The United States has an extremely short view of history. Much of this may be due to people forgetting just what went on before 1776, and concentrating on the enormous changes that occurred since the Industrial Revolution. Often now, though, people's 'long view' barely stretches back to World War I a century ago. I don't see this happening in other countries. France has no trouble thinking back to Charlemagne or the Romans. In Ireland, I was asked if I wanted to see Clontarf, where the Vikings were pushed into the sea in 1040 --"Don't worry, we've cleaned it up a bit since then". In some cities in Switzerland, the "new" bridge is 600 years old and the old bridge is 2,000 years old; the new one is timber, the old one is stone and both are used daily. A lot of the houses in other countries were built before 1492 and are still lived in, and that's not even counting the millennia of history of India and China.
So it comes as no surprise that a lot of Congressional representatives and Senators have forgotten where they came from, where their families came from, how they arrived here and how they made their way to their current situation.
In the broadest sense, everyone in this country is a child of immigrants. If you want to take a slightly less broad sense, consider that a lot of the people who came here in boats, above or below or between decks, pushed around the people who were already here to the point that very few are living on their ancestral land. And it wasn't uncommon for the people who were already here to have done a bit of that as well. Some of the five nations that made the original Iroquois Confederacy moved down into what's now New York from the St. Lawrence Valley hundreds of years ago, dislodging the Erie people who moved west and the Neutral Nation who were absorbed into the westernmost Iroquois tribe, the Seneca -- and even older tribes and nations whose names I don't know. A lot of people today tend to forget this, as they drive or walk or live in places whose original names were given by people in cultures that don't exist any more, or that are little remembered. Everyone knows about the beer that made Milwaukee famous; who knows what "Milwaukee" means? Or Chilicothe? Or Alabama? Or Oregon?
Here's how it was, all the way along: people were here, living their lives, and new people came and lived with them. Some of the people who were here already didn't like it and tried to push the newcomers around -- and because the people who lived here longer generally had more money, they sometimes pushed pretty hard, with riots and deaths, and sometimes with whippings and stonings, and sometimes with burning people out, and sometimes with ignorance and bigotry and sometimes with prejudicial laws. But over time, the people who had just arrived somehow became the people who were already there, and someone else new came in who had to face what the people-who-were-already-there-at-that-point would do. And onward it went.
Where I grew up, the kids of the old-line Dutch and German and English families, whose great-great-great grandparents had arrived here in the early 1800s, tried to lord it over the Polish and Irish and Italian and Central European and Hispanic kids; the black kids generally were outside that scuffle because their ancestors had been here a long time, too, and their families were as working-class as the rest of us newcomers. I remember that kind of hostility going on through high school, as if the culture your family came from or the amount of time your family had been living in the school district made any difference in how well you'd do on the chemistry final. There were a few gangs, but they were interracial and turf-based, more concerned with looking cool in their denim jackets and picking up girls at the bowling alley that they were with history; they also got into fights with the gangs from the other towns, once after a brawl in a spectacular car crash that changed a lot of people's lives. This was just outside a city where the local mob A Team and B Team a few years later were knocking off players on the opposite teams with car bombs. It wasn't easy being Italian in that city for a long time. (As you may guess, I see racism as a subset of bigotry, because some of the nastiest bigotry I've ever seen was between people who shared skin color but not cultural background and beliefs.)
Think about the current Administration, and think about Congress, the House and the Senate. How many of the people who were elected or appointed to these positions come from families whose parents arrived in this country during the 1900s, during the immigration of Germans and Italians and Poles and Central Europeans and Jewish refugees of all countries from Nazi camps, and Vietnamese and Cambodians and Chinese and Laotians and Indians? Not to mention the immigration of war brides (and eventually children) from every country where US troops went? How many of the officials' parents arrived here during the 1800s, mostly from Europe, fleeing the potato famine or the Napoleonic wars or the revolutions of 1848? How many of their ancestors fought in the US Civil War? How many fought in the Mexican War of the 1840s, or the War of 1812? How many were here for the Revolution -- or were pushed out to Canada as Tories, losing land and possessions but keeping their lives, and might have moved back to get jobs in Chicago or New York a few decades later when the Industrial Revolution made the American cities a drawing point for labor? How many had ancestors who were here from the start, either arriving in the first ships or meeting the ships? Or, in the Southwest, ancestors who always lived in that area, under whatever government or ruler, until wars resulted in border lines drawn that divided families and someone had to decide which way to go? Chances are that the vast majority of our elected officials come from familes who didn't get off the first boat at Plymouth Rock; chances also are that anyone whose family has been in some parts of this country for more than a century and a half has ancestors who were here five hundred years ago as well, not that most people realize this. And all of these people, from whatever place, however long ago, have become part of what we know as America. What we think of as Middle America, the culture of the Great Plains, inland from the more obvious international influences that affect coastal cities and states, grew out of a combination of influences from German, Scandinavian, English, Scottish, Mennonite and other cultures. It's becoming seasoned now in some places by an influx of refugees from Southeast Asia; within another generation, that too will change. Just because it changes more slowly than on the coast does not mean it does not change at all.
