Uh oh, California’s Governator is getting in trouble again. Now Gov. Schwarzenegger is telling Mexican immigrants that if they want to learn to speak English, they should, um … expose themselves to a lot of English.

“You’ve got to turn off the Spanish television set” and avoid Spanish-language television, books and newspapers, the Republican governor said Wednesday night at the annual convention of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.

“You’re just forced to speak English, and that just makes you learn the language faster,” Schwarzenegger said.
[Schwarzenegger: Turn Off Spanish TV, San Francisco Chronicle 6/14/07]

Naturally, such commonsensical advice on how to learn a foreign language was condemned by those who benefit by keeping immigrants dependent on Spanish media.

“I’m sitting shaking my head not believing that someone would be so naive and out of it that he would say something like that,” said Alex Nogales, president and chief executive of the National Hispanic Media Coalition.

Arnold was appearing at the big convention of Hispanic journalists (NAHJ) that took place in San Jose last week. He knew he was asking for a spanking, and he has gotten it. The abuse continued in today’s Chronicle: Latinos reject governor’s English-immersion advice. The gov’s advice was “both insensitive and irresponsible,” according to Prof John Ramirez of Cal State Los Angeles, and that was one of the kinder comments.

Isn’t diversity fun!?

You can watch the video of the Arnold interview on the NAHJ website.

The New Republic recently published an article entitled “Why genes don’t determine race: Race Against History” by Merlin Chowkwanyun that’s a lot of the same old same old.

I’ve long felt my single biggest contribution was coming up with a definition of “racial group” that was both rigorous and common-sensical (“a partly inbred extended family”). Simply having a useful definition should do much to dispel the hysteria, bad-faith, status-seeking, and general air of nonsense surrounding the topic of race.

On the other hand, my definition hasn’t exactly swept like wildfire through the intellectual world as Chowkwanyun. But that’s the way it generally is. You don’t persuade famous thinkers, like, say, Richard Rorty, you outlive them. A new generation then comes along that doesn’t have their egos invested in bad old ideas.

So, I was pleased to see in TNR a reply to the article by Justin Shubow that demonstrates a good familiarity with state-of-the-art thinking on the subject.

(By the way, Steven Pinker was mistaken in attributing the phrase a “a race is just a very large and partly inbred family” to my friend Vince Sarich–Sarich was the first to draw the analogy of races to fuzzy sets in math.)

This morning I blogged on the powerful initial responses to a piece of open borders propaganda in the Houston Chronicle. Checking back just now, I see that precisely zero further postings were allowed on this thread for over nine hours, after which two pro-amnesty items appeared (one illiterate), two seconds apart.

Clearly, the Chronicle is suppressing comments. It is just incredible that this white-hot issue should attract so few replies. (I suppose it is possible that only two pro-bill comments arrived).

This, fundamentally, is why Patriots have to oppose the swamping of America by the current inflow. Repression is not an argument, but in many cultures it is legitimate. Political freedom is not normal in human society. It has appeared at its strongest in the Anglo Saxon culture America inherited (and advanced). Far too many subsequent immigrating groups have not comprehended or valued this.

Complain to the Houston Chronicle.

I’ve frequently heard the story of the 1998 Vidalia onion field raids from Mark Krikorian’s writings, but if you haven’t heard it, here’s a short version, which, unlike Krikorian’s version, names the legislators responsible.

In 1998, for example, Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) agents raided several farms in south Georgia, rounding up illegal workers who were harvesting highly prized Vidalia onions. It took only two days for four Georgia congressmen to complain to the INS about “a lack of regard for farmers.” The four are still in office: GOP Sen. Saxby Chambliss, Republican Congressmen Jack Kingston and Charlie Norwood and Democratic Congressman Sanford Bishop. The INS got the message and backed down.[The land of fair play?, Cynthia Tucker, Universal Press, February 21, 2005 ]

In another article, Mark Krikorian says that the legislators involved said that the Immigration and Naturalization Service “does not understand the needs of America’s farmers.”

Here are the needs of America’s farmers, with respect to illegal cheap labor:

• Some of them need to be paying higher wages, so they can hire Americans.
• Some of them need to mechanize their operations.
• Some of them need to switch to less labor-intensive crops, which can be harvested by machine.
• If some of them still can’t make a living farming without importing illegals to harvest their crops, they need to stop farming, and get a job, because their farm is costing them and the nation more than the value of their produce.
• And finally, some of them need to be fined or jailed.

