There is no point to a May “skip” day for Latino students

Give me another shot of tequila. It seems that the same kinds of “geniuses” who came up with the concept of a Tequila Party to encourage Latino political involvement concocted another nonsensical idea that would go a long way toward achieving the exact opposite of its alleged intentions.

It seems that activists in the Phoenix area, sick and tired of young Latinos having their interests ignored in school, want to make a symbolic gesture to show how important the young ones are to the educational system.

HENCE, THEY ARE considering a measure by which all Latino students on May 2 of next year would stay home from school that day. They seem to think everyone will be shocked and appalled at the lack of brown faces and Spanish-tinged names in the classrooms – and will suddenly realize the significance of the Latino to the student body.

Excuse me for snickering. Because a part of me wonders if this particular  bit of “protest” is legitimate, or some sort of sick joke concocted by some sort of Klan sympathizer.

Who else would think that having Latinos stay at home for an extra day (it’s a Monday, so we’d be talking a three-day weekend) is somehow a plus? It strikes me as being similar to those people who took the promotional items from the film “A Day With Out A Mexican” and turned them into racist diatribes about how our society would be better off with that very predicament – even though the film portrayed a world where no work got done because there were no “Mexicans” to do it.

In fact, just about all the Internet “commentary” I have read in response to this idea for a protest praises it because it reinforces their segregationist fantasies.

IF ANYTHING, A more serious idea that would “offend” the sensibilities of those in our society who are our opposition would be if every single Latino showed up in school on that date and took a serious interest in their personal self-betterment through education.

Then again, that would take some serious work to coordinate. I suppose telling people to slack off for a day is so much easier.

As I understand it, the group behind this effort is one called Chicanos Unidos Arizona, which has tried several stunts to draw attention to the hostile activity that has emanated from that state’s Legislature – and which will be battled out in the federal court system for the next few years all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States.

This group has urged people to boycott Madonna because the aging singer is including Phoenix on her upcoming concert tour. They even wrote out a $350 check to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., even though none of them as Arizona residents could vote for him.

IN SHORT, THIS group seems  to be about public stunts and theater; creating a bit of drama to draw attention to their cause – which is a noble one on account that it is improving the lot in life of the growing Latino population.

So if we think of these activists as actors trying to create a show, then perhaps their acts such as filing a court brief in support of the federal government’s position challenging the Arizona state law requiring local police to take a greater role in federal immigration law enforcement is the equivalent of the group putting on an Oscar-worthy production.

But just as every star actor has a few clunkers, this latest proposed stunt is one of them. Perhaps we should think of it as the activist equivalent of the film, “Howard the Duck.”

Just as that film is best ignored every time it comes on an obscure cable television channel, the idea of skipping school on May 2 is equally abominable – right alongside the idea of creating a separate Latino political party named for tequila.

  -30-

“Tequila Party” sounds like somebody’s been drinking too much

"Tequila Party" could take on a new meaning ...

On the one hand, it is encouraging to hear of Latino activists realizing the need to gain more influence within electoral politics and the current governmental structure in order to make the changes in our society that are so desperately needed.

But when I read accounts such as the one published in the Las Vegas Sun newspaper where activists are contemplating the creation of a new organization (which, in mocking the Tea Party activists, is tentatively being called the Tequila party), I have to wonder who is getting delusional.

IN SHORT, WHO has been downing too many shots at Tequila parties.

I get my giggles from the Tea Party types who get so worked up in their rhetoric that it becomes all too apparent they live in their own little worlds, and their anger about our society is because they are misfits. The more extremist of those Tea Party types are un-electable, and they will be the reason that movement’s future is limited.

They’ll either assimilate, or die off. Either fate is fine with me.



... if some Latino activists get their way.

But when it comes to the growing Latino population, I’d hate to think of our political future falling into the same fate.



I HONESTLY BELIEVE that if a significant number of Latino activists persist with talk of splitting off into our own future, all that would happen is that we isolate ourselves to the point where we get nothing.



In fact, I can’t help but think that the more rabid Tea Party types would like that idea. A part of me wonders if it is Tea Party types who are trying to put up Latinos into spewing such nonsense-talk.

For better or worse, we have two established political parties in our government. The goals of our ethnic brethren are best served by working to gain as much influence within those two parties as is possible.