Why should this matter, in terms of how they do their jobs? It shouldn't, and most times it doesn't. Whether I agree with their positions on the issues or not, the majority of our legally elected officials are intelligent, capable people. But the one place it does matter is when they try to make laws about immigration, and forget who they themselves are and where they came from. This time around the wheel, if you don't remember where your family came from, someone might remind you. I suspect that many of the members of Congress who want to close the door are acting a lot more like the Chili Boys and the Riga Boys drawing lines around the local bowling alley. But make no mistake: the current immigration discussion fighting its way through Congress has very, very little to do with the actual security of this country, and much more to do with two other things: the desire of neoCon Republicans to impose their will on everyone else, including the paranoid xenophobia they share with some Administration officials that want to see this country turned into a totalitarian state.
The other -- largely unacknowledged -- reason that the Republicans don't want more immigrants is the historical fact that immigrants tend to vote liberally, with the Democrats or whatever other party wanted to enlarge the social safety net and give them a place to be at home. Republicans are scrambling to continue to control Congress in the face of rising public disapproval of Administration policies, and if they lose control of either Senate or House the political landscape may well undergo a sizeable earthquake.
...With ultimate approval of the Senate committee bill unlikely, the most attractive alternative outcome would be for the immigration issue to blow up in the face of hot-headed congressional Republicans who want to build a Berlin Wall along the U.S.-Mexican border and catapult as many illegal aliens as possible back across it. You'd think they were in possession of some latter day version of the Zimmerman Telegram.
An exploding immigration debate would, unfortunately, barely singe many of the House Republicans who forced through a mean-spirited joke of an immigration bill late one night in December on a largely party-line 239-182 vote. Nary a trace of a guest-worker program, supposedly a non-negotiable demand by Bush, appears in the House bill.
Many of the House bill's supporters come from crassly gerrymandered seats that allow them to stake out the most reactionary position without much fear of voter retribution. "Very white representatives in very safe Republican districts," noted Alan Hoffenblum, himself a Republican political consultant in Los Angeles.
A stalemate on immigration could be less attractive for Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., who has expressed determination to all but personally string barbed wire atop a new border barrier from Brownsville to San Diego. Another Frist flop would perfectly bookend a year-long run of political miscalculation by the grasping 2008 presidential prospect that began with his butting into the Terry Schiavo case.
What would the Republican right, whom Frist has been trying to smarm up to, think if the mighty leader cannot deliver on his border-blocking promise? They'll think what some already think of Frist: not much.
Frist has tried to play a legislative game of chicken on immigration, saying he would call up this week his own intemperate proposal if the Judiciary Committee did not produce a bill.
But now that the committee has, Frist must decide if it's dangerous for his political health to allow a final Senate vote on a bill that would be likely to draw a majority of Democrats and just enough Republican votes to ensure passage.
Republicans who point with assurance to national polls that show growing anti-immigrant sentiment may need to be reminded that there were similar polls in California in the mid-1990s when Republicans rallied behind Proposition 187, a measure to deny state services to illegals.
The measure passed but was thrown out in a court challenge. Of more partisan importance, Republicans have never recovered their footing in the nation's most populous state.
"Republicans in Congress better beware," said California consultant Hoffenblum.
Hispanics can interpret the anti-immigrant message as "unless you look like us and talk like us we don't want you to vote for us," Hoffenblum said.
The angst in Congress contrasts sharply with largely joyous pro-immigrant demonstrations around the country, prompting political scientist Sherry Bebitch Jeffe of the University of Southern California to remark on the political effects of the debate that so many conservatives have been demanding: "It energizes the Democratic base and splits the Republican base."...
I have not heard yet whether one of the most insidious bits of the immigration reform has been removed from the House or Senate bills: the section that would say that children born in the US of illegal immigrants would not be US citizens. If anyone hears anything on that, please comment.
I suspect that when talk is raised on 'detaining' illegal immigrants -- such as the thousands of illegal Chinese immigrants that China doesn't want back -- this is where those secret detention camps may come into use. I hate that my country is trying to turn itself into the USSR with its gulag archipelago. Damn it, we're supposed to know better than that.
3/29/2006 10:23:00 AM
Monday, March 20, 2006
So, what will life be like without the Fourth Amendment?
