A reader writes about my liveblogging of the “Million Immigrant March:”

I just saw briefly on C-Span this particular meeting. The part I did see was what one could label as “dark” humor. I saw a crowd shot which had one individual holding up a side upside down - the sign read “We Are America.”

While it drew an immediate laugh for the basic- “this guy has his sign upside down” thing, it also showed a dark undertone of how far off the wall this whole illegal alien thing is.

Here you have this individual who probably is in the country illegally, probably has no clue to understanding English, probably has little or no education, and yet according to the speakers at the podium–he is our new American future.

The upside down sign shows how upside down and illogical the whole debate on this issue is If this individual holding the upside down sign up has children then the schools they are enrolled in are probably being turned upside down in educational value to accomodate them. The health services the upside down sign holder uses are probably being turned upside down to serve him and probably several family members. One could go on and on to find more meanings to what this upside down sign means for America.Quite literally this issue has been turned upside down and we are paying a huge price for it.

A reader pointed out to me that Randy Ransom has had an interesting role in Miller Brewing that might shed some light on Miller Brewings sponsorship of the ilegal immigration advocacy marches. From the July 17, 2006 Business Wire:

Business Wire, July 17, 2006
MILWAUKEE — Tom Long named President & CEO; Randy Ransom joins brewer as CMO; Tom Cardella to lead Miller Sales organization; Doug Brodman shifts to head Miller International

Now, just who is Randy Ransom?

Randy Ransom was most recently President of ConvergencePoint Group, a business consulting firm focusing on assisting organizations with capitalizing on cross-cultural market trends and opportunities. Prior to this role, Ransom served as senior vice president of portfolio strategy for Coca-Cola North America. Before joining Coca-Cola North America, Ransom served as director of International business development for FEMSA Corporate and chief marketing officer for FEMSA Cerveza. While at FEMSA, Ransom was a member of the company board. Prior to FEMSA, Ransom held a series of domestic and international positions within The Coca-Cola Company. Before his original stint at The Coca-Cola Company, Ransom spent more than 10 years in ethnic marketing and advertising. Originally from Mexico City, Mexico, Randy is a dual citizen of Mexico and the United States. Ransom earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of California-Berkeley and an MBA from UCLA.

Now, one fundamental question here: how has Miller been doing? I find it interesting that SABMiller, the parent company of Miller Brewing went from trading at 1196 on Apr 20, 2006 to trading at 921 on June 12, 2006. The big drop here was right after the May 1 demonstrations(and Ransom got formally hired right after the company seemed to bottom out). They’ve rebounded a bit since then-but maybe, just maybe in part the market didn’t like the management playing politics with corporate equity. Now, the market cap of SABMiller was something like $31 Billion–so that drop was significant, we are talking something like $7 Billion in shareholder value getting zapped. I’m sure there were other factors going on here-but the conincidence is really interesting.

I’m continually puzzled at why so many conservative supporters of immigration restriction are so restrained in their attitudes towards corporate and financial elites. Why shouldn’t supporters of immigration restriction support things like shifting taxes from income to a tax on concentrated assets, publicly financed elections, proportional representation or tougher laws on corporate crime? The simple fact is that illegal immigration and mass immigration in general wouldn’t go anywhere without the support of extremely wealthy and powerful interests. Containing those interests will go a long ways towards making a sane immigration policy possible. Frankly, folks like the SAB Shareholders may really need some protections from cavalier management-and might be better off even if the price of such protection were higher taxes.