I have no desire to back some political entity that has the feel of H. Ross Perot – only with a light-brown complexion and an occasional word of Spanish thrown into the mix.

BECAUSE THAT IS what I truly think of the sound of a “Tequila Party.” It would be as loopy and irrational as anything spewed by that Texas billionaire back during his presidential bids of 1992 and ’96.

About the only thing I can understand about these people talking about Tequila Parties is their level of discontent with the two established parties – a Republican Party that is so intent these days of gaining the nativist vote that it seems to openly encourage the use of Latinos as a political punching bag.

That is the only reason such large percentages of Latinos vote for Democrats – it’s purely by default. Too many Latino activists see Democratic officials who seem too scared to challenge the GOP partisans on any issue that remotely impacts Latinos in a positive manner.

In campaigning in the month prior to the November 2010 elections, President Barack Obama tried appealing to Latino voters on the grounds that a Republican-influenced federal government would be blatantly hostile toward our interests.



IN A SENSE, he is correct. Just consider that in Indiana, Tea Party types are seriously considering a challenge to long-time Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., because they’re offended that he doesn’t share their opposition to the DREAM Act.



LUGAR: Upsetting his "allies?"

He is committing the cardinal sin, in their mini-minds, of trying to get Republicans to support the measure that would allow for eventual citizenship for young people who complete a college education or serve honorably in the U.S. military.

We know that many Republican officials these days are not our allies. Although I say the way to deal with that is through our numbers who persist in voting for the GOP.

The more Latinos who consider themselves Republican would mean increased exposure. Just like more political pressure from those who are Democrats is what it will take to get party officials there to get off their collective duffs.

IN SHORT, WE need to increase our numbers within the two established parties to become a serious part of them. We need to kick the door down to the establishment so we can get in. Isolating ourselves would give the government officials all the more reason to ignore us, while also providing a stupid punch line for their gags.

Tequila Party? Please!

  -30-

GOP “success” factors will be their eventual downfall

Thanksgiving Day table conversation got a little heated, particularly when my college-age cousin persisted in saying nice things about Sarah Palin – which got her mother, aunt and grandmother all worked up about what a “disaster” it would be if that woman ever got elected to a position of significance.

Personally, I think my cousin was just trying to stir up an argument for kicks, which is why I didn’t feel compelled to join in. I really don’t feel threatened by Palin, or any of these new people who managed to get themselves elected earlier this month and are now claiming they’re going to undo the accomplishments of the past two years.

IN FACT, I stumbled across a story published Friday by the Las Vegas Review-Journal newspaper that further reinforced my gut feeling that these kinds of people who are pushing conservative ideological beliefs as some sort of revolution are going to be the undoing of the GOP, and will ensure for the long run that people with sense prevail.

That newspaper account looked at the composition of the newly-elected Nevada state Legislature, and found that the Republican caucus is almost entirely a batch of white guys.

Only one of the 11 women who serve in the Legislature identifies with the GOP. Just about anyone in the Legislature who isn’t a white male is a Democrat.

This isn’t a surprise. It merely means the trends that began back when Richard Nixon ran for president in 1968 on a “Southern Strategy” of appealing for the votes of people who feel threatened by the trends of modern society has reached its natural peak.

THE PROBLEM WITH that strategy is that it ultimately has trapped the GOP into needing to over-rely on the voter support of a segment of our society that deliberately stands against trying to build any kind of coalition to the rest of the people.

And it is those “rest of the people” who are the growing segment of our society.

Palin herself might be a woman, but she’s trying to position herself as the choice of people who don’t like “pushy broads,” which is what I would guess is how the ideologues would describe the 10 female members of the Nevada Legislature who are Democrats.

Which ultimately makes the 2010 election cycle the aberration – a period in which people who were grossly offended by ’08 managed to milk the natural tendency to retract support for the president’s political party to its extreme. A recent poll by the Gallup Organization showed that only 27 percent of people really want those Tea Party types to have a strong influence over public policy; a figure that is bound to decline with the passage of time.

IT ALSO MEANS that the election cycle for 2012 is most likely to be the corrective cycle that knocks some of the fringier members of Congress from their posts.

The simple fact is that the United States is becoming an ethnic nation, with that mixture of ethnicities not limited to people who would appear from a distance to be white.

