(SPECIAL-LENGTH FINAL COLUMN OF THE AMERICAS)

   By: Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez
How do you end a column after 16 years? With regrets and unfulfilled dreams? Perhaps, but truthfully, Column of the Americas as a deadline-based column ends with even bigger dreams.

There indeed is disappointment with the ease in which the U.S. populace has accepted and normalized 1) the notion of permanent war as a God-given U.S. birthright; 2) the further militarization of the nation & world; 3) the politics of fear, hate and blame; and 4) Big Brother Government. All with nary a whimper.

Under George W. Bush, this was not surprising. The disappointment has come in seeing the Obama administration generally embrace the reactionary policies of Bush’s 9-11 Nation. Despite the 2006 & 2008 electoral sweeps – in which the electorate thoroughly repudiated the Republican program of war, xenophobia and corporate welfare – [angry] conservatives act as though they won. The irony is that president Obama actually has governed as though he agrees, and owes them. For example, his health care reform is actually a centrist compromise; universal health care it is not.

There are regrets; while many of us drove CNN’s Lou Dobbs into political exile, we didn’t consistently go after the entertainment industry – an industry that enables dehumanization and what amounts to racial apartheid. During this era, Jay Leno made Americans comfortable laughing nightly at “illegal aliens.” After 35 years, Saturday Night Live has still not taken its “No Red-Brown comedians need apply” signs down, and Spanish-language TV continues to generally be an assortment of “all-blonde” networks.

Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez and Patrisia Gonzales, Ph.D

Another regret is that the journalism profession has now become the lapdog of government.

Even now, there’s plenty of money for invading, occupying and bombing nations, but little for health and education.

While pols are seemingly unaware of this jarring equation, media lapdogs are nowadays handsomely rewarded for being consistently wrong and/or silent.

Enough on these failings.

The bigger dreams involve ceasing writing reactively and writing from a point of creation. Column writing is necessarily reactive; I’ve been writing about human/Indigenous rights, anti-immigrant hysteria and U.S.-support of brutal military dictatorships since 1972. And now, with a president lying us into Iraq, the instinct is to counter. The same holds true when society unabashedly scapegoats brown peoples, and treats migrants as disposable populations; witness the March 21 rally in Washington D.C. More than demanding reform, it was a demand by more than 100,000 marchers to treat migrants as full human beings. While the president’s centrist approach to immigration reform places a heavy emphasis on draconian enforcement, conservatives will interpret human rights for migrants and “the path to legalization” as nothing short of “freeing the slaves” and a cause for insurrection.

Simply creating, without countering is akin to burying one’s head in the sand. But there comes a time when always responding means always reacting – rarely creating. But because of permanent war, my focus as a writer lately, has become heavily tiled towards resistance. The creation element of who I am has suffered (this is true of most people). It’s time for balance, thus a time to create.

Through the years, I’ve been exposed to great maestros/maestras and great Tlamintini – great teachers – who have shared their knowledge and Huehuetlahtolli (ancient guidances) about what it means to be human. Hereafter, I want to continue with those traditions and contribute to the definition of what it means to be human.

In discontinuing the column, I take no pleasure in hereafter writing strictly for an academic audience. It goes against who I am. I’ve always written for mass audiences, including writing Column of the Americas since 1994 for more than 100 newspapers nationwide. For the first 12 years, it was co-written as a weekly, syndicated column with my wife, Patrisia Gonzales, for Chronicle Features, then Universal Press Syndicate (Her Patzin column is slated to return). In writing for the academy, the audience is much smaller and narrower, while jargon is the preferred means of communication. It’s not naturally conducive for storytelling. Even beyond that, the acceptable experts continue to be “the usual suspects.”

I will continue to assert that if our own aunts and uncles, parents, grandparents, neighbors and other elders – whom we used to quote frequently – can’t understand our own writing, then what good did all our years of schooling accomplish?

As such, I plan to continue to make public the knowledge that has been passed on to me via elder knowledge – in forthcoming essays and columns and academic and non-academic books. I look forward to the day when I will not have to write for two separate audiences.

