It wasn't that long ago that we featured the story of college graduate, Benita Veliz, a honor student who had been arrested by San Antonio police and sentenced to start deportation proceedings.

We learned last month that Benita can stay in the U.S. for another three months until her fate is determined.

Student Walter Lara is to be deported July 6, 2009.

Unfortunately, time is fast running out for yet another honors student. His name is Walter Lara and he only has 5 days left to convince Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to let him stay in the only country he has ever known as home.

Earlier this week, Latina Lista published a post opining how the "coup" in Honduras didn't have all the earmarks of traditional Latin American military takeovers.

Honduran protesters march against the referendum.
(Source: El Heraldo newspaper)

Yet, many readers disagreed pointing to the fact that the military forced the President out of the palace at gunpoint and that many of those same military leaders had received their training at the infamous "School of the Americas."

Also, the Miami Herald and other publications are reporting that the new government is censoring journalists and repressing protests.

But every Honduran-focused blog that I was able to find (Pensieve, La Gringa's Blogcito, Honduras Living,) were telling a different story. In fact, at one point, the bloggers were trying to unite to send a message out to their readers to send a message to Obama to explain to him the "real situation" in Honduras.

The people there in the country are saying that the media is presenting a one-sided look at the situation and is actually filing a lot of information that is not entirely accurate.

Some of these Honduran bloggers want to set the record straight.

One of these Honduras-based bloggers is Laurie Matherne. Laurie is an ESL teacher in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. She authors the blog Laurie's Spot: Thoughts on Honduras, Missions and Justice.

On Sunday, June 28, I awoke to the news that President "Mel" Zelaya of Honduras had been removed from the presidency by the Armed Forces. As a resident of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, I was soon assailed with the sounds of jets and helicopters overhead.

From my perch on the third floor rooftop, my friends and I noted dozens of aircraft, and we hoped for a peaceful day. It was peaceful that day. No blood was shed, no shots were fired. The president, I later learned, was escorted to Costa Rica.

Since that day, however, peace has not prevailed at least in the world-at-large. The city and the country are at peace internally, despite a few protestors who have blocked roads and attempted to throw rocks at a few policemen.

Externally, among the nations, the outcry has been loud and urgent. Mr. Zelaya has the privilege of having the world's attention and sympathy for the moment as world leaders demand his immediate reinstatement as President of the Republic of Honduras.

He was acclaimed with accolades from socialists and conservatives alike after his remarks before the United Nations earlier this week.

However, Mr. Zelaya is an unlikely poster boy for democracy.

Editor's Note: In association with New America Media, a national association of ethnic media, the following post was published by ethnic media across the country this week to bring attention to the urgency of immigration reform.

The White House and members of Congress must move quickly on enacting a just and humane immigration reform package that will reunite families, reinvigorate the economy, and remove the term "illegal or undocumented immigrants" from the dialogue in this country.

Ethnic media, which reaches over 60 million adults in the United States, calls on Congress to move decisively on immigration reform because there are few issues as important to the nation's well-being as an overhaul of the inefficient, inhumane and economically debilitating immigration system.

More importantly, we are also urging our readers and viewers to contact their Senators and Congressmen and let them know that immigration reform must be a national priority.

Of all the states in the southwest where the anti-immigrant fervor has been the strongest and loudest -- legislatively and law enforcement speaking -- is Arizona.

One prime example that questions whether some people really are concerned about the consequences of illegal immigration or are targeting Latinos is the fight over ethnic studies being allowed in Arizona schools.

An amendment added to Senate Bill 1069 states:

A SCHOOL DISTRICT OR CHARTER SCHOOL IN THIS STATE SHALL NOT INCLUDE
IN THE PROGRAM OF INSTRUCTION ANY COURSES OR CLASSES THAT EITHER:

1. ARE DESIGNED PRIMARILY FOR PUPILS OF A PARTICULAR ETHNIC GROUP.

2. ADVOCATE ETHNIC SOLIDARITY INSTEAD OF THE TREATMENT OF PUPILS AS INDIVIDUALS.

The amendment stems from the criticisms voiced by State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne against the Tucson school district's ethnic studies program. Horne feels the ethnic studies classes for Mexican American students promote "ethnic chauvinism."

In yet another disturbing story to come out of Arizona this week -- and it's only Tuesday! -- is news that Latinos make up the ethnic majority in the Maricopa County jails.