Which puts those conservative ideologues who persist in turning the Republican Party into a mirror image of themselves on a path to their own destruction. Without a change on their part, the Republican Party that once represented the ideals of Abraham Lincoln but now seems more interested in touting Ronald Reagan above all else is going to become the party of the past.

As it is, that Nevada Legislature Democratic caucus more strongly resembles the composition of our society than does the Republican caucus. And Nevada isn’t even unique. The idea that it was BIG NEWS that a couple of Latinos got elected as Republicans to positions in the Southwestern U.S. was significant because it is still far out of the norm.

ALL TOO OFTEN, non-Anglo people wishing to get involved in public policy wind up with the Democrats by default – scared off by people like Palin (who I honestly believe is all talk, although I do expect her to try for a run for president in ’12).

Because even though my cousin was plugging Palin, I couldn’t help but notice the nicest thing she really had to say about Sarah was how comical she looked on that reality-based television show she did – particularly in one scene where she was beating up on a fish she had just caught.

That alone is probably enough of an image to take down her presidential dreams.

  -30-

NOTICIAS de LATINO: Are these ornaments the latest fad?

We’re now into the holiday season (even though so many places seemed eager to hang up the Christmas decorations a month or two ago), and I couldn’t help but stumble onto what seems to be a new fad – Latino-themed ornaments for the Christmas tree.

Now in all fairness, I must admit it is not a new concept. My mother had a few ornaments that she always referred to as the “Mexican ornaments,” but that was because they were hand-made by craftsmen in Mexico.

THEY WEREN’T ANYTHING like the newest ornaments, which I saw being sold by a San Jose, Calif.-based company called CasaQ.

One can hang the Virgin of Guadalupe from their tree, if they wish, or little miniature figurines of painter Frida Kahlo. There’s even a figure called “Rudolfo,” which purports to be a reindeer with a nose colored rojo (and not because he had too much tequila to drink).

-I’m still trying to figure out if these ornaments are cute, kitschy or downright tacky in appearance. Personally, I wonder what Kahlo herself would think of her image being turned into an ornament for the Christmas tree (only $35 for a 5 1/2-inch glass ornament detailed down to her thick eyebrows).

Now I’m not telling you how to spend your money. It’s your choice. Just don’t look to me to buy any of these ornaments, in part because they seem to go counter to the spirit of Christmas.

IF I FEEL like adding an ethnic component to any holiday decorations I do around the homestead this season, I most likely will dig those ornaments of my mother’s out of the closet where she had all of her Christmas decorations stored away.

If anything, I sense she would want me to remember her this season by keeping a touch of her Christmas image alive. I also think she’d berate me if I seriously spent money on an ornament depicting, “Pancho Claus.”

So now that Thanksgiving is over (and I hope we didn’t overstuff ourselves with too much pavo), it is time to count down to the 29 days remaining until we have a Feliz Navidad, or four more days until the beginning of Hanukkah (take your pick).

What else is notable on this day when I pledge at all costs to avoid anything resembling a shopping mall (which means I won’t be anywhere near a Macy’s store where these ornaments are being sold)?

GEE, WHAT A SHOCK. LATINOS PLAY FOOTBALL TOO:  For what it’s worth, some people seem enamored with the fact that Mark Sanchez of the New York Jets is a Latino (of Mexican ethnicity, to be exact).

But the tone of this particular story  (on the Fox News Latino website) seems to be amazed that the number of Latinos playing professional football in this country is on the rise. Our numbers are on the rise everywhere, so why should the National Football League be any different?

A sport where big guys get to jump on each other and try to bash each other about seems like a natural match. It is the Mexican-based Lucha Libre form of professional wrestling, after all, that shows once and for all just how big of wimps these WWE-type wrestlers truly are.

A LOOK INTO THE FUTURE?: Raul Ramos y Sanchez is an author in the middle of writing a series of novels that offer up a scary vision for our nation, if we’re not careful.

His storyline, started in the book America Libre and continued in House Divided (which I currently am working my way through), is of a United States of America in the 21^st Century where the white masses were so hostile to the growing Latino population that Latinos began to fight back.

He has made it clear that this is fiction, although it is a vision that could be the worst-case scenario if the nativist element of our society isn’t brought under control.