I also look forward to the day when we as a society have finally eliminated war as a “solution” to anything, and when society ceases to divide human beings into legal and illegal categories. I am convinced that even the most conservative of conservatives don’t either want such a society. I look forward to the day when we can all truly say: San Ce Tojuan – Nosotros Somos Uno – We Are One.

It’s not something that comes about solely through dreaming. One has to imagine it, fight for it, and then live it.

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You change my way of writing, you change my way of thinking. You change my way of thinking, you change who I am.
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On The Rush Limbaugh Show, Mark Davis accused President-elect Barack Obama of choosing an “amnesty fetishist” in his appointment of Cecilia Muñoz, of the National Council of La Raza. But contrary to Davis’ suggestion, Muñoz and NCLR’s position in support of comprehensive immigration reform is far from radical, and shared in principle by members of Congress from both parties and by President Bush.

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….and here is another right-wing bigot playing the “Slavery Card“

While discussing potential Republican outreach efforts toward African-Americans during the November 14 broadcast of The Rush Limbaugh Show, guest host Jason Lewis stated: “This whole notion of taxing — taxing America’s labor — you know, I don’t know how else you describe what this sordid experience of slavery was when you take away somebody’s ability to engage in the marketplace with the fruits of their labor.” Lewis later added: “We need to go into the African-American community there on cultural issues. And they should be there on taxes, because they know what it’s like to have to work for free. And during the times of slavery, we targeted black folks. Well, now I guess it’s OK to target wealthy folks. Either way, you’re taking something that doesn’t belong to you.”

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My question is: Who should be playing the “Slavery Card“, ME a black man or some white right-wing RACIST, who is enjoying the fruits of 400+ years UNPAID black slave labor, in the United States? WHO?

Right-Wing Republicans have this nauseating tendency of playing some weird form of victim hood — stealth propaganda very similar to Hitler’s Nazism, in the hope that the “White Masses” will rise and fight a fictitious and cooked-up enemy,….and they are very good at it. Fabricationists and Distortionists thrive in the Republican world of GOD, GUNS, BACKWARDNESS and HOMELAND SECURITY – a quagmire of bitterness, bigotry and vicious “Neanderthal racism.”

In an Amazon book review, John Moe writes: Conservative talk show hosts and newspaper columnists have made an industry out of incessantly deriding the American left, citing liberals for everything from moral decay to bad economic policy to a soft approach on terrorism. Often these accusations are bound in book form and sell quite well. Only one problem: the charges they’re leveling just aren’t true. In Big Lies, author Joe Conason dissects 10 of the most persistent, and–according to him–glaringly incorrect, arguments made by conservatives. Each chapter begins with a quotation (“Liberals control the media and misuse their influence to promote left-wing politics,” “Conservatives are the only true champions of free enterprise”), which is then picked apart using statistical evidence and detailed historical research and rejected. The modern right wing, in the opinion of Conason, is not the bastion of virtue and defender of the common man it claims to be. Rather, it is a calculating and shrewdly efficient group of propagandists fueled by revenues generated by a system that rewards cronyism. Granted, it doesn’t take much to deflate the bombast of shrill political talk show hosts whose very living depends on making shocking accusations about public figures, a couple of raw facts usually does the trick, but Conason offers more than simple refutation, going deeper to challenge the presumptions that generate such platitudes. And he navigates a highly readable and informative writing style that feels more substantive than Molly Ivins and Al Franken but still a lot wittier than Noam Chomsky. [See: Propaganda & Control of the Public Mind] Many of Conason’s arguments, like those of his foes, naturally come down to matters of opinion, and published material can readily be found to back up nearly any perspective. Nonetheless, he presents clear and logical points, and his thinking is well supported by both the historical record and empirical data. Accusing Joe Conason of lies (of any size) would certainly be a difficult task.

Right-Wing radio which flourished during the Clinton/Lewinsky years is killing the GOP, so indicates Michael Medved, a GOP NUTBAG himself.