Seeing that this is the domain of the infamous Sheriff Arpaio, the news isn't completely shocking. Yet, what is surprising is that instead of the undocumented Hispanic immigrant male who should be accounting for this majority, we find out that it's the legal Hispanic male resident of Maricopa County who occupies this distinction.

Why?

Are Latino males in Maricopa County born with a criminal gene?

Por favor!

As Nastassia Walsh, a research analyst with the Justice Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C.,-based group that advocates alternatives to incarceration, said "Putting large numbers of police officers and deputies in Latino neighborhoods would clearly result in more Latinos going to jail."

When the "official" immigration reform bill finally gets drafted and subjected to congressional debate, the expectation in Latino communities is that it will be a loud and boisterous fight but key elements will be approved in some form -- notably The DREAM Act and the fate of 12 million people.

Yet, if today' actions are any indication, it's clear that there will be "trade-offs" to getting the key elements of immigration reform passed.

Trade-offs are nothing new and in politics are to be expected but when there are so many overlapping elements that comprise immigration reform, with people working on separate agendas towards the same goal, it makes it harder to accept certain elements being sacrificed for others.

That's what happened today when an amendment sponsored by Senator DeMint to the Department of Homeland Security's appropriations bill requiring another 700 miles of border wall to be built by 2010 was passed.

Among the Senators who voted for it were some of the staunchest supporters of comprehensive immigration reform.

The issue of undocumented immigration and its consequences is not unique to the United States. Countries throughout the world are grappling with the same problem. Sometimes, their approaches to solving this universal dilemma is worse than what is being considered in the United States and sometimes it's better -- far better.

Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva

Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva signed a law last week that legalized the country's estimated 200,000 undocumented immigrants.

The new bill establishes that undocumented foreigners who entered the country prior to Feb. 1 will now have the right to ask for a temporary residence permit valid for two years, and once that period has elapsed it will be able to be converted into permanent residence.

The text of the bill says that "the foreigners benefitted by this bill will have the same rights and duties as native-born Brazilians, with the exception of the exclusive ones (accorded) to those born in the country, such as the possibility of running for elective office."

However, it doesn't stop there.

Monica Youn is the author of a new study entitled Judge Sotomayor's Record in Constitutional Cases.

As an attorney in the Democracy Program of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, a nonpartisan part think-tank, part public interest law firm, part advocacy group that focuses on issues of democracy and justice, Youn, in conjunction with the Brennan Center, felt they could share significant insight to the ongoing debate surrounding Judge Sotomayor and the issue of judicial activism.

Given that the namesake of the Brennan Center was Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., -- a position he held for 34 years, until replaced by Justice David Souter, and the very seat for which Judge Sotomayor is being considered -- Youn and the Brennan Center staff felt compelled to set the record straight on "judicial activism."

Declaring that they take no position on Judge Sotomayor's confirmation, Youn and the Brennan Center staff reviewed a total of 1,194 constitutional cases decided by the Second Circuit during Judge Sotomayor's service.

The team created a set of distinct criteria to measure the "relative deference or activism" of Sotomayor, in comparison to her colleagues' actions in particular cases.

Their review of the facts revealed one unmistakable conclusion.

(The following is a condensed version of the full analysis Judge Sotomayor's Record in Constitutional Cases.)

Fears that unelected, life-tenured federal judges will abuse their prerogatives to rule by judicial fiat are as old as the Republic. As Alexander Hamilton stated in Federalist No. 78, "The Courts must declare the sense of the law; and if they should be disposed to exercise will instead of judgment, the consequences would equally be the substitution of their pleasure for that of the legislative body."

The Supreme Court has been criticized for judicial activism ever since Marbury v. Madison established the federal judiciary's power of judicial review in 1803.

Some have viewed the power of judicial review as the essential safeguard of constitutional rights and freedoms against the tyranny of the majority, while others have worried about usurpation of democratic functions by unaccountable elites.

Accusations of inappropriate "judicial activism" have been hurled at judges at both ends of the ideological spectrum. The Warren Court -- including this Center's namesake Justice William F. Brennan, Jr. -- is often invoked as "the poster child of judicial activism."

However, it bears pointing out that the Warren Court decisions that provoked the most impassioned accusations of "activism" at the time -- decisions such as Brown v. Board of Education (ending segregation in public schools), Gideon v. Wainright (establishing the right to counsel in criminal cases), or Mapp v. Ohio (establishing the exclusionary rule in criminal prosecutions) -- are today widely considered to be pillars of our constitutional jurisprudence.

