You're not helping, perckerwoods

The debate over illegal immigration reform can be heated and contentious, but this kind of thing is ridiculous, and it sure as hell doesn't help the side that wants to strengthen our border security and see the laws enforced.

Prominent Hispanic elected officials, including the mayor of Los Angeles and California's lieutenant governor, have received threats in the midst of a heated national debate over immigration policy, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Monday.

Schwarzenegger told reporters about the threats against Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, both Democrats, during a news conference in his office Monday.

"There's something very important that I need to speak to my fellow Californians about," he said. "It has come to my attention that our Lieutenant Governor Bustamante and our Los Angeles Mayor Villaraigosa and other elected officials of Mexican heritage have received disturbing and hateful death threats."

[...]

Bustamante spokesman Steve Green said the lieutenant governor appeared at some immigration rallies with Villaraigosa at the end of March and received "nasty e-mails" afterward. The threat came about three weeks ago on a blank postcard, he said.

"We got one postcard from Pasadena that said words to the effect, 'All you dirty Mexicans should go back to Mexico. The only good Mexican is a dead Mexican,"' Green said.

And there you go. Some racist asshole makes threats like this, and I can guarantee that this just gives ammunition to the other side of the political debate. "Look at the racist bullshit that they're espousing," someone will say.

If you want to disagree with someone's politics, that's your right. This kind of thing is beyond the pale, though. Stupid, too. Really stupid.