Dee Deakos Speaks About Mayor Lou Barletta
[The following is an email sent to me a few days ago from Dee Deakos, a long time fixture in Hazleton politics and Lou Barletta's challenger in the last Hazleton Mayoral Primary race.]
This quote is from Lou’s 60 Minutes interview:
“We’re not involved in immigration in any way. We’re not regulating people coming in and out of the country. In fact, we’re not doing anything to the illegal alien. We’re simply punishing businesses that hire them and landlords who rent to them,” Barletta says.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/17/60minutes/main2195789_page3.shtml
This is his claim on what he is doing to illegals. He is simply pushing the problems onto other communities. Is this truly a solution to the problem?
He doesn’t understand the economics of the problem. The federal government has limited resources to chase and deport all illegals. In fact some countries won’t even take them back.
He should target the ones in the prisons that have been convicted and have them deported. The ones he claimed who shot that man were already in the legal system. Criminals tend to be repeat offenders, so why give them the chance to commit more crimes?
Drug dealers and violent persons are allowed to return to the streets without a whisper from Lou. As people cheered the compassionate ruling that some violent criminals should be forced to learn English, Lou should have been shouting “Deport them – it is the law”. Yes, there is a federal law that allow these individuals to be deported whether legal or illegal. Unfortunately these criminals who are in the minority had made it difficult for the whole immigrant community.
With Lou’s rhetoric, people feel comfortable bashing the Hispanics and other foreigners. What a shame – one man’s bid for popularity can hurt so many people. He needed this popularity because so many people were angry with him because he brought questionable dredge is an already polluted portion of the city.
He embroils Hazleton into a lawsuit that violates federal law. He said no problem – we have insurance. But he knew that insurance wasn’t going to cover it all, in fact, very little of it. His solution was to beg to the people of America to send donations to his personal fund – Small Town Defenders. Too bad it won’t cover the million plus in legal fees that Hazleton will be left to pay as Lou tries to move to greener pastures. Does he really care?
Of course that whole lawsuit was illegal because he didn’t ask council to give him the funds to pay for it. Wait a minute; don’t you understand “illegal”, Lou, when it applies to you?
-Dee Deakos
