE, 57 minutes ago

MEXICALI, Mexico - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger , looking to improve his image with Hispanics at home, proclaimed his friendship for Mexico Friday following meetings with his Baja California counterpart on security and immigration.

Schwarzenegger and Gov. Eugenio Elorduy pledged to maintain "a permanent working relationship," and the U.S. governor said he planned to travel to Mexico "in the near future" to meet with President Vicente Fox , and invite him to California.

"The citizens of our states have important familial, economic and cultural ties that cannot be ignored," the two said in a joint statement at the end of their two-hour meeting. "When we work together to produce positive results, the citizens on both sides of the border reap the benefits."

"No one ought to be armed, no one ought to harass anybody, and nobody ought to violate the human rights issues," he said.

"We have agreed to thorough review ... of the economic and environmental implications for both California and northern Mexico," according to the governors‘ joint statement.

He stressed his many trips to Mexico in the past, noting he had won a bodybuilding contest in Tijuana once, and had shot all or parts of four movies in Mexico. "I always felt safe, I was always welcomed with open arms" in Mexico, Schwarzenegger said.

He repeated his refusal to sign the license bill, but said he favored a guest worker program in which workers would have a right to drivers licenses.

"He doesn‘t want Mexicans to go," to California, said Victor Faz, a 16-year-old street taco vendor in Mexicali. "And they are the ones that help the state get ahead."

Schwarzenegger appeared to enjoy the visit. "I think the more we travel around the world and learn from various other countries, the better it is, the more we become one community rather than fighting one another."




http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N23669939.htm

No firearms for citizen border patrols-Calif gov.
24 Sep 2005 02:33:53 GMT

Source: Reuters

By Jim Christie

MEXICALI, Mexico, Sept 23 (Reuters) - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said on Friday that citizen patrols of his state's border with Mexico must be unarmed to avoid violence.

"I never believed in armed Minutemen," the former movie star told a news conference in Mexicali after meeting with Gov. Eugenio Elorduy, the head of the Mexican state of Baja California.

Schwarzenegger had expressed support in April for the vigilantes, who began patrolling the U.S.-Mexican border in Arizona to draw attention to illegal immigration. A handful of Schwarzenegger's critics followed him to Mexicali to protest his support for the patrols.

Daniel Morales of Riverside, California, said Schwarzenegger should follow the example of U.S. President George W. Bush. "Even President Bush has labeled these people vigilantes," Morales said.

Schwarzenegger, on his second visit to Mexico as California governor, also said the U.S. government must craft a guest worker program to ease illegal immigration.

His meeting with Elorduy came amid renewed focus in the United States on troubles along its border with Mexico, including drug trafficking and a wave of related violence.

Schwarzenegger, a Republican, has since seen his popularity plunge among California's Hispanic voters, who are overwhelmingly Democratic.



www.signonsandiego.com


Immigration tops meeting of governors

Schwarzenegger visits Baja California leader
By John Marelius and Sandra Dibble
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITERS
September 24, 2005

K.C. ALFRED / Union-Tribune
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger met yesterday with Baja California Gov. Eugenio Elorduy in Mexicali.

MEXICALI – The whole menu of hot-button California immigration issues intruded yesterday on a long-awaited meeting between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and his Baja California counterpart.
Schwarzenegger and Baja California Gov. Eugenio Elorduy discussed cross-border cooperation on transportation, trade, education, environmental issues and immigration during a two-hour private meeting in the state government headquarters here.

The two issued a joint statement with immigration couched in delicate diplomatic language:

"Undocumented immigration is perhaps one of the most challenging and controversial issues that we face, but that does not mean that workable solutions cannot be found. Our dialogue with respect to this issue must be constructive and based on mutual respect."

Minutes after the statement was read at a joint news conference in the Baja California capital, Schwarzenegger was peppered with questions from reporters about controversial statements that many in Mexico have taken offense at, particularly on the Minutemen border watchers and driver licenses for illegal immigrants.

The Republican governor defended his support of the efforts of the Minuteman as a self-appointed citizen adjunct to an understaffed Border Patrol, but does not want them to be armed or harass border crossers.

"Obviously, we do not have enough Border Patrol, so that is the problem why the Minutemen came about in the first place," Schwarzenegger said. "I also made it clear that I never believed in armed Minutemen. No one ought to be armed. No one ought to harass anybody.

"And everyone ought to remember always the human rights issues. It's very important that even though you see someone crossing illegally, they ought to be treated with human rights and with dignity."

Schwarzenegger also reiterated that he will not sign SB 60, which would allow the issuance of a driving certificate – not an official California driver license that can be used for identification – to people who are not in the country legally. He said he favors a universal license, but wants to wait for the federal government to develop uniform criteria for all 50 states.

"I think that we're all trying to achieve kind of the same goal here and we just have to be patient and move the agenda forward slowly," Schwarzenegger said.

Though immigration dominated the news conference, the two governors spent an hour talking about another sensitive border topic – a U.S. plan to conserve water by lining a 23-mile stretch of the All-American Canal, which carries Colorado River water to the Imperial Valley.

The project has long been the subject of protests in Mexico, as Mexicali farmers have for decades watered their fields from wells fed by the canal's seepage. Up to now, only the federal governments have conducted negotiations on the canal's lining, but the two governors agreed that their staffs would work with a Mexicali economic development group to seek a solution.

