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Our Ugly Side
AP – Illegal immigrants plan to leave over Ariz. law
Jose Armenta, a 33-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico’s western coast, is already planning to move to Utah within the next 20 days because of a combination of the economy and the new law.
“A lot of people drive by,” he says as he watched nearby cars speeding past, “and they yell, ‘Hey, go back to Mexico!’”
Still waiting on the story about unemployed supporters of the law going out to stake their claim on the new jobs that have opened up.
Popularity: 2% [?]
Reid, Lott, Words, Politics, Etc
The difference between former Senator Lott and Majority Leader Reid’s respective comments seems patent–one lamented the failed presidential bid of a segregationist candidate; the other used unfortunate, arguably offensive–though, in context of the conversation, unprejudiced and certainly benevolent–words while describing how he was impressed by a black candidate.
But, because the furor from the Bad-Faith Right apparently persists–and because so long as there’s any semblance of good faith on important issues (and others of good faith have submitted comment), they ought to be given a going-over and talked about even if the mass of comment is superficial and co-optive in the worst sense–John McWhorter, a linguist (and black person), breaks down what Reid said.
First of all, we need not pretend that by “Negro dialect” Reid meant the cartoon minstrel talk of Amos n Andy. After all, why
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Popularity: 1% [?]
Profiling Profiling
To save you unnecessary reading: it’s racist and ineffective. Matt Yglesias expounds anyway, and quite well, in a post responding to the right’s battle cry to profile Muslims after the Detroit would-be underwear bombing:
On the pro side of the ledger, had we implemented such a policy in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 we would have helped prevent some portion of the zero deaths in post-9/11 plane-related terrorism.
On the con side, consider the devastation this would have wrought on our foreign policy. Suppose Indonesia wants to send some new interns to New York and Washington to work in the embassy and UN missions—strip search time! There are over 10,000 Muslims serving in the United States military, the majority of them almost certainly young men. How strip-searching them in an act of explicit religious discrimination going to
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Popularity: 1% [?]
Playing the Waiting Game
Today marks the date of the 2009 autumnal equinox. That’s right, summer will officially be over.
Many of us were stuck at home all summer as our vacation accounts were drained to pay bills instead. With September in full swing, temperatures in places like Arizona still hover around 100 degrees. Baseball – the sport of summer – still has two weeks of its regular season left. And I haven’t seen a single Halloween decoration yet (shocking!).
A grueling, endless summer it has been.
In addition, the notoriously slow August news cycles have been stretched forth. Now that every single celebrity imaginable has died, there has been nothing but low-caliber, partisan health care rhetoric coverage, some random comments on the Afghanistan situation and a few straggling cries for justice from Iran. Hell, the top headline from last week came from MTV’s Video Music Awards. (In fact, I would have finished …
Popularity: 1% [?]
Perception Becomes Reality: Gatesgate and Mainstream Media
Sometimes the media are ridiculous.
After waiting until Michael Jackson’s death to give his last two off-kilter decades a fair analysis, discussing Sarah Palin’s ridiculously miniscule chances at election to the presidency following an abrupt resignation, and screaming at each other from partisan pedestals over a proposed healthcare bill, we’ve decided that our latest obsession will be the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr., who some consider to be the world’s top African American scholar.
Henry Louis Gates Jr. yelling at police while being arrested at his Cambridge home.
Us media types are aware that perception is reality, and we utilize it to the fullest. Fox News, CNN, BBC, MSNBC and Al-Jazeera all speak the truth, but to different people. Amazing, isn’t it?
That’s because different people compile different …
Popularity: 1% [?]
