WBEZ | Achy Obejas

Hate is in the air: LGBTQ setbacks

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:10:00 -0500

Sometimes, there are reminders. Indications that, yes, the arch of justice bends... and sometimes breaks. Here we are, poised maybe before the queer equivalent of the Dred Scott decision at the Supreme Court (if anybody was listening to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg at the University of Chicago law school a few weeks back, you know the court’s rulings on DOMA/Prop 8 are not not going to be Brown) and hate—individual, societal, institutional—can still rear its gnarly head and wreck a life or two or three.

Consider:

*Earlier this month, a Texas judge enforced a so-called "morality clause" in the divorce decree between Carolyn Compton and her ex-husband, effectively destroying her current same-sex relationship. How’s that? Well, the clause, which is pretty common in Texas divorces though rarely enforced, demands that Compton—a grown woman—not be allowed to have anyone she’s dating or intimate with and who is not related by blood or marriage in her home after 9 p.m.

That’s right: the judge gave Compton, the mother of two, a curfew—and essentially forced her partner of three years, Page Price, to move out of the home they’ve shared. Why? Because the state of Texas’ laws not only ban same-sex marriage but affect collateral legalities, such as power of attorney, child custody, etc. In other words, Texas laws dictate pretty much every aspect of their private lives. The demand for the enforcement came from Compton’s former husband of 11 years, a man who’s been stalking and harassing her enough in the last few years to have earned a protective order and a guilty plea for criminal trespassing.

*Then there’s the case of Kaitlyn Hunt, a Florida high school senior who’s been charged with "lewd and lascivious battery of a child 12-16 years old." The story is best told by Hunt’s mother, who started a Facebook page in her daughter’s defense:

"Voted the student with ‘Most School Spirit’ by her peers, Kaitlyn was an active cheerleader, a basketball player, a camp counselor and cheering coach, and a medical assistant training to join the nursing program at Valencia College after graduation. She looked forward to a career helping others and a memorable final year of high school. At the beginning of the school year, Kaitlyn made friends with a 14-year-old freshmen girl in Sebastian River High's IB program who played varsity sports and took classes with upper classmen. The girls were peers in the same social circle, and as happens every day high schools across America, their friendship eventually developed into more. In September, shortly after Kaitlyn's 18th birthday, the girls began dating, and they eventually expressed their affection for one another in intimate ways.When the girls' basketball coach found out that two of her players were dating, she kicked Kaitlyn off the team and informed her girlfriend's parents that their daughter was in a same-sex relationship. The parents then conspired with police to entrap Kaitlyn and press charges.The police recorded a phone conversation between the two girls, who today are 18 and 15, in which they discussed their relationship. Kaitlyn was arrested and charged with two counts of felony lewd and lascivious battery on a child 12-16. Kaitlyn's girlfriend denies that Kaitlyn ever pressured her and is adamant that their relationship is entirely consensual, but her parents are out to destroy Kaitlyn's life. After two separate judges ruled that Kaitlyn could finish her senior year with her peers, her girlfriend's parents appealed to the Indian River County School Board, who expelled Kaitlyn and sent her to the alternative school."

One great thing going for Hunt: Her mom. Family support can make all the difference. But should a high school girl—a girl who was obviously a good and popular student—ever have to go through something like this?

*Lastly, there’s New York City. One of the safest, most accepting places for queer people. Or is it? Last Saturday, a fool with a gun put a bullet into Mark Carson’s face and shot him dead, just blocks from the iconic Stonewall Inn, site of one of Gay Liberation’s most well-known freedom riot. Let me be perfectly clear: this happened in the heart of Greenwich Village, where the sight of same-sex couples holding hands and being affectionate is as common as ... well, opposite sex couples. Fifteen hundred people marched in the Village Monday night chanting Carson’s name. But later that same night, Dan Contarino, another openly gay man, was bashed at Avenue D and 4th Street.

What’s going on here? An uncomfortable heat, hate’s penultimate gasp.

