Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Monday, August 31, 2015

Chris Christie Wants To Track Immigrants Like FedEx Packages

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) on Saturday revealed a plan to curb unauthorized immigration: track anyone who enters the country from the time they receive their visa, like a FedEx package.

At a New Hampshire town hall, the presidential hopeful lamented that 40 percent of the undocumented immigrants in the United States entered on legal visas that they had overstayed.

"So here's what I'm gonna do if I'm president. I'm gonna ask Fred Smith, the founder of FedEx, come work for the governor for three months. Just come for three months to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and show these people," Christie said, drawing laughter from the crowd.

"We need to have a system that tracks you from the moment you come in," he continued. "And then when your time is up...then we go get you. Tap you on the shoulder and say excuse me, thanks for coming, time to go."

Christie's campaign did not immediately return a request for comment.

FedEx uses barcode technology and unique tracking numbers to keep track of shipments, with each package scanned an average of 13 times between dropoff and delivery, said FedEx spokeswoman Jennifer Caccavo. She declined to comment on Christie's plan.

Earlier this month, Christie called for a re-examination of birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants born on United States soil.

UPDATE: 8/30, 9:23 a.m. -- Christie doubled down on his remarks Sunday.

 "My point was this is once again a situation where the private sector laps us in the government with the use of technology," he told Fox News' Chris Wallace. "Let's use the same type of technology to make sure that 40 percent of the 11 million people here illegally don't overstay."

"We can do it," he added. "And we can bring in the folks from FedEx to use the technology to do it. There's nothing wrong with that, and I don't mean people are packages. Don't be ridiculous."

Original Article
Source: huffingtonpost.com/
Author: Sam Levine

No comments:

Post a Comment