Let's talk immigration shall we? I think it's about time I got my two cents into this debate.
I never thought I would see the day when I agreed with the frat boy, but alas, the day has come. Because the frat boy is actually pushing for the immigration reform bill, which would grant a path to citizenship to about twelve million illegal immigrants in this country. (More on that little 12 million figure in a minute)
Folks, make no mistake, this debate is about fear and xenophobia. Our "wingnut" friends don't want to hear it, but let's keep it real; if Canadians and not Mexicans were sneaking into our country through Vermont and Washington state, no one would give a f**k. Why? Because they look like us, and they speak English like we do, and....wait. let's go back to that again: They look like us. That's the debate, plain and simple. These brown people from Mexico and all points south do not look like us. So all this talk about following the "rule of law" and assimilation, and controlling the threat of terrorism is just bullshit. "Rule of law?" So when we go barreling down the highway at 85 miles per hour are we following the rule of law? Why don't we report every red cent we get to the IRS if we want to follow the f*****g "rule of law?" Because we are all hypocrites that's why, we only follow the "rule of law" when it's convenient to us. We will use any excuse to deny the real reason we don't want these people in our country. "But field, these people take away jobs from black people, they drive down wages, add to health care costs, and contribute to crime" And that's all bullshit! Drive down what wages? Oh, I get it; we could be cutting lawns and washing dishes for $7 an hour and not $5.50 an hour. Give me a break! What jobs are poor Hispanics taking away from black people? Like these people hiring these poor Hispanics for day work are going to hire your black ass. And if they offered you the job, you know damn good and well that you wouldn't want it. Are you going to live on twenty dollars a week? Are you going to walk everywhere you go and forgo all the creature comforts that your black ass has grown used to while pursuing happiness? Cause that's the type of spartan existence the "brown people" from south of the border eek out when they are here working and sending half of their checks home to their families. Twenty dollars would last you one visit to Popeye's and that's it.
I get so sick of black folks buying into this racist bullshit. As if this country can survive without the labor and industry these people bring on a daily basis. (Now there is even a bill on the table to allow amnesty for the "brown people" if they join the military. That's the way to do it, get the illegals to die for us. I knew America would find something for them to do) Let the FOX NOISE people and the racist xenophobic fear pimps play that card, you black folks should know better. Lou Dobb's ignorant ass has his Mexican wife already (she came here legally) I guess he wants to be the only white man to taste that fruit. How else do we explain his daily drum beat against illegal immigration. Well, there is the money. Homeboys ratings have gone up consistently since his pony has been doing that one f*****g trick. I mean how many times must we hear that the brown people are coming? Yeah yeah yeah, there are twelve million illegals in this country, so what? Contrary to what you might see on Bill O'Lie-Iie's show, the brown people are not going around the country raping our women and killing our kids. I swear they must sit around over there at FOX NOISE and hope and pray that the next big criminal act in the news cycle is committed by an illegal. "Hey did you hear the news about the guy who killed his family and then killed himself in Wisconsin? Was he an illegal? Ahhh no, looks like he was an American. Not interested." There isn't twelve million illegals in this country. There is almost four hundred million illegals! Because every so called American is here illegally. We took this land from the natives who owned it illegally. Plain and simple. So if we are going to follow the "rule of law" we all are here illegally.
"But field what about securing the borders against terrorism?" What about it? I guarantee you that the next terrorist will more than likely get into this country through Canada and not Mexico. If they are not here already. But it's so easy to pick on the "brown people", after all, the 911 hijackers were brown weren't they? They might have been a little taller, but they sure looked like those other "brown people".
But.....boy I hate to say this...I agree with the frat boy on this immigration reform bill. Although I suspect that the reason he supports this bill is for political reasons. He knows that the Latino population is the largest growing segment of our population and he wants them voting for his party in the future. But unlike his friends in the republi-con "big tent", he isn't afraid of the "brown people'. He lived in Texas, and he has been around them all of his life. Heck, he even has one in his family. George knows they won't bite, and I suspect that the others in his party know it too. But hey, that won't fire up the base. You need fear, fear, and more fear. That's what gets em going. Despite facts to contradict all those fears. Still,we gotta find a common cause to rally around. We just can't lose Americana and our little slice of heaven (In God we trust) here on earth "to these brown people". We just can't let history repeat itself. One illegal takeover is more than enough.
73 comments:
Well FN,
We will agree to disagree about illegal immigration.
And, I'll leave it at that.
My girl, Rikyrah... I love it that she always stands by her beliefs, even silently. I ain't mad at a sista that can quietly disagree. Rikyrah, I'm learning from you. (smile)
Field, I'm going to have to think about this before I respond directly to your post. I have to say that Rikyrah and I pretty much have the same opinions about the immigration issue. And I really feel strong about my opinion, mainly because I live down here in Texico, where many of these issues of Mexican immigration play out.
But with that being said, you raised some interesting points that is forcing me to think. Will I have the same conclusion after thinking about what you wrote? I don't know... We'll just have to see how powerful the Field Negro's argument is. LOL
BTW: I'm glad that we got a post from you so soon. I love reading your commentary on issues. They are so thoughtful, well constructed, and razor sharp.
06 19 07
Hey FN:
Good post. Although as Rikyrah said, we still disagree on this issue. Now I do understand the racism that and xenophobia aspects to your commentary because some jerks just want to use anti immigration as a smokescreen for their racist beliefs. HOWEVER, not everyone who has something to say about immigration need not be racist or xenophobic. If you actually LOOK AT THE NUMBERS, you will see that we are legally allowing over one million immigrants to come here each year, while there are countless illegals.
All of this has drastically impacted healthcare services, HOW education is administered and so forth. We cannot continue turning a blind eye to the problem of importing too many people. The environmental impacts from our lax policies is rearing its ugly head.
See this link, where Roy Beck explains how screwed up our immigration policy is!
Immigrants made this country what it is, however, there has been NO TIME in our history where this many immigrants were allowed in LEGALLY AND our infrastructure is suffering major growing pains as a result...
OK three comments above from three of my favorite posters, all disagreeing with me. Fair enough, and I have heard a few people of good will make reasoned arguments on the other side. Usually it's people who live in border states like Texas Or, as angie calls it; Texico (I love that name).
Still, you will have a hards time convincing me that most (most not all) of the people on the other side of this debate aren't there because of one thing; racism!
I see where you're coming from, field, but most of black americans' ancestors didn't come here of our free will. So we were stolen and stripped of everything to where we couldn't go back to Africa - we didn't even pass on the language!
If anybody is here illegally, it would be white folks from Europe. Black and brown and native indians really did help build this country.
And I wish we would stop trying to wedge this divide between Latinos (namely Mexicans) and ourselves. It's counterproductive. We're allowing whites and the govment to create this fake drama for "favored status" with them, which only helps whites and the rich stay in power.
They're using Mexican labor to bring more money in for themselves, creating these cess pools for the rest of us (blacks and mexican immigrants) and we think Mexicans are the problem??? I don't think so.
It's a shame, there is so much we can accomplish together. Latinos are not the enemy, per se, but I do think it's interesting that they can get on govment rolls as soon as they come here and people are still hollerin about black women being on welfare. Hello? Go to your local welfare office and see who's there! Not us!
Neither of our groups are in the best situations we can be in, so I think the anger is a little misguided.
I think we have to pull this thing a little tighter between blacks and latinos. I can remember a time in the NYC area where Puerto Ricans and Blacks were hand in hand in the 80s...those were the days.
I think we have to pull this thing a little tighter between blacks and latinos. I can remember a time in the NYC area where Puerto Ricans and Blacks were hand in hand in the 80s...those were the days.
Ok, I gotta step in it now.
Pam, you said a mouthful, but you express the sentiment of what I call the ' Kumbaya/Alliance/Coalition' crowd.
As long as its us against ' Da White Man', it's ok.
Please stop thinking like that.
Puerto Ricans are NOT Mexicans. Whatever alliance you saw in the 80's with Puerto Ricans isn't happening with Mexicans.
An alliance means that BOTH sides are offering something to the table. That BOTH sides come wanting to help the other.
That's not happening, and don't let anyone tell you differently.
As I've said before, I never thought I'd be Black Nationalist in ANYTHING....
And then came illegal immigration, and all those I thought would certainly understand, were spouting the ' Kumbaya/Alliance/Coalition' position.
This dream of a Black/Brown coalition of folks teaming up against ' Da Man'. And, it's just that, ' a dream'.
Name any issue that's important to Black folk, and we're out there, fighting for it ON OUR OWN. No Hispanics to be found.
WE are the only ones supporting THEM in this so-called 'alliance'.
I ask this simple question of you, FN:
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS FOR THE BLACK COMMUNITY FROM ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION?
I have yet to hear anything concrete, outside of this so-called Black/Brown alliance that, from where I sit is DELUSIONAL.
They have no interest in an alliance. They pimp and play upon our natural sympathies for their situation, all the while having no intention of standing by us as we fight.
And, according to more than one study, they come here racist against us already, inclined to, and I quote the last study, ' leaning towards the White community and not the Black'. Don't get no more plainer than that for me.
You're going to enter into an alliance with folks who come here racist against you?
That is a new definition of insanity.
And, FN, this isn't about the crop picking job. You don't know the extent of the damage of illegal immigration to the Black community, if you're going to just throw out we could be cutting lawns and washing dishes for $7 an hour and not $5.50 an hour.. I don't know how it is in Philly, but that's the least of the Black community's worry where Illegal Immigrants are concerned. I could get into it with you about those jobs, but that's the tip of the iceberg.