The bit about “fined or jailed” sounds harsh, although many farmers would call “stop farming” harsher, but remember, these guys are living a life of crime–what the RICO Act calls “enterprise crime,” where your whole profit structure is dependent on illegal activities.

And speaking of “enterprise crime,” I think it would be worthwhile investigating donations from the Georgia Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association [send them mail]to the various Congressmen involved in shutting down enforcement in 1998.

There has always been something bothering me about this term. MSM isn’t really reflective of the broad base of popular opinion. Overwhelmingly, MSM channels couldn’t be sustained if it weren’t for corporate advertising. Thus, the purpose of MSM media is ultimately doing what advertisers want-and that means delivering readers to the corporate agenda.

One alternative term that might work is “Mainline” media-in reference to the practice of injecting heroin directly into veins. MSM really is the modern equivalent of what Marx referred to as the “opiate of the masses”.

The term that I think has a bit more precedent is Ralph Nader’s phrase “corporate pornography”. That really explains a lot of the peculiar bias of the media in the US.

Immigration restriction is ultimately a populist issue. Immigration was loosened in the US not because of an overabundance of democracy, but because of systematic over representation of specific groups due to campaign finance practices illegal in most countries, peculiarities in the US election system-and concentration of media power. No truly representative body would have approved immigration expansion even with the power of money and media.

We writers on VDARE.com need to quite being so nice to the purveyors of corporate pornography. There is nothing “mainstream” about these folks. They simply aren’t deserving of the term MSM. Corporate Media might be a little less offensive term-but largely these publications and broadcasts are infomercials with pretenses of journalism, particularly when it comes to immigration coverage.

I suspect the immigration issue will really start to get resolved when we see films with an attitude similar to Super Size Me or Sicko directly addressing immigration. Fast Food Nation made a stab in that direction, but we need material that more directly addresses the issue of immigration both from a fictional standpoint and documentaries-and which maintains a strong, “in your face” anti-corporate stand to be truly marketable.

Readers are enraged today at a particularly shameless Bush call for (putatively law-abiding) Hispanics to support amnesty for their illegal alien cousins:

President Bush yesterday told Hispanics to step into the middle of the immigration debate and make sure senators who have been bombarded with calls from opponents also hear from those who support the bill.

“There’s a lot of emotion on this issue, and it makes sense to have people from around the country come and sit down with members of Congress to talk rationally about the issue,” he told those attending the Hispanic Prayer Breakfast in Washington yesterday.

(Bush urges Hispanics to speak up, By Stephen Dinan, THE WASHINGTON TIMES, June 16, 2007)

(Implication: opponents of amnesty are irrational - get it?

Ironically, also today an unusual source provides graphic polling evidence of why Bush needs to find new support - and maybe a new party:

The new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll] survey makes clear that the easy path for both President Bush and the Republican senators who stand with him in promoting the immigration overhaul would have been to simply let the bill die. There now is no doubt that it was yanked temporarily from the Senate floor earlier this month because of intense resistance among conservatives, which prevented Senate leaders from bringing it to a final vote.

The poll paints a picture of opposition that increases steadily as you move left to right across the political spectrum. The survey asked Americans whether the immigration bill that the Senate is considering is an “acceptable compromise.” Among self-identified “strong Democrats,” 29% said it was; 19% of “strong Republicans” agreed.

By contrast, 57% of strong Republicans agreed that the measure gave “too many compromises to illegal immigrants by allowing them to stay in the U.S.” Just 31% of strong Democrats shared that sentiment — a 26-point gap between the true partisans on the key issue in the debate.

(For Republicans, Poll Shows Perils, By GERALD F. SEIB, Wall Street Journal, June 16, 2007)

Significantly, whatever Bush’s new party is, it apparently won’t be the Democrats:

To be sure, some feelings about immigration appear to be bipartisan in this time of rising anti-immigrant sentiment. A striking 73% of those surveyed said they strongly favored requiring all immigrants who apply to become citizens to learn English, and 57% strongly favor imposing new fines on businesses that hire illegal aliens.

