When Racists Cry "Racism!"

With a President who will send 160,000 troops to Iraq to fight to protect this nation from Al Qaeda but who refuses to do anything to stem the invasion by criminal aliens flooding by the hundreds-of-thousands across our borders, the compromise of our laws and national security continues.

There are few Americans, born or naturalized, who would state that the numbers of criminal immigrants coming into this country is not a problem. Even those who would say that would still concede that the lack of security leading to this issue is a problem, since if we don't know who is coming over the border, it would be very easy (and I hate to speak in the hypothetical, as I'm quite sure that this is happening now) for terrorists to walk right on in.

But just try to speak out about this. The CAs already here along with their friends, relatives, advocacy groups, and politicians looking at this population segment as a rich pool of potential votes will shout you down in a din worthy of a group thousands of times their numbers. What's their argument? Well, you might hear the occasional "[Criminal Aliens] take jobs Americans won't do," argument, but since it has been proven that many jobless Americans have pointed to jobs held by CAs as being jobs they'd gladly do, that one fizzled out. So what are they left with? Absolutely nothing. So what can they possibly say?

The "R" word.

Here's where the Irony comes into play.

Americans who truly love America and want to protect our country "from all enemies, foreign and domestic," want to stop criminal immigration. We simply want to stop this blatant disregard for the laws of this country, and we want to know who is coming and going. There is a process in place for people who want to come here and we want that followed. If the unfortunate aspiring immigrant is denied, that is because, through our representative democracy, we have decided that there is a reason why we don't want this person coming into our country. You know that. I know that.

However, when the pro-CA crowd has nothing on us, they play the race card. This is the political equivalent of, "I know you are, but what am I?" They call us "Racists" and even invoke the names of such horrid organizations as the KKK, Nazis, etc. They say that we hate Mexicans, Latinos, and Hispanics. But did we say anything about race? I didn't. Did you? I didn't think so. So here's what I think of these claims...they are calling me a racist to mask their own racism! "How's that?" you might ask. Well...allow me to digress for a moment.

Growing up in Boston in the 1970s, I experienced a huge amount of racism. With the desegregation and busing debates going on at the time, racial tensions between whites and blacks were at their highest point of any time in my life. My neighborhood was a mixture of predominantly Irish and Italians. Racism against blacks was the order of the day. The "n" word was commonplace. There was so much fear and hate that it was almost palpable. We were taught, by word or example, that if we saw a black person walking down the street we should avoid him and be watchful. Why? He might be a criminal. Rightfully and thankfully I, as well as the community as a whole, has outgrown that attitude.

But think for a minute what your reaction would be if I happened to be walking down the street with you today and we saw a black stranger walking toward us and I crossed the street to avoid him because, "He might be a criminal." You'd be appalled, right? Of course, and rightly so! Why? Because, while anyone might be a criminal, it was racist of me to single that man out as a possible criminal based on his race. How about a little word association? You say "criminal," and I respond with "Black," or worse, the "n" word. Would that make me a racist? You bet it would!

"Ok, so what does this have to do with CAs and the people that love them," you might ask. Well, did I say "Mexican?" Did I say "Latino?" Did I say "Hispanic?" Nope. Not me. I said "Criminal Alien," (my preferred term, although you might prefer the more common "Illegal Immigrant"). So, by calling me a racist, the pro-CA set inadvertently calls attention to the fact that when I say the words "criminal," and "alien," they think "Mexican," "Latino," or "Hispanic!"

That's right, they are the true racists!

In fact, I don't care who the CAs are. The fact that the vast majority are Mexican is completely immaterial to me. I want all immigration controlled. Not stopped, controlled. If we had a glut of illegal Canadians here, I'd be saying the same thing. I wouldn't be learning how to say "Eh," or teaching ice-fishing in the schools to accommodate their anchor-babies. I'd be calling for securing the border and for the deportation of as many as we can find.

And one last point: The goal here is to control who comes into our country so that we don't get other countries' refuse and undesirables coming here. The goal is to enforce the law. It so often gets lost in the shuffle of shifting arguments the fact that there are laws in the United States of America that say it is not OK to come into this country without a visa. Questioning my motives for demanding that those laws be enforced does not, in any way, diminish the importance of enforcing those laws. I could be the biggest racist in the world, thinking that Latinos are the scum of the earth (a view which I most certainly do NOT espouse), but that doesn't make it wrong to enforce the law.

If you hate the law so much, change it. But don't resort to subterfuge, argument-dodging, and obfuscation to push your agenda. If you truly believe you are right, then you can say with conviction that anyone who wants to come here should be allowed in, and petition your representatives to make that so. So far, I haven't heard anyone make that argument.

Until then, you need to have the same respect for the laws that all Americans are taught.