For those wanting to hear more from Ramos y Sanchez, take into account that he will be appearing on the Hispanic Information and Telecommunications Network program Diologa de Costa a Costa on Tuesday at 7 p.m. (central standard time).

  -30-

Could beisbol cause embargo to be lifted?

I’m starting to wonder if it is going to be the so-called National Pastime (a.k.a., baseball) that causes the U.S. government to someday end its decades-old policy of trying to isolate Cuba from the rest of the world.



We’re talking about the trade embargo, by which U.S. companies and individuals are forbidden to do business with the Cuban government, and by which we officially look down upon nations that are sympathetic to Cuba.

IT WAS THOUGHT that the embargo would result in a Cuba that was so economically stricken that its people would revolt against the Communist government. Instead, all it has done is fed into the Castro propaganda machine by giving them someone (U.S.) to blame for all of the country’s financial troubles.

The rest of the world looks upon that embargo implemented during the presidency of John F. Kennedy as an anachronism of the Cold War.

But now, there is a development that I think could cause a shift when it comes to professional baseball officials in this country – who usually support the status-quo on most issues and claim it is because they don’t want to get involved in politics.

Cuba, which likes to think that its national baseball team and the Cuban League itself is among the elite of the sport, is considering measures that would allow Cuban peloteros to play ball elsewhere in the world.

THE PROPOSAL SAYS that Cuban citizens could openly play baseball professionally in leagues existing in such places asTaiwan, Japan and South Korea, along with Italy, and Latin American nations such as Venezuela, Nicaragua and Mexico.

They would not be able to openly play ball in the U.S. major leagues, all because of that trade embargo.

Which is why I can’t help but think we could someday see Major League Baseball lobbyists among those pushing for an end to the trade embargo. I just can’t see U.S. baseball officials finding it acceptable that the Mexican League would get a crack at talented ballplayers, whereas the American and National leagues would not.

Obviously, Cubans do manage to play baseball professionally in the United States. But we’re talking about the whole route of defection and having to take risks and accept the fact that they’re cutting themselves off from their families back home in Cuba.

UNDER THIS NEW proposal being studied by the Cuban Baseball Federation (whose vice president, Antonio Castro, is the son of Fidel and nephew of current Cuba President Raul), the whole thing would be done openly. Which would mean contact could be maintained, and the ballplayers would have a chance to make some money for their families.

Cuba is doing this because they want the public recognition from the baseball world. That is why they’re willing to alter the current Cuban tax setup and let the ballplayers keep 60 percent of their wages (currently, Cuban citizens who earn money from foreign countries are taxed at an 80 percent rate).

It also is why they are considering moving forward from their past effort to encourage Cuban competition in foreign leagues – Cubanos were required to “retire” from Cuban baseball before they could play elsewhere, which meant the athletes who played in Japan or elsewhere were physically past their peak years (and earning potential).

But you know that the peloteros Cubanos who are ambitious enough to live in a foreign country are going to be chomping at the bit to come to the United States for the same reason that other athletes from foreign countries focus on this country – Major League Baseball pays better than the professional leagues in Japan, Mexico or anywhere else on this planet.

ULTIMATELY, IT IS the embargo that stands in the way of the United States being added to the list of countries that Cuba’s athletic federation will sell its ballplayers to.

That is why I think baseball officials in this country ultimately will take up the cause of eliminating the trade embargo. They will claim they still are not interested in playing politics – they just want the top-talent ballplayers.

Which may be a noble sentiment that benefits the nation – even if it comes about because of hard-nosed considerations by teams hoping to find a better shortstop or an extra bat in the lineup.

  -30-

A few random thoughts …

REID: What does he have to lose?

Reading a recent report published by the Politico website/newspaper about the partisan climate of Congress these days seems to conclude that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is making a serious tactical mistake if he pushes ahead for something resembling a vote next week on the DREAM Act.

Such an act would offend the partisan opponents of anything related to immigration so much that it would kill off any chance of the long-overdue reform of the nation’s immigration policies from being approved.

WHAT MAKES ME skeptical about this idea is the fact that the new GOP-majority House of Representatives has already made it clear they are so opposed to the idea. I say there’s nothing to lose, and Reid’s act may wind up becoming little more than a token gesture of support.

