America's Sheriff? For Bush's Overspent AmeriKa, Maybe

Be sure to catch the East Valley Tribune's five-part series on Sheriff Joe Arpaio's conversion of the Sheriff's Office to a state branch of ICE. Key findings:

• "Deputies are failing to meet the county’s standard for response times on life-threatening emergencies. In 2006 and 2007, patrol cars arrived late two-thirds of the time on more than 6,000 of the most serious calls for service.

• "MCSO's arrest rate has plunged the past two years even as the number of criminal investigations has soared.

• "The sheriff’s “saturation” patrols and “crime suppression/anti-illegal immigration” sweeps in Hispanic neighborhoods are done without any evidence of criminal activity, violating federal regulations intended to prevent racial profiling.

• "Rampant overtime spending on immigration operations drove the agency into financial crisis and forced it to close facilities across the county. Although MCSO officials have said state and federal grants covered all the expense, illegal immigration arrests actually are costing county taxpayers millions of dollars.

• "Despite the money and manpower expended, the sheriff’s office has arrested only low-level participants in human smuggling rings: drop house guards, drivers and the immigrants they ferry.

• "Deputies regularly make traffic stops based only on their suspicion that illegal immigrants are inside vehicles. They figure out probable cause after deciding whom to pull over."

Sure looks like racist's wet dream and a tax-payer funded re-election scam to me.