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On July 14, during the second day of hearings for Judge Sonia Sotamayor, Senator Charles Schumer noted<\/a>, smiling: \u201cin the nearly 850 cases you have decided in the 2nd Circuit, you ruled in favor of the government — that is, against the petitioners seeking asylum, the immigrants seeking asylum — 83 percent of the time. That happens to be the exact statistical median rate for your court. It’s not one way or the other.\u201d These numbers are meant to assure us that, when it comes to foreigners and asylum seekers, the Judge is ok. She has a balanced record.<\/p>\n Asylum is a legal court procedure with rules and codes and whatever else. But it\u2019s also about sanctuary, an inviolable place of refuge, of safety from seizure. The people who seek that asylum, the asylum of refuge, are not all immigrants, nor are they all `foreigners\u2019. Where in this country can the seekers go to find asylum?<\/p>\n Not Santa Monica. The American Civil Liberties Union sued the city of Santa Monica<\/a> this week for violating homeless peoples\u2019 rights by harassing and arresting them, all while the city cuts back on beds for the homeless. They call it \u201ca deportation program for the homeless\u201d. It sounds like the poorhouses of England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when the State fenced off the common land and forced peasants to move to find work, and then passed anti-vagabond laws, which criminalized unregulated popular movement. And so a cheap, reserve labor force came into being. What profit does Santa Monica wrest from the bodies of the twenty first century imprisoned poors?<\/p>\n Nadine Chlubna<\/a> is a 56 year old schizophrenic paranoid woman who fears spaceships and the Santa Monica police force. Only the police have actually ever done her any harm, having arrested her three times and mocked her delusional fears of interplanetary aliens. Where is asylum for Nadine Chlubna? Not in Santa Monica.<\/p>\n Santa Monica was the mother of Saint Augustine of Hippo. You can read all about her in The Confessions<\/em>. It\u2019s good stuff. And you know where Monica and her son Augustine were born and lived much of their lives? North Africa. They were Berbers from what is today called Algeria. Augustine moved to Italy, and, after her husband died, Monica followed. As immigrants, they found asylum. Would the same happen in Santa Monica or in Italy? I doubt it.<\/p>\n The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty and the National Coalition for the Homeless just released a report, Homes Not Handcuffs<\/a><\/em>, which lists the ten meanest cities in the United States, those that most viciously and thoroughly criminalize the homeless and militarize the streets and all public spaces. Number one? Los Angeles<\/a>, just down the road from Santa Monica: \u201cA study by UCLA<\/a> released in September 2007 found that Los Angeles was spending $6 million a year to pay for fifty extra police officers to crack down on crime in the Skid Row area at a time when the city budgeted only $5.7 million for homeless services.\u201d Six million for 50 cops, 5.7 for all the homeless. It\u2019s a delicate balance. You know what the crimes were? Jaywalking. Loitering. Serious stuff.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what six million dollars buys: \u201cPolice brutality<\/a> against homeless people intensified during the crackdown on crime in Skid Row.\u00a0 In June 2007, the Los Angeles County Community Action Network reported one example: two L.A. Police officers attacked a petite homeless woman, who may have been mentally disabled, with clubs and pepper spray.\u00a0 Police reportedly beat her and tied her down.\u201d Six million dollars doesn\u2019t buy asylum, doesn\u2019t buy security. It buys beat-downs, tie-downs, lock downs, and fear. At six million, it\u2019s a bargain.<\/p>\n