to celebrate cinco de mayo, my insensitive/ignorant relative sent me this

Please pass this on ... it says it all!

Dear President Bush:

I'm about to plan a little trip with my family and extended family, and I would like to ask you to assist me. I'm going to walk across the border from the U.S. into Mexico, and I need to make a few arrangements. I know you can help with this. I plan to skip all the legal stuff like visas, passports, immigration quotas and laws. I'm sure they handle those things the same way you do here. So, would you mind telling President Vicente Fox, that I'm on my way over? Please let him know that I will be expecting the following:

1. Free medical care for my entire family.

2. English-speaking government bureaucrats for all services I might need, whether I use them or not.

3. All government forms need to be printed in English.

4. I want my kids to be taught by English-speaking teachers.

5. Schools need to include classes on American culture and history.

6. I want my kids to see the American flag flying on the top of the flag pole at their school with the Mexican flag flying lower down.

7. Please plan to feed my kids at school for both breakfast and lunch.

8. I will need a local Mexican driver's license so I can get easy access to government services.

9. I do not plan to have any car insurance, and I won't make any effort to learn local traffic laws.

10. In case one of the Mexican police officers does not get the memo from Pres. Fox to leave me alone, please be sure that all police officers speak English.

11. I plan to fly the U.S. flag from my house top, put flag decals on my car, and have a gigantic celebration on July 4th. I do not want any complaints or negative comments from the locals.

12. I would also like to have a nice job without paying any taxes, and don't enforce any labor laws or tax laws.

13. Please tell all the people in the country to be extremely nice and never say a critical word about me, or about the strain I might place on the economy.

I know this is an easy request because you already do all these things for all the people who come to the U.S. from Mexico. I am sure that Pres. Fox won't mind returning the favor if you ask him nicely.

*****


i'd already stifled my urge to reply to every other ignorant/republican/etc. email...so i wasn't able to hold back again...and sent this:

my abuelito came from mexico as a young man. he settled in pontiac where he worked nearly his entire life for one of the big three auto makers, making the cars we all drive. he payed taxes, learned and spoke fluent english; his children went to school, graduated, spoke english, got jobs and payed taxes.



when the majority population of mexico is white, i am positive a natural outgrowth of that fact will be more english spoken and written and read. of course, we don't go to mexico for work, do we, because we won't perform any of the work our neighbors to the south do.



when you get a chance, google maquilladoras. major corporations in the us are outsourcing jobs, yes, to mexico, but it's no golden ticket. the workers at these glorified sweat shops are treated one step above slaves, but it's only a small step.



i am exasperated with the "debate" over immigration in this country. first, it isn't a debate when the vast majority of responses are ill-informed citizens spewing the same ignorant tag lines: "send them back to their country", "they're taking our jobs", "we don't go to mexico and speak english", etc etc etc.



as the protests this week showed, if we did "send them back", the lines at walmart (which so many of these folks who claim patriotism as a motivation for deporting illegal aliens) would be so long you'd have to wait an hour just to buy your diapers for a dollar less. ask my sister, it happened to her. the price of the fruits and vegetables you love--oranges, cherries, and more--would skyrocket without migrant workers, who, by the way, stay only half the year. without a substantial segment of the population willing to perform the menial, degrading and disgusting tasks necessary for a culture of excess to keep going, all the "conveniences" you don't think you're paying for you suddenly will.



i'm confused: it seems the conservatives of the country are pointing to the troubles at the big three and blaming it on the unions, saying workers have been paid too much for too long. but then along comes an entire work force willing to work for pennies on the dollar, and that's unacceptable too?



god forbid the people who work for less than most of us could even fathom surviving on should benefit from programs most of them pay into. god forbid a few free lunches or social programs are made use of when minorities (mexican americans especially) enlist at a greater proportion than the general (white) population; and die in greater numbers in this and every war in modern history.



please, when you're deciding who to forward any of this vein of correspondence to, resist the urge to add my name to the list. i let the first one go, but couldn't be quiet about this one too.


angela




the irony, of course, being that anyone i'd have this argument with would be the equivalent of a bill o'reilly or sean hannity about it--unable to have any actual opinion beyond what's being fed to them, and recycled by the same lame sources.

grrr.

no wonder my head hurts.