The public, political, and academic furor over "judicial activism" shows no signs of dying down. In a 2005 survey conducted by the American Bar Association, a majority of respondents agreed with statements that "'judicial activism' has reached the crisis stage and that judges who ignore voters' values should be impeached."

The term "judicial activism" has been "omnipresent" in Supreme Court confirmation
hearings over the past few decades, and Judge Sotomayor's confirmation hearing looks to be no exception.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee's immigration subcommittee, made headlines last week when he announced that he planned to have a new immigration reform bill put together by Labor Day.

Sen. Chuck Schumer's tough-guy approach to immigration reform increasingly appeals to conservatives.

From preliminary reports, conservative congressional members are liking what Schumer has to say about the new bill, or rather they like his "attitude."

They like the fact that he sounds tougher (on undocumented immigrants) this time around.

Yet, for some conservatives, Schumer isn't tough enough. They fear a blanket amnesty.

They would rather see all undocumented immigrants return to their native country, stand in an imaginary line to get the proper paperwork and then return to the U.S. to become citizens.

Aside from being a delusional expectation, there is already evidence that such a move would devastate this country in more ways than can possibly be imagined.

It was to be expected that the senators grilling Judge Sonia Sotomayor during her Supreme Court confirmation hearings would bring up her "wise Latina" statement.

Judge Sonia Sotomayor during her confirmation hearings.

And it's not surprising that she would pull a "my bad" form of apology in explaining it away.

Yet, a couple of senators were intent on shaming Sotomayor in ever making the statement.

As Arizona's Sen. Kyle scolded:

...So here you're reaching a judgment that not only will it make a difference but that it should make a difference. You acknowledge that they made a big difference in discrimination cases but it took a long time to understand -- it takes time and effort. "In short, I accept the proposition that difference will be made by the presence of women and people of color on bench and my experiences will affect the facts that I choose to see. I don't know exactly what the difference will be in my judging but I accept that there will be some based gender and my Latina heritage."

You said that you weren't encouraging that. And you talked about how we need to set that aside, but you didn't in your speech say that this is not good. We need to set this aside. Instead you seem to be celebrating it. The clear inference is it's a good thing that this is happening.

So that's why some of us are concerned, first with the [?] [?] in his speech and then this article. It would lead someone to the conclusion that (a) you understand it will make a difference; and (b) not only are you not saying anything negative about that, but you seem to embrace that difference, in concluding that you'll make better decisions. That's the basis of concern that a lot of people have.

Judge Sotomayor needs to be given kudos for even following that rant.

Then it was South Carolina Sen. Lindsay Graham's turn which proved difficult to watch not because he also made it a point to scold Sotomayor for her choice of words in the "wise Latina" statement, but repeatedly stooped to condescendingly shaming her on her statement in an unacceptable and repulsive manner.

The problem is that while hard questions were expected, the line of questioning forcing her to practically denounce the statement isn't seen as having anything to do with her qualifications as a Supreme Court justice. Rather, it hearkens back to a time in history, dare I say, when submission was beaten into a person of color.

That Judge Sotomayor has to sit there with a smile on her face and take the condescending insults is not just disrespectful to Latinos but women and people of color who have been historically subjected to this kind of authoritarian treatment.

As the first Latina Supreme Court nominee, Judge Sonia Sotomayor has gotten a lot of grief partly over the very thing that makes her nomination so historically significant -- the fact that she is Latina.

Over the last few days of her confirmation hearings, Judge Sotomayor has repeatedly been taken to task by Republican senators for uttering the words "wise Latina" when she shared her inspirational story with a Berkeley law symposium audience. Her usage of the words in that 2001 speech have now been turned into a catch phrase to mean other than what Judge Sotomayor ever intended.

She knew only too well how much of an anomaly she was as a Latina federal judge. When she was invited to participate in the UC Berkeley School of Law symposium "Raising the Bar: Latino and Latina Presence in the Judiciary and the Struggle for Representation, where she delivered, the now infamous, "A Latina Judge's Voice," she was addressing an audience that was keen to see more women and people of color advance to her level of success.

Her mission that night was two-fold: to deliver a speech that not only showcased a typical rags-to-riches success story but inspire and motivate the women and younger Latinos in the audience to believe they could achieve their dreams too. Being a rare breed, the first Latina nominated to sit on a federal appellate court, she had to draw on her identity to illustrate by example that if she could make it, so could they.