If anything, what I expect to come out of an attempt to vote on the issue is that people are going to be put “on the record” as to whether they want to address immigration issues, or are more interested in playing partisan politics.

It could wind up becoming the first of several acts taken by Republican partisan politicians during the next two years that will wind up backfiring on them by making them appear to be more interested in playing politics against people who aren’t just like them.



PALIN: Can Sarah dance?

I do believe that callousness will wind up resulting in the so-called gains of the Republicans from this past election cycle being scaled back. It may even become so intense that it ensures the re-election of Barack Obama in 2012 out of a sense that someone has to balance out those people (that could wind up being the true harm of Sarah Palin if she pursues a bid for president in two years).

AS FOR THOSE people who are getting worked up these days over the fact that Palin’s daughter is doing so well on that “Dancing with the Stars” television show despite an alleged lack of talent, all I have to say is that while it may be true that Mama Sarah’s political fans are behind Bristol’s strong fan support, since when does anyone with any real talent appear on any of those shows?

It’s all about being (with apologies to Mike Royko) the tallest midget in the circus.

A couple of other news items also managed to catch my attention.

Robert Creamer (a.k.a., Mr. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill.) published a commentary pointing out how the conservative ideologues of Illinois had the sense to hold back on the rancid rants against “foreigners” during the recent elections – because they knew the issue would backfire against them.

THAT IS WHAT happens when you have a state with a significant immigrant population that will see through the nonsense-talk. It also is the type of place already that many states are going to become in future years.



ROS-LEHTINEN: Should she keep quiet?

There also is the outrage expressed by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., over the fact that Israel recently offered praise for Cuba, following comments by Fidel Castro that criticized Iran’s hostility toward the Jewish state.

It must be nice to serve in Congress, where such a rant can warrant an apology from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. And I can appreciate the fact that a Cuban exile like Ros-Lehtinen would be sensitive to every nuance of this issue.

But I can’t help but wonder how outraged the Lady from Florida would be if some other country’s officials were to make comments about her attitude toward Cuba. She’d probably be the first to tell them to “shut their yap” and mind their own business.

SHE IS GOING to have to accept the fact that the rest of the world sees Fidel for what he has become – an old coot from a bankrupt island nation who doesn’t warrant demonization because it gives him more consideration than he deserves.

On a final note, those of you who want to hear tales of ethnic-inspired Thanksgiving feasts will have to turn elsewhere (although I got a kick out of hearing Chicago mayoral hopeful Gery Chico say his family planned to include a few Cubano dishes with Thursday’s meal).

But this pumpkin-flavored flan could assuage your appetite, if you absolutely feel compelled to do something different.

  -30-

Dream a little DREAM with me

I’m never sure what to think of the political squabbling over the DREAM Act.

A part of me thinks it would be so much easier for the political process to just enact the comprehensive reforms needed in our immigration laws, rather than going through the various issues piecemeal.



Will this be the battlefield next week for the DREAM Act? Photograph provided by Architect of the Capitol



BUT LEAVE IT to our elected officials to figure out the most difficult way of trying to accomplish something for the public good, complicated by the partisan knuckleheads who are determined to try to score political points for themselves at the expense of people not born in this country.

When it comes to the DREAM Act, whose purpose is to make it possible for young people whose lives are entirely U.S.-oriented to have the same opportunities as other young people in this country,  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has long hinted he wants to try to force a vote on the issue some time before the changeover to a new Congress – one that will be Republican-controlled in the House of Representatives and less Democratic-sympathetic in the Senate.

The word going around on Monday was that the DREAM vote could literally come next week, with the Senate scheduled to return to Washington for their final activity on Nov. 29.

Perhaps Reid thinks he can catch his Congressional colleagues in a Thanksgiving spirit, willing to give something that ought to be regarded as common sense.

THERE ARE NEWS reports these days about how the GOP opposition to this idea (largely because they think it will play to their nativist backers who are determined to believe immigration reform is a “war” they can “win”). They’re already passing about their own analysis that attempts to pass so much misinformation about what the DREAM Act truly is.

What the “right” wants to believe is that this is a measure that will reward “criminal” behavior and will be so easy for individuals to achieve. They then create the image of all these young people someday getting the legal status that would allow them to live openly in this country, turning around and sponsoring their own parents for legal status.