I said I would keep quiet, but I can't with regards to this point, because I find too many Black folk bring up a ' Black/Brown coalition' as the reason to be supporting this insanity, and I just feel that's a delusional dream, not based in practicality, and nobody can tell me YET, what Black folk have received from this 'coalition'.
And, from my POV, I don't give hoot about the xenophobia of others. My question is and still remains:
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS FOR THE BLACK COMMUNITY FROM ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION?
That is my reference point, and if it puts me on the same side of this issue as Pat Buchanan, then that's how it rolls, FN.
Black folks not supposed to have permanent friends anyway, only permanent interests, and if the interests line us up with strange bedfellows, then SO.BE.IT.
Well, Field, I'm probably the only one on this board that agrees with you somewhat, regarding immigration.
On one hand, the brothas who could do construction work and get paid legit, don't get the construction jobs because the contractors don't want to pay union scale. Most brothers in construction are in labor unions, but illegal aliens can get paid under the table, and the boss man has cheap labor. Illegal immigration facilitates this form of paid slavery.
On the other hand, I'd like to see those advocating for xenophobia will do when they get their way, and suddenly, Miss Anne doesn't have Rosita cleaning her house and toilets, or cooking her meals anymore. I'd like to see what Mr. Charlie will do when he doesn't have Paco to cut his lawn and do his landscaping.
I'd like to see what the hell Wal-Mart will do when those of color aren't here to work those jobs that pay below minimum wage, even though minimum wage is the law.
They know a Black person is fully aware of their rights as employees and will utilize them whenever they're needed. You're not going to underpay us, and justify paying a white guy more money because he's got a family.
I work in EEO - I see this all the time. They get the illegals because (a) they don't know the laws here; (b) many of them can't speak the english language and therefore agree to whatever boss man tells them, even if it's against the law, and (c) boss man always has the threat of deportation hanging over their heads at all times to get them to comply with boss man's orders.
To Rikyrah and other sistas on this blog, thank you for your comments, but I need to point something out to you on a historical basis.
Before we were forced here to this land, America was largely inhabited by Native Americans and Mexicans. Mexico used to extend into what is now known as most of Texas. They inhabited California all the way to the Oregon border, and had what is now known as New Mexico, Arizona and most of Colorado as their own land.
The British (later American colonists) beat them up, shot them, drugged them, hooked them on alcohol and stole their land, claiming it for their own. They infected the Native American with smallpox and other plagues until the Native American has virtually gone into extinction.
There's two trains of thought you can have here. My own thought is that Mexicans are claiming what was theirs in the first place, in terms of land and possessions. Ever notice how many cities and counties in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas have either Spanish or Indian names? They're named after who inhabited them first.
So my position on immigration comes from a historical perspective - they were here first. We got brought here against our will; but that in NO WAY diminishes the fact we built this bastard of a country known as America.
Because we know first hand how we continue to be treated, we should be the last ones joining the xenophobic movement.
I do believe a lot of people aren't just anti illegal immigration, they are anti Mexican immigration. And though I don’t buy into the racist rhetoric there should be a system of legal immigration. A lack of documentation and come as you may is not the way to go. There is nothing efficient and productive about that. Immigration reform (as in fix these ambiguous if not contradictory laws) should be addressed.
Our national security is a legitimate when it comes to the Mexican-US border. There have been non-Latinos crossing into the US via Mexico. And we shouldn’t be a reactionary government--waiting until something becomes an epidemic before we acknowledge the problem. It didn’t take thousands of terrorists to enter into this country and cause 9/11. And it should be said the hijackers did come in legally.
Its not just about the jobs Mexicans will do but those of the highly skilled immigrants too. I just posted a link to an op-ed that talked about the potential harm the point system can have on minorities in this country. Allowing all the best and brightest from other countries isn’t going to keep whites from their positions at (or even near) the top. They will get theirs and someone is going to miss out.
Christian Progressive Liberal, I agree with you. My sentiments exactly. I don't have time right now to really post but I'll be back, rikyrah.
To Rikyrah and other sistas on this blog, thank you for your comments, but I need to point something out to you on a historical basis.
Before we were forced here to this land, America was largely inhabited by Native Americans and Mexicans. Mexico used to extend into what is now known as most of Texas. They inhabited California all the way to the Oregon border, and had what is now known as New Mexico, Arizona and most of Colorado as their own land.
The British (later American colonists) beat them up, shot them, drugged them, hooked them on alcohol and stole their land, claiming it for their own. They infected the Native American with smallpox and other plagues until the Native American has virtually gone into extinction.
Yes, Mexico had that land, but, they were fought and defeated in 2 wars, I believe. Not only that, but they were financially compensated for the land even after they were defeated.
I hate to put this in such racial terms, but I will.
Look how they treat Black folk in their own country. Look at their television stations. Do you see anything darker than a paperbag on their stations in anything other than subservient role? Looking at their tv, you'd think that the slave ships stopped in the Carribbean, and didn't go any further. And suddenly, those folks come here, and they're going to be interested in an ' alliance' with us?
Take emotion out of it, does that make any logical sense?
As for the Native Americans, they had my sympathies until some of the tribes decided to chuck their Black mixins, while keeping their White ones.
This immigration bill is a danger to the American worker, no matter what collar. The subtrefuge is using the name calling about the lower end of the socio-economic scale, all the while putting into place things on the higher end of the scale that are just as damaging. This bill is bad for the American worker. Period.
Even if this bill passes, it will be an utter failure. Simply because the fine that deported illegals are required to pay is somewhere around $5000.
I might be stretching it a bit (just a bit), but I don't think the average illegal immigrant has $5000. But they have to pay the fine if they want to be legal. And most of them probably do want to be legal, if nothing less than to quit worrying about the INS stalking them.
So, they've been deported to Mexico (because they're ALL Mexicans) and they need to get $5000 to get back in the U.S. They'll need to get a job.
But wait a minute--there's no jobs in Mexico, which is why they left in the first place, to provide for their family. The only nearby place where they can get a job and eventually save up that $5000 is...
The United States of America.
Hey man, I have to side with my boy Dobbs on a lot of this. Bush sold the GOP on reviving the immigration bill based on thsi notion of cheap labor and the fact that as a macho, no divorce, religious, have a kid and get married at 18, no abortion, macho and--if you're talking about a huge chunk of Central American and Mexican immigrants--under-educated population...they'd be ripe pickings as Republican voters. On the other side of the coin, Hispanics have always bogarted our tactics and ridden on our civil rights coattails. Hell there're still discrimination and affirmative action/government contract prescriptions and proscriptions in places like Miami and LA, San Antonio!!! How did that happen? Simple. I'm not going paranoid and whining about a vast Spanish speaking conspiracy, but when you get in the cut/beind closed doors with the activists you see clear and hear that their goals entail a pan-Hispanic society within the general society. That's not assimilation, dude. And that's the difference. More ominous forus, they don't see this as some grand alliance. They see us as marginalized junior partners. Now, we're marginalized due to a deeper history of racism and our own bullshit habits/quirks/'tudes/practices that culminate into everyhting from bad aspects of hip hop culture to Bill Jefferson. Still, we dont matter to them.
My advice to you: Rent the DVD of "Gangs of New York" and watch it over and over again. That was 1846-1863. Then you tell me when immigration of ANY kind has been good to us. To Mr. Charlie, yeah--even when he's been none too happy on certain levels. But not to us. Those black shrimpers in Texas who allied with the Klan when the Klan was attacking Vietnamese who were taking over the whole fishing industry in the Gulf back in the early 80s... I think about them. It's easy for me to toss up myhands in disgust. Then I think about what they had to endure, how they built those boats from nothing...and I think of the Vietnamese who looked upon hem not as allies, but as obstacles and folks who just danced well and did drugs and were violent, per the media.
I say we sit this one out and let Mr. Charlie and Jose fight...maybe leverage something out of it. But I'm not ready to march down the street waving a Honduran flag...
Have I told you how I'm planning to move to the south of France? I'm hoping they start some kind of amnesty program over there for black women who need a break from the USA.
In all seriousness, I think our immigration policies are unjust across the board and I don't see this immigration bill fixing much of anything. One need only look at the number of Hatians here vs. the number of Cubans as evidence of how racial politics impact immigration. I do think a better solution would be to fine the hell out of these strawberry and lettuce plantation owners and the construction firms that hire people here illegally. When I was in New Orleans in March I kept waiting to see black folks working on construction sites. I saw like three brothas in a week. Most of the fruits and vegetables eaten in this country are produced in California's Central Valley and when you drive through those field and see how folks are getting paid nothing and live in shacks...it's just wrong. And I wouldn't mind paying higher prices if I knew that I could confidently eat my salad without wondering whose backs were broken picking my food for 35 cents an hour.
I would be happy if I knew that when my landlord hires someone to fix wiring that that person is actually licensed and knows what they are doing. Instead, I come home to a hole in my ceiling and the person bounced after they messed up because they were scared they were going to get deported.
When I first moved out here to LA eight years ago, I told folks back home in Chicago about people standing in front of Home Depot, waiting on corners for trucks to come pick them up, about our Latino brothers that were the color of my coffee table but would be sitting up telling me they were white and calling me the n-word. My family in the Chi could not believe it. Now it's there too and my dad complains how he's scared he's gonna hit someone in the parking lot. Having cheap childcare, cleaning people and lawn care.... Those are not reasons to allow folks into this country.
