Dear Editor:
Part one:
Fear is the father of hate. In times of insecurity, demagogues do everything they can to pump up people’s fears and channel it against whoever is not in a position to defend themselves. This lets people vent their frustration against a politically weak target such as Jews in Nazi Germany, or various minorities over the centuries right here in America. If there were no minorities, we’d have to invent one. So we dehumanize some group. They become aliens, even worse, illegal aliens. Their space ships are hidden in the forest or desert waiting to abduct your children. They will do evil things like put salsa on your baloney sandwich. You never know what kind of horrors they might perpetrate.
Hating Jews and Blacks is unfashionable these days, and Muslims of all types are becoming passe, but what a great target Hispanics have become, especially Mexicans. They’re all over the place. Growing and cooking your food, cleaning your houses, planting trees, and competing for every lousy dead end minimum wage job that no one else wants. Wasn’t it the illegal aliens from planet Mexico that forced all the manufacturers to flee in terror and move their factories to China?
And why don’t they learn to speak English? If it was good enough for Jesus, it ought to be good enough for them. This land is our land. We stole it from the Indians fair and square. If you don’t like it, go back to where you came from.
Part two:
Scott Siegel has become the champion of teenagers and “minorities,” by which I assume he means people with dark skin. I don’t think he’s referring to, for example, Swedish Americans. He’s going to help them by cutting the minimum wage so they can slip into even deeper poverty than before. Maybe if we pay them nothing at all, the jobs will flow right back in from China and Vietnam. Of course, we’d have to also get rid of big government environmental regulations and workplace safety rules.
So we’ll pay people just enough to eat rice and beans and live in a cardboard box. That’s compassionate conservatism. I’m sure Scott would be delighted to work for $5 an hour. Maybe he should actually talk to some “minorities” and see what they think of his idea. As for teenagers, we have to get them used to dead end low wage jobs early. Especially if they’re not white.
What do Scott Siegel and Susan Scherman have in common? They both make targets out of the weak and vulnerable while ignoring the bloated corporate predators that are ripping us off every day.
Greg Ribot