Second Chances

I was on a plane a few years ago when I read a New Yorker profile of Arizona's Maricopa County and its sheriff, Joe Arpaio. Until that plane ride, I primarily knew that Mexican immigration had steadily transformed the demographics in the southwest United States. I otherwise had taken little time to think about it, aside from occasionally marveling when I would hear or read that by such-and-such date, white people would be a minority in places like Texas and California. (Frankly, that struck me as cool, and maybe even a bizarre form of comeuppance.) I suppose that such a unique and observable phenomenon failed to inspire anything more than passing thoughts because whatever was happening felt far away. I only had been to San Francisco once, Boulder for a weekend, Eugene for a football game, and Seattle for work assignments. That was the entirety of my western life. With the shifting population far away, I easily could ignore the xenophobia and prejudice it engendered. However, by ...