Also, even though we have legit examples of black and brown unity throughout the history of this country, I'll be the first to admit that most of my family has some really prejudiced attitudes toward Latinos. Calling them all Mexicans is just the tip of the iceberg. We need to get ourselves right first. We can sit around all day and talk about how they are racist against us but we have to look at how we think and how welcoming we are when they move into the neighborhood. Just like there was white flight to get away from us, LA has some serious black flight to get away from Latinos.
All that to say, I don't trust anything Bush is proposing. There's always a catch or something coming around to slap us on the backend.
Ok, Field, sorry to leave such a long comment.
The backend is that we have been working our butts off to graduate from college and get higher paying jobs and the US wants to assign points to high-skilled immigrants (in addition to the H-1B visa) to fill these positions instead of investing real effort into fixing the public education failure where millions of our kids languish.
And of course there is the business of bad legislation and order.
Okay, Rikyrah, I understand your point. And most of what you said is factual, but in leaving the emotional rememberance of how our ancestors were treated, still lowers us to the white guy's level, and that's something I'll never agree to do.
I've seen how they treated Blacks in their own countries - I personally think it's universal racism; treat people of darker skin pigment worse than those of lighter skin pigment. But my position is really based on what Jesus would have us do, think and say in such situations that are fully and accurately representative of Him.
(Hold your horses, Fairlane, because I've read your previous posts on Christianity, and all I'll say is that I'm sorry you met some people who were simply 'illin - check out the gates of hell and see who will be busting it out! You will probably see those who gave you and your friend a hard time).
But I digress from my point. If Jesus is no respector of persons (see Romans, chapter 2), and our standard is at least up to Jesus' standard, then our response to this whole immigration issue is one of balance and fairness. As someone upthread pointed out, illegal immigrants been crossing into America long before 9/11. What we're all seeing now is pure, unadulterated racism and full-fledged bigots who aren't even bothering to hide under a hood and robe anymore. To buy into their schtick gives them a victory they never, EVER, deserved.
There are ways to accomplish immigration on a legal and regulated basis; if the fools in Congress took their heads out of their asses to do the research and develop a comprehensive strategy for dealing with this. Is it fair to deport Haitians by the boatload, but give a free pass to the Mexicans? No, No, and Hell to the No, but that's exactly what Bill Clinton did back in the 1990s.
If he'd addressed it then, GeeShrubya wouldn't be trying to address it now. Usually, with issues like this, there is no rational thought or comprehensive discussion; it is a matter of division and conquering one's personal agenda (for the ReThugs, that means engaging in bigotry).
And don't think if they're successful with immigration, that this government is going to stop with illegal immigrants. Soon, they will turn their attention onto legal immigrants, and finally, Americans of ethnicity or nationality - this is how Hitler started the Third Reich back in 1939; he wasn't content to be separate from Jews - he had to annihilate them in ovens, to the tune of six million people, who'd done nothing except being born Jewish.
People like those who want to run immigrants out of America are not going to be satisfied at targeting the illegal immigrants. They always need a target to catch the brunt of their own self-hatred, and unwillingness to look at the "Dorian Grays" within themselves. They need to feel "superior" but can't explain why they have that need.
Put all of this together and you have the makings of xenophobia, and as an African-American woman, and a Christian Progressive Liberal, I cannot sign off on being a part of that movement.
It's not signing Kubaya, because the "can't we get along" speeches obscure the real issues and problems that divide us as a people. We need to talk it out, then we can walk it out.
Those black shrimpers in Texas who allied with the Klan when the Klan was attacking Vietnamese who were taking over the whole fishing industry in the Gulf back in the early 80s...
Huh?? I was born, raised, and still live in the Houston area. I don't remember seeing one black shrimper involved in that whole uproar. That situation was localized in some of the small communities on the shores of Galveston Bay, between the coast and Houston. Believe me, none of those towns were hospitable to blacks. Those white shrimpers called the Klan in to try to run. the Vietnamese away for one reason- they couldn't hang with the competition.
Christian Progressive Liberal is right that the whole Southwest U.S. was taken from Mexico in the 1846-1848 war. Then as soon as we took the land, folks called a "gold rush" to encourage white settlement out that way. So, Mexican immigrants, in my opinion it's not so simple.
Anonymous--it was actually quite a few of these folks, operating from Corpus Christi all the way up to places like Port Lavaca.
Christian--we ain't xenophobes, and if you recall from Gangs of New York, the nativists hated black folks ALMOST as much as they hated the Irish. So we are allying ourselves inthat camp. But nor will we sing the tune that this bill is some sort of victory for us, too...
Mr. Chambers, you may be correct, but I definitely don't remember any black shrimpers being involved in that strife. I do remember a black District Court judge hearing the the suit against the Klansman and their shrimper allies, and (her and her family) receiving death threats as a result. Port Lavaca is actually south of Galveston bay, about halfway between Galveston and Corpus, so it was even father up than you say. I only say that in the interest of accuracy. I don't mean any offense.
"They have no interest in an alliance. They pimp and play upon our natural sympathies for their situation, all the while having no intention of standing by us as we fight. And, according to more than one study, they come here racist against us already, inclined to, and I quote the last study, ' leaning towards the White community and not the Black'. Don't get no more plainer than that for me. You're going to enter into an alliance with folks who come here racist against you?" Rikyrah
She snatched the words right out of my mouth. But let me piggyback on her comment and offer some examples of what she is speaking of.
Here in Houston, the Mexicans that live here are not all cutting yards, fixing roofs, picking watermelons, and/or standing on the corner as a day laborer. Many of these people that you are sympathizing with are working great jobs out at the Ship Channel and in the bay cities in Houston. They are working at plants and refineries down in Pasadena, Texas City, Sugarland, Laporte, and Baytown. They're kids are graduating from college faster than the blacks here in Houston. They are buying houses in nice neighborhoods, while our families are stuck in the hoods. They are riding around in big fine trucks, that according to my cousin who owns a Ford dealership, are paying cash for these F150's and Navigators. Do they have $5K to pay for this the immigration pass? Yes, many of them do.
And how do they look at blacks? Well, they turn their noses up at us and think we are nothing to them. They, because of their light skin, are able to blend into this white world that we live in. And many of them, especially the Mexican women, take full advantage of this. Trust me, Field, many of these folks that you speak of think of as beneath them. A great deal of them are posing as white.
These Mexican immigrants that you are siding with are getting jobs and opportunities that even educated black women and men are getting passed on. When I go into a beautiful office building in Houston, who's working there in great positions? Whites and Mexicans... And the Mexicans ain't just cleaning up. There sitting behind desks doing jobs that we should be getting the same opportunity to get. Even the social service jobs that black women were able to get a lot of are being withheld from us because of the employer requiring that the candidate for the position is bilingual.
I recently sent you an e-mail discussing how this Mexican woman on my job criticized her daughter for marrying a "wetback." Now you know if these middle and upper class Mexican Americans are trying to distance themselves from their own brothers and sisters from their motherland that they deem as being "wetbacks", you know how they are looking at us. Don't kid yourself...
Do I love all people...? You're darn right I do. But I'm tired of trying to be everyone's friends, while we stand and fight our battles alone.
I won’t even touch how this major flow of immigration into southern cities like Houston and Dallas is drying up the social service and health care wells. I’ll just leave that alone right now.
Do I recognize that many Mexican immigrants are being taken advantage of? Um, yes… But they are able to climb out of the barrel way better than us. While we are trying to lift them up out of the barrel, we’ll be stuck down in it.
Now, I know that my opinion will be criticized, but that’s cool. I’m like Rikyrah in this-When someone offers me a real reason why allowing immigrants to flow into this country without sanctions is good for us, I’ll back down.
Angie
The immigrants, any immigrants that I have a problem with are the ones who come with an ideology that is in accordance with the underbelly, the nastier, and the less human friendly side of America. If an immigrant is in an SUV or a big truck, I get really pissed off. It is not as if I am willing to give an American a free pass, but I would expect that type of disregard from selfish and spoiled Americans, ---and I wish them the most pain in the world for being that way. If immigrants come here and immerge themselves in materialism, predatory hustling, etc, then I think they need to keep their asses wherever they came from. I stood behind a woman once in Macy’s, could not speak a lick of English, but she had an armload of clothes, a few coupons from an catalog advertisement (fair enough) and then the saleswoman (who looked to be from her kind) scanned another coupon. When I asked for one, I was told she did not know what I was talking about. I am not stupid, I saw how the woman’s purchase went from $400 to $90.
I used to be for open borders, completely open borders, however, I am seeing that the people who come to America, or the people who want to come to America, are not typically the romanticized type immigrant who is just looking for some land in order to homestead, to make a peaceful future for his or her family, or to have food to eat because they were starving in their own country, but a bunch of indifferent opportunistic. We have not been able to squash that in our own people (Americans of any “race”), in fact, opportunism is revered, promoted, just look at Bush and his cronies. When it comes to making money, a blind eye is turned. In fact, I worked with an Indian (from south India) woman who would steal everyone’s sales (black and white women and we all complained). We would bust our ass kissing a customer ass and the minute our back was turned or we were juggling another customer she would step in and ring the customer up. Management awarded with top sales awards etc. And then she would tell us how she was squirreling her money away because she hated America and was going to go back to India. Yeah, we really felt the love. Don’t even get me started on my garage sale. Motherfuckers got hostile when I was not willing to give shit away. Like a fairly new dryer I was asking $30. I thought I was going to get cut because I would not take 5. Getting all up in my personal space and telling about how it ain’t worth 30. So why was he looking at it then?
