New Bedford Sob Story...

Here's the New York Times Editorial which should have you outraged. Pay particular attention to the lede (emphasis mine):

"A screaming baby girl has been forcibly weaned from breast milk and taken, dehydrated, to an emergency room, so that the nation’s borders will be secure. Her mother and more than 300 other workers in a leather-goods factory in New Bedford, Mass., have been terrorized — subdued by guns and dogs, their children stranded at school — so that the country will notice that the Bush administration is serious about enforcing immigration laws. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of poor Americans, lacking the right citizenship papers, have been denied a doctor’s care so that not a penny of Medicaid will go to a sick illegal immigrant."

The GALL of the New York Times to insinuate that the Bush administration is "terrorizing" illegal immigrants just to get attention. The implication is also that these people who are "lacking the right citizenship papers" are doing everything they can to become legal citizens, but unfortunately haven't completed the process - who knows if that's true? And, I'm sorry, if they are "illegal immigrants", they cannot at the same time be "Americans"!

Bill O'Reilly, meanwhile, takes the NYT to task. He's at his best here (again, my emphasis):

"Wow. A screaming baby denied breast milk? So dehydrated she has to be hospitalized? Can this be happening in America?
"Well, it may not have happened.
"Because The Times editorial was so intense we decided to look into the situation. And guess what? There's some real problems with The Times' descriptions.
"Two babies were admitted to two New Bedford area hospitals shortly after the raid. A 7-month-old was taken to St. Vincent's where it was diagnosed with pneumonia and dehydration. And another baby was admitted to St. Luke's, also with pneumonia and dehydration. Both babies were accompanied by guardians and both were treated. If there's another baby in play, we can't find it.
"Of course, the immigration raid didn't cause the pneumonia, which most likely led to the dehydration. So the description used by The New York Times to demonize the Department of Homeland Security seems to be false.
"Now, we called the Times asking for clarification. They say they witnessed the event but can't provide any details. What hospital was the baby in? We suspect they looked at the Web site featuring an unidentified baby. We saw the same Web site, the same thing, and it proves nothing."

Deval Patrick is now feigning outrage over the whole matter, though it's clear that he knew about the raid beforehand. Now there's going to be a Congressional investigation! So much for enforcing the law...

Here's a thought: since all the illegals were flown out to Texas and separated from their children, instead of flying the illegals back here, why not fly the children out to the illegals? That way nobody can complain that "immigration raids split families."

Michael Graham sums it up much better than I could:

"...There are real costs to real Americans of refusing to enforce immigration laws. There are also real costs to the nations these illegals are fleeing. If your life is so lousy that you'd rather work in an American sweatshop than in your own country, your country must really, really suck.
"So why not stay there and fight for a better future? Why not work as hard to create jobs back home as you do to steal jobs here? If illegal immigrants truly are the ambitious, caring, community-minded folk their advocates insist, aren't they needed more in the backwards ratholes of Central and South America?"

Lastly, check out Froma Harrop's take for a fairly reasoned liberal perspective on this case.