Obama's unnecessary scandals

Thu, 16 May 2013 10:53:00 -0500

Leave it to Barack Obama to bring together in genuine outrage Tea Party conservatives, sparked to life by his election and determined to undermine it, and the American press, technically unfettered but the administration’s best friend in times of crisis.

Sure, Obama can say his people really had nothing to do with the IRS scandal unfolding before us, in which the tax agency harassed Tea Party groups seeking not-for-profit status for their work. It’s true that the IRS is semi-independent. But does anyone believe Obama really found out about the mess from the media?

Obama is already perceived, even by many of his supporters, as aloof and above it all. Is he now saying he’s so beyond his own administration, so disconnected from his own aides, no one thought to tip him off a scandal was brewing?

Saying he found out about the mess from the media is no shield: it’s an admission of neglect, both by him and by his own team. Are they too busy trying to coordinate the next dinner in the so-called “charm” offensive on congressional Republicans they didn’t bother to establish some kind of routine communications with the IRS that might have let them in on the problem? Or are the IRS people so disdainful of the president and his administration they figured they could wait until the boiling point?

And let’s not forget Attorney General Eric Holder, copy-catting the president in ignorance: turns out he had no idea either his folks had been caching phone records for months over at the Associated Press. Holder said he’d recused himself and didn’t actually sign off on the spying – but doesn’t the law require the Department of Justice to inform the source first, to seek its cooperation? Never mind, Holder remembers so little of this, is so aimless a satellite, he failed to put his recusal in writing, leading to his inability to remember the date he actually recused himself.

How pissed off are media people? Almost every major newspaper has been leading with at least one Obama disaster – the IRS, the AP story or, in more conservative circles, Benghazi.

On the Internet, HuffPost – the president’s biggest booster – lead with “DOJ WTF.” The 24 TV news cycle has been churning with all three, and with connections between all three. There’s actual talk of impeachment, however ridiculous.

Here’s the thing: All three of these events are completely unnecessary scandals. Republicans may be lapping and stirring them up, but all three are crazy careless mistakes on the part of a White House that, even to supporters, has often seemed arrogant beyond the pale.

And while at least two of the scandals appear to have merit (Benghazi strikes me as a GOP wet dream to derail Hillary Clinton’s 2016 bid – good luck with that, guys), none actually hit the heights of bulldozing over rights and law-bending in similar situations in previous administrations.

What makes them red meat right now is the GOP’s appetite for anything to tarnish this president, and the president and his cronies’ unfettered belief that’s the only thing keeping them from glory.

In the meantime, judgeships remain vacant, appointments remain unconfirmed, the sequester marches on, government slows to a crawl and the 2014 midterms – an exercise that, no matter who wins, will reward bad behavior – approaches.

GOP leader quits amid eugenics-fueled immigration report

Wed, 15 May 2013 01:15:00 -0500

Last week, the Florida Republican Party’s Hispanic outreach director quit his job and switched sides.

According to Pablo Pantoja, the final straw came in the Heritage Foundation’s immigration report, a screed authored in part by a racist named Jason Richwine who’d once told the American Enterprise Institute that “decades of psychometric testing has indicated that at least in America, you have Jews with the highest average IQ, usually followed by East Asians, then you have non-Jewish whites, Hispanics, and then blacks. These are real differences, and they're not going to go away tomorrow, and for that reason we have to address them in our immigration discussions and our debates.”

Sound familiar?

Perhaps it should. It’s an echo of arguments against immigration that go back more than a century. At the beginning of the 20th, Henry Goddard – the father of American intelligence testing – had very similar words about the immigrants coming through Ellis Island when he concluded that "83 percent of the Jews, 80 percent of the Hungarians, 79 percent of the Italians and 87 percent of the Russians were feeble-minded."

It’s funny, you know, how in about one hundred years – to use one example – Jews have gone from being considered near imbecilic, according to Goddard, to the smart leaders, according to Richwine.

The history of race and intelligence testing is so fraught that it boggles the mind the GOP would dare allow it, even indirectly, anywhere near arguments against immigration. But intelligence testing and race have always been intimately related, and the issue of race has never been a subtle shadow in Republican politics.

