Ruben Navarrette, disingenuous race-baiter

The San Diego Union-Tribune's Ruben Navarrette Jr. offers a disingenuous, race-baiting hit piece on U.S. Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI):

...What concerns Sensenbrenner is that [Pence massive amnesty] "provides unlimited immigration from Mexico and Central America." I asked him if that meant he would like to see a return to the pre-1965 system when we had immigration quotas based on country of origin.

No, he insisted, he didn't support quotas, but he and some of his GOP colleagues did have concerns about an "immigration system heavily weighted toward Mexicans and Central Americans, rather than people from other parts of the world." Then, he tried to change the subject.

I pressed him on whether rhetoric such as that fed the perception that Republicans are flirting with nativism or racism. If you say the problem is that there are too many Mexicans, I asked, then why isn't the conversation anti-Mexican?

What follows is similar to that excerpt. Sensenbrenner was discussing the percentages of Mexicans allowed in. Sensenbrenner wasn't discussing "too many Mexicans", he was discussing too many Mexicans in comparison to others. Navarrette, knowing that many of those who read him won't figure out what he's doing, tries to call that racism. In fact, it's those who would gladly accept as many Mexicans as possible even if those in other countries were disadvantaged who are the true racists.

And, while RN is correct that there are differences between Mexicans and the Mexican government, the more people of Mexican descent in the U.S., the greater the chance that the Mexican government can "get closer" to them and use them to advance the Mexican agenda in the U.S. In fact, Navarrette wrote a column about his friend Rob Allyn who was paid $720,000 to spread Mexican propaganda in the U.S.

Immigration · Wed, 08/09/2006 - 23:52 · Importance: 1