Saturday Short & Sweet News Brief

Gloom and Despair at the Goober Convention

 The California GOP has gathered in Sacramento for a misery loves company themed convention. The party is almost broke, morale is at a historic low, Latinos don't like them, and there are no bright stars on the horizon. Whitman and Fiorina, of course, headed for the hills some time ago.

 Arizona, still suffering from the economic blowback caused by SB1070 has just nixed a new round of immigrant bashing bills proposed by the author of SB1070, Sen. Russell Pearce. The most vocal opponents of the bills? The Arizona business community. 60 CEOs from a broad swath of Arizona corporations signed a letter to the Senate that stated;

Arizona’s lawmakers and citizens are right to be concerned about illegal immigration. But we must acknowledge that when Arizona goes it alone on this issue, unintended consequences inevitably occur. Last year, boycotts were called against our state’s business community, adversely impacting our already-struggling economy and costing us jobs. Arizona-based businesses saw contracts cancelled or were turned away from bidding. “Sales outside of the state declined. Even a business which merely had ‘Arizona’ in its name felt the effects of the boycotts, compelling them to launch an educational campaign about their company’s roots in Brooklyn. It is an undeniable fact that each of our companies and our employees were impacted by the boycotts and the coincident negative image.
“Tourism, one of our state’s largest industries and employment centers, also suffered from negative perceptions after the passage of SB 1070. The fact Gov. Brewer directed $250,000 to repairing Arizona’s reputation strongly suggests these efforts – whether fair or unfair - are harmful to our image".

Hey, what happened to the "Boycotts won't hurt Arizona" crowd?