Keller @ Large: Patrick Clueless On Illegal Immigration Safety Crisis

BOSTON (CBS) - After five years in office, we've learned quite a bit about Gov. Deval Patrick.

Listen to Jon's commentary:

We've come to know, for instance, that he is a very savvy politician, a person of principle, with the ability to learn from his mistakes.

That's the good news about Gov. Patrick, the part that helped bring him back from the brink of political extinction in his re-election bid last year.

But outside of Jacoby Ellsbury, no human being is perfect in this world.

And so it is with the governor, who has been treating us lately to a glimpse of his bad-news side, the tone-deaf, arrogant pol who cannot or will not acknowledge that we have a serious public-safety crisis on our hands in the form of criminal behavior by illegal immigrants.

This has been going on for years.

Most people here illegally are otherwise law-abiding and eager to avoid any interaction with law enforcement, so they tend to avoid committing dangerous crimes like drunken driving.

Their fear of the police makes them easy marks for the illegals among them who have no such compunction, not to mention the rest of us.

But since the day he took office, when he ended a Romney-era practice of allowing state police to detain them, Gov. Patrick has been on a mission to restrict law enforcement's ability to identify and pursue illegals suspected of criminal activity.

He reversed a campaign pledge last spring by backing out of a federal program that streamlines information sharing about arrests of illegals.

In the wake of the horrific death this summer of Matthew Denice of Milford - allegedly at the hands of a drunk-driving illegal with a long rap sheet - county sheriffs and state legislators have tried to take action.

But the governor has the gall to claim its much ado about nothing, and dismiss their efforts as mere headline grabbing.

Here's a headline for you, governor:

"Outraged Citizens Demand Clueless Governor Set Ideology and Posturing Aside and Protect Them."

Coming soon, if it hasn't already, to a newspaper near you.

You can listen to Keller At Large on WBZ News Radio every weekday at 7:55 a.m. and 12:25 p.m. You can also watch Jon on WBZ-TV News.