You know you're getting the best of your opponents when they begin hitting below the belt, picking up a handful of sand and throwing it into your eyes, giving you "noogies" when they have you in a head lock, etc.The latest example of such tactics aimed at our side comes from a Feb. 7 program scheduled by the Chicago-based Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR): "Learning From Past Targets of the Politics of Hate: The Internment of Americans of Japanese Descent."

The "politics of hate." Hmmmmm. Get the picture here, you mean-spirited, round 'em up and ship 'em out fanatics?

The noon-to 1:30 p.m. event, which will be held in the ICIRR's headquarters and sponsored by the Citizens League, Asian American Institute, Equal Voices Campaign and Albany Park Neighborhood Council, notes that during World War II, 120,000 people of Japanese descent, more than half of them U.S. citizens, were interned in these camps.

Speakers will include two former internees of these camps.

"Bring your lunch and come learn from past struggles!" reads the online flyer.

Now, I don't care where you stand on whether these internment camps were the result of legitimate national security concerns or blatant racism, I'd like to suggest that the following question is a fair one to put before this program's sponsors, especially the Asian American Institute: Are you at all bothered that the ICIRR is using the two former internees, i.e., attempting to compare what happened to them more than 60 years ago to the removal of people in this country illegally through strict enforcement of our immigration laws?