About Those Damn Mexicans

So there's this buzz going on right now on the left. Bush has made a political mistake and turned his so-called base against him. Some on Free Republic call for his impeachment. And I say, if only someone on Free Republic could spell impeachment...

Now's our chance. Finally we can get the higher ground by getting tough on immigration. We can take the Democratic Party away from the Move Ons and into victory by building this high wall and kicking immigrants back home. It's not just our right, it's our duty, now more than ever.

But why is that? We get our opinions or at least our water-cooler topics of conversation from the media. Why are we talking about immigration now and not four years ago? Simple. Four years ago we were busy debating the sanctity of marriage. Why haven't we talked about illegal immigration twenty years ago? Because we were talking about crack cocaine. Why haven't we been talking about damn Mexicans until now? Because we were talking about AIDS. And about hunger in Ethiopia. And the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And Iran and Lybia and Vietnam and inner-city violence and drugs and the morality of euthanasia.

And now? We have endless wars all over this crumbling planet, inner-city violence rises and wage decreases, people still go hungry due to economic policy dictated by the greed of the few, and people still die of AIDS. Yet somehow we dare talk about illegal immigration.

They're destroying our culture and our way of life - What culture are you talking about? I don't like to watch cars driving around in circles. I don't like backyard fireworks. I don't like wrestling. But it doesn't destroy my culture, just like my activities don't destroy your culture. When they cancel a Nascar race for an emergency discussion about Nabokov we'll talk. Meanwhile, drink your beer and shut up.

Security!!! Now more than ever!!! - It's been said before and I hate to repeat the obvious here, but the 9/11 attack wasn't done by illegal immigrants. This country was relatively safe without a wall, and it will continue to be relatively safe. People die from preventable car accidents, from an ill-conceived war on drugs, from poverty and hunger and even from boredom-driven suicide. People die. It's a fact of life.

They're stealing our jobs - Spend more time looking for a job rather than going online. Go to school and learn a trade. Become a philosopher. And what's so wrong about having people driven to work and succeed in a country that has lost its sense of self-pride? Democrats love to put their heads in the sand and hope for the best. They apologize to people in other countries, saying "Don't blame me. I didn't vote for him." But they're just as guilty as the Free Republican ignorant xenophobes, because one day they woke up, and not knowing why, they said, "Maybe he does have those weapons." The next morning they woke up and said, "I'm all for equal rights, but why do they have to call it marriage?" And yesterday they woke up, after five hundred years of illegal immigrants coming to this country, and they said,

They don't even speak English - Then teach them. Help them. You'll feel better about yourself in the morning.

Hey, Everyone Else is Doing the Imus Thing

Alec Baldwin wants to know why, even though we're in the middle of a war in Iraq and a struggle against the Bush crooks at home people still obsess about Imus. In his words:

[T]his Imus crap is just another distraction from what really matters. The Attorney General may be a corrupt, lying hitman for the Bush-Cheney junta. The war is a disaster that is being prolonged in order to potentially embarrass Democrats in 2008. Global warming is now recognized as a major and looming emergency by literally everyone on Earth but the White House

Yet African American people continue to talk about "the Imus crap." So, what's going on here? Are they so easily distracted? Don't THEY know there's a war on?

Or maybe they're just so sick of this momentary spotlight on our inherent social problems that they wish maybe this time it will last for more than a week; maybe this time we'll talk about black men's treatment of black women, about elitist media that rather than face its own race problem spends its time--now more than ever--condemning hip hop music, about the problem that will not go away until we deal with it.

But It won't happen. Not yet. Not as long as for every Imus in the Morning we have a hundred Glenn Becks in the evening. And for every racist comment made in public, we have a million racist comments made in private.

On the Israel-Lebanon War and the Possible US Escalation in Iraq (or, Just Say No)

A short while ago I wrote a post about my army service in the West Bank. This wasn't simply a redemption piece but also an attempt to reflect on the situation American soldiers face in Iraq. Like them, I was certain I was doing the right thing, and like them, I thought everything I was doing was done in the (self-)defense of my country. Similarly, the implications of the recent Israeli war in Lebanon should be considered with Iraq in mind.

Like the US, the Israeli army was undoubtedly going in with superior military force for what was supposed to be a short offensive, and like in Iraq, it was immediately shown to be a mistake. Many Israeli soldiers died, attacks on Israeli civilians increased, and radical Islamic forces legitimized their relative control. A month into the conflict, the Israeli government was forced to choose what many considered the best of two evils: a retreat or an escalation.

Now, as Americans are divided about the future in Iraq, and as Democratic hopefuls are still afraid of saying the US should leave immediately, it is important to see what happened after the Israeli army left Lebanon. First, and most importantly, the number of casualties on both sides, including civilians, was about 2000 for the one month of conflict (between mid-July and mid-August of 2006). There is no reason to think this trend would have decreased if the fighting had continued at the same pace, and an escalation would have undoubtedly only increased the number of fatalities.

Second, as one of the reasons for remaining in Iraq is a flawed domino theory that scares us into thinking a retreat would destroy American prestige and, more importantly, its power of deterrence, we can first look at the current situation, where the war has created a diminishing American military might, encouraging other nations to rise up, at least rhetorically, against US hegemony. And second, we need to look again at Israel. Retreating after one month from the Lebanon mistake did not diminish Israeli hegemony in the region. If anything, Israel has since regained the power it had lost during the war. Moreover, while the war helped legitimize the Hezbollah, its victory did not create the nightmare scenario the Israeli government was advancing before the war to convince the public this was a no-choice war. Neither Hezbollah nor Syria have any more control over the Lebanese government then they did before, and the risk of Israeli destruction or of future attacks has not grown.

