http://www.couragecampaign.org/page/community/tag_rss/Tom+Campbell In the wake of the Arizona immigration law being signed by their governor, California Republican and US Senate candidate Tom Campbell was quick to announce his support for the law , putting him significantly out of step with public opinion in California and indicating a willingness to let his fellow Californians be subjected to unfair violations of their civil liberties and random searches based on racial profiling. So the Courage Campaign decided to let Tom Campbell know that Californians didn't agree with his stance. We joined Rev. Eric Lee of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the California of Federation of Teachers to ask our members to sign a letter to Campbell asking him to withdraw his support for the Arizona law and pledge to not bring such a law to California. Just a few hours after we deployed our email, Campbell responded directly to us via email : Had you contacted me, I would have urged you not to fan the flames of this controversy, as you have chosen to do. Your language is inflammatory in the highest degree. We are all bound by the same federal laws. No state or city has the right to exclude itself from the application of federal law. And if a state wishes to ask its law enforcement agents to help enforce federal law, I don't see how we can object. After all, the federal government has done a terrible job of enforcing the laws against illegal immigration. Under Arizona's law, and under the Constitution as interpreted by Chief Justice Earl Warren in Terry v. Ohio, in 1968, police officers have the right to ask individuals when they have reasonable grounds for suspicion of a law violation. Racial profiling does not constitute reasonable grounds. That was always clear in the new law; but changes adopted yesterday by Arizona make it even more clear. Another change makes even clearer the intent of the original law, that the stop must be for violation of other laws, such as a moving violation in traffic. Californians, especially, ought to watch the experience of our neighbor state before rushing to condemn it. Like Arizona, California, too, has been burdened by the federal government's unwillingness to enforce existing laws, and our nation's sovereignty. "Sanctuary cities," setting themselves up as immune to federal law, are no more legal than the efforts of "nullification" of federal law tried by southern states before our country's civil war. And when the federal government fails to enforce the law, it is us, the citizens of the border states, who pay the price. We ought to be free, therefore, to take steps to assist federal enforcement of our nation's sovereignty, and its borders. There's a lot of problematic and flawed arguments here, as Rick Jacobs, Chair of the Courage Campaign, Rev. Eric Lee, and Kenneth Burt, Political Director of the CFT explained in their response letter emailed to Campbell this afternoon: While we may not agree with you on the specifics of Arizona’s SB 1070 and California “sanctuary cities,” we can surely agree that both policies were the result of failures at the federal level. After reflecting on the fact that you had 10 years and either a Republican President or Republican Congress with which to fix this growing problem, we decided to give you the benefit of the doubt and research the matter further. What we found is that in your ten years in Congress, you did not produce comprehensive immigration reform. By failing to lead on this vitally important economic and national security issue, you were part of the problem. The letter goes on to demand Campbell own up to his failures and apologize for creating this ugly situation: It seems to us you're trying to use your own failures as an excuse to lend your name and credentials to an indefensible law, while pandering to extremist elements with hopes that it will help you win an election. But facts, and your own record of outright failure to lead on the issue of immigration, speak much louder than election year pandering. So now we are calling on you, formally, to apologize to the people of California and America for abdicating your responsibility to fix our immigration system when you had the chance. The letter also takes issue with Campbell's other justifications for the Arizona law: As for SB 1070, you also suggested in your email that "Californians ought to watch the experience of our neighbor state before rushing to condemn it." It seems to us that Californians unfortunately have a lot of experience with using immigration status as a basis for racial discrimination. We know the division and pain it causes, and therefore have a strong basis to condemn Arizona. That's why a growing number of Californians, including faith leaders, are calling for Arizona to repeal its law. You also view the application of legal authority by law enforcement officers from a perspective of privilege. African Americans across the nation, and now Latinos in Arizona, have been victims of documented racial profiling for decades. "Reasonable suspicion" allows for police officers to subjectively determine whether to pull-over or stop a "suspect". This law is similar to the law enforcement policy that allows police to shoot if they "feel in danger". This is nothing more than "shoot first, ask questions later". Already Californians are being targeted by Arizona authorities -- just two weeks ago a U.S. citizen from Fresno with dark skin was pulled over and arrested by Arizona police for not having his birth certificate on him. In other words, racial profiling is already a serious problem. Arizona already settled a lawsuit with the ACLU over rampant racial profiling, and Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is a noted defender of racial profiling. This is the behavior Campbell is enabling. We haven't heard back from Tom Campbell on this most recent letter. But no matter what his response, now isn't the time to let up. Sign your name to the Courage Campaign/CFT letter and show Tom Campbell that California won't stand for his defense of the indefensible. Below the fold is the email we sent to our members: http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2q3 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2q3/commentary#comments Wed, 05 May 2010 11:32:17 PDT http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2q3 Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/profile_picture/8e501f6005c216fc9b_j8m6b99j3.jpg Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign 0 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/comment_rss/C2q3/ They're baaaaaack. The National Organization for Marriage (NOM), one of the leading anti-gay groups in the country and a key opponent of same-sex marriage, is again pushing out a bizarre video ad that distorts the truth. In the fall of 2008 NOM produced an ad filled with fear about same sex marriage to motivate their base to support Prop 8. The ad, "The Gathering Storm" , told the lie that marriage equality somehow threatened individual freedoms. NOM is back again with a new ad attacking Barbara Boxer for her support of marriage equality, and claiming that Tom Campbell supports it too. The ad also focuses on other political issues, showing that NOM is trying to branch out and become a multi-issue right-wing organization. The ad, which is part of a $500,000 ad buy, makes a big mistake when it comes to Tom Campbell. As this KNBC video shows from just 2 weeks ago, he doesn't believe