HYPOCRISY; ALIVE AND WELL IN UTAH

From Michael Gifford, Salt Lake City

Well, I’ve sat with this for several days, not wanting to be reactionary. I remain dumbfounded by the recent events in Salt Lake and the surveys around them.

We all know that the illegal alien issue is a serious one. Most of us also know that it is complex and multi-faceted; not black and white. Having said that, the main criticism seems to be that we have laws against people entering our country ILLEGALLY and taking jobs, receiving benefits, etc. Just to keep this simple, I won’t mention that employers hire them, we insist on low prices, those who get regular paychecks have deductions which stay with the govt when they don’t file taxes, etc. The primary issue is a frustration that we have laws that aren’t being enforced.

Now comes the news that some employees of Workforce Services have ILLEGALLY gathered information and provided a list (accuracy be damned) of illegal aliens to the press, govt agencies and others. This list includes names, addresses, social security numbers, etc. These state employees have contracts that forbid the compilation and disclosure of this information. We have state and federal laws in place that make what they did illegal. I saw the open hypocrisy of these lists immediately, and just assumed that the people who created the lists would be held accountable for their violations of the laws, and the Attorney General’s office is investigating with action to follow.

What blows my mind is a KUTV, Channel 2 survey asking how the people of Salt Lake feel about the list and the perpetrators of it. With thousands responding, over 56% feel that the perpetrators should not be punished!! Many people interviewed, including some politicians, call the perpetrators heros and patriots! How, on God’s green earth can they decry illegal aliens and then give sainthood to state workers who knowingly violated several state and federal laws. The hypocrisy blows me away!

I shouldn’t be surprised, given the recent behaviors in Utah (including lies and deceit from the state’s biggest institute). Still, I keep hoping that, even in Utah (no especially in Utah, where we know what it is like to be persecuted and hated without cause) that we will show a little more humanity. I guess I’ll have to wait a little while longer!

Mike Gifford

Salt Lake City