Throwing down the gauntlet
Writing by treason on Thursday, 31 of May , 2007 at 11:40 am
In this corner, in the green trunks: The Wall Street Journal! And in this corner, wearing red, white, and blue: The National Review! DING!!!
It’s a freakin’ rumble! T’ree of your best guys against t’ree o’ our best guys! Weapons? Youse can bring whatcha want – we’re bringin’ da facts!
I almost popped my spleen when I read about the “invitation” on NRO today. National Review has challenged The Wall Street Journal to a debate. Come out of the shadows, they taunt, we’re calling you out on this. I said I’d give my left nut – if I had one – to attend the dedication of The Victims of Communism Memorial, but I’d give both nuts – if I had nuts – to be at this debate.
This whole campaign of 2008, this whole debate on illegal immigration — it’s becoming clear to me that the two parties are in suspended animation. The way the Democrats are stuck in the sixties, I think too many Republicans are stuck in the eighties.
Again, in the late eighties and early nineties I worked for a Japanese company that looked, felt, and smelled – depending on who put what in the breakroom microwave – like the United Nations. George Bush 41 was running against Bill Clinton and I was vocal in my disgust. I felt like Bob Tyrrell, knowing – in every fiber of my being – that Bill Clinton embodied all that was repulsive about humanity and that if he was elected, the culture would shift. He was calling for change, and some of us knew precisely what kind of change he was talking about. I was engaged in non-stop arguments and was writing anti-Clinton editorials in our corporate newsletter. The paper’s editor, who thought Bill was “sexy,” actually censored me. I was incensed. I looked for support and noticed the immigrants who worked with me were awfully quiet.
“So!,” I asked them, “What do you think about this election?”
It wasn’t easy at first getting them to open up, but little by little they started to confide in me. It’s okay, I told them. This is America. You can say what you think. Who do you feel is better for the country?
“Coercion, after all, merely captures man. Freedom captivates him.”
– Ronald Reagan
I was talking to people who had come from places that were not free. Now they were here, they had good jobs – hell, many of them were my supervisors – and they owned homes and were raising their kids in a new country.
“We like Bush.”
I was on fire. Are you a citizen? Can you vote? What can we do to get you there?
Off the top of my head, most of the people who wanted Bush to win were from Nicaragua, China, and Vietnam. I’d had long conversations with my coworkers and even though they had come from different hemispheres and had different experiences, they all had come to the same conclusion: they loved Ronald Reagan. And they hoped that George Bush – 41 – would be the same kinda guy. They knew who Clinton was and they weren’t going for it.
I was so hopeful. This is the future, I’d thought. Like my grandparents, these people knew America. They knew the value of freedom. They were living the Dream. Only one person – a Socialist from Portugal who moved to Albuquerque when we did – was voraciously pro-Clinton. For several years we continued our debate in a different state.
But something has changed. I’m not sure that the new immigrants understand history as well as the ones I worked with in California did. The America they see is a different America – not the one my grandparents saw from the deck of that boat in the harbor.
And maybe they see something that it’s taken me much longer to see. Something has changed and voting isn’t going to fix the problem. If I believe in democracy and freedom for Iraqis and Afghanis, then it’s my responsibility to do whatever I can to help the cause here on our soil. It’s something I’ve wanted to do as long as I can remember but never got off my ass to do until now. I’ve become a volunteer for a local ESL program and I’m going to tutor the new immigrants. I’ll be helping them to read, write, and speak English and work towards citizenship.
If it’s true that Republicans have resigned themselves to the fact that the party’s over and it’s time to call it a day, then we’re just going to have to start over. And I guess the best place to start is with the new Americans.
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