So, to say it is about race is just wrong. They asses can come from Poland to Brazil and if they are not making this country a better place by being good people, meaning people who improve society, not help it get to hell quicker in a hand basket, then they can stay their asses home.
It is about what is being brought to the table. I don’t dine well on shit.
Angie, I grew up on Houston too!
Wetback was fighting words, and I mean between Tex-Mexs. I thougth my SIL was going to lose her mind when someone called her a wetback. It was another Tex-Mex woman who did it too.
I went to Smiley High School. Do you know about Smiley High School and that area?
Damn I wish I could answer everybody, but I can't. (Still trying to multitask at the J.O.B.)
Rikyrah and Angie, how is this for allowing the immigrants to flow into this country? How about a stronger voting block in support of issues -like a proper health care system-that effects all of us. We should be looking at the world from a more PanA frican perspective. The people who are darker from Cuba are still in Cuba, the light skinned Cubans are the ones in South Florida that hate black folks. Just as the Argentinians and the upper class Mexicans are full of prejudice against other dark skinned people in their own country, and the black ones here.
I am sorry, I have never experienced this bias from Latinos that I hear you guys talking about. I live in Philly (and I lived in L.A.), and I get nothing but love for my Rican and Latino friends. Sorry, I just don't believe that they are taking away our jobs. So there are a few low level white collar jobs going to them in places like Houston and Dallas. Well that's inevitable given the make up of the populations of those cities.
We should be forming coalitions, and trying to build with them. At least the ones that look like we do. I take it many of you have never seen a Dominican, or some of the Cubans that still live in Cuba. They look just like we do. Have you guys ever stopped to think that we are the ones who act bigoted and ignorant towards them?Maybe not the people posting here, cause you guys are too educated for that.But don't get it twisted, they get it from black and white folks, and we expect them, to turnm around and show us love? Let's keep it 100% I remember the joke in L.A.; If the blacks come the neighborhood is gone, if the Mexicans or South Americans come, it is gone and will never come back.
Damn I gotta go, but I will revisit this issue with you guys.
Peace.
I'm with Liz.
To underline one point: where I am from in the U.S. many people who look "Mexican" are in fact Native American. They or their ancestors speak Spanish, yes, because the Spaniards were here first and taught it to them. Then the English speakers came. However these so-called "Mexicans" are living on their ancestral lands. I am not. It is *very* ironic to hear people like me complain about how "those Mexicans" have "invaded us."
The current immigration bill is advantageous primarily to the growers and to big business, from what I can tell. I am very concerned about the expansion of the guest worker program ... what we have going on already in those terms is very worrying. There is also the English Only provision which would mean the end of funding, for instance, for French language hospice and other health services to the French speakers in my current region - many of whom are African-American, and all of whom were here before the English speakers.
When people go on about how we should have one national language, I want to ask them which Native American language they would suggest we all learn. Or perhaps we could emphasize both our English and African cultural roots and make the national language Gullah
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gullah_language
And anyway, why fetishize plain old English, the language of slave traders from a rainy little island in the North Atlantic? Why (if not because of colonialism and imperialism) was it converted into a god?
My problems with the most recent version of the bill that I read are:
1) The Amnesty clause is such a bad deal that few, if any illegal immigrants will take it.
2) The "Guest worker program" is designed to maintain a permanent underclass of temporary Mexican workers.
3) There is a lot of focus on Border enforcement (which is a rather inefficient way to reduce illegal immigration).
4) It makes several changes to existing immigration law that make it more difficult for family members of legal immigrants to gain entry.
My opinion is to sink it until the next Congress, when perhaps a more rational deal can be made.
I hear you on the racism that Afro-Latinos are subject to in their own country but some of them are darker than me and they don't consider themselves black.
Check out the Miami Herlad five-part series I've been blogging about. If Latinos discriminate against their own (who are darker) what makes us think they are willing to align themselves with us? They are not going to leave their racist view of color back in their native land. Just like I'm beyond trying to change white people I'm not going to try and change the racist mentality of Latinos.
Like everyone else we are focusing on Mexicans but immigration is larger than one country and we're turning a blind eye to that.
Not agreeing with this immigration bill does not mean black folks are buying into the xenophobic kool-aid like the Irish did when they wanted to be white in the mid-1800s.
First of all its a disaster because its too comprehensive. One of the reasons the sanctions against Iraq in the 90s didnt work. Too many people that needed to vote on too many different issues and too many people with their own agendas that had nothing to do with the original intent.
We can debate numerous things but who thinks immigration without knowing who is here, people can come and go as they please and no coming to this country without documentation is okay?
Because if you do then we're on totally different wavelengths here.
I'm okay with immigration--I am not okay with stupidity as far as security and legislation.
Good points / good ideas, Zimbel. Also Christian Progressive, and thanks, Field, for raising this issue. The current bill is complicated, and in general it is very hard to figure out what to do about this immigration thing since it does not exist in isolation. It is connected to the entire industrial and wage structure. I favor paying everyone union scale and if prices go up, so be it ... I live modestly but people in other parts of the world live more modestly, I do not mind cutting back if it means we can get more wage equity around here. Most Americans, though, do not seem to think this way. They say, "Gimme mine, and believe me when I say I am superior to everyone else and entitled to more."
Some notes: the fact that the white elite which runs Mexico is racist does not justify racism against the poorer and darker Mexicans who are forced by that government's collusion with global elites to come here. Similarly, the fact that the U.S. beat Mexico in an imperialist war does not justify racism against the descendants of the people living of the land we took.
Rikyrah - the second war to which you refer, I believe, was the Spanish-American war, which did not involve Mexico. In that war we fought Spain and acquired Cuba (which is why we are still in Guantanamo Bay), Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. We justified it with false allegations. Our having succeeded at that does not make us superior to people in or from those countries, nor does it justify further exploitation of them.
"I'm okay with immigration--I am not okay with stupidity as far as security and legislation."
OK symphony, that's a good point. The bill is definately not the greatest, and someone posting earlier mentioned the $5,000 which will be needed to get legalization, which everyone knows aint gonna happen.
So yes, this bill has some issues; but I would still rather side with those who support this bill than with the close the border crowd.
Gotta go again....damn!
Have I heard of Smiley? Yep... After I graduated from college, I was a consultant for that entire school district for a few years. I use to walk the halls of Smiley every single, dreadful day. Plus, a great deal of my folks went to that school.
Visit my blog if you wish to talk about Smiley and/or Houston. I don't want to use this space for that. Plus, I'd like to know when you attended.
http://www.nuvisionforanuday.blogspot.com
Angie
Field: You are right about things being different in other regions of the country. I traveled to Florida and NYC, and I was amazed by the number of Latinos that were my color and darker. In fact, every time I go to Florida or NYC, Latinos often walk up to me speaking in spanish. LOL I guess I can pass for one of their more colored sistas. They are sadly mistaken when I respond with a look of "What?" on my face and english out of my mouth. What's even more funny is that Latino brothas in those areas are always trying to holla at a sista. But the Latinos in Texas... Well, many of them ain't trying to go there.
I guess I shouldn't hold this issue of employment against the Mexicans. They are only trying to take care of their families. It just rubs me the wrong way when I see those Mexican men working out at the port and in the bay cities, making 40K to 80K, doing work that I know black men can do if they had the chance. I refuse to believe that all the black men I see standing on the streets in inner Houston are out there only because they choose to be. But maybe they are... Perhaps, black men aren't even applying for those jobs.
Tension between blacks and mexicans are not totally sour. I've noticed that a lot of the Mexicans that are in their 20's are more willing to connect with blacks then older Mexicans are. I think that Hip Hop and blacks and mexicans being thrown in the same neighborhoods have a lot to do with that.
BTW: My darling, little niece is half Latina. I love both sides of her. (smile)
Before I go... I don't think that the $5K is gon' to be as big as a problem as you guys think. Remember, many of the mexicans out here in Texas are paying cash for trucks and houses. Plus, they will all live in the same house, save that $5K, and then work on the next family member's $5K. That's how they work together. I ain't telling you what I heard; I'm telling you what I know.
Field, I didn't have to go to work today. Can you believe it? June 19th is actually a state holiday in Texas. So, all of us good old state employees were off.
Angie
Field, I completely agree with you. I'm an immigrant - US born and living in Brazil. I've had a lot of problems in the US, but not a single one of them was caused by immigration. Slavery wasn't caused by immigration. Jim Crow wasn't caused by immigration, and the 43-term white male monopoly of the presidency wasn't caused by immigration, although immigration might be part of the solution.
All of the wealth of Black people and Latino's put together in the US doesn't light a candle to that of white America, so if we're going to be concerned about someone having more of the pie, it's hard to see how immigrants would be that "someone."
I used to work with the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), the largest national group of immigration lawyers and their a reliable source on the policy minutia, trying to help immigrants. Last month, they said,
The proposed immigration reform "is nothing short of high-risk, large-scale social experimentation. By untethering the system from its moorings to employer and family relationships, we threaten to dissolve the social fabric that binds immigrant communities," announced Carlina Tapia-Ruano, President of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA).