In fact, Richwine, the Heritage researcher behind the recent controversy, had included these claims in his Harvard dissertation (which cited discredited sources such as J. Philipe Rushton and has caused academic protests at Harvard). And he had published tracts on the same ideas on AlternativeRight, a white supremacist website that describes itself as “paleoconservative” and questions the fact of the Holocaust.

Even now, as the Heritage Foundation’s VP in charge of communications, Mike Gonzalez (another Cuban – because the GOP seems to only have Cubans – undeportable and immune to most immigration politics – to deal with immigration matters) tries to distance his organization from Richwine, you just have to wonder: Did Heritage not know about Richwine’s doctoral work? About the stuff on AlternativeRight? What was the basis of the hire if not his previous research?

"Its findings do not reflect the positions of The Heritage Foundation or the conclusions of our study on the cost of amnesty to U.S. taxpayers, as race and ethnicity are not part of Heritage immigration policy recommendations," Gonzalez said of Richwine’s doctoral work in an effort to keep it from totally sinking the Heritage report.

My suspicion is that, in fact, Heritage knew quite well about Richwine’s work and wasn’t in the least bit bothered by it until it became a liability. The GOP likes to ignore the inconvenient, just as it massages history and the societal treatment of groups to explain so-called deficiencies in people it considers undesirable.

Pantoja, the Republican-turned-Democrat, addressed some of these matters in a letter he wrote to the Tampa Bay Times:

“Although the (Heritage Foundation) distanced themselves from those assertions, other immigration-related research is still padded with the same racist and eugenics-based innuendo. Some Republican leaders have blandly (if at all) denied and distanced themselves from this but it doesn’t take away from the culture within the ranks of intolerance. The pseudo-apologies appear to be a quick fix to deep-rooted issues in the Republican Party in hopes that it will soon pass and be forgotten … We are not looking at an isolated incident of rhetoric or research. Others subscribe to motivating people to action by stating, ‘In California, a majority of all Hispanic births are illegitimate. That’s a lot of Democratic voters coming’. The discourse that moves the Republican Party is filled with this anti-immigrant movement and overall radicalization that is far removed from reality. Another quick example beyond the immigration debate happened during CPAC this year when a supporter shouted ‘For giving him shelter and food for all those years?’ while a moderator explained how Frederick Douglass had written a letter to his slave master saying that he forgave him for ‘all the things you did to me’. I think you get the idea.”

But do we? Because they just keep coming back, over and over and over.

Why Assata Shakur was suddenly promoted to terrorist

Wed, 08 May 2013 23:15:00 -0500

Last week, on the 40th anniversary of her arrest, the FBI suddenly put Assata Shakur, aka Joanne Chesimard, on the Ten Most Wanted Terrorists List. She is the first woman to reach such criminal heights. The reward for her capture has been doubled to $2 million.

But that move might say less about Shakur’s alleged crimes than about President Barack Obama. His willingness to use a black woman—a black woman whose political roots date back to a time when official U.S. government policy was to destroy the black liberation movement—to play this kind of politics is soulless.

Because have no doubt whatsoever: putting Shakur—who is at worst a cop killer—on that list has less to do with her and any recent activities to justify her promotion to terrorist status than it does with helping to make an argument to keep Cuba on the terrorist nations list, an appointment that reflects political game-playing more than reality.

Perhaps Obama sees this as a last ditch effort to pressure Cuba into releasing Alan Gross, a USAID contractor jailed on the island for anti-government activities. (This year’s iteration of the terrorist nations list will be released at the end of the month.)

Because Cuba has long ceased being a state-sponsor of terrorism, the main accusation hurled its way by the U.S. is that it serves as a refuge for international terrorists, including about 70 U.S. citizens, many of them affiliated with the Black Panthers and other black liberation groups.

But just one quick look at the rest of the FBI terrorists list—a collection of bombers and international kidnappers and conspirators—makes clear just how out of place Shakur and her alleged crimes are in such company. As a warning, the FBI laughably says Shakur “may wear her hair in a variety of styles and dress in African tribal clothing.”