Says Medved: “….if the new president makes credible efforts to govern from the center, then talk radio can’t afford long-term marginalization as a sulking, sniping, angry irrelevancy. It makes no sense to react with pre-emptive rage (and an odd obsession over Obama’s birth certificate) ….”

Donofrio v. Wells — A non-American President?

Yes, the GOP is quickly becoming an “angry irrelevancy,” — drop in the “Sarah Palin dimension” and the the ReTHUGlican Party slides a confused mix of GOD, STUPIDITY, GUNS and “MOOSE-TURKEY” ADDICTED COMEDIANS.

A quagmire of GAY BASHING nincompoops, led by the Saxby Chambliss anointed Psycho-Bomb, Sarah Palin.

Bob Cesca sums up the Republican morass quite nicely: “Right now, the Republicans have an exorcist, a Bush, a turkey geeker who makes people explode, and Newt, who, by the way, wrote a book imagining if the South had won the Civil War. If these cable reality show misfits represent the future of the Republican Party, it’s going to be a seriously entertaining four years.” — [ READ MORE ]

LOL!

I strongly agree.

……and NOW Republicans ….here is:

Prop 8 — The Musical

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By ANABELLE GARAY

AP — Federal authorities have compromised the rights and safety of some unaccompanied illegal immigrant children they have detained, and inadequate government guidelines are partly to blame, according to a Texas-based research group.

Many children appeared before immigration judges without legal representation, some were transported home in shackles or cages, and the medical needs of some were ignored, according to a report released Thursday by the Center for Public Policy Priorities, a nonprofit think tank.

“There’s no consistent policy. There’s nobody who’s responsible for these kids, in looking out for their safety,” report author Amy Thompson said. “It’s being handled in ad hoc fashion.”

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees immigration and border enforcement, disputes the center’s findings.

“DHS and its component agencies treat all minors, including unaccompanied alien children, with dignity, respect and special concern for their particular vulnerabilities,” spokeswoman Laura Keehner said in a statement Thursday evening.

The report was compiled by examining U.S. immigration agency documents and immigration policies and statistics in the U.S., Mexico and Honduras. The center also interviewed children who were apprehended, government officials, contractors and nonprofit workers in the three countries, and toured of two Texas facilities where unaccompanied illegal immigrant children are held.

An estimated 43,000 unaccompanied illegal immigrant children were removed from the U.S. in 2007, according to the report. They were caught while traveling alone, or with siblings, other children or adults whom they may not know.

Fifty to 70 percent of unaccompanied minors who appeared before an immigration judge last year did so without legal representation, the center contends. Sometimes, consulates weren’t notified about the repatriation of children from their country, a violation of an international treaty, the report says.

“I would say — ‘Imagine your 8-year-old daughter or niece in a country where they didn’t speak the language, don’t know the culture and were completely at the mercy of strangers. How would you want them to be treated?’” Thompson said. “Children aren’t capable of understanding international laws and boundaries. They’re little kids mixed up in something bigger than themselves.”

Some children flown to non-bordering countries were shackled during the flight and those taken by vehicle across the border to Mexico were transported in kennel-like compartments, the report says. Mexican officials reported that some children were returned in the middle of the night and brought to ports of entry that weren’t specified in agreements.

In one interview, a 13-year-old girl from Mexico described being injured during her apprehension in the summer of 2007. She said she was tackled by a U.S. official she thinks was a drug enforcement agent. The agent apologized but refused to take off her handcuffs, the girl said.

After she was transferred to the Border Patrol’s custody, the girl said she asked for a pain reliever because she had recently had surgery on her arm and the injury caused by the agent aggravated the wound. But Border Patrol agents refused to give her over-the-counter medication, she said.

When the Mexican consulate intervened, the girl was taken to a hospital. The medical attention she received there seemed to be geared toward responding to the possibility of an abuse allegation, according to the report.

As many as 15 different federal agencies can be involved in the apprehension and repatriation of an unaccompanied child, the report states. There are very few written guidelines for the treatment of those children, it says.

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