However, since that version of the bill was defeated, they're urging Congress to work up a new version that really helps immigrants without curtailing the family immigration that has been the basis of legal immigration for the last 50 years. Now they "strongly urge Congress to get it right and pass a workable immigration bill before the end of the year." AILA
Immigration policy is really complex, but if AILA's pushing Congress to get back to work, they must think they can get a deal that will really help immigrants, and I strongly support that. After all, my wife and children would be immigrants if I ever decided to leave Brazil and return to the United States with them.
So, I urge your readers not to advocate any policies that might one day hurt the wife and children of the Francis L. Holland Blog.
Field
I will be upfront and honest. I'm African America, my families been here in this country for more than a minute. I read your site from time to time and find it entertaining but we aren't going to ever agree on much. I'm fairly right of center, and a libertarian. I'm not fan of Bush, I don't consider him conservative. He is just a liberal religious fanatic who is hawkish on foreign policy. Oh and an idiot.
Take the religious right out of the Republican party and I would likely vote Republican more often.
That being said, I have lived in Japan on a work visa for over a year. Undergrad I studied abroad in China, so I have an idea of what it is like to be a foreign in a country very different from your own, where you stand out.
My wife is also Japanese, and we have paid out thousands of dollars to get her green card and filled out all the forms for USCIS ourselves, so I have an idea of the system. I also have friends here on H1Bs and L-1 visas. So I am not anti-immigrant. I'm pro-immigrant, but I'm not pro-illegal immigrant or unskilled worker.
For me this is not an issue of racism, or xenophobia it is purely about the math and the logic.
First I would invite you to come to my site and view this:
http://pmsol3.wordpress.com/2007/05/20/illegal-immigrant-watch-recap/
Then read this:
http://pmsol3.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/ethnic-cleansing-of-blacks-in-california/
Then if you have some time I invite you to look through my other post on illegal immigration.
I'm sorry bra, I know you have a big heart and you feel for people, but you are dead wrong on this issue and what you propose will hurt this nation which as Americans (of any race) our fortunes are tied to unless we want to emmigrate, and specifically the African American community will bear the brunt of it.
Think about the millions of black men who have dropped out of the job market and are no longer recorded in the unemployment stats, the 50% graduation or less in many urban areas of black folks...then think about the racist elite businessmen who want to import serfs and blackball unions and black people from the remaining low skill and manufacturing jobs. This is not just about picking fruit it is bigger than that.
I have documented most of the major issues.
I strongly encourage you to read on this issue a little more seriously and don't let emotion cloud your judgement.
Respect.
"So, I urge your readers not to advocate any policies that might one day hurt the wife and children of the Francis L. Holland Blog."
This has nothing to do with your family. This is not about "immigration" this is about illegal aliens. Big difference.
Your wife and kids would be legal coming here due to the fact you are an American citzen and they can get visas right away and work authorization, travel authorization, etc until their Green Cards come.
My wife is an immigrant and I've been through this process, don't get it twisted, this bill has nothing to do with legal immigrants...well most of it does not.
You know I was thinking about the racism thing.
1) Just because racist support something does not necessarily in and of itself make it something blacks should not support, that is a logical fallacy to say other wise.
2) Illegal immigration subsidizes Mexican elite racist/classist/colorist.
If you notice the Mexicans immigranting here are not the elite white and near white Iberians who run Mexico. They are the dark short mostly Amerindian Mexicans from the South. They don't look like the Mexicans on Spanish TV. They can't get jobs in Mexico but Mexico has billionaires.
Look up Carlos Sim (Mexican billionaire). Mexico has a lot of natural resources. According to the IMF Mexico is in the top 63 nations in per capita income
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)_per_capita
However according to the gini coefficient by the UN
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality
It has high income inequality, higher than China and Ivory Coast.
According to Transparency International, Mexico is more corrupt than Egypt, Ghana, China, etc...just slightly about Saudi Arabia.
So let me get this straight, about 20% of Mexico's economy is remittance from the U.S. If Americans were making that money it would stay in our country in our hoods, in our econmies. MExicans are sending it home to feed family and support Mexico's economy so the racist Mexican elites don't have to reform a damn thing.
That's nice. It is kind of like giving subsidies to the KKK to continue Jim Crow.
All that being said most Mexicans who come here are obviously mostly Amerinidian and most of them are from Mexico, however in the last census over half of Hispanics, marked Hispanic and white.
The reason why we have terms on EEO forms like NonHispanic white, because so many Hispanics see themselves as white but at home they catch hell for not being white. Wonder what they think of you?
Oh I know.
http://pmsol3.wordpress.com/2007/03/20/ethnic-cleansing-of-blacks-in-california/
Its all good though. Juan comes here with pregnant Maria gets an anchor baby. Maria goes to the local public hospital to have Juan Jr and doesn't pay so your insurance premiums go up as the hospital tries to pass the cost on to your insurance company to stay open.
Juan is not legally married to Maria because they have no papers but Maria applies for welfare, Juan buys a new Ford F-150. Oh yeah...Juan lives with his two brothers and Maria and Juan Jr in a 1 bed room. Land lord knows this is illegal but turns a blind eye, landlord knows 3 folks in the house are working and Maria likely got welfare so he raises the rent. Poor black person with a kid thinking they can get a one bedroom can't afford the rent anymore.
Oh yeah Maria and Juan don't pay tax but you pay for thier kid to get "bilingual education".
Oh yeah sometimes Juan likes to get drunk and slap Maria around so the police have to come and put him in jail overnight...yeah that cost money too.
Maybe Juan Jr grows up and joins and gang with his illegal cousin who just came across and sells some meth, drop out of school (which is not unusual in Hispanic communities since they have a lower education rate than black folks)...it goes on and on...
Peep my site, numbers aren't lying but LA RAZA and your politicians that got bought out by lobbyist are.
I've seen much of this with my own eyes in Houston when I lived there.
There may be blacks out of the job market, but whether we have more immigrants or not, our working status will not change. Blacks will not get the job anyway. I really think immigration is not our issue, because we don't hold enough power to change the laws to benefit us. I think our focus after making our community viable, would be attack the mythology about race that is being subtly produced by those who say "I am not a racist."
There are plenty of Americans that could fill the H1B jobs. Lets start with the white folks, there is sexism and ageism. Being female in those high tech jobs is a minus and when one is over forty, they cost too much and also considered brain dead. Now add racism and blacks are even more at a disadvantage.
Its funny I see everyday some black person doing a job they say Americans wont do. Only a few years back I would ride the commuter train with black women still working for below min. wage and carfare. They did what we called day's work. In the sixties when minimum wage was $1.15 an hour, days work was $4.00 a day and carfare. Somehow when referring to the same work now, its call housekeeping, nanny, and cook. They give the immigrant a better job title. Tell me how a black man in Pennsylvania can turn down any job, when welfare will not cover him and life in a shelter or hustling is not an option.
Field: Thank you so very much for the great post. Haven't read the comments yet. I'll take a deep breath and dive in.
I'd like to remind everyone that California, and a large segment of the SW US, used to BE Mexico.
By the way, some of the first people of African descent in what is now the LA area had Spanish last names and spoke spanish. I learned this from an exhibit at the African American Museum in LA back in the 1990's. See the link and the cut pasted info below:
http://federationofblackcowboysnyc.com/page/history2.html
Maria Rita Valdez & Francisco Reyes
Los Angeles was founded in 1781 by a group of 44 people, two were White, some were Natives and twenty-six were African descendents. Among the founding families of Los Angeles were the African grandparents of Maria Rita Valdez, owner of Rancho Rodeo de Las Aguas, known today as Beverly Hills. Fransisco Reyes, owned the San Fernando Valley and became the mayor of Los Angeles despite his African ancestry.
Pio Pico
Mexican California offered a land of opportunity for African Americans. For one, the society was much more open and tolerant to interracial marriages. Furthermore, earning wealth and holding office was not exclusively for the lily-white. Pio Pico was a culmination of these factors as his ancestry was African, Native American and European. He went on to earn wealth and fortune and became Governor of California twice over. His brother, Andreas, served as a general during the U.S.-Mexican War and achieved a great victory over U.S. forces in San Pascual.
Okay, here's more of my two cents.
My impression from what I see in these parts is that the Latinos who are on Welfare tend to be American citizens, not illegals. Illegals generally work like dogs, two jobs, and really don't need a handout. The groups that I see most with food stamps where I live tend to be Southeast Asians and black folks. I don't have statistical data, just empirical data from the 'hood.
Mexicans have white skins? Huh?
I mean, some do have blue eyes and blond hair but in these parts of the US, the Latino illegals are from Mexico and Central America, are of Native American descent and a lot of them speak an Indian dialect, in addition to or instead of Spanish. They are short, very dark people. There's no way they are blending in with white folks.
The 9-11 terrorists were all in the US legally. The so-called terrorists who have been subsequently in caught in the US have been US citizens. Of the ones I know of, I don’t recall that any of the ones who were deported came through Mexico. And honestly, Middle Easterners and Latin Americans really don’t look a whole lot alike unless the Latin American in question has Middle Eastern roots.
Yes, there are color line and class issues in Latin America. The people coming to this country are typically treated like shit in their native countries because they are considered peasants. I know black people who don't wan't their kids to marry anyone too dark or who isn't part of a particular social strata.
The US failed to compensate for, through guarantees in the Treaty of Guadalupe that ended the war, land owned by Mexicans before the Mexican-American war. As usual, the US stole someone else's land.