For the record, this is the FBI’s own definition of terrorism: “The unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a Government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”

If you believe Shakur did what she was convicted of, then she’s a vicious but common criminal—and nothing more. It’s not imperative to be sympathetic to Shakur’s politics to see the disconnect between what she’s been tried and convicted of doing and her new designation.

And nothing in the FBI’s own description of her crimes suggests Shakur has done anything to merit reconsideration. Her new listing merely recounts her previous history: In 1977, Shakur was convicted of first degree murder of a police officer after a shootout on the New Jersey Turnpike. She was sentenced to life in prison. Two years later, she escaped, eventually turning up in Cuba.

Shakur maintains her innocence, pointing out that she was also wounded in the incident and that the state police’s own investigation found there was no gunpowder residue on her hands at the time of her arrest. But now the FBI clams Shakur has always been seen as a terrorist.

"Today, Chesimard, now known as Assata Shakur, remains an inspiration to the radical, left-wing, anti-government black separatist movement," said Aaron Ford, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Newark office in announcing the change in Shakur’s status. "While living openly and freely in Cuba, she continues to maintain and promote her terrorist ideology. She provides anti-U.S.-government speeches, espousing the Black Liberation Army’s message of revolution and terrorism."

In other words, Shakur talks and writes about revolutionary change. Writing and talking are not in and of themselves force or violence even if the words themselves call for such actions. It seems not even the FBI, in its announcement of her new status, can actually pin her with terrorist action.

With so many other U.S. exiles in Cuba, why Shakur? Perhaps because she’s the best known U.S. fugitive in Cuba. She is, however, not the only Black Panther convicted of cop killing exiled on the island: Charlie Hill, whose crime took place in New Mexico and involved the hijacking of a U.S. airline (which, in some circles, might actually qualify as terrorism), is also living in Cuba.

Perhaps the bigger question is, without a Florida election to worry about, what Obama hopes to accomplish beyond keeping Cuba on the terrorists list. He is most certainly not going to invade Cuba or send in a drone to kill a 65-year-old African-American grandmother. Shakur is not going to surrender, Havana is not going to turn her in, and good luck to any bounty hunters who want to risk playing in Cuba.

But this is precisely the kind of move that gets the Cubans’ back up. It threatens to not only extend rather than abbreviate Gross’ sentence but to mess with bilateral cooperation on a variety of matters that Havana and Washington have been quietly making progress on. What the hell, Barack?

The absurdity of Tim Tebow vs. Jason Collins

Fri, 03 May 2013 05:52:00 -0500

You may have seen this tweet, or a variation, in the last few days:

Tim Tebow: I’m Christian.
Media: Keep it to yourself!
Jason Collins: I’m gay.
Media: This man’s a hero!

Oh, the self-pity, the false equivalency!

Both men became free agents in their respective sports recently, both making news, but that's about where the similarity in their situations begin and end.

Yet Tebow's fans seem all bent out of shape that their man—long known as a Christian—didn't get the kinds of love Collins provoked by revealing his homosexuality.

Can we just review?

Tebow is part of an American majority: A straight Christian male.

Collins is part of several American and global minorities: An African-American gay male.

Tebow has all the rights of our Constitution – including the right to marry, to have his children instantly recognized as his, to attend the church of his choice, to be as proudly heterosexual as he’d like – that is, publicly holding hands, kissing, etc. There is a complete, undisputed right to religious freedom in this country. There is a complete undisputed right to heterosexuality in this country. Tebow can’t be denied housing, employment, or any other right simply for being a Christian or heterosexual.

In other words, proclaiming his Christianity or his virginal heterosexuality does not in any way involve stakes for Tebow. There is no risk in being a straight Christian.

Collins has limited rights as a gay man – depending entirely on where he’s standing. In Massachusetts and several other states, he can marry if he wants and he’s protected from discrimination in hiring and lodging and most quotidian activities.

But that’s not the case for Collins in, say, in Jacksonville, Florida, where Tebow grew up. In fact, in Jacksonville, the City Council specifically rejected adding protections for LGBT people less than a year ago – refusing to amend the city’s Human Rights Ordinance, a bill that already protects residents based on race, color, sex, marital status, national origin, age, disability or religion.

