This LTE is written to counter the one in your last issue, written by Rosemary LaBonte, which had initially been rejected by the Orange County Register in California, and thus was put online by her husband David.

It is all too easy to fume from the comfort of one’s favorite chair in front of the television set, viewing a parade of flag-waving people marching for their rights on American soil when the flags are not the Stars and Stripes. Now, if the occasion had been St Patrick’s Day, and the flag represented Ireland, we might be more accepting. If it were Columbus Day, and the flag represented Italy, that too would be understandable. Or, if it were later in the month and the occasion was Oktoberfest, we’d not be troubled to see a German flag. If it were the newly-established April celebration for those with Scots heritage, we might even applaud the banner of Scotland. And, since we citizens of the United States are, together, such a decent tolerant people, we wouldn’t mind the touting of the Mexican flag on Cinco de Mayo. But let those of Mexican descent or—God forbid!—Mexican nationals hold the Mexican flag up high while demanding to be treated as human beings, well, huff, that’s another matter altogether.

Talk about ingratitude! No humility whatsoever.

Who do they think they are? Do they really think they’re as deserving of dignity and justice and mercy as we? Of course they are not; we got here first, thanks to our superior immigrant ancestors, who were smart enough to speak English right away, so it’s a matter of finders/keepers.

Mrs. LaBonte claims she knows history. I suggest she has an unquestioning comprehension, being content with the romanticized version of earlier immigration patterns while confusing progeny of immigrants arriving in 1900 as coming of age for WWII. Then, as now, most fled from their very homes due to persecution and famine. She remains oblivious that the blood coursing in any kind of Mexican’s veins surges on from a time when there were no borders anywhere in this hemisphere. She also fails to recognize that meanwhile, progress has been made. Just as we no longer expect our children to have to trudge for miles through deep snow in order to reach the little red one-room school house, no longer do we expect immigrants—documented or not—to slave in sweat shops where they risk burning to death when the building catches fire or to keel over dead from heat stroke in the harvest fields. Being maimed in meat-packing plants is no longer just one of those regrettable but alas acceptable aspects to earning a living. Certainly we who are free and brave would never, in our American Dream, dream of rounding them up in mid-night raids, then keeping them (with their children!) incarcerated, sometimes for years, before their deportation, would we?

Since she’s from out of state, shall we overlook Mrs. LaBonte’s ignorance of the Texas Comptroller’s report a few years back, factually showing that we’ve actually profited from undocumented workers…yes, even after subtracting all that luxurious health care and other cushy benefits they ripped away from us taxpayers.

Mrs. LaBonte makes such a big deal out of speaking English. How proficient in the language (of her birth!) is she, when she can’t even distinguish rhetoric from other forms of expression? When she takes exception to Ernie Lujan’s suggestion that we tear down the Statue of