What wiser method of inspiration is there than through personal example?

Yet, words in a speech that achieved its goals are now being stripped of the true meaning they're supposed to convey and being reduced as the butt of jokes.

To the disgust of the Latino community, and really, women everywhere, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham had the arrogance during his confirmation questioning to tell Sotomayor, "Don't become a speechwriter, if this law thing doesn't work out, because these speeches really throw a wrinkle into everything."

It was obvious that the only wrinkles Sotomayor's speeches created were those on the forehead of Sen. Graham as he tried to get her to admit that she had "misspoke."

But she didn't.

By now, everyone knows Judge Sotomayor will be the first Latina Supreme Court justice. The senators cross-examining her have either alluded to that fact or have just come out and admitted it.

Judge Sonia Sotomayor

Yet, even if Sotomayor was not assured to be sworn into office, she has already won widespread admiration and respect for the way she handled herself during questioning that bordered on harassment rather than discovering if she was truly qualified.

Political pundits are saying that the conservative senators who subjected Sotomayor to the most infuriating lines of questioning did so to set benchmarks for President Obama if he should have the opportunity to nominate another Supreme Court Justice.

However, what was clear from these hearings was that senators followed no guidelines in how they asked their questions or what they asked and their intent to "trap" her was so blatantly obvious that it diminished their roles as the public's voice in determining how and why she was qualified.

This is yet another example of something in Washington that has been done for so long in one way that people accept there is no better way.

From these hearings, we have seen there has to be a better way to determine a potential candidate's qualifications for the Supreme Court.

There's no two ways about it -- the treatment by Republican senators of Judge Sonia Sotomayor during this week's confirmation hearings had a lot of Latinos/as seeing red.

It wasn't the questioning that dealt with her views on the death penalty or abortion or reverse discrimination -- those were legitimate questions that any Supreme Court nominee should have to answer.

It was the side remarks, the insults thrown her way over her speech writing, the stupid attempt at a Ricky Ricardo impersonation, the chastisement of comments that dealt with her heritage, the presumptuous lecturing about is she understood the proper role of the judiciary and the incessant browbeating to make her apologize for the infamous "wise Latina" reference.

That this behavior was mixed with tight-lipped smiles, half-hearted compliments and assurances that she had their votes doesn't justify this treatment of Sotomayor.

Nor does it show the Latino community that the Republican leaders have matured when it comes to knowing how to treat people of different ethnicities -- and in this case a Latina.

The debate over healthcare reform is getting so ugly that President Obama has resorted to using his weapon-of-last-resort -- bloggers!

In a morning email, Latina Lista was notified of an afternoon blogger-only conference call with the President and his senior healthcare advisors. There was nothing new revealed on the call. The President basically delivered the same talking points we've heard him address since the debate began and which will probably be continually addressed until the bill is passed.

His passion for the topic was obvious on the call as was his disgust that South Carolina Republican Senator Jim DeMint would allow himself to be quoted as saying, "If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

It was reported that DeMint's statement would be taken by the White House to "rally the troops" a.k.a. bloggers and other potential supporters of the healthcare reform bill.

Yet, long before the Obama Administration started pushing Congress to fix healthcare, most in the Latino community were already rallying for Washington to fix the system for one very simple reason -- the need for healthcare coverage is too great in the Latino community to be ignored or delayed any longer.

Accusing someone of hate speech can be a delicate accusation to make unless it is blatantly obvious that the intention is meant to incite people to commit violence against others.

Otherwise, it can be viewed as someone's personal opinion and certainly falls under the category of free speech as protected by the First Amendment.

But what happens when someone's opinion, that is obviously hateful in nature -- meaning that one group is being diminished in some form compared to another -- is given an influential platform from which to express these hateful opinions?

By virtue of the fact that the platform is influential -- in that it reaches a much wider audience than just a podium in a lecture hall or a soapbox on a street corner where the audience is limited -- the argument that hate speech is only someone's opinion can only be true if it's countered with an opposing viewpoint. That way, people can see or hear the two sides, or two trains of thought on the issue.

Yet, when a single person is given the privilege to expand upon their hateful viewpoint in denigrating one particular group using an influential platform and without opposition, it ceases to be ordinary free speech.