The folks who led the charge in Jacksonville? Christian folk like Tebow, who take their rights so for granted they can lead their lives without ever worrying if they can put their partner on their health insurance, if they’ll still have that health insurance if their bosses find out who their partner is, or if they’ll get asked to leave a restaurant for reaching across the dinner table to hold hands with their mate.

Christian folk who apparently fail to notice Jesus said nada about homosexuality and prefer to cherry pick their way through the Old Testament for their condemnations.

Give me a break!

And while I have no idea what Tebow thinks of his hometown’s ordinance, I know he gave a speech at Liberty University this year, the school founded by Jerry Falwell, which explicitly prohibits the enrollment of openly gay students.

(Is there a single queer institution that bans Christians? If there is, I don’t know about it.)

From the comparisons being made between Collins – the very first ever gay male athlete in a major league sport to come out – we might think Tebow was also breaking some kind of grounds as an out and proud Christian player.

But let’s not forget Kurt Warner, who lead the Cardinals to a Super Bowl while wearing Jesus on his sleeve. Or former Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs, who used to pray on the sidelines. Or former Seattle Seahawk Shaun Alexander. Or Indianapolis Colts kicker Hunter Smith. Or Atlanta Falcons kicker Jason Elam, who wrote a Christian-based novel called “Monday Night Jihad.” And those are just the football players.

What drives people nuts about Tebow is not that he's Christian but the constant Christian-in-your-face gestures – the kneeling, the scripture written on his cheeks, the anti-abortion Super Bowl ad.

Say what you will about Collins, up until this point, his sexuality has been completely inobtrusive. If he suddenly starts grabbing his crotch, writing Gertrude Stein verses on his face, or appearing in smoochy pro-gay Super Bowl ads, he could wear his welcome out as quickly as Tebow.

The reason Collins is getting the pats on the back now, the presidential call and the media high fives is because what he did still involves risks – he has given up a life of presumed heterosexuality, with all its attendant privileges, to accept the life of an openly gay man, with all its joys and limitations.

Sure, he could play blissfully protected in New York or Boston, but — now that he’s out of the closet — what about Memphis? Or Atlanta? The Orlando Magic could, for all intents and purposes, point to Florida’s anti-sodomy law (technically unenforceable but still on the books) and say, Hey, we don’t want to hire somebody who’s gonna come in and break the law.

People may not like Tebow – just like they may not like Collins – but Tebow is never, ever, going to experience anything even close to that.

PREVIOUS STORY: Why Jason Collins' coming out matters

Why Jason Collins' coming out is so meaningful

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:33:00 -0500

When I was in 20s, my queer friends and I had a phone tree. One of the most fun excuses to call was when a gay character would pop on TV. These were like rare birds or comets. There was a certain delight in seeing them, even when they were terribly written or acted, or when their ultimate effect was negative. For us, who rarely saw ourselves reflected in the flickering light of media ordinariness, seeing another member of our species in almost any circumstance was an affirmation that we existed, that we were, in fact, everywhere, however covertly.

I was thinking about those times again after reading Jason Collins’ moving coming out story in Sports Illustrated. We live at a time when queer people have never been more ubiquitous in media and out in the world. However unequal we may in fact be, we’ve never been more equal. But Collins' description of life in the NBA closet harkened back to a darker and lonelier time, a time when the stakes of being found out could be life-altering and devastating.

It reminded me too of those years when Martina Navratilova ruled the tennis world and we – gaggles of lesbians, including many like myself who weren’t particularly interested in tennis – would flock to see her perform. Why did we go? Because one of us had reached a pinnacle, because it was important to support her. Especially important since Navratilova, one of the very first pro athletes ever to come out, was hounded by the media and actually brought to tears by the relentlessness inquisition and barbs.

That particular episode made a hero of her friend and rival, Chris Evert, the tennis golden girl she stole the crown from. Evert admonished everybody to leave her friend alone. Evert demonstrated the importance of allies with words, but there was something more significant in her actions: She draped her arm around Martina and showed queerness didn’t rub off.