Poll PDF here.

One writer, unimpressed by the cucumber growers begging for cheap labor writes

You know where those poor farmers can shove those cucumbers don’t ya?

This always comes up when cucumbers are mentioned–the answer is “The same place the Senate can shove S. 1348.” Actually, if they can’t–the cucumbers are supposed to be rotting in the fields for lack of anyone to bend over and pull them out. But it’s the thought that counts.

Liz Smith writes from New York

Of course, this is beyond ridiculous.

VDARE has done a great job of discussing the need for mechanization, but let’s not forget that in times of crisis Americans can be very resourceful with human power.

The cucumber story made me think of the Women’s Land Army that brought the harvests in during WWI in Britain and WWII in the U.S. As a Long Islander, I remember when school kids had a “spud break” during the fall season to help with the potato harvest. This was done in Maine as well.

My family would be the first in line to help a FAMILY farmer with his crops. Screw the corporate growers.

Another writer, on the subject of apples:

I am familiar with the price of apples on the retail side of the market. The price of the apples in the stores is not dependant on how much it is to grow as it is how much the consumer is willing to pay for the apple. The price of an apple is $1.20 for one you would put
in your lunch pail. But the cost of the apple is only $0.14 to produce and pick and sort.

The price in the store is almost completely independant of how much cost went into the production of the apple but is entirely dependant on how much the consumer is
willing to pay. If the cost to produce the apple went to say $0.27 the consumer will still pay $1.20 since this is the price point where the maximum dollars are made by the farmer. If the apple cost only $0.09 to produce the farmer will still charge $1.20 since this is
what the consumer is willing to pay, what the consumer deems the intrinsic value of the apple.

The farmers well know the above economics lesson but they also know that if they can get really cheap labor the cost savings is all theirs.

Vox populi, vox dei… I continue to be struck by the sheer quality of the some of the remarks posted on the comment threads following many MSM Open Borders propaganda blasts. Consider the first two responses to Enforcing responsibility: Senate saves face by returning to immigration law Houston Chronicle June 15 2007 -which is merely a squalid attempt to morally intimidate immigration patriots to accept amnesty because:

we also need a mechanism to admit those workers we want; we need to regularize undocumented workers already in our midst…

(In other words, we insist on keeping our cheap workers).

littlebit wrote

This immigration reform, more correctly termed “amnesty” is just another justification for pushing the housing, medical and educational costs of illegal aliens on the taxpayers while businesses increase their profits.
The elites who want this bill passed won’t be in the public hospitals competing against immigrants for medical care, their gated communities will only see the results of immigration through their nannies and gardeners. They certainly won’t have their children receiving an education in public schools that are spending more time on Spanish speaking children and less time on the education children whose parents obey the law and are paying the bills for these social giveaways . The elites don’t see the impact of this runaway illegal immigration and their lives won’t be altered by this amnesty. It’s the average American who will see their way of life destroyed by secret deals behind closed doors.

Painter offered

I bought a bird feeder. I hung it on my back porch and filled it with seed. Within a week we had hundreds of birds taking advantage of the continuous flow of free and easily accessible food. But then the birds started building nests …some of the birds turned mean… others birds were boisterous and loud: They sat on the feeder and squawked and screamed at all hours of the day and night and demanded that I fill it when it got low on food.

After a while, I couldn’t even sit on my own back porch anymore. I took down the bird feeder and in three days the birds were gone.

Now let’s see … our government gives out free food, subsidized housing, free medical care, free education and allows anyone born here to be an automatic citizen. Then the illegal’s came by the tens of thousands. Suddenly our taxes went up to pay for free services; small apartments are housing 5 families: you have to wait 6 hours to be seen by an emergency room doctor: your child’s 2nd grade class is behind other schools because over half the class doesn’t speak English. Corn Flakes now come in a bilingual box; I have to press “one” to hear my bank talk to me in English, and people waving flags other than “Old Glory” are squawking and screaming in the streets, demanding more rights and free liberties. Maybe it’s time for the government to take down the bird feeder and clean up the mess.

(This is a classic piece of satire which deserves to be read in full.)

With ordinary citizens of this quality reaching for their intellectual weapons, I wonder if the Inside the Beltway crowd realizes what it is unleashing.