someone probably already said this when i was out of the country and paying less attention, but assuming this arizona law survives the constitutional challenge its likely effect will be to bankrupt arizona municipalities.
local police departments are going to have to choose between stopping to check the immigration status of everyone (thus effectively shutting down their ability to investigate crime, or issue the traffic tickets that provide so much of their department's revenue), or stopping only some people and subjecting the department to endless lawsuits over racial profiling and selective enforcement. this is a potential bonanza for the civil rights bar. i almost suspect they wrote the law themselves.
