Arizona: when logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead…
Marisa Treviño at Latina Lista looks at the two more popular rationales given for supporting laws that “have the potential of being applied in a discriminatory fashion” (as one mealy-mouthed politico put it),
… escalating crime committed by the undocumented and abuse of the healthcare system.
Looking at Arizona, one has to wonder why the crime portion would be a premise for their infamous SB 1070 when crime rates are actually at their lowest in four decades.
…
The other often cited complaint of undocumented immigrants which inspires swift action to enact punitive state immigration enforcement is healthcare. According to the rhetoric, undocumented immigrants take advantage of our healthcare system and are overburdening our emergency rooms.
Yet, a new report by the National Center for Health Statistics finds that this common argument is nothing more than another smokebomb thrown at a gullible public and even more gullible politicians.
According to the report, the majority of people filling up emergency rooms are senior citizens and African Americans.
Among the three ethnic groups: white, black and Hispanic, Hispanics had the lowest rates of emergency room visits.
…
These are only two examples illustrating how two of the arguments levied against the undocumented, as reasons enough to create the kind of legislation we, as a nation, condemn other countries for, are manipulated and exaggerated to fit an agenda of a small self-serving group.
Of course, as H.L. Mencken said, “no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public” — 55 percent of whom still believe this nonsense.
The Mex Files 
Well, if you would like a lesson in college-level logic, you would learn that your two examples are logical failures. The fact that crime rates in Arizona are the lowest in four decades does nothing to demonstrate that crime among illegals is not a growing problem. For instance, what if crime in Arizona would only be 50% of its current four decade low if there were no illegal aliens? Stating a total crime rate as proof that a seperate component of a population is not prone to high crime is a fallacy. Marisa Treviño could do us all a big favor by explaining why the population of illegal aliens in our prisons is higher than their percentage in the population in the US.
On the emergency medical issue, it matters not one wit how many elderly, poor or African Americans present themselves for treatment in emergency rooms. They are here legally. This is an inductive fallacy. It only matters how many illegal aliens present themselves, as this is taxpayer money that would be saved if they were not here.
“The believing mind is externally impervious to evidence. The most that can be accomplished with it is to induce it to substitute one delusion for another. It rejects all overt evidence as wicked…”
H. L. MENCKEN