I suppose that concept is what truly scares the nativist element – the fact that they are going to someday have to concede that there is no legitimate reason to keep out the bulk of those people who currently are in this country without proper papers.

The whole concept of an “illegal alien” is an artificial concept. Illegal is whoever we say is illegal. There is nothing inherently illegal, or criminal, about these people.

THE THING ABOUT the DREAM Act that always caught my attention is how stringent the measure truly is.

Those people who decide to use the measure to make themselves eligible for the same financial aid that others use to pay for higher education would have to wind up earning a degree of some sorts, or else they would fail to qualify for “resident alien” status.

Likewise, anyone who uses the DREAM Act to enlist in the military has to get that “honorable” discharge in order to qualify.

Particularly on the academic side, I can see many people struggling and coming up short. Which means I think the critics of DREAM are letting their fears get the best of their brains when it comes to this issue.

THE PART OF the opposition argument that always bothers me the most is the implication that approving such a measure somehow gives these young people (who in order to qualify must have arrived in the U.S. with their parents prior to age 16 and must have lived in this country for at least five years) some added advantage over other young people.

All it really does is acknowledges that there is no reason to treat these young people any differently than their counterparts in high school. Which means the real hang-up is that it makes it harder to demonize these young people, if we have to concede they’re no different, and should receive exactly the same chances to gain opportunities to succeed.

Note that I didn’t say they deserve the opportunities themselves. They just should be included in the mix for a chance.

Which in my mind makes it seem so much like all those social conservatives who argue against gay marriage or gay rights issues by claiming that it offers special perks to gay people, when most of those measures merely seek to eliminate any restrictions or barriers that might exist to gay people in our society.

IT ALWAYS SEEMS like some people think the natural order of things ought to be that there are some people who exist to be beaten upon by the so-called majority.

That makes my DREAM one where young immigrant kids currently caught up in a bureaucratic bungle are no longer to be used as a political punching bag for the social conservatives.

Which, when you think about it, ought to be the dream of any respectable person in our society, since the benefit to our society is a better-educated workforce and/or persons serving in our military.

  -30-

My mother was a part of the Latino story

My mother, as I prefer to remember her, before her health began declining.

I have been thinking quite a bit about my mother this past week – my brother, Christopher, and I lost her following a decade-long period during which her health steadily deteriorated.

But in thinking of my mother, Juanita (who also answered to the English version of “Jenny” so often that some people never realized that wasn’t her official name), I can’t help but think how much her life story is ever so similar to that of Latinos as a whole. It’s almost like my mother’s life is that of our growing numbers in this society.

NOT THAT I’M claiming my mother was some overly-ethnic creature who went out of her way to spread her Latina status to everyone around her. In fact, there were times when my mother was so assimilated into the thought process of our society that one wouldn’t quickly figure what she was ethnically.

For that, she would have been pleased.

Because growing up, my brother and I were raised to think that we’d be doing our ethnic brethren the most good by trying to make ourselves as successful as possible within the society as a whole. At the very least, we’d be going a long way to knock down the stereotypes that the nit-wits try to perpetuate.

That is why I have a mother who, while herself was only a high school graduate with no real special skills (the bulk of the jobs she held during her working life were as cashiers or as waitresses -- meaning she had to really work for a living), made sure that both my brother and I took education seriously.

IT HELPED THAT both my brother and I took to “book-learning” rather quickly. It really wasn’t a challenge for either of us, the way it can be for some people. My mother realized that all these things we were doing that she had never done were going to be the reason that my brother and I helped advance the status of our family tree.

Despite the notion that some people are determined to hold of a growing Latino population that is resistant to assimilation and unwilling to take to education, my mother’s attitude is much more prevalent.



It is the reason why the daughter of a Mexican immigrant father (my grandfather, Mike Vargas, came from Jalisco near the city of Guadalajara) and a mother whose parents were the immigrants was able to grow up in an ethnic enclave (the South Chicago neighborhood for which this weblog is named), yet manage to feel comfortable when later in life she moved to areas that were not so dominant Latino (and lived the last 18 years of her life in a Chicago suburb where the Latino population was just under 5 percent).



