
 |
|
May 13, 2013
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
May 5, 2006
/ 7 Iyar, 5766
Not a day without racism
By
Debra J. Saunders
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
If you go by certain columnists and news reports, you see a clear dividing line: good hard-working immigrants — legal, illegal, it makes no difference — who supported the May 1 Great American Boycott versus conservative white racists, who like cheap lettuce but hate immigrants.
I agree that illegal immigrants are, for the most part, good, hard-working folk, but that's where the truth of the stereotype ends. The hundreds of e-mails I've receive in the last week — overwhelmingly in support of my opposition to the boycott, even in the liberal San Francisco Bay Area — belie the propaganda spewed by the boycotters and swallowed whole by too many journalists. The story is not one of good, open-minded immigrants versus bad, closed-minded racists.
For one thing, many legal immigrants opposed the boycott. If you work in California, you probably saw immigrants on the job in your workplace on Monday. Maybe they sympathized with the boycott. Maybe they didn't.
Attorney Manny Madriaga from San Jose, Calif., wrote that he is "a small businessman and a naturalized citizen. I immigrated to the U.S. because it is a nation of laws and it has a vibrant democracy. Any group that shoves signs in our collective faces that they are above the law does not have a place in the United States of America."
Pat, a proud Mexican-American from Orange County, Calif., who didn't want to release her last name, told me she would rather see protests against the high Latino dropout rate or corrupt Mexican government. And, "I have to go shopping after work, my own small contribution to the anti-boycott programs."
A number of readers told of spouses or friends battling with the bureaucracy to win legal status — they were furious that protesters don't think they have to follow the law.
Non-white Americans have issues, too. A woman from Southern California phoned to tell me she is half African-American and part Native-American, and she is sick of watching trauma centers close because hospitals are going broke caring for the uninsured.
This is not a Republican-Democrat issue, either. The April 12 Field Poll found that less than one-third of voters in left-leaning California — only 44 percent of Democrats — back allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses.
Supporters of the May 1 boycott often cite racism as the reason Americans want to limit immigration. I am ashamed to say that some people who oppose illegal immigration spout racist venom.
Nonetheless, it is a mistake to see the pro-illegal forces as free of the racist taint. I'm not just talking about Los Angeles marchers seen yelling "hueros" (white people) in front of businesses open on May 1. The very notion that illegal immigrants do the work Americans won't do — also voiced by President Bush— is predicated on the unspoken notion that black people won't take jobs illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America grab, while white people don't want to work hard, although they are happy to buy cheap products (as if consumers have a choice).
Beneath the public dialogue is an ugly undercurrent of racism that emerges when people are not speaking for public consumption.
One reader e-mailed that the May 1 marchers "are better Americans than the white trash that dominates our welfare system; they are better than the crybaby black males who are now proclaiming that illegal aliens are the greatest threat to blacks since slavery."
A San Franciscan chided me for being mean-spirited about Latinos — I wasn't — when anyone who lives in the Bay Area knows that "Asians have totally taken over this city and surrounding areas with their wealth, greed and filthy personal habits."
There was a time in my career when someone would call me a "racist," and I'd be furious at the facile belief that if you oppose illegal immigration, you are anti-Latino. This week, and not for the first time, I heard from Latinos who oppose illegal immigration but love their heritage. I also heard from illegal-immigration supporters who suggested I was a racist — but they were the ones spewing hate-filled stereotypes.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Comment JWR contributor Debra J. Saunders's column by clicking here.
Debra J. Saunders Archives
© 2006, Creators Syndicate
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|