marriage rights for same-sex couples are included in the U.S. Constitution, opposing the federal trial of Prop 8. As NOM rolls out its new ad campaign, California progressives need to hold them accountable and push back against their bull. That's why the Courage Campaign is going to produce and air a response ad of our own. We need your help to fund it. Click here to help us quickly get our response ad on the air -- and let NOM know we're not going to let them keep peddling their crap to Californians. Below is the email we sent to our members today on this subject. http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2qg http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2qg/commentary#comments Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:12:32 PDT http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2qg Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/profile_picture/8e501f6005c216fc9b_j8m6b99j3.jpg Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign 1 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/comment_rss/C2qg/ California's media likes to play up Tom Campbell as some sort of "moderate" or "sensible" Republican. As compared to Attila the Hun this might be plausible. But even a cursory glance at his alternative budget solutions shows that he is a typically conservative politician. Sure, his conservatism seems to be of the Ronald Reagan sort as opposed to the Grover Norquist sort. But there never was much difference between the two, except in tone, which is apparently all that matters to the media. Campbell's proposed budget claims to want to solve a "systemic" crisis in a way that doesn't hurt our ability to recover from the economic crisis. Yet his budget merely offers a different method to achieve the same downward spiral that has afflicted the state - particularly Campbell's total ignorance of the revenue drop and the negative impact of spending cuts on consumer spending. Tom Campbell believes the budget can be balanced by hammering social services, even though there is unprecedented need for these services. An example of his proposals: •15% salary reduction for state workers OR 15% layoffs of state workforce • $156.7 million savings in Cal Works by implementing Federal work participation requirements. • $248.5 million savings by reverting to federal minimums on Supplemental Security Income and the State Supplementary Payment. • $114.1 million savings by reducing compensation to in-home supportive service workers to the state minimum wage. • $882 million savings in Medi-Cal, provided California receives a federal waiver from terms of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. In other words, he's offering a mixture of attacks on the poor and attacks on Obama's stimulus. His rationale: 1. California must, in large part, return to national standards on welfare and health care; we cannot afford to provide more than the national average in areas where we have long exceeded those levels; 2. California must ask those capable of taking care of themselves to do so; 3. California must not undercut its ability to bounce back when the national recession ends. This means being careful about cutting education, especially Community Colleges where much workforce retraining takes place. This is complete nonsense. First, the national standards on welfare and health care are woefully insufficient. Campbell acts as if there is no national health care problem, as if there is no issue with the working-class finding and holding jobs. Campbell is a typical Republican - identifying with the wealthy and totally ignorant of how everyone else experiences life in California. Second, how the heck are people supposed to "take care of themselves" in a recession like this?! Campbell is the sort of guy who drives through a poor community in his Jaguar (or whatever he drives) and shakes his head saying "why don't they just get a job?" That statement alone is proof that Campbell is intellectually unfit for office by virtue of his unwillingness to understand the challenges facing most Californians. Campbell also proves he has no clue about modern economics - otherwise he wouldn't so blithely ignore the work of Nobel Laureates who point out that if you cut social service spending, folks have to replace that lost money by curtailing consumer spending, hammering jobs and tax revenues. Third, Campbell's whole budget blueprint is designed specifically to *prevent* California from enjoying economic recovery. How are people who have no health care benefits supposed to find work? How are people supposed to find work period if you're scaling back Cal-WORKS? How are small businesses supposed to open when the state is laying off workers or cutting their salaries? Campbell's also internally inconsistent. He states he wants to be "careful about cutting education" and then proposes: $150 million unallocated cut to UC and CSU (I realize this would require further increases in student fees, or improved fund-raising). Tom Campbell isn't some kind of new Republican. He's no moderate. Instead, he is the *same exact kind of Republican* that the party has offered dating back to Herbert Hoover. He is a man of the upper class, determined to protect the wealth and privileges of the upper class at the expense of everyone else. Campbell's economic policies are no different than Reagan's, or Bush's (either one, 41 or 43). Campbell offers the vast majority of this state only reduced services and less money in their wallets. His Hooverite policies would merely make the recession worse, and ensure that when economic recovery does come, only Campbell's rich friends see any of its benefits, while everyone else is left behind. Which will apparently be just fine with Campbell, since everyone else should just take care of themselves anyway. We've all seen this movie before. We know how it ends - we're living through it right now. Californians will reject Campbell's Hooverism. But will the media report on exactly what Campbell offers? Or will they continue to lie to their readers and claim he's some kind of "moderate"? I'm not exactly holding my breath. http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2W7 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2W7/commentary#comments Mon, 18 May 2009 11:48:01 PDT http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/roberticruickshank/C2W7 Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/profile_picture/8e501f6005c216fc9b_j8m6b99j3.jpg Robert Cruickshank, Courage Campaign 0 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/comment_rss/C2W7/ As heavyweight Democratic gubernatorial candidates jockey for position, the Republican side of the aisle appears to be a race with no clear cut favorite. Keeping in line with the "yacht party" mantra, the GOP will likely field several candidates wealthy enough to fund their own campaign, but not nearly represent the majority of the state's citizenry. Once these folks go public with their stances on social issues the right-wing of their own party will eat them alive. Cant wait. Republicans Rumored to Replace the Terminator: http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/elliottpetty/CLqJ http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/elliottpetty/CLqJ/commentary#comments Tue, 08 Jul 2008 11:11:55 PDT http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/post/elliottpetty/CLqJ Elliott D. Petty Elliott D. Petty 0 http://couragecampaign.org/page/community/comment_rss/CLqJ/