The following is an op-ed piece from the San Diego Union-Tribune published about a week after Escondido, a city in North San Diego County, passed an ordinance making it illegal to rent housing to undocumented people. see http://deletetheborder.org/node/1579 for the original repost of the story.
I pulled out a section of the op-ed to start (click read more for the full text). I think that it brings up a really important yet often forgotten piece of the immigration conversation. That point is that throughout the history of the United States, nativist movements and fascist nationalists have violently scapegoated several groups including radicals and immigrants. But, nativism is about nativists not immigrants.
In Waldron's arch-conservative world view, illegal immigrants are the new Cold War Communists, infiltrators threatening the “sovereignty†of the United States.
To her, the fight against illegal immigration amounts to a solemn patriotic duty to save the United States. “To look the other way is treasonous,†she told the half-adoring, half-hostile audience.
Waldron reminded the crowd that she's from New York and 55 of her former classmates died in the World Trade Center. Their terrorist killers were, she said, illegal immigrants. Half the crowd booed.
Communists–Terrorists–Illegals.
It's a powerful nexus that stokes fear, resentment and anger toward the enemy overrunning schools, hospitals and job sites. Political gold.
In Escondido, the Dark Side of Politics
October 12, 2006
I have a new rule:
Local columnists should never leave the county, let alone the country.
One week in Canada for a family wedding – and what do I miss?
Arguably the most emotionally wrenching public meeting in Escondido's history.
For rhetorical drama, last week's three-hour council meeting ranks right up there with North County's version of the 1925 Scopes Trial: The 1993 Vista school board's nationally notorious vote about creationism in science classrooms.
Thanks to the city of Escondido's Web site, I was able to watch last week's spectacle – twice.
It's gripping TV, if lacking in suspense.
Everyone knew the council majority – Marie Waldron, Ed Gallo and Sam Abed – would vote to rid Escondido of illegal immigrants.
The two council moderates – Mayor Lori Holt Pfeiler and Ron Newman – had expressed their distaste for what they see as political grandstanding over a federal responsibility.
The math was simple. Three beats two.
Still, speaker after speaker – about 70 of them – marched to the lectern.
Deborah Szekely, founder of the Golden Door spa in Escondido and a truly formidable woman in a region famous for them, urged the council not to approve this “nightmare ordinance.â€
Dozens of others echoed Szekely's view that Escondido was about to mutilate itself with a mean-spirited, even racist, law.
A roughly equal number blessed the council majority as “heroes†with the courage to attempt what the feds have failed to do: Evict the illegal horde – and their children – from Escondido's overcrowded apartments and homes.
So what, in practical terms, did last week's 3-2 vote accomplish?
Let's go back seven weeks.
The council ordered the city attorney to fashion an ordinance, modeled on others around the country, that would require landlords to banish undocumented tenants.
But the city attorney, leery of civil-rights lawsuits, produced a watered-down ordinance that relies on federal, not municipal, enforcement. Exactly how this would work is as unclear as the ordinance's constitutionality.
What started out as fire and brimstone is now hazy smoke and mirrors.
“It's almost as if we're perpetrating a fraud on you,†Newman said to the crowd.
Even if a judge ultimately signs off on it, the Escondido ordinance would be driven by citizen complaints. But what's a legal complaint?
If someone says that a house is full of Mexican-looking people, that's blatant discrimination, a form of racial profiling.
“We don't know what illegal immigrants look like,†Pfeiler told the audience.
In his remarks, Abed conceded that people will not be thrown out of their homes en masse. He referred to the ordinance as a “compromise,†which is a softer word for Newman's “fraud.â€
So why has Escondido been forced to run this divisive gantlet?
In short, the dark side of politics.
You think this sort of stuff is new? Believe me, this ain't no new rocket science. It's the old-time populism of fear.
In her summary remarks before voting, Waldron linked illegal immigration with a general deterioration of American values.
For example, children in public schools “don't learn the truth†about the nation's founding principles, she said. In fact, they are never exposed to the Declaration of Independence, she asserted.
To support her bizarre thesis, Waldron quoted from the research of John Stormer, the author of “None Dare Call It Treason,†the 1962 anti-Communist tract that served as a central text of the John Birch Society.
Waldron went on to quote, of all people, J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the FBI who gave a 1962 speech at Valley Forge decrying the reluctance of citizens to salute the flag or “sign a loyalty oath,†the corrosive litmus test of the McCarthy era.
Listening to Waldron allude to Stormer and Hoover, a light went off.
In Waldron's arch-conservative world view, illegal immigrants are the new Cold War Communists, infiltrators threatening the “sovereignty†of the United States.
To her, the fight against illegal immigration amounts to a solemn patriotic duty to save the United States. “To look the other way is treasonous,†she told the half-adoring, half-hostile audience.
Waldron reminded the crowd that she's from New York and 55 of her former classmates died in the World Trade Center. Their terrorist killers were, she said, illegal immigrants. Half the crowd booed.
Communists–Terrorists–Illegals.
It's a powerful nexus that stokes fear, resentment and anger toward the enemy overrunning schools, hospitals and job sites. Political gold.
As it stands, Waldron is a good bet to win re-election next month. As the Joan of Arc of the Minutemen, her base is vibrating. Waldron, it can be argued, is at least doing something to shame the feds into action.
Still, last week's meeting displayed Waldron's toxicity among those who do not share her imperiled view of America.
Early in the meeting, Olga Diaz, a bilingual council candidate with fire in her eye, sounded a common theme when she accused the majority of disfiguring her city's reputation.
“I want your seat, lady,†Diaz said, staring straight at Waldron.
Among all the races in North County, none packs the passion of Escondido's decision whether or not to return this lady to her seat.
Logan Jenkins can be reached at (760) 737-7555 or by e-mail at logan.jenkins@uniontrib.com.