And we, the gay gals in the stands, understood something else was at play too. With every inch that Martina won for herself, she was advancing the cause of tolerance. And every time Evert draped that arm over her shoulder, it was less extraordinary, less brave – precisely because it had been so brave that first time – and more and more a common sight at countless Grand Slams. It was weird not to see them together, so much had they become the norm. And, sure, because Martina was such a towering figure – because she reshaped and redefined women’s tennis – she was indisputable.

Navratilova wrote an accompanying piece to Collins’ in which she makes an important point: hers was an individual sport. She was either good enough or she wasn’t. No one could keep her off the court but herself. With Collins, in a team sport in which personnel decisions aren’t made by players, a prejudiced coach or owner could keep a player off the court. Jason Collins’ position was more precarious.

And yet Collins, deep in the closet, felt compelled to reach out with symbolic identification, a move so covert I’m not sure anyone outside his most immediate circle understood it. He wore 98 on his uniform, in honor of 1998, the year Matthew Shepard, a young gay man was murdered in horrific and inhumane fashion.

That may seem an odd choice for identification. Collins is a titan, Shepard like a baby bird. But it may say something about how vulnerable Collins has felt all his life. And, of course, what an incredibly important step his coming out is. And how important all the media, league and political support is. It's Chris Evert’s arm multiplied by thousands.

When I read through the reactions to Collins’ announcement and see the inevitable reader comment suggesting the revelation of sexual orientation shouldn’t be news, I agree. But until there are no Matthew Shepards, saying you’re anything but heteronormative is still an act of courage.

And the fact that Jason Collins – roommates with a Kennedy, earning more than $1 million a year, and possessing the physical powers to dispatch any street bully – was still afraid, means that, yes, it’s still news.

With FAA, Democrats lose the sequester battle

Sun, 28 Apr 2013 16:00:00 -0500

Not that Democrats have ever been particularly good negotiators, but it’s possible President Barack Obama’s namby pamby adjudicating may have rubbed off on them, to bad effect.

Just last Friday, finally given a chance to show their courage in the sequester battle, the Democrats blinked — hard. by agreeing to a bill that allows the Federal Aviation Administration to bypass, at least for now, sequester-mandated cuts, the Democrats actually agreed to a strategy that basically hands the budget battle victory to the Republicans.

Do you remember the sequester? It was supposed to be so damn bad both sides in Washington were going to be forced back to the negotiating table, bipartisanship would have no choice but to emerge from the bitter pill of automatic cuts to the federal budget, without regard to need or politics: Head Start, the military — every favorite program was going to be guillotined.

When the Republicans didn’t fall for that and allowed the sequester to go into effect, the White House — which unconvincingly disavows the sequester as its idea — went on a campaign to warn about the hardships the cuts would cause. Things were going to get so bad, we were all going to be really sorry. And, in fact, things were going to get so terribly bad, the people would rise up and blame the GOP and then the Dems would have the upper hand and things would get fixed, probably.

There’s still a White House page with many dire warnings such as this: “Harmful automatic budget cuts — known as the sequester — threaten hundreds of thousands of jobs, and cut vital services for children, seniors, people with mental illness and our men and women in uniform. These cuts will make it harder to grow our economy and create jobs by affecting our ability to invest in important priorities like education, research and innovation, public safety, and military readiness.”

Except it hasn’t happened that way. Not that the sequester isn’t slicing and dicing: It is. But the very nature of the cuts means the pain is being administered slowly, over a huge swath of programs, and most people haven’t seen a big change in their lives post-sequester.

Still, the damage is real. In Illinois alone, the sequester affects funding for teachers, funding for special education for kids with disabilities, work study jobs, Head Start programs, child care, vaccines, nutrition programs for seniors, mental health programs, cuts to the FBI, emergency responders, veteran services, senior meals, housing voucher programs, AIDS and HIV services and many more programs.

So you’d think once the cuts actually started to squeeze people in a noticeable way — like say, hours long delays at the nation’s airports because of furloughed air traffic controllers — that the Dems would turn around and say, “See? This is what we mean. And it’s going to get worse.”

