The Barrett Brown Review of Arts and Letters and Jail: Secrets of the Illuminati, or, Yay, Cookies!
“At the three different holding facilities in which I’ve been collectively cooling my heels lately, the majority of my fellow inmates have been Mexican laborers who are guilty of nothing more than moving from one place where their productivity as measured in real dollars was low to another place where their output was higher, all in accordance with the natural osmosis of the market. In some cases, the ‘Mexicans’ in question were actually raised in the United States from infancy, speak English better than they do Spanish, and are otherwise indistinguishable from the large mass of American Hispanics. But merely by living in the country in which they have spent almost their entire lives, they are subject to arrest and expulsion to Mexico, a country with which they are essentially unfamiliar. If they return to the United States ”” and of course they do, for here are their families and their lives ”” they are subject to arrest and federal incarceration for ‘re-entry.’ Many of the ‘Mexicans’ I’ve met are on their third or fourth such charge, with each successive ‘crime’ carrying more and more prison time. Naturally, all of this is done at great expense to the same American public that has allowed this state of affairs to come about to begin with ”” which is to say that at least some degree of justice is achieved, if only by accident. …
“Tio was an avuncular, potbellied Mexican who was in on a cocaine distribution charge. At least once a day, Tio would confront me with his thumb and forefinger both extended to form a ‘pistol’ and thereby ‘hold me at gunpoint’ until I raised my hands into the air in surrender, at which point he would nod knowingly and place his invisible gun back in the invisible holster he wore at his side. This went on for months until, one day, I responded by pulling TWO invisible pistols out of the invisible holsters I had begun pretending to wear for this very purpose, at which point he raised his own hands in submission. When you’re locked up in the midst of the federal system’s non-violent pseudo-criminals, every day is a make-believe struggle just to survive.”
The first one:Â The Barrett Brown Review of Arts and Letters and Jail: The Poetry of William Blake
Update: See also:Â Brown’s defense moves for dismissal of first indictment