My grandparents, with fraternal twins, Jenny and Johnny

Of course, part of that ability to assimilate was due to my maternal grandparents, who made sure their children had command of the English language so as to fit in. I can recall the only time I ever heard mis abuelos speak en Español was when they quarreled, and didn’t want people around them listening in.

NOT THAT MY mother was ashamed of her ethnic ties, particularly the cooking. A part of me feels that Mexican-style cooking will never be the same for me, because there were certain dishes that only my mother could seem to get right.

On the other hand, this was also a woman who took pride in being able to prepare a quality lasagna dish, and also was capable of preparing her own tomato sauces for Italian-style cooking that no one would ever have mistaken for Ragu.

One other aspect of my mother’s life is all-too-Latino. Her kidneys gave out more than a decade ago, and she was awaiting a transplant that never came. She was kept alive in recent years by dialysis treatments. Three times a week, she went to a facility where her blood was cleaned of the toxins that in other people are eliminated when they use the restroom.

I know I have heard some people argue that those who don’t live well and don’t take care of themselves are more susceptible to such deadly conditions. Yet one also can’t deny that there seems to be a higher-than-usual rate of diabetes among Latinos.

JUST OVER ONE of every 10 Latinos suffers from diabetes, which is about double the rate of the population at-large. It also isn’t just that statistic that makes me concerned. This is a disease that took out my grandmother and at least one of her brothers, and that various other people (including one of my aunts) on my mother’s side of the family has had to cope with.

For all I know, it may be something I have to address in later years, which in and of itself is enough reason to try to watch my health as best I can.

So while there is a part of me that thinks about my mother and realizes I will never again be able to enjoy her version of pollo con mole (a personal favorite dish of mine), I also see the big picture and realize that my mother’s life had meaning because it shows just why our numbers and our significance have grown in recent years.

It also makes me believe that the best thing I can do to pay tribute to my mother’s memory is to continue to work my hardest to succeed in our society. Because if there’s anything that would bring my mother’s spirit back to try to give me a coscoron to the cabeza, it would be if I were willing to settle for second-best in anything.

  -30-

Preoccupied with my mother

My mother, Juanita Tejeda (nee Vargas) died Saturday night. She was 66, and had been undergoing treatment related to diabetes for the past decade.

All of which means I will be preoccupied for the next few days and will be too busy to be posting regular commentary at this weblog. I hope to resume soon, once my life and that of my brother, Christopher, get back to normal.

  -30-

“Rats” isn’t the least bit surprising. That’s the level the debate has sunk to

TODD: "Rats?????????"

When it comes to the state senator from Tennessee who recently described immigrant women having babies in ways similar to, “rats that multiply,” I can’t say I’m offended.

Dismayed, yes. But offended would imply that I was surprised that someone who carries a public office could possibly think in such an idiotic manner.

BECAUSE WITH THE level of hostility that the debate over immigration reform has reached in our society, I fully expect nonsense such as this when it comes from the people who really believe that federal immigration policy should focus on the concept that all newcomers to this country should be people just like themselves.

So the saga playing out in Tennessee these days is all too predictable.

Tennessee state Sen. Curry Todd, R-Collierville, made the comment during a legislative hearing when discussion came around to how the babies of non-citizens without a valid visa are entitled to full healthcare benefits because they are U.S. citizens.

It’s true. The law makes it clear that while the mother doesn’t qualify for anything, the children do.

BUT SOME PEOPLE would rather make their ideological argument that these non-citizens don’t deserve to be thought of as people, and don’t want anything to occur that shows the legitimacy of these people or their children.

They’d rather see the kid starve, I suppose.

In one warped way, I suppose it is a step forward that Todd would make such an argument about immigration. A generation ago, Todd’s political counterpart probably would have made some argument about poor black women somehow having babies just to get her welfare benefits boosted.

Except that even Todd realizes that if he were to say something like that, he’d be dead politically. People with sense (whom I do believe are a true majority in our society) would never let him hear the end of it.

BUT BY FOCUSING on immigration, and perhaps putting the image of pregnant Latinas in the minds of people, he can get away with it. His political colleagues will stay silent, and some may even try to defend his “right” to express his opinion in such a nonsensical manner.