...Our effort to take America for Christ is now a peculiar cultural artifact, a curiosity gathering dust on the shelf of early 20th-century history. We built triumphant monuments to our importance. At the Metropolitan Memorial United Methodist Church in Washington, D.C., a prime, front-pew seat features a plaque marking where the President of the United States should sit when he attends—not unlike churches in Constantinople that once featured imperial boxes for the emperor to ride his chariot into without having to dismount. But Caesar's seat goes empty these days, even with a Methodist President.
This is not to denigrate monuments from a more triumphant age of mainline Protestantism—many such places still do fine ministry. But church influence on politics is fickle. "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's," our Lord says. The last people in the world who want to be caught dead pledging allegiance to the wrong Lord ought to be evangelicals.
I expect you'll amen this general warning, but let the preacher step on a few toes. I understand why you support the war on terror, for instance—to defeat evildoers, to spread democracy. But remember that a just war in the Christian tradition, according to many theologians, requires penance by its wagers—not celebration. Christians ought to be the most eager repenters around.
I know you are used to being a persecuted minority, but isn't it time to drop the inferiority complex, rule graciously, and love your enemies, even if they are liberal? I know politics makes strange bedfellows, but do you really want to be allied with foul-mouthed know-it-alls on AM radio or with politicians who don't care a lick about Jesus?...
...These people are absolute lunatics; they have had a complete break with reality. And any elected official who supports this categorical balderdash about the judiciary “overruling” god is committing treason, plain and simple. They are quite literally betraying a fundamental principle upon which this nation was founded as laid out in the Constitution, which they swore to uphold. I’m tired of pussyfooting around this bullshit. They’re angling for a theocracy, and that’s patently unacceptable. Cornyn, Brownback, DeLay, and any of their godshill compatriots who support this bullshit need to be immediately censured and removed from Congress if they cannot commit to upholding the separation of church and state as they are required to do....
Meet the four horsemen of the Constitutional apocalypse: Republican Senators Mike DeWine, Olympia Snowe, Lindsey Graham, and Chuck Hagel. "Apocalypse, what hyperbole!" you say. But how else to label the fact that these four Senators will bring to the Senate a billowing white flag of surrender, and a crown for their King?
Yesterday, these four Senators introduced the "Terrorist Surveillance Act of 2006." The bill would legalize the President's crimes. It would allow this Congress to rubber-stamp the administration's violation of FISA and the Fourth Amendment by condoning warrantless spying. According to their ass-backwards approach to oversight, the President can continue to spy on Americans without a warrant for 45 days. After 45 days, the President has three choices:
1. "Stop" the spying: Because naturally, we can trust this government to cease and desist on demand, given its amazing track record of self-restraint; 2. Ask the FISA court for a court order: Because naturally, this President has shown great respect for the FISA court process and would dutifully follow Congressional directives when it comes to applying for a FISA order; or 3. Inform the Intelligence Sub-committee: Because, of course, the President has proven he can be trusted to follow the law and notify intelligence activities about warrantless spying. The bill is co-sponsored by four so-called "moderates" in order to hide its radical and catastrophic nature. What these four extremists accomplish with their bill is to amend the Constitution unilaterally--without the consent of the states--by nullifying the Fourth Amendment. Warrant? Reasonable cause? Psssh. Remnants of a pre-9/11 world, my friends.
Their bill, by making congressional notification optional, also effectively repeals the National Security Act of 1947, which requires the President keep the House and Senate Intelligence Committees "fully and currently informed of all intelligence activities." If the administration does chose to inform the Intelligence Sub-Committee, the members on that committee cannot disclose any abuses they may learn of. They can't order the government to stop the spying and they can't hold the government accountable for any abuses. Their mouths are sealed shut. Their hands are bound with inaction. They can do nothing but serve as audience for an all-powerful King. As Senate Judiciary Chairman Specter commented, this bill lets the administration "do whatever the hell it wants." And this is "oversight"? The sadder question that needs to be asked is is this America anymore?...
You want to do your good deed for the day? Contact your Senators and tell them to reject the DeWine bill and go for censure. You can find your Senators' contact information here at http://www.senate.gov, listed by state.
Why am I so hot on this issue? Several reasons: Drilling will have permanent -- as in thousands of years -- ecological consequences, including ruining the breeding grounds for the Porcupine caribou herd, which migrates from ANWR to the Yukon and back every year. The Gwi'itchin people in the Yukon are some of the last of the caribou people -- they hunt caribou to survive, and if the herd does not come, they will starve. It would not be outside of bounds for Canada to look unkindly upon the US if its residents' wellbeing is threatened. Do we really want our longtime northern neighbor on the other side in a war? I'd rather avoid that if possible. I'd rather keep the untouched ANWR untouched, a place for animals and for the people whose ancestors lived there, not ruin it for the sake of three months' worth of oil.
3/20/2006 02:57:00 PM