There's a big difference between Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, Central Americans, Cubans, and people from South American countries. We shouldn't be lumping them together because culturally and historically they are very different.
Just a footnote but in SF there has always been a big Irish illegal population. Asians are regularly smuggled into this country. Illegal Russians and Eastern Europeans are bringing a particularly toxic form of organized crime with them.
Indians are brought here (legally) to fill tekkie jobs in Silicon Valley. How come we aren't hollering about the loss of tekkie jobs to Asians? How come we are only hollering about the loss of unskilled jobs? How come we have to set the bar so low for ourselves?
The comments have been very depressing to read.
dragon horse, I read your blog, and it's very interesting.I always like to gather knowledge from my center to right brothers and sisters.
I like how you prefaced your comments by saying you were going to be honest. That's always a good start in my world. But don't only read my blog to be amused try to gain some knowledge from me as well.-Us field Negroes can think too:)
"This has nothing to do with your family. This is not about "immigration" this is about illegal aliens."
I think that quote is misguided. This isn't about "illegal aliens", it's about dark skinned "illegal aliens". It's as simple as that. If those aliens looked like the Cubans who settled in South Florida,or the Irish who settled here in the Northeast, we wouldn't be having this debate. And if we are going to have an honest debate we have to start with that premise.
Sometimes a spade is just a fraking spade if you get my drift. All the fancy talk about The Mexican "caste" system,elites in that country, economic and free trade policies, and Third World corruption are non-sequiturs in this debate. Regardless of what led them to come here, they are here now, and that's the reality we have to deal with.
So what do we do; turn against them like white folks turned on us? I don't think so. I wil take my chances with the brown people, whether they are here "legally" or not.
Indians are brought here (legally) to fill tekkie jobs in Silicon Valley. How come we aren't hollering about the loss of tekkie jobs to Asians? How come we are only hollering about the loss of unskilled jobs? How come we have to set the bar so low for ourselves?
I've said that this bill is bad for every worker, no matter the collar.
That the battle is over the illegals on the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum, but that's just a cover.
The corporations don't want us to notice that hatchet ready to be struck at the OTHER end of the socio-economic spectrum.
The hustle on that end, is to bring in the cheap HB-1 Visa denying work to an American Citizen (as long as there's unemployment, I see no reason to grant ONE HB-1 Visa), and then, get them here, with lower wages, and stick out in front of them the 'possibility that the corporation would sponsor them for the Green Card. Of course, it NEVER HAPPENS.
Because, once the visa holder gets the Green Card, THEY'LL WANT TO BE PAID WHAT A CITIZEN WANTS.
There is no difference between this hustle, and the one who threatens the dishwashers; only difference is that it's being done by people in suits. Tactics are the same.
West Coast, you havent read all the comments. The point has been made that its not simply low wage jobs that are in question.
And not all immigrants from Latin American countries are here because they were discriminated against and they are poor. Though it is like the US, where it is concentrated, there is a lot of money in Latin American countries and the rich make their presence known either temporarily or permanently in the US.
And its a great history lesson to talk about who had the land first and who it technically belongs to but the reality of here and now is that this is the US and we should deal with our immigration policy.
And I don't feel compelled to go with the flow because one segment of the immigrants (the only ones talked about) happen to have dark skin.
there is as much difference between hispanics (who mainly wish to assimilate as white) & latin@s (who generally identify w/ their black & brown roots), as there is between house negroes & field negroes. actual color has nothing to do w/ this phenom (see clarence thomas). and, to add to the historical points that have been made, the us-mexican war was fought over the annexation of texas. one reason texas was annexed because mexico had outlawed slavery, the slave owners did not want to give up their slaves. also the underground railroad ran south into mexico as well as north into canada. guess its a good thing the borders were open back then.
someone upthread mentioned deportation wouldn't stop with undocumented folx, that's already happened. an american latino (born here i believe, american citizen @ any rate) was scooped up in a raid & deported (of course this is nothing new - see guantanamo, bagram, & other sites worldwide). ICE won't open an investigation to find out what happened to him. also some children born in this country are locked up w/their parents @ ICE's hutto prison in texas. other children are just left behind w/ no parents.
but in the final analysis, the immigration debate is about politicians playing to their white supremacist base. the capitalist class in this country ain't having it. nor is the imperial class in mexico (where most of the undocumented come from). mexico is having a hard enuf time keeping the lid on the revolution pot w/o 12 million new recruits.
How do you treat a "racist"? A Francis L. Holland drama now showing at MyLeftWing.
Field:
I know you can think, or I wouldn't read the site at all.
I'm not as worried about the 12+ million that are here, as much as the 12+ million who will come if we go with this bill.
Mexicans are not Canadians. I don't think 20% of people in L.A. county jail are Canadian or even in Seattle jails, but I know that 20% of them according to ICE (government agency) are illegal Hispanics who come here to work hard, at gang banging, drug dealing, and ethnically cleansing our people in LA as shown on my site.
As far as the Irish, the country has changed a lot. When the Irish and Italians came here we were a manufacturing based economy. Any moron with a strong back could make a middle class wage by turning screws all day long on an assembly line. That does not exist anymore.
Hispanic immigrants, legal or illegal do poorer in school than Americans, even black people, and have a relatively high criminality rate (likely due to the fact that the kids of these immigrants get tired of doing crap jobs but don't have the skills or talent to do much else so they turn to crime).
Also the immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe in the past was not as great as what we have today, AMerica has never had immigration this large from one or two ethnic groups that is highly concentrated in a half a dozen states.
Look at Quebec or any nation that has one or two provinces with one ethnic group being the overwealming majority that is different from the rest of the nation, there is always always conflict, I can give about a dozen examples if you wish. This is what is happening in the South West today.
I am pro-immigration, just not pro legal or illegal immigration from low brow no skill population that are not upwardly mobile, because they bring too many negative extranalities to society. Hispanic immigrants on average (legal or illegal) are a net negative for society, especially for tax revenue.
Most low wage immigrants are not going to shore up social security and neither are their children, because as we both know working at McDonalds and sweeping floors you don't pay much in the way of tax.
I am pro-immigrant that can generate value for this society and generate tax revenue. we need those immigrants
We don't need a serf underclass, we havee poor people already, millions.
You are right we can't deport 12 million people what we can do is force them to repatriate.
If we had balls we would be like France and the EU, which started paying illegals and some legals to leave. They also are pulling business liscences of employers who hire them. Yep, no fine, just no business.
Why can they do that? Well in most of the EU, lobbying is considered illegal corruption, so politicians pay attention to the people.
If you want to make illegals repatriate in America.
1) Make people prove legal residence with a national ID before sending remittance.
2) Crack down on employers.
who wins in all of this?
Elite racists on both sides of the border.
Why do you think Bush is so buddy buddy with upperclass Mexicans in Mexico?
This is all about them staying rich.
Elite Mexicans create a situation where their poorest, most ignorant, and often criminal minded come to America. The money they make by legitimate or crooked ways goes back to Mexico in remmitance, their poor families buy stuff? From who? Yes, the elite Mexicans who own everything. But the elites there never had to do anything to change or reform their corruption and racism.
What do American elites get?
Well they get a compliant serf class, and they don't have to hire negros and poor white trash who actually demand a certain level of respect and standards guaranteed them by law.
This helps to improverish the lower middle class and poor even more as illegal immigrants take lower white collar jobs and blue collar work from the millions of Americans who have no degree or diploma...weakening the power of the middle class.
Sure the upper middle class and rich benefit, no one else in America does. What good is saving $800 on a $150K house if you "ain't got no J-O-B?"
Also going back to Canadians, Irish, Hispanic immigrants.
lets put it this way...there are many Americans here today whose ancestors I would not have let immigrate, but that didn't happen on my watch.
As far as I can see in this economy the only thing we need to import low skill labor to do is pick fruit, if they aren't doing that we don't need them, we have an underclass with no education who can everything else and will do it for "real wages".
If we really did need immigrants to do other work, I would not import low brow Mexicans or Central americans to do it.
All immigrant populations are not equal in their ability to be upwardly mobile or create and maintain a 1st world country.
I would rather open the border to 12 million Chinese than 12 million Mexicans.
Based on Chinese immigrant (overseas) societies in Asia and the West there is no population that I can find where the average person after two generations is poorer, less educated, and more criminal minded than the average of the host population.
I can't say the same for Mexicans.
So who is the better source population for immigration?
The thing is we should be doing what is good for America and our citizens, not what is good for the immigrant.
Under national and international law we have every right as a nation-state to determine who we allow in our home and under what conditions. If we want only people under 6 foot tall, or only people with Master's Degrees, only women over 30, that is our right.
There is no guaranteed right for anyone to live here from another nation.
low skill immigrants from Latin America are a net negative to our society and we don't need them. That is what is good for America.
That's all I have to say.
Thanks.
dragon horse, you make some good points. I co-sign with Bush being tight with the upper crust in Mexico's society, and I understand the whole big business cabal thing.
But you still didn't tell me what we would do without the low income labor force that some of these immigrants bring especially given the fact that we have almost 100% employment now in this country.
I know that many of the illegals in the SW states end up in the criminal justice system. That actually supports my point. Maybe if we did a better job of helping these people assimilate into our society they would not end up on the wrong side of the law. It's no different than the early Irish gangs, and the Italian underworld of times past. Those particuler groups are slowly going away. The Irish have been given an easy path to assimilation and so...wadahhh; no more Irish gangs. It can work with the immigrants from south of the border as well.
