Currently, the family of the late Jamiel Shaw is scrambling to gather the roughly 20,000 more signatures necessary to put Jamiel's Law ( http://web.mac.com/waltermoore/WalterMo ... s_Law.html ) on next year's ballot. They only have until December 5 to complete this task, and it has taken them since the Spring of this year to get just over 50,000. Consequently, I have been trying to lend a hand and have been spending about an hour each day (for the past few days) haunting parking lots in front of supermarkets.

I hate doing that kind of thing because I'm not particularly outgoing and, quite frankly, I've always viewed people with suspicion when they come at me in similar locations wanting signatures. And, without a doubt, I am factoring race and age in my approach to obtaining these signatures.

1. I have chosen supermarkets in predominantly middle class and upper-middle class L.A. neighborhoods.

2. Over 90% of the folks I have approached are white.

3. About 65% of the people of whom I request a signature are older than me (I'm 45).

Reason for #'s 2 and 3: Whenever I go to anti-illegal immigration meetings or political functions in SoCal, the majority of my fellow attendees are invariably graying or white haired, caucasians, and the majority are older than I am.

4. On the occasions that I have walked up to black people in a supermarket parking lot, I always, right off the bat, ask them if they have heard of Jamiel Shaw. I reserve this conduct for black people and have never asked the same question of a white shopper.

Reason for #4: I figure African-Americans in L.A. are more likely to know who he is, and even if they don't, most people hear the name "Jamiel" and realize I'm trying to help out the family of a black guy (i.e. they're more likely to receive me warmly).

5. I have not approached even one Latino.

Reason for #5: I deem them to be the most likely to get rude or accuse me of racism, and since I'm already doing something that makes me a bit uncomfortable, I'm just not in the mood to hear any crap when I'm trying to do a good deed.

Now, I know damn well that every Hispanic is not in favor of illegal immigration. Hell, when I've been running around with my camera, I've interviewed members of You Don't Speak For Me and seen, firsthand, that the most hardcore Minutemen (i.e. strong language about illegals and a complete lack of sympathy for their "plight") are the Mexican-American ones, but still ... I'm just not going up to our brown friends.

I have only encountered on Latino while I was making my pitch. It was in front of a supermarket a few hours ago in Sherman Oaks (an L.A. suburb). I was speaking to an elderly couple and a clerk from the store was helping them put their bags into the back of their car. I explained to them that what we want to put on the ballot would require the LAPD to check the immigration status of any known gang member they take into custody. If the gang member is found not to have legal residence in the U.S., the LAPD would be required to turn him over to ICE, and under no circumstances, could the undocumented gang member be released out onto the streets (which is exactly what resulted in Jamiel Shaw's death earlier this year).

Promptly after hearing this, the kid looked at me and said "So, this is against immigrants." My response was "No, this is against illegal aliens. There's a big difference between them and immigrants." The upshot of this entire thing was the couple decided not to sign.

There ... that's my entire Sunday night confession of filtering my expectations of people based upon their looks and skin color.

And with that, I, the filthy and bigoted Klansman racist, am logging off for the evening.