"We've got to find a way where we can help Mexico and at the same time accomplish our goals," Schwarzenegger said.

Schwarzenegger came into office after the canal lining deal was put together, but his administration remains firmly behind the project. His 2005-06 budget sets aside $59 million to assist in the concrete lining of the All-American and Coachella canals.

The lining project is part of a broader deal to reduce demand on the Colorado River.

It was only Schwarzenegger's second visit to Mexico since he became governor after the October 2003 recall election. He paid a brief visit to a Border Governors Conference in Torreon, Coahuila, in July.

Mexico is California's largest trading partner and California is home to more Mexican-born residents than any other state.

Schwarzenegger's outspoken stance on illegal immigration has generated widespread criticism in Mexico, where initial reaction to his victory was greeted with dismay. Mexican media were quick to point to his support of Proposition 187, the initiative supported by former Gov. Pete Wilson to deny government services to illegal immigrants in California.

But yesterday, Schwarzenegger and Elorduy spoke of their friendship and willingness to work together to strengthen cross-border ties. Smiling broadly, Schwarzenegger recalled his first visit to Mexico, for the Mr. International bodybuilding championship in Tijuana in 1968. He pointed to the success of the four movies he filmed in Mexico. "I always said that Mexico brought me good luck," he said.

Together with Elorduy, he spent almost half an hour with students and graduates from joint degree programs in international business and public administration involving universities on both sides of the border.

The meeting came almost two years after Schwarzenegger took office. Elorduy, a member of Mexico's National Action Party who speaks fluent English and was born in Calexico, has struggled since taking office in 2001 to get the attention of his northern counterparts, first Gray Davis and then Schwarzenegger.

Analysts say such encounters require a balancing act by officials from both sides of the border who may have strong feelings about emotional social issues but also want to make progress on common economic goals.

"There are two levels in dialogue," said Jeffrey Davidow, president of the Institute of the Americas at the University of California, San Diego. "One is public dialogue where sometimes on both sides of the border very emotional issues are staked out, polemical things are said. Then there are the day-to-day let's-work-together-and-get-things-done kind of contact."

Schwarzenegger also alluded to the protests Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, a Los Angeles Democrat, encountered in Mexico City last month over his advocacy of declaring a state of emergency at the border.

"I don't know what the point of it is at this point, because we are getting movement from Washington to bring more Border Patrol to our borders," Schwarzenegger said.

Schwarzenegger sought to put a compassionate face on his views on immigration by saying that the vast majority of illegal immigrants in California are working and contributing to the economy.

Notwithstanding his one-time support for Proposition 187, he emphasized that all people in California are entitled to essential government services regardless of their immigration status.

"We have equal rights for everybody, as you know," he said. "Everyone has the right to use our emergency rooms and to get medical care. Everyone has the right to have education."

Schwarzenegger noted that he signed AB 22, which imposes stiff civil and criminal penalties on persons convicted of smuggling people across the border.

"I just signed a bill the other day to make it a felony of human trafficking," he said. "So if you get busted with that, you go to jail for a long time."

And he pointed out that he signed legislation long sought by the United Farm Workers to guarantee farm laborers protection from the heat.

Schwarzenegger said he regards recent indication that the Bush administration intends to push aggressively for congressional approval of a guest-worker program as a hopeful sign.

"I think I'm very much encouraged about that because we must resolve the issue," he said. "I think it's wrong for the federal government to live in denial and to pretend that it's not existing."

Schwarzenegger was joined in Mexico by three of his Cabinet secretaries – Business, Transportation and Housing Secretary Sunne Wright McPeak, Director of Homeland Security Matthew Bettenhausen and Education Secretary Alan Bersin – who met with their counterparts in the Baja California government.

Schwarzenegger may have charmed government officials here, but he has yet to win over Latinos on both sides of the border, said Nativo Lopez, president of the Mexican American Political Assn.

Using Larry Lopez's opinions really adds a lot of credibility to the LA times article. Even people from his own race thinks he is a loser. Why does anyone care what he has to say.

Daniel Morales of Riverside, California, said Schwarzenegger should follow the example of U.S. President George W. Bush. "Even President Bush has labeled these people vigilantes," Morales said.

Yeah follow the example of the worst, most horrible, most pathetic, most inept president ever since Jimmy Carter. That will win Arnies reelection for sure.

You know what gets me the most, dont these people understand that Arnold is an American Gov, not Mexico's Gov? Also i guess these people dont understand that the MM have the right under the second Amendment to bear arms, so the gov can say anything they he wants and he knows that he cant force them to be unarmed. What a joke!

P

I don't know what to think. The LA Times has always been a horribly biased open border rag but they've really stepped over the edge since their new Hispanic editor took over. I don't believe anything written in that paper any more than I do the National Enquirer.

This says it all to me ...

""I think that we're all trying to achieve kind of the same goal here and we just have to be patient and move the agenda forward slowly," Schwarzenegger said."

Originally Posted by ALIPAC

This says it all to me ...

""I think that we're all trying to achieve kind of the same goal here and we just have to be patient and move the agenda forward slowly," Schwarzenegger said."

That is correct W.