It's thought that the conservative party got the message during the 2008 elections, when Democrats soundly beat Republicans.

Congressman Steve King (R-IA)

Yet, someone is feeding conservatives the belief that the issue of illegal immigration still resonates loudly with independents and those on the fence about it. Otherwise, the latest idiotic allegations involving undocumented immigrants wouldn't have been issued, let alone signed with pride.

It seems Congressman Steve King (R-IA), the Ranking Member on the House Immigration Subcommittee really wants to see Obama's healthcare plan defeated along with his fellow Republicans.

So while all the Republicans have been retreating to their corners to strategize how best to instill fear in the American public, someone must have told King to use his position on the House Immigration Subcommittee to issue a statement that people would think he knows what he's talking about.

It's painfully clear he doesn't. The poor guy, while towing the party line, is setting himself up to not only be the fall guy for a proven failed strategy but in the process is revealing the level of desperation that the Conservative party feels towards immigration reform.

King issued a press release this morning, where he said the information he got from the Congressional Budget Office, revealed that Obama's healthcare plan would give "5.6 million illegal aliens" health insurance.

Funny, but everyone from Obama to Douglas W. Elmendorf, director of the CBO, have explicitly stated that this healthcare plan is for legal residents only.

The President did make one exception and the fact that he did should instill pride in every American who likes to think we are still the most reasoned and compassionate country in the world.

Unlike past presidents who have lived sheltered and privileged lives, it's not a stretch to see why it's natural that President Obama would dive head first into the escalating race debate over the initial arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. by Cambridge officer Sgt. James Crowley.

Cambridge officer Sgt. James Crowley says he has no intention of apologizing to Harvard Professor Gates.

Being black and having worked in Chicago as a community organizer, there's no doubt that Obama, if not experiencing it firsthand, certainly heard from people who suffered racial discrimination at the hands of their local law enforcement.

Yet determining discrimination always depends on which shoes you stand in.

If Sgt. Crowley had a dashboard camera rolling pointed to the professor's front porch then we would have a better idea of what went down. Did Professor Gates let his irritation at being asked to provide ID in his own home get the better of him? Or was Sgt. Crowley irritated that Professor Gates talked back to him, as was reported.

For sure, discrimination is much easier to view objectively when seen through the impartial lens of a camera.

It was certainly true in two other cases: In the case of Dallas police officer Robert Powell who ignored pleas from Ryan Moats, an NFL running back for the Houston Texans, who was rushing his family to the hospital bedside of his dying mother-in-law.

Family members, a hospital nurse and a Plano police officer all made a plea for Moats to be allowed to enter the hospital. Unphased, the Dallas officer made Moats remain at the scene while he lectured him and wrote out a ticket. By the time he entered the hospital, his mother-in-law Jonetta Collingsworth had died.

And in another case of when an Oklahoma State Trooper pulled over an ambulance on its way to the hospital and got into an altercation with a (black) paramedic while a heart patient waited inside the ambulance.

While both of these cases, just as the Cambridge incident, are white on black altercations, the case for discrimination is a harder claim to make in these cases but one thing is obviously clear.

All three incidents illustrate a very troubling attitude that exists with some police officers, and is obvious in both video footage -- some police officers don't like being challenged -- meaning their authority is verbally being questioned.

When that happens, they literally lose it.

The way Robert Renteria's life was going as a kid -- poverty, domestic violence, drugs, gangs -- it wasn't surprising that people thought Renteria had a one-way ticket to nowhere.

Robert Renteria

Yet, he surprised everyone by not just turning his life around but becoming an old-fashioned American success story -- complete with the money, expensive car, suits and the title of CEO of his own business.

For most people, especially those who've had to fight for everything they've earned, sitting back and enjoying the fruits of their success would be natural, but not for Renteria.

He wanted to see the cycle of hopelessness, violence and low self-esteem broken among children who just needed to see how someone else made it out of the same situations and found success.

So last year, Renteria wrote the book From the Barrio to the Board Room and published it through Writers of the Round Table Press. He developed a companion web site, established a foundation and created an unique school curriculum incorporating his life's lessons into exercises that give kids the tools to see the hope that exists for them.

Renteria shares with Latina Lista readers the new hopes and dreams he has, not for himself, but for those students across the nation who also have hopes and dreams but feel that dreaming is pretty hopeless for them.