And then, you know, maybe the Republicans would at least have to explain their position.

But no. In fact, not at all. The Democrats completed caved. The vote wasn’t even close: unanimous in the Senate and 361 to 41 in the House.

The Dems agreed to a Republican bill that allows the FAA to shift funds to keep air traffic controllers working, and to keep travelers from being inconvenienced. And in doing so, the Democrats have given the GOP a blueprint on how to get around any other cuts to favored programs they’d like to alleviate.

In other words, the Democrats have given away whatever leverage they might have had had — especially because Obama has agreed to sign this bill, as is his wont, without concessions (like, say, Head Start in exchange for the air traffic controllers).

Let me be even clearer: The Republicans have figured out how to save programs important to their relatively privileged constituencies. The Democrats have completely sold their constituencies — especially the poor, young people, and women — down the river.

Obama and the Democrats are back out there now talking about ending the sequester, how it’s unfair to this and that program, and that the Republicans need to come back to the negotiating table. But why would be the GOP ever do that?

The Republicans are enjoying the sequester. It is, after all, what they wanted: cuts to government programs. Sure, they would have preferred more say in what to cut, what to preserve. But in the long run — in terms of goals — the sequester, which both parties signed on to as a strategy, is actually doing what the Republicans — and only the Republicans — wanted.

Immigration reform = 11 million new Democrats

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 11:47:00 -0500

Who would have thought that Donald Trump could be right about anything?

I’m referring to Trump’s speech last March to a half-empty room at the Conservative Political Pac Conference, when he railed against immigration reform while several other GOP bigwigs struggled with trying to bring the Republicans along on the issue.

But The Donald, in characteristic slash-and-burn style, railed with a warning about a path to citizenship – and not just the moral meaning of it, the way former Sen. Jim DeMint, who now heads the Heritage Foundation did, or based on national security concerns, however faux, like Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has posited.

No, Trump’s Cassandra moment was crass and political, aimed squarely at the electoral consequences of providing a path to the voting booth for 11 million mostly Latino undocumented residents.

“Every one of those 11 million people will be voting Democratic,” he said about the possible number of potential citizens. “It’s just the way it works. And you have to be very, very careful, because you could say that to a certain extent, the odds aren’t looking so great right now for Republicans, that you’re on a suicide mission, you’re not going to get those votes.”

Well, according to an analysis by Politico based on data from the U.S. Census and Pew Research Center, Trump was dead-on. Those 11 million new voters – and if all goes according to plan, the path to citizenship for some will come as early as 2018, the bulk around 2026 – will lean heavily toward the Democrats.

And here’s the fallout: Swing and almost-swing states like Florida, Colorado, Nevada and North Carolina will fall much more easily into the Democratic column.

And the new swing states could prove to be places as currently red as Texas, Arizona and Georgia – all with estimated undocumented immigrant populations that exceed Mitt Romney’s victory vote margins.

When you consider the GOP’s other population shift problems – especially the giant swerve toward urbanization, which favors Democrats (84 percent of Americans already live in cities) – there’s no question the Republicans are between a rock and a hard place.

If they don’t engage with Latinos on immigration reform, their resistance will engender even greater hostility from a growing demographic – a demographic headed to majority status in an inexorable march.

But if they surrender to the path of citizenship, they are also surrendering – at least in the short term, after the newly authorized residents become citizens – the possibility of continuing as a viable American party.

Neither scenario is good for the GOP, which is why immigration reform will be dragged out and then dragged down by Congress: why no meaningful reform has a real chance at all this time around.

There is a third way, of course, but no one – not Trump, of course, not Sen. Marco Rubio or Sen. Ted Cruz, or Rep. Paul Ryan (now palling around with immigration champ Rep. Luis Gutierrez) nor DeMint nor anyone else – is talking about it, because it would mean a wholesale rethinking of the GOP.

That would be to go ahead and create a path to citizenship and use the time from now to the first blossoming of voters to engage with Latinos on issues they care about even more deeply than immigration, such as education, healthcare, and hemispheric matters.