For those who are about to send me nasty e-mail messages saying that Todd never said “Latino,” “Hispanic” or any other term that would refer to people with ethnic origins in a Latin American nation, I’d argue that his weak attempt to backtrack  reinforced that thought.

By claiming he used the wrong term and really meant to say “anchor baby” creates that impression. Because that is a favorite term of the nativists who want to believe that Latinas without visas are deliberately getting pregnant in a lame attempt to stay in the United States.

The fact that Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen quickly criticizedTodd’s comments. But the fact that he is a Democrat will cause Todd’s backers to dismiss his criticism out-of-hand.

I GOT A kick out of learning about the group of people who on Thursday gathered outside of Todd’s home to express their opposition to him. Although I don’t expect their presence changed anyone’s mind.

Somehow, I think Todd’s neighbors, even if they privately think their neighbor sounded like a knucklehead, are going to remember the incident as the time the riff-raff came too close to their homes for personal comfort.

For better or worse, this is the mentality that we’re in. Until we can get people to start looking at the matter in a more humane manner, we’re not going to make any serious progress toward the reform in immigration policy that our federal government is going to have to enact eventually – no matter how much the nativists object.

I happened to hear a program Friday where U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Vice President Gerald Kicanas (who also is bishop of the Catholic Diocese for Tuscon, Ariz.) said the key to reform is getting people to see the “undocumented” as human beings who, in some cases, have truly horrifying stories about how they got into this country.

IN SHORT, IT means we’re going to have to overcome a mentality by which some political people think the fact that they have a constitutional right to free expression means they are entitled to think of the undocumented as “rats.”

All it really proves is that, in the United States, people have a right to be wrong. Todd is living proof of that fact.

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Political partisanship will get ugly in upcoming year

I’m not getting as bent out of shape the way some Latino activists are with the fact that Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, is likely to become the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.



SMITH: Not our new buddy



That post is a significant one in terms of setting the House of Representatives’ agenda when it comes to anything related to immigration reform. In short, Smith is going to become the face of immigration opposition, and probably will become the thorn in the nalgas of Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who gave up a chance to run for Chicago mayor so he could continue the fight for immigration reform.

LOOKING AT AN ideologically conservative analysis of Smith’s record on the issue, it is filled with the catch-phrases such as “amnesty,” “anchor baby,” “chain migration” and all the other buzz-words used by the “right” to express their opposition to people in this country who aren’t ethnically just like themselves.

He’s not going to be a buddy.

But on the other hand, anything hostile he tries to do is going to be held in check by the U.S. Senate, which remains in the control of Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., who seems to realize he owes the Latino voter bloc and activists something significant.

It seems that the “something significant” he will try to give is a vote of some type on the DREAM Act, that measure that allows long-time residents of this country without a visa to have access to the same educational benefits as other natives of this nation.

AND YES, FOR the record, Smith opposes this too.



REID: What comes after the DREAM?



It could come up during the upcoming weeks that the current incarnation of Congress – the one that had, for awhile, filibuster-proof majorities in the Senate and a significant House majority, all favoring da Dems.

Beyond that, what we’re going to get during 2011 and 2012 is a whole lot of nothing. Any openly hostile measure that gets introduced in the House of Representatives is muerte in the Senate.

That is important because I fully expect the newly-GOP House to try to devise something in the name of “national security” that will be hostile to the interests of Latinos.

AFTER ALL, THEY probably think we need to be punished, on account of the fact that in certain western states, a strong Latino vote against their would-be political colleagues caused them to go down to electoral defeat.

At the very least, Reid is still a leader because of an overwhelming Latino vote.

Will we really get an attempt to repeal the 14^th Amendment to the Constitution? Or will they try to devise something even more insipid? I’m actually curious. I can afford to be, since I realize it has zero chance of actually getting enacted into law.

We’re going to have to rely on Reid and his use of a Democratic majority – one that seems to have fewer of those rural Democrats who despite their use of the “D” following their names always seemed to vote more in line with the Republicans – to prevent some serious harm from taking place.

IT MEANS I’M looking beyond any token gesture of support Reid might offer up with the DREAM Act. He’s going to have to show during the next two years that he earned overwhelming Latino support that he received in last week’s elections.

Here’s hoping he does a more convincing job in the eyes of some Latino activists than Barack Obama has done during the past two years of his presidency.

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