Several years ago, a young man approached me and wanted to know the secret to getting himself a "phat" ride like my new Mercedes. He said he was 21, so I invited him into a nearby bar for a drink.

We made small talk for a bit and then he asked me again, "What's your secret?" I told him to get a napkin from the bartender and to write down two words. "Hard." He wrote down the word. "Work." He penned that on the napkin as well. He looked down at what he had written, said to himself "Hard Work" and then looked up at me and asked, "That's it?"

When I told the young man that was my secret, he placed the napkin into his pocket, shook my hand and then raced off as though I had given him gold. At that moment, I realized that countless children, teenagers, and adults are walking around -- lost in a culture of darkness -- and I needed to do something about it.

By Mariana Llamas-Cendon
Latinalista.net

MANZANILLO, MEXICO: The city of Manzanillo, the main tourist destination of the Mexican state of Colima, houses a very unusual attraction. Something a visitor or a resident would never expect to see in a beach resort -- The Museum of Perversity: A Historic Look at Human Rights.

Manzanillo is one of the most important commercial ports in Mexico, and is one of the safest cities, if not the safest, in the country. So, the idea of a museum dedicated to torture and capital punishment, in a city that basically has no known record of human rights violations, started out as a game.

"We thought doing something like this would be easy," said Gary Hirsch, director of the Museum of Perversity and an attorney.

Mannequin depiction of torture.
(Photo Source: The Museum of Perversity)

It took about two years to reproduce and recreate the torture instruments that were going to be exhibited. Artisans from the states of Colima and Jalisco participated in the process. The iron and forged iron artifacts were created by artisans from Sayula, Tonala and Tlaquepaque, in the state of Jalisco.

"The instruments by themselves were not attractive, so therefore we had the idea of creating characters to represent them," said Hirsch.

About 63 mannequins were made of fiberglass by a local artist. Due to the small size of the museum, only a small number of mannequins are in use. The same with about 10 paintings representing the topic of torture made by a group of artists and which can be seen decorating the museum lobby's walls.

Once the museum's concept started taking shape, an anthropologist, a historian, a museographer, and a lighting technician were hired by Hirsch. Later on, a sound specialist joined the team to create special sound effects.

Thereafter, the idea was given the professional look of a museum with a total investment of two million pesos.

The intention of having such a museum was not to turn it into a little House of Horrors, Disneyland style, according to Gary Hirsch, but for it to become an educational tool regarding the history of human rights.

This week's Newsweek magazine cover story proclaims what everyone has been waiting for -- the recession is over!

Of course, such a proclamation is being dissected all across the blogosphere and on talk radio but the author of the article says the determination to call the recession is actually based on a technicality:

...they mean economic output has stopped contracting... Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth alone can't feed a family, or pay a mortgage. Cursed with a high national debt load and blessed with a dynamic, growing workforce, the U.S. economy needs annual growth of at least 1.5 percent just to feel like we're standing still.

Worse, the data point that means the most to our psychological well-being--unemployment--is likely to keep climbing. The loss of 6.5 million jobs since December 2007 has spurred the sharpest rise in the unemployment rate since the 1930s. As manufacturing jobs move overseas and companies struggle to further reduce costs, unemployment--which stands at 9.5 percent--is likely to rise above 10 percent.

An article in Workforce Management magazine concurs with Newsweek's findings and discovered that conservative estimates show that 15 million unemployed workers are applying for only 2.5 million job openings.

The article says that recruiters are so overwhelmed with the number of applications that they receive for each job posting that an unforeseen consequence of the recession is starting to materialize in the labor force -- an increase in racial discrimination in hiring practices.

Only one GOP Senator on the Senate Judiciary Committee broke party ranks when siding with his Democratic peers today in voting to send a positive recommendation to the full Senate that Judge Sonia Sotomayor should be confirmed as the first Latina Supreme Court justice.

It was a partisan split that became really apparent after the confirmation hearings concluded, as one GOP senator after another started announcing their opposition to Sotomayor.

"The stakes are simply too high for me to confirm someone who could redefine 'the law of the land' from a liberal, activist perspective," Texas Senator John Cornyn said.

Seeing that Sotomayor showed time and time again to be a moderate justice in her rulings, which was independently verified, and the most qualified when it comes to any sitting judge on the bench, Cornyn's and his fellow GOPers' opposition to her is only the latest example of how the GOP doesn't care how their "act of contrariness" against Sotomayor resonates with Latinos.