"Under national and international law we have every right as a nation-state to determine who we allow in our home and under what conditions. If we want only people under 6 foot tall, or only people with Master's Degrees, only women over 30, that is our right."
Now I have an entirely new discussion for that quote. But that's for another time :)
I agree with Dragon.
One thing that stood out is that you said "I will take my chances with the brown people" as if they are better than whites or more perferrable.
Brother, look around the world.
As racist as white Americans are or Western whites in general, how racist are they compared to the rest of the world.
In what country can black people live like they do here, like you do, like Oprah, run for president like Obama?
My point is not that white people are saints, they are not, we know this, but the fact is that if you look at how blacks are treated in Latin America, or how you would be greated in Russia, China, INdia as a black person, please...there is no such thing as "integration" or civil rights. You are a negro and they will discriminate against you and have no issues with it. Even in Africa, if you have no tribe and no money do you think you will get a fair shake in Nigeria, Congo, Ethiopia, etc. I don't think so.
I've been to a few countries, and bra, black folks are living bad in the rest of the world and are looked down on and treated bad in a lot of places, including Latin America (despite Mr. Holland says, dark people (predo) are at the bottom of Brazilian society just as they are in Columbia, Panama, etc.
So before you hope the "brown man" takes over, you should consider what you are asking. They act cool now when they are the minority, but when they are not, as in LA as in their own countries they show they are no different and often times worse than white people in how they treat us. Ain't no civil rights movement ever popped off in Latin America.
I have to differ with anonymous and DH on a couple of points.
I don't understand this desire to induce paranoia in black folks towards the rest of the world in a time of globalization. The world outside the US is rife with opportunity, and blacks should go out and get their share.
There is no greater impediment to black success than white supremacy as practiced in many nations. White folks have had a hard on for blacks that isn't seen in other places.
In other nations, you are dealing with nationalism or tribalism, but the racist yoke is the greatest hindrance to the black person. In India, China, etc, the forces a black person has to contend with are the same for everyone. I agree that Russia is worse for any people of color than the US.
Money talks everywhere. That is why the elites of Africa who do belong to tribes and have money emigrate. Why can't american blacks of affluence take their cash and ambitions and go offshore?
I have been overseas also, and the US has the biggest hindrances to black folks. The reason there is no Obama and Oprah in other countries is because there is no critical mass of blacks in these other places, not because they aren't allowed.
The impediments you named above are what all immigrants go through. It's what all of the asian and latino groups go through in the US. These groups are addressing this through population growth, and by creating their own enclaves in their adopted cities and regions. Blacks can adopt the same tactics overseas.
-Caged Lion
I would add that in Brazil, where there is a critical mass of blacks (the largest population of blacks outside of nigeria) we have seen a steady rising of black empowerment. In fact, I would predict that in 10-20 years, Brazil will be the heart of African (south) American progression, with Brazil's rise as an economic power.
Caged Lion
On the thread main topic. I tend to agree with field.
I think one thing we are ignoring is what these people (mexican laborers) add economically. Taxes are one, but more importantly, we are all (blacks included) benefitting from their low waged labor. Everytime we buy produce, go to some restaurants, or purchase some types of services, we pay a much lower price than we otherwise would have, if not for low wage (sub-min wage) labor.
This frees up dollars that are spent elsewhere. Thus, there is a significant positive economic impact that blacks receive also. When I buy cherries at 2-3 dollars a lb instead of 9-10 dollars a pound, I am able to stretch my buying dollar.
The question is, are we willing to give up this benefit and enact fair labor practices?
Caged Lion
caged lion:
No one is saying that blacks can not and should not go overseas and do there thing. The point is that racism/nationality/xenophobia/ethnocentrism may not be one in the same but they can have the same effects depending on degree.
It is one thing to go overseas to do business and make a buck.
Money does talk and most folks who are about business don't care who they do it with. What I am speaking of is immigrating and moving in their neighborhood, and expecting equal rights to them as you have in the U.S. that is a different story all together. That does not happen most places in the world outside of the West, regardless of race really.
Try to move to Korea and become Korean and expect equal rights and treatement, argue that you got civil rights as a human, despite being black, blah blah and see how quick people look at your dumbfounded and laugh. Go to Hong Kong, go to UAE, go to Tunisia.
Not saying blacks should not go abroad but blacks should keep things in perspective when at home in the West on how bad things are and also keep in perspective the effect of letting in a lot of foreigners that are from countries known to seriously discriminate against blacks.
There are native black populations in Southern Mexico off the Atlanatic coast, check them out, they live like crap too.
Also you talk about Brazil and blacks.
First off you are wrong.
Brazil has few "blacks". They never had a one drop rule in Brazil or anywhere in Latin America, so people you "think" are black don't consider themselves to be black and are not considered black by society.
ONe drop of black blood or one black African feature does not make one a black person in every nation, that is particular to Anglo-Saxon nations, not Latin ones.
That being the case, soccer players like Ronaldo in Brazil call themselves "white".
In Brazil the people who look like unmixed West Africans are black and are treated like garbage.
As far as wages, go to DH's site and look at the link he put above in his first post, illegal aliens don't make things significantly cheaper in the vast majority of industries, because the cost saving is not passed on it is pocketed by the business owner.
That is a myth put out by the business elites.
Try to move to Korea and become Korean and expect equal rights and treatement, argue that you got civil rights as a human, despite being black, blah blah and see how quick people look at your dumbfounded and laugh. Go to Hong Kong, go to UAE, go to Tunisia.
And that differs from the united states, how? We got the same issues here. And I know blacks living in Hong Kong, one raising a kid who would say differently.
On Brazil, yes the dynamics of race and colorism are different, but the fact is that movements driven by people of african descent have been going on for a while, and continue to grow. As far as some sports star claiming whiteness, OJ and a host of self-hating american black celebs come to mind.
On the economic benefits of mexican cheap labor, I looked on the site, but could not open the links to articles that purportedly had evidence.
Caged Lion
Field, this might be off topic, but maybe not! Fear of Brown People?
You should check this:
"A Texas man who called 911 to request medical assistance for a diabetic seizure earned a tasering from local cops for his trouble, the Waxahachie Daily Light reports.
Allen Nelms, 52, was suffering said seizure "during the early morning hours of April 28 when his girlfriend, Josie Edwards, called 911 to request paramedics"....When she asked what were they doing to him, one policeman replied, 'We just took care of him.' ... "After they did their shooting and laughing, they came out [of] the rooms. The paramedics had to pull out the Tasers."
It appears to me that Mr. Nelms is black. Somehow I don't think that the instrument of choice to "treat" a white seizure victim would be a Taser. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/20/diabteic_tasering/
Several days ago, cops in San Angelo were confronting a suicidal latino man who had doused himself with gasoline:
"A man who doused himself with gasoline then caught on fire after police fired a Taser stun gun at him died from his injuries Tuesday, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Juan Flores Lopez, 47, was hospitalized after the confrontation with officers in his yard Monday." Mr. Flores subsequently died of his burns. The Taser spark may have ignited the gasoline.
Is there a pattern here? And aren't you glad you don't live in Texas? http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/062007dntextaser.1efe5d08.html
Tigerbalm
You've been nominated, to see for what, come by my spot.
My post got lost in cyberspace. Just as well. What I've read here is certainly depressing. I had no idea that black folks were so virulently anti-Latino. It is clearly far beyond the illegal issue. This is just sad because I would have hoped we were better than this. Posting that the whole world is against black people is scarily paranoid and kind of contradictory. On the one hand, the US is the worst imperialist that only wishes to crush black people but then it turns out it's our best hope because the rest of world is much worst.
I think it's time a big fat couch that can accommodate a few million people be constructed so that we can have our collective head shrunk because we are not well people. Someone posed that racism is a mental health issue and I couldn't agree more.
Before I read this story I knew the man beaten to death would be Latino. He was.
***********************************
AP News
Texas crowd kills passenger riding in vehicle that struck child during Juneteenth celebration
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON
Associated Press Writer
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) An angry crowd beat a man to death after a vehicle he was riding in struck and injured a young girl, police said Wednesday.
Police believe 2,000 to 3,000 people were in the area for a Juneteenth celebration when the attack occurred Tuesday night.
The driver had stopped to check on the little girl at the entrance to an apartment complex when a group of men attacked him, authorities said. The passenger, David Rivas Morales, 40, got out to try to help the driver, but the crowd turned on him, said police Commander Harold Piatt.
Morales was beaten to death by as many as 20 men and left lying in a parking lot, Piatt said. A preliminary autopsy listed blunt force trauma as the cause of death.
The little girl, 3 or 4 years old, was taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
The driver, who got away from the crowd, is cooperating with investigators, police said.
Piatt did not know how many witnesses had been identified, but thousands of people had been in the area for the daylong festival. He said no guns or knives appeared to have used in the fatal attack.
Juneteenth marks the day Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston in 1865 to share news of the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed slaves two years earlier on Jan. 1, 1863.
(Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
My opinion is that the primary option to decreasing illegal immigration is simply to increase legal immigration.
The secondary option is to help develop jobs in the countries that people are presently emigrating from.
Any incomplete barriers (like a fence in Texas & southern California) would end up with illegal immigrants simply taking another route - like one of the other ones presently used. Overstaying perfectly legal visas is a very popular way to illegally immigrate. In any case, such impediments to trade should also measure the harm they do; note that in a number of cases on both sides of the border, there is a dependency on people from the other side of the border to be able to cross easily.
off topic
"Also you talk about Brazil and blacks.
