this is my first glimpse

into the lives of the (immigrant) sheep herders. you bet your bottom dollar those that yell and scream about OTHER immigrants entering our country are all too happy to have their borregueros here. seems to me something is stinking really badly and it AIN'T the borregueros. at the very least this is an interesting read. at the very most, it's sad and telling about greedy hypocritical OUR SOCIETY

In Loneliness, Immigrants Tend the Flock
By DAN FROSCH
ROCK SPRINGS, Wyo. — Somewhere in Wyoming’s vast, barren sagebrush country, Lorenzo Cortez Vargas pokes his head out of the rickety camper where he lives and stares into the dirt.

Mr. Vargas, a sheepherder from Chile, spends his days and nights on lonesome stretches of the Rockies, driving 2,000 sheep across Colorado and Wyoming as part of a federal temporary worker program he signed up for more than a year ago.

But like the other sheepherders, or “borregueros,” in the West, Mr. Vargas has barely any contact with his new country, where he earns $750 a month for working round the clock without a day off.

He lives alone in the crude 5-foot-by-10-foot “campito” with no running water, toilet or electricity, save for a car battery he has rigged to a small radio. A sputtering wood-burning stove is his only source of heat in winter, a collection of faded telephone cards his only connection to home.

“They never tell you exactly what it’s going to be like,” Mr. Vargas, 28, said in Spanish. “But you’ve got to stick it out here. What are you going to do?”..............

picture:

Kevin Moloney for The New York Times

José Ruiz, a former sheepherder from Chile, at a “campito” in Wyoming. The harsh lives of foreign sheepherders in the American West have long been unchanged.

isn't sheriff an elected post?

#1) he seems to be in the news an AWFUL lot for a sheriff
#2) he seems to be in the news an AWFUL lot for a sheriff
#3) he seems to be in the news an AWFUL lot for a sheriff
#4) he seems like a giant gatsu piedi

Chained Immigrants on Parade: Who Will Stand Up to the Sick Antics of a Racist Sheriff?

By Casey Sanchez, SPLC's Hate Watch.

Last week in Maricopa County, Ariz., more than 200 Latino immigrants were chained, dressed in prison stripes and forced to march down a public street from a county jail to a detainment camp in a desert industrial zone outside Phoenix.

Along the way they were filmed by television news crews and guarded by at least 50 Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) deputies, wearing body armor and combat fatigues, armed with shotguns and automatic rifles. At least two canine units were present; a Sheriff’s Department helicopter hovered overhead.

The massive show of force was pure stagecraft for a blatant and dehumanizing publicity stunt orchestrated by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. The MCSO gave no indication that any of the immigrant prisoners were particularly violent or presented a grave danger to the public.

According to a MCSO press release, 220 immigrants were transferred to a “Tent City” surrounded by electrified fencing. “This is a population of criminals more adept perhaps at escape,” Arpaio stated in the press release. “But this is a fence they won’t want to scale because they risk receiving a shock – literally.”........

here's a lil' somethin' somethin' from his wiki entry

Joe Arpaio

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Joseph M. Arpaio (born June 14, 1932 in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States) is a law enforcement officer, and the sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona. Arpaio, who promotes himself as "America's Toughest Sheriff,"^[1][2] is controversial for his approach to operating the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office. He has a large number of vocal supporters as well as detractors. His practices have been criticized by organizations such as Amnesty International,^[3] the American Civil Liberties Union, the Arizona Ecumenical Council, the American Jewish Committee, and the Arizona chapter of the Anti-Defamation League.^[4]

seems like he's really not too well thought of in places other than my couch
Opinion: Arizona sheriff is an embarrassment to Homeland Security czar

By Ruben Navarette Jr.

Special to the Mercury News

SAN DIEGO — One of the most dangerous places to be in Arizona is caught between Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and one of his publicity stunts. That's just where Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano finds herself.

Months ago, Arpaio and his deputies began scouring Hispanic neighborhoods in the Phoenix area looking for illegal immigrants. So far, hundreds have been hauled away. Often in these types of operations, "probable cause" gets defined as brown skin and Spanish accents. So, there is no telling how many U.S.-born Hispanics were detained and harassed in the process.

All of which sets the stage for the stunt. The man who put inmates in pink underwear and fed them green bologna has some people in Arizona seeing red after he recently paraded about 200 illegal immigrants in shackles and prison stripes to his notorious "Tent City."

Of course, Arpaio did this after alerting the media...........

there's even a site to dump him!

A few reasons why Joe's GOT TO GO

Click to read more With Arpaio, real community law enforcement takes a backseat to publicity stunts. He lives in a fantasy world of self-importance. Millions of tax dollars have been wasted on lawsuits He is responsible for a critical and dangerous shortage of personnel in both in the jails and patrol. Hundreds of current MCSO employees, represented by a number of employee organizations, have expressed a vote of no confidence in Sheriff Arpaio. The self proclaimed “Toughest Sheriff in America ” is too fearful to debate other candidates.

Arpaio routinely abuses his authority for personal, political, and vindictive reasons. Many Phoenix community leaders and concerned organizations have looked beyond the smokescreen to see the corruption and incompetence of the Arpaio administration. Sheriff Joe Arpaio has deceived, misinformed and outright lied to the public and violated rights! Arpaio's self-serving and ego-driven actions have severely damaged relations between the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office and other Arizona agencies.

sometimes

i think we're nothing more than animals.

these are two cases we know about. how many cases DON'T we know about?
question: shouldn't ALL people be treated with respect? with dignity? with COMPASSION?

Electronic trail incriminates government in detainee's cancer death
Nick Langewis
Damning electronic evidence has been brought to light that incriminates the federal government in the neglect of a detainee in the months preceding his cancer death.
Having fled his native El Salvador with his family at age 10, Francisco Castaneda, 36, was an illegal immigrant, though he had lived in Los Angeles for close to 25 years, and fathered his daughter Vanessa, before a drug possession conviction found him incarcerated and facing deportation.
In March of 2006, while Castaneda was in custody, his assigned doctor wanted him immediately admitted to a hospital and a biopsy done on a painful lesion on his penis, suspicious that it was cancerous. Division of Immigration Health Services refused the request, seeking more "cost-effective" treatment options. An emergency circumcision and biopsy of the lesion, later recommended by a urologist, were refused as "elective" treatment, according to Castaneda's testimony to Congress on October 4, 2007. The cancer would go untreated throughout 2006, despite repeated requests for help, and it had visibly spread by the end of the year...........

In Custody, In Pain
Beset by Medical Problems as She Fights Deportation, A U.S. Resident Struggles to Get the Treatment She Needs
by Amy Goldstein and Dana Priest Washington Post Staff Writers

FLORENCE, Ariz. -- Underneath her baggy jail-issue pants, Yong Sun Harvill feels the soft lump just below her left knee. Sometimes it tingles. Sometimes it is numb. Like her cancer felt when it arrived behind the knee a few years ago.
She noticed the lump under the thin, blue cotton in August, five months after federal immigration officers, to her amazement, took her into custody to try to deport her for buying stolen jewelry more than a decade ago. The lump grows slowly. It is now three inches across. And though she keeps asking, no one has done a test to see whether her sarcoma has come back.
Her leg is painful and swollen from hip to foot, damaged by past surgeries and radiation treatments. Some nights, liquid seeps through cracks in her distended skin. Her left ankle is three times as big as her right. For years, she relied on a leg pump to boost her circulation and keep the swelling in check. But as an immigration detainee in this desert prison town, Harvill, 52, has been unable to persuade anyone to get her a pump, or to let her family back in Florida send hers from home.........