I’m no fan of the GOP, but even as I push back on their policies and proposals, I understand one solid purpose for the Grand Ol’ Party: In the absence of another viable party, they’re the only thing stopping the Democrats from turning the U.S. into a one-party country.

And that’s not good for anybody.

Rubio vs. Cruz on immigration

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 08:55:00 -0500

The Boston bombing is casting a long shadow over the immigration bill penned by the bipartisan Gang of Eight, but that — the idea that border procedures need to be tightened to keep out the likes of the immigrant bombers (who were 8 and 15 when they arrived here) — is the least of the bill’s problems.

The first is that the only political team that needs this bill is the GOP. And because the Republicans have such a nasty recent history on immigration (self-deportation, anyone?) and are so split on the issue, the Democrats don’t really have to do much of anything to benefit. When it comes to the largest voter bloc invested in the immigration bill — Latinos — there are so many other issues that push them away from the GOP (the umpteenth attempt to repeal Obamacare, positions on education and taxes), that Democrats can just stand by and whistle. If the bill passes, it will be a victory for them and the crossover Republicans, but if it dies, it’ll be the Republicans’ fault. So no need to break a sweat.

(And anyone who thinks President Barack Obama is going to ride to the rescue need only look at what just happened with the gun control bill: No one in Congress, GOP or Dem, gives a crap what he thinks; the man has no leverage. Moreover, this is a last minute leftover from his last term, when he deported more Latinos than any other president and completely ignored the southern half of the hemisphere in foreign policy.)

For the GOP, the immigration bill was originally the band-aid to cover up the bruising they got at the presidential polls from Latinos last November. For a minute, it looked like the very ambitious Sen. Marco Rubio (Florida) was going to be the Moses figure to deliver. You see, Rubio wants to run for president, and the best argument for his candidacy — because he has no legislative accomplishments — is that he, unlike other Republicans, will connect with the illusive Latino community. Unfortunately for him, most non-Cuban Latinos (and quite a few Cubans) despise him for his Tea Party allegiance and extreme right wing positions. The immigration bill, though not without its perils, seemed perfect for him: An opportunity to author a major piece of legislation while simultaneously neutralizing some of the antipathy toward him and the GOP among Latinos, giving him a chance to reshape the relationship in time for 2016.

But a number of things have happened since November to cool the GOP on immigration reform. For starters, while Rubio —Tea Party-affiliated, conservative, Latino -- gave cover to Republicans who might want to crossover and vote for immigration reform, the rise of Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas), another 2016 presidential aspirant, gives them another kind of cover. Cruz is also Tea-Party-affiliated, also ultra-conservative, also Latino (even also Cuban), and he absolutely hates the idea of immigration reform. In other words, Cruz serves as a shield for anyone who wants to vote against it and beat accusations of racism and the like. How can it be racist, after all, if a Latino like Cruz is also against it — and not just against it but vehemently, ferociously against it?

Cruz’s opposition — because Cruz doesn’t care about protocol or tradition — means he’ll nitpick his way through hearings (as he did with the Chuck Hagel confirmation), dragging matters out for months, so that the chances of the deal dying even before it leaves the Senate increase. (This may not be so bad for Rubio, even if the bill dies, if he can make the case that he really, really, really tried.)

And if it makes it out, it’ll then go to the House, where opposition is even more vocal, where the GOP has control and the our lame duck president has even less influence.

The sad fact is that many, if not most, of the GOP senators and reps calling for a slowed legislative process on immigration reform aren’t for immigration reform at all. What they want is to stop or dramatically slow immigration, especially from non-European countries. Cruz, in fact, goes so far as to consider undocumented immigrants subject to criminal prosecution on their status alone. And he isn’t above piling on: he authored a Supreme Court amicus brief on behalf of 10 states (Lopez v. Gonzales), urging the strictest enforcement of laws punishing those with prior felony convictions who entered the country illegally.

If Cruz takes the reins on this issue from Rubio, the immigration bill is dead on arrival. And when you consider that Rubio might be the best bet for this bill, you know something has gone really, really wrong.

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Fri, 19 Apr 2013 11:33:00 -0500

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