First off you are wrong.
Brazil has few "blacks". They never had a one drop rule in Brazil or anywhere in Latin America, so people you "think" are black don't consider themselves to be black and are not considered black by society." - anonymous (by the way, if you select "other" under identity, you can give yourself a name without an account)
The last census had 6.2% of their population self-identify as "black", and 0.4% as "Amerindian" (which, much like African people, tend to have fairly dark skin-colors). Note that genetically speaking, it seems that Amerindian genes are very common in Brazil even among the "White" population (about 33% in one matrilineal DNA study; just a bit above the 28% African genes in the same sample).
So I guess my comment is that it seems that the plurality (and quite possibly the majority) of genes in Brazil may be from Amerindian lines, but less than 1 in 200 people identify themselves as being Amerindian.
Seems like there is stronger evidence of anti-native sentiment in Brazil than anti-dark-skinned sentiment.
Pro-immigration reform and being aware of racism against black skin that exists in Latin American countries doesn't equate to anti-Latino.
"Whole world against black people" conspiracy I don't know but I do know America isn't the only place in the world that has racism when it comes to black skin.
for field:
http://www.biodiversityforum.com/old-and-modern-pics-of-african-americans-t6828.html
Great pictures of African America since slavery till now.
Field said, "So what do we do; turn against them like white folks turned on us? I don't think so. I wil take my chances with the brown people, whether they are here "legally" or not." couldn't say that any better, so I'm not going to try.
WestCoast Story, yes we do need some shrinks to get in on the work of diagnosing and treating racism, one day at a time.
Really make me said to see what happened to that Latino guy on Juneteenth and who might have done it. I couldn't care less about "illegal immigration". If enough immigrants come from Brazil, and Cuba, maybe they'll bring national health care with them!
Before I read this story I knew the man beaten to death would be Latino. He was.
Well, I'm going to tell you a sad thing; IF I accidently run someone over, and it's in a certain neighborhood, I'M NOT STOPPING. I will drive myself to the police station.
There have been a number of these mob killings - but, the victims and mobs have all been Black where I live.
No crossover violence like this. Black, White, Hispanic, Asian - I'll be blunt - if you hit someone, and you're in certain neighborhoods, get yourself to a police station. Doing the right thing by sticking around could cause your death. No joke.
They won't kill the local gang kingpin, but they'll kill you for an accident.
You may not read this, but it is about racism in my view contemporary america is afraid of them and they want to keep them out of this country
What i really what to talk about is flavor flav and New york. I am really ashamed of Vh1 they are exploiting those people and they are just stupid enough to go along with it. Money my friend money. VH1 exploits them for money and the people on that show have so little respect for themselves that they will act that way on televison all for money. Black people are not angry over those show they love that crap. almost every black person I know watches that crap and they love it. I just shake my head. I am ashamed so very much.
Black people are not angry over those show they love that crap. almost every black person I know watches that crap and they love it. I just shake my head. I am ashamed so very much
Speak for yourself, because I feel like twitching everytime I see them. They are Modern Day MINSTRELS, plain and simple.
And, for those of us who actually enjoy watching them...I shake my head in disgust.
Ref. to earlier in thread - for reasons why the 'infrastructure' in this country is crumbling / overloaded consider (in California *Proposition 13* [really important on de-funding of schools]), the rule of the corporations, spending on adventures such as the Iraq war ...
Re: I love New York.
What tripped me out was when I heard that the men on I Love New York only made a $100 a day for the two week period they were on the show. They got $250 if they were invited to the reunion show.
This totally pissed me off, being that Viacom is making money hand over fist on these idiots. It's just freaking ridiculous for these folks to lend their bodies to these reality shows for a few minutes of fame, while the network makes millions upon millions.
Field, you will have to write a post on this. Many of us need to vent. LOL
I don't think the mob were black. I read one article that said the juneteenth was taking place several blocks away. The little boy's last name was Hosea (I think), I will find the article again.
If this mob was not black. I am already ready to shame on the person upthread who was ready to paint blacks as most likely to attack.
But late Wednesday, police spokeswoman Toni Chovanetz said witnesses reported that four or five men attacked Morales, knocking him to the ground and hitting him.
Chovanetz also said there was no connection to the nearby city-sponsored festival for Juneteenth, which commemorates Texas slaves getting the word that they had been freed.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CRASH_ASSAULT?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=US
God forbid black folks get together for something. Anything within a ten mile radius of the gathering will be their fault.
Blacks beating the crap out of someone non black has happened here. I read this morning that it wasn't a mob but a couple of dozen people. The race of the victim and the formerly known as mob was not indicated in the story.
My point in posting this was that when you make it okay to demonize a group of people for no other reason than who they are, you make mob action acceptable. It's a tactic that's been used against us repeatedly (most notably to support slavery) and just about any group not in favor with our "lofty" government. Hitler used it masterfully in Europe and a lot of people sat back and let it happen because they didn't like Jews and felt they had it coming.
I have a big fat hair up my butt about intolerance.
The whole argument about illegal immigration is just another way the GOP is playing racial politics to keep power now that Bush is so unpopular.
The illegal immigrants are the welfare mothers of the 21st century.
The irony is that the GOP's wealthy buddies are the one's responsible for hiring illegals to do cheap labor instead of giving american workers a decent salary to live on. You rarely hear the wingnuts attacking big business.
To me it is a matter of saving face by blamimg the helpless.
Field,
I have mixed emotions about the section of immi-bill regarding transferring fund from legal aid, but you hit the nail on the head. I don't think Mexicans will take jobs from because the pay is so low, folks will not work for those wages. I live in a house where I use to cut the grass for the owners in the early 70's. They paid me a paltry amount of $1.50 using my lawnmower, which wasn't much, but it allowed me to buy sodas and chips and not steal them. In the name of Black Capitalism, I decided to once again try and find a college/high school student to cut my grass, but they want to use my mower and then charge me what a lawn service does. Here come a Mexican and presto, my grass is cut, but young dudes still want to borrow two dollars, and people don't realize it, but over 40% of Illegal are hired by home owners and small businesses. I put a sign up in my yard that reads.
You present a true picture about what fuels Lou Dobbs and that crowd of nuts he keep attracting.
If he did a story on the racist conduct of policeman more than a week, he would be off the air in a heartbeat. Your post provided some much needed discussion for my Blog; http://www.bigloo.wordpress.com Maybe these illegals are just trying to do a end around and trick Americans into being discovered, like what happen many moons ago. This is complex and I'm glad you opened the dialogue in the manner you did.
Field, I love your blog. It's been given me much needed brain food. For anyone who reads this please go the following link and let him know how you feel about multiculturalism.
http://clutteredeclecticmind.blogspot.com/2007/06/multiculturalism.html
Three more things:
1. Why aren't people up in arms with the companies that hire illegals? Why is all the ire directed at the illegals?
2. American citizens get deported to Mexico during immigration sweeps. It's particularly bad when it's teenagers who are "deported" and their parents don't know what happened to them. Are we all supposed to walk around with our birth certificates now?
3. When parents are deported whose kids are legal US citizens, the kids end up in foster homes. Splitting up families and dumping kids into an environment where they become at risk makes no sense and frankly, is barbaric.
I don't support open borders. Never have but the way we do things now makes no sense. It's all to protect the Wal-Marts and Tysons who rely on illegals for their workforce. The proposal in the Senate is to continue protecting the Wal-Marts and the Tysons.
People PLEEZ!!!
Get your head out of the sand and read something besides a "black blog" or even a "white blog".
I dont want to point to some individual "discrepancys" here but, GET A GRIP A Clue or something!!! Fidel Castro is going to "out" the CIA about trying to assassinate him in the 50s or whatever? Hopefully, when he writes his "memoirs" he will also write about Chavez being booted out by him, on the street after helping him get to where he is - in charge.
This is "documented" so I am not worried about any repercussions as "black folks" dont read anyway. Which would explain them being able to hide HUGE shipments of illegal drugs in the caskets of dead soldiers being sent home to their families in Jamaica. To which I say - If you gone "tell it"; tell it all!
FACT:
Black people are not "welcome" anywhere by anyone on the planet - PERIOD. There is no other "race" so hated by EVERYONE than blacks.
FACT: My great-grand father was FULL BLOOD CHEROKEE!!! In March of 2007 the "Cherokee Nation" decided to "disown" blacks/Freedmen. Typical for the "5 Nations", but you didnt hear it from me. (They wounded me in a "place" they will never SEE/know.)
And the "Mexican Mafia" is killing black men in the ghetto? But I am supposed to "support" their right to come to the U S and join the rest of the screw up fairies? Like the kids say, "Nigger Please". I like my "species" whether kafir,nigger, abeed, wet back, greaser, etc., like you like your own. SMD!
By "confining" me to this b.s. because of my race and/or gender, you also ensure your own demise. A. Hitler and even the dumb ass (or should I say lethal ass?) Charles Manson figured it the FOSS out. Genetically speaking, if you kill and/or eliminate all of the black people on the planet, you have effectively killed your damn self! As long as Folgers sells coffee, Manson will not get out of prison; because he killed an "elite" not some hood rat or trailer trash. (And "NO", I am not a racist/sexist/etc.,just tired of the STUPID people being "in charge")you care more about animals than black people.
Cassandra
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