Let's read through this article on the latest Arizona law targeted at Latinos. Please keep in mind as you read this, this has nothing to do with illegal immigration. It's schools.
First, the headline.
Arizona gov. signs bill targeting ethnic studies
No, she signed a law targeting Latino studies. As you'll see below, the impetus was political and specifically because of Latino studies. So, the state bans a local school district's program? Where is the Tea Party rally against big government? I'm waiting.
So, why shouldn't they teach this?
State schools chief Tom Horne, who has pushed the bill for years, said he believes the Tucson school district's Mexican-American studies program teaches Latino students that they are oppressed by white people.
Umm... the schools chief opposes a law that teaches what is more or less the truth? I mean, is there really any arguing this, especially in Arizona?
So, I really hate it when people say "Orwellian" for effect when something is really just wrong. Maybe I'm doing that, but this seals it:
"It's just like the old South, and it's long past time that we prohibited it," Horne said.
No, Horne doesn't mean the workers in the field picking your cheap produce for slave wages are like the Old South. He actually means the Latino-studies program teaching their students that rich white douchebags like Horne make their life more difficult. You see, overt acts of racism are ok if you can somehow bamboozle people into thinking it's "color blind."
Horne is a Republican running for attorney general.
He's been trying to restrict [the programs] ever since he learned that Hispanic civil rights activist Dolores Huerta told students in 2006 that "Republicans hate Latinos."
Gee, how wrong is she? Silly grape lady, don't you know that Arizona Republicans heart all of you brown people so much? Can't you tell? And so that's what this is really about. Someone spoke the truth about the more or less genocidal talk that is considered tolerable in polite white society in many western states that, unfortunately is not confined to the Republican party, though all opposition to it is located outside the Republican party.
Look, I've lived most of my life in California. I know the things people say. And it's not just that they say them. It's that they say them in public, like it's not weird. If I said, "we should shoot every Jew* that tries to come to America," people would rightfully think I was a Nazi. But shooting Mexicans crossing the border is perfectly acceptable talk in white society in California. If I said, "we should round up all the Jews in California and deport them," same rule would apply. But people don't seem to see it that way here when it comes to the "illegals."
Yeah, I get it. They are breaking the law crossing the border. I suppose that means every time you drive 66 on the freeway we should round you up and put you in a camp? Or better yet, have the traffic cameras shoot you? Yeah, I get it too that a porous border is bad for national security. I get it that violent criminals peddling dangerous drugs take advantage of this. Yet the solutions are never about that, are they? They're always about kicking "illegals" out of school, out of hospitals, and now...
Wait. What on earth does this have to do with "illegals?" Isn't this a school program, not a border security program? Nothing. Nothing at all. Unless, of course, you realize that "illegals" is just code for "Latinos" regardless of their immigration status.
This is sick, sick. Very sick. It's the kind of conduct that requires action. If these loons who are so confused they aren't even aware they are racist don't get stopped, history will wonder why the rest of us let them continue.
* No, this does not compare to the Holocaust. However, I know the limits of "polite conversation" in most parts of California. If I said the same exact thing of non-Mexicans what I said would not be tolerated. Before I get electronically krav magaed, n.b. I'm a Jew. A very big Jew.