When Democratic hopefuls are asked about their solution for the war, they often either avoid the question by stating the obvious (It's Bush's mess), or endorse a phased, "dignified" withdrawal. This is not enough, not anymore. When the Republican keyboard warriors come with catchy, meaningless slogans like Cut-and-Run, the answer should be Study the Israel-Lebanon War. Sure, it's not as catchy, but it happens to be the truth. When the Israeli government chose retreat over escalation, it put the safety of its citizens first and political prestige second. The future leaders of America should have the courage to do the same.

Character Assassination

Following a story published by Greg Garland in the Baltimore Sun and picked up by various papers in the DC/Baltimore area, it looks as though Kenneth Montague has finally been defeated. The latest smear piece in Garland's personal vendetta implies Montague has used his position as the Secretary of Juvenile Services in Maryland for a coast to coast dream vacation.

There are no outright lies in Garland's character assassination. This is merely an insinuation of corruption, nothing more. Nothing libelous in here.

So what do we have here? Actually, it's easier to see what we don't have in this story. There are no lobbyist-sponsored golf trips and no private jets. There are no brown envelopes and no Jacuzzis overflowing with champagne. What we do have is the story of a Democrat appointed by a Republican for the nearly impossible job of revamping a huge bureaucracy while fending off political punches from Democrats and Republicans on the one hand, and trying his best to do a job while a reporter builds a career out of smear pieces on the other hand.

At some point, after repeated, politically motivated attacks, Ehrlich had made a decision to ignore The Sun. Determined to concentrate on the job at hand, Montague also refused to speak to the Sun. Then the attacks begun.

There were stories of overcrowding and fights in juvenile detention facilities. Some were true, most occurred before Ehrlich and O'Malley took over, all were sensationalized by Garland while any attempt to reform a broken system was ignored. There were other stories involving courageous whistle blowing inspectors who told Garland about the terrible conditions they found. Small details such as Ehrlich and Montague ordering these reports were ignored. That findings did not take later reforms into consideration was also ignored.

Ehrlich lost the elections, but Montague was still a candidate to continue to be the Secretary under O'Malley. Garland and the editors of The Sun could not see that happen. So they dug deep into the files, searching for a hidden Abramoff or a Duke Cunningham, or at least a small vacation on a cruise ship to the Bahamas. Surely they could get something.

To their disappointment, The Sun's researchers could only find learning trips, each with its itinerary and learning points well documented in neat folders. Still, what the hell, The Sun went with the piece. After all, if there wasn't a scandal, they were going to create one. It didn't matter that other Maryland State Secretaries joined Montague in these conferences, and it didn't matter that other states' Juvenile Services Secretaries were there. All the Sun needed to finish Montague's career was a non-story; a hint of corruption which never existed was enough. While Montague was busy traveling from one city to another, bringing ideas and solutions back to Maryland, The Sun was busy destroying him. Finally, it looks like they may have succeeded.

Kenneth Montague resigned today.

The Soul of the Democratic Party

It's been a while without much writing. I wish I could say I've been working on the final touches of my NaNoWriMo but it's been more like post-election fatigue. Here we were, pushing and pushing as hard as we could, arguing our points online and during family dinners, hoping America was tired of war and corruption, and here we are now, the winners, like Dustin Hoffman at the end of The Graduate, asking ourselves "What now?"

So it's not easy, the sinking feeling that even if things change they will take their sweet time doing so. After all, we're dealing with huge bureaucracies filled with constant power struggles and tailored for a system that protects a status quo many of us don't believe in, no matter who is in the majority.

They will tell us things take time, and they will threaten us with insignificance when we get impatient. "Remember Lamont," they will say. They will point their fingers at us and say we sit on the margins of public opinion; the flip-side of the far Right.

But in spite of it all, we must continue our work to pull the Democratic Party away from the so-called middle and into a defined position on issues we care about.

After three years of membership in Democratic Underground, I had to get away after a comment I made was deleted. I dared to criticize a Democratic candidate who is an opportunistic career politician. This man, who destroyed his Democratic opponent and used corrupt and racist policies to fight his Republican opponent didn't deserve our votes. I called for people to stay home. My comment wasn't simply argued against; it was deleted. Apparently, no one needed to hear this kind of argument, or as Skinner, the founder of DU wrote me, "Our policies are clear about telling people not to vote for the Democratic candidate."

This is what we should fight against, first within ourselves and later in public: We do not support the Democratic Party's agenda because we support the Party; we support the Party because its values closely resemble our own. We must fight for the soul of the Democratic Party to keep it from moving to the Right. We must stay away from Tony Blair's "Third Way Labor Party," an empty political entity with no values and no backbone. We must reject Democratic leaders who will vote to ban gay marriage and abortions, we must reject those supporting an increase for defense spending for endless, pointless wars. Now that the Democratic Party has won the election it's time we won back the Democratic Party.

Only by standing up for our values rather than blindly following our Party leaders do we stand a chance of influencing the way the Democratic Party looks in the future; only by singling out and kicking out Democrats by-name-only do we stand a chance of the Democratic Party not becoming a party of Liebermans. Only by keeping our struggle do we have a chance of making history.