One of the most disturbing facets of the immigration reform debate was the racism charge that was so casually cast about by supporters of the failed bill, from Ted Kennedy to John McCain and even hinted at by President Bush.
The people who tried to ram this horrible bill through Congress are so insulated, so out of touch with reality, that they truly believe their opponents recoil at the sight of Latinos. But the truth is far different.
What prompts this blog entry is the starting lineup of Major League Baseball's American League All-Star team. David Ortiz is at first base, with Placido Palanco at second. You probably see where I'm going here. While Derek Jeter is the shortstop, the third baseman is Alex Rodriguez, Magglio Ordonez is in left, Vladimir Guerrero is in right and Ivan Rodriguez is catching. If not for Jeter and center fielder Ichiro Suzuki, you'd have an all-Hispanic lineup.
The key here is that all these players were voted as starters by the fans. The American public. And baseball has quite a cross-section of followers over the socio-political-economic spectrum. In the middle of a heated debate over whether to let 12 million illegal immigrants become citizens, the people of the United States voted six Latino ballplayers to the All-Star Game for the AL. And while two are not Hispanic, one is Japanese and the other mixed-race. No white starters. The National League added two more Latino starters, and fans of the senior circuit nearly selected Cubs pitcher Carlos Zambrano over the far more deserving Chris Young, the Padres hurler, in the Internet balloting for the final roster spot.
You can just feel the racial hatred simmering in this country.
Seriously, you can't get a real feel for what's happening on this subject -- or many others, for that matter -- by isolating yourself in Washington, D.C., or midtown Manhattan. In Southern California, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, we've been living with Latinos for our entire lives. We know what it's like. You hear all kinds of things about them, such as whether they assimilate. Like just about every other ethnic group that's come here, some of them do and some don't. In a courthouse where I often work, Latinos are heavily represented among the criminals, the bailiffs, the cops, the prosecutors, the defense attorneys and the judges. It's across the board.
Some Latinos become baseball players, and can be very talented ones. As fans, no matter our race or their's, we appreciate their skills and enjoy watching them. Race is a non-issue. It was during the immigration debate, too. Unfortunately, our unethical and ineffectual leaders played the race card because they just couldn't bring themselves to admit that they were trying to swindle the public with their bill.
Monday, July 9, 2007
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Blog Philosophy
It is my observation that the most fundamental problem with politics and government in Washington, D.C., is that our national debate too often takes places on the extreme fringes of our political fabric. This gives our national leaders a warped viewpoint of how We The People feel about different issues.
Exhibit A is the recent effort to reform our laws on immigration. It seemed like no one in the White House or Capital Hill had any clue how we felt. This was a bill that no one liked. You had the left thinking their fellow Democrats were willing to accept millions of illegal immigrants becoming citizens for the simple reason that they'd be able to win more elections. The right seems to think everyone with brown skin should be immediately ejected from the country. Neither one is true. Those inside the Beltway may as well be on another planet, their disconnect from the citizenry is so wide.
My story on how I came to this belief about debates on the extremes and the negative effect on the political culture is actually rather funny. It all stems from the Janet Jackson breast-baring incident at halftime of the 2004 Super Bowl. Remember the two weeks that followed? All the TV and radio talk shows dealt with it, so much so that the presidential campaign was temporarily upstaged.
What we heard from commentators and callers was "our popular culture had hit bottom" or "lighten up, dudes, it was only a breast." We heard next to nothing about the reaction that most of us actually had -- that the baring of a singer's breast might be acceptable on a pay-cable television show, but was inappropriate for a general audience that was there to watch a football game and the halftime entertainment.
My goal is to reintroduce the reasonable back into our political debate. As I wrote in my first post, immigration reform should have been easy. All we had to do was secure the border and not offer citizenship to the illegal immigrants already here, then most of us would have accepted any sort of disposition for the 12 million who are here, since there's no way they can all be deported. But since we don't have a well-reasoned political culture, such ideas apparently never had a chance.
Well, we have to regain the center, folks. Our politicians and their backers are too busy looking for political expediency and spouting ideology. Most of the issues we face, from terrorism to the looming entitlement solvency problems, overwhelm ideology. The posts you read will, hopefully, pull us all back from the edges and form realistic opinions on what we face as a nation.
Exhibit A is the recent effort to reform our laws on immigration. It seemed like no one in the White House or Capital Hill had any clue how we felt. This was a bill that no one liked. You had the left thinking their fellow Democrats were willing to accept millions of illegal immigrants becoming citizens for the simple reason that they'd be able to win more elections. The right seems to think everyone with brown skin should be immediately ejected from the country. Neither one is true. Those inside the Beltway may as well be on another planet, their disconnect from the citizenry is so wide.
My story on how I came to this belief about debates on the extremes and the negative effect on the political culture is actually rather funny. It all stems from the Janet Jackson breast-baring incident at halftime of the 2004 Super Bowl. Remember the two weeks that followed? All the TV and radio talk shows dealt with it, so much so that the presidential campaign was temporarily upstaged.
What we heard from commentators and callers was "our popular culture had hit bottom" or "lighten up, dudes, it was only a breast." We heard next to nothing about the reaction that most of us actually had -- that the baring of a singer's breast might be acceptable on a pay-cable television show, but was inappropriate for a general audience that was there to watch a football game and the halftime entertainment.
My goal is to reintroduce the reasonable back into our political debate. As I wrote in my first post, immigration reform should have been easy. All we had to do was secure the border and not offer citizenship to the illegal immigrants already here, then most of us would have accepted any sort of disposition for the 12 million who are here, since there's no way they can all be deported. But since we don't have a well-reasoned political culture, such ideas apparently never had a chance.
Well, we have to regain the center, folks. Our politicians and their backers are too busy looking for political expediency and spouting ideology. Most of the issues we face, from terrorism to the looming entitlement solvency problems, overwhelm ideology. The posts you read will, hopefully, pull us all back from the edges and form realistic opinions on what we face as a nation.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)