For all the criticism Latinos are getting for supporting Sotomayor -- for example, being accused of supporting her only because she's Latina -- it would seem Republicans are doing the opposite -- opposing her because she is Latina.

Sound crazy?

Well, news coming from Chicago, the site of the national meeting of the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), seems to support that crazy idea.

When Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano assumed her office, there were plenty of cynics who wondered if Napolitano would truly be a breath of fresh air for the DHS or merely Michael Chertoff, her predecessor, in drag.

Department of Homeland Secretary Janet Napolitano
(Photo Source: AP)

At the beginning, there were some hopeful signs. For example, the new attitude the Sec. had towards ICE conducting worksite raids at will. They've been minimized and reportedly, a clear chain of command must be informed when such raids take place.

Another hopeful sign was how Sec. Napolitano appeared to really want to hear the people. As recently as this week, she held a closed-door "listening session" with people who are impacted by illegal immigration in the Northwest.

Something her predecessor never had the time or will to do.

Yet, that's where the change stops.

Maybe as an olive branch to conservative critics, or because of all the other pending issues draining White House brains of creative solutions, Sec. Napolitano outlined this week that the Obama Administration's approach towards immigrant detention and the infamous 287 g program won't be different from the past administration's views.

In fact, they'll just be bigger and uglier.

Anyone who subscribes to newspapers knows times are tough in newsrooms, of all sizes, across the country. Loss of advertising revenue means smaller staff, less diversity and the fewer remaining reporters turning out more copy on shorter deadlines.

Yet, a balanced news story shouldn't be the sacrificial lamb in this new age of journalism when it comes to objectively reporting a news story -- unlike an op-ed column or blog post where one-sided opinion prevails.

No, objective reporting is the hallmark of any newspaper that wants to sustain credibility among their readers and in journalistic circles.

So, it's with great surprise that an article that appeared in the Phoenix Business Journal would be so completely off-balance that the insinuation the writer is trying to make is not only misleading but calls into question the integrity of the writer and the newspaper itself.

By Cynthia Mazariegos

Second-generation Guatemalan-American, Cynthia Mazariegos, dreams of becoming a lawyer one day and championing justice for immigrants as an immigration attorney. Her dreams are fueled by the ongoing debate in the United States over comprehensive immigration reform and witnessing how hard-working, undocumented immigrants have been caught in the middle of this contentious issue.

Cynthia Mazariegos totes wood the traditional way while visiting Guatemalan communities.
(Photo Source: Cynthia Mazariegos)

Yet, it wasn't until a recent opportunity presented to Cynthia by the Guatemalan Human Rights Commission, that enabled this 24-year-old paralegal to return to her parents' birthplace, did Cynthia fully learn what kinds of conditions exist in Guatemala that propel people to come and work illegally in the United States. Because of her trip, Cynthia learned, that contrary to popular perception, the people of Guatemala are trying to help themselves and change those conditions.

An unforgettable part of the trip was meeting with some of the Guatemalans who were deported from the United States as a result of one of the biggest federal immigration raids in the country at Postville, Iowa.

Cynthia shares with Latina Lista readers her impressions and her conversations during a trip that underscored how little international borders mean to people who need to earn a wage to live.

Living in Chicago, as a first generation Guatemalan-American, the topic of immigration has always been close to my heart. So when the Guatemalan Human Rights Commission (GHRC) offered me a seat in their August delegation to study the economic reasons for migration to the United States, I jumped at the opportunity.

What I learned in those ten days showed me that there are many alternatives to "comprehensive" immigration reform than what both political parties have presented so far.

On our ten-day trip through the beautiful country of Guatemala, the GHRC delegation met with several cooperatives that created jobs in which the employees could earn a decent wage.

Women of Lema weaving a scarf.
(Photo Source: Cynthia Mazariegos)

One example was L'EMA' Tz'utujil Women's Weaving Cooperative of San Juan la Laguna. The women of San Juan made a conscious choice to create a system to earn a wage they could live on so their families could stay united.

They formed a cooperative where they are selling their woven works in a small store and are trying to sell their pieces of woven works through the internet. What makes their work extraordinary is that they use dyes from local plants making them an eco-friendly cooperative.

If you are thinking they're different than the general Guatemalan population, you would be surprised to know that all of the women who belong to the cooperative, even the administrative board, cannot read or write Spanish. Some women do not even know how to speak the language.