What 50,000 people in San Diego taught me

On April 9 I was in San Diego and stumbled onto the March for Dignity, Hope, and Respect (and against the bogus immigration "reform" being debated in Washington). It was truly inspiring to see tens of thousands of people, mostly Latino/Hispanic, of all ages and clearly from all walks of life marching in support of freedom and dignity and against the rightist attempts to bolster the criminalization of the lowest-paid, lowest standard of living people WORKING in our society.

I came away from the rally on Pacific Highway with two insights:

1) I have spent the last few days trying to engage in rational discourse with Bushistas in some of the comments sections on the newest "Blog of the Year" (name withheld). While there were a few commenters who could engage arguments in fairly rational ways, most, as I'm sure would surprise no one, were reminiscent of smart ass and very unfunny high school debaters. They don't engage in arguments, they just make ad hominem attacks and then congratulate themselves on what for them passes for "intelligence" (i.e., smart ass comments, the kind of "intelligence" displayed by their Dear Leader, the naked wannabe emperor who thinks he's dressed up as a cowboy). This effort of mine was not based on masochism; when I think about it in a certain way, I am really disconcerted by the left/right divide manifesting itself on the internet and the mass media at this point in history, and I was sincerely trying to reach out to see if there was any chance left for rational interchange. (I admit I did sink to insulting rejoinders on a few occasions [it's so fun!].)

But having attended this rally and seen thousands of mostly Latino/Hispanic people of all ages and all walks of life marching and chanting and waving flags and celebrating America and freedom made me realize there is no need to reach out to the rightists - they are history, soon to be drowned by the impending sea change in our society. I am not sure how our society will change in the coming years, but I am confident the rightists will have not have much say it in. Sure, they will go down fighting, but they will go down. And sure, the establishment-corporate media will continue to pretend like the rightists are relevant, but they won't be. The rest of us will be moving on, out of this national nightmare and - working together - into a better society that places the well-being of people over the priorities of profit-seeking.

So the march brought me back to my senses - let the rightwing sink like the lead weight black ball of hatred that it is. The rest of us will continue to build the boat to a better future.

2) That being said, the danger is not past by any means. I have long been interested in / traumatized by the similarities between the Bush regime and the fascisti of Mussolini's Italy. The current attack on Latino immigrants closes the fascist loop - undocumented workers, along with gay people, are the American right's Jews and Gypsies - the other to be attacked and feared and demonized in order to wield control over an angry, cowering populace. Happily, Americans are seemingly beginning to shed their Republican and corporate-orchestrated doltification despite the "patriotic" efforts of our still-doltified mass media. (The people in the mass media and the others in their establishment elite segment of society will, of course, be the last ones to come to their senses.)

The point is, hyperbole aside, fascism is here now in America: we are governed by a super-secret centralized power effectuating the interests of plutocratic capital and controlling the population through lies, emotion, and fear, rather than reason (as well as, when necessary, executive-engineered police action).

So this is the other thing I learned today at the San Diego march: It's now or never in America - libertad o muerte.

Viva la libertad! Viva la justicia! Viva America! Viva la gente!


Oh, and if we want to deal with the "illegal immigration problem," it is clear what we need to do. The issue is supply and demand – there are jobs here needing to be filled and there are people there who need jobs. So the "solution" is to cut off the supply. A reasonable way to do that is to legalize the people who are already here working and then start jailing employers who hire new arrivals. If new arrivals can't get jobs they won't come. We should also use tax policy to penalize American corporations that take wealth out of Latin America. One could legitimately argue that migrants are following the wealth of their countries across the border. Contrary to the idea of free trade advocated by Adam Smith, the current corporate capitalist version of free trade allows capital to be free, but labor is not. Labor necessarily follows capital, but in our perverted system the laborers thereby become illegal. How could anyone who claims to be a follower of Jesus support the anti-immigrant positions advocated by our national leaders? America is in a very dark place; I for one am willing to follow the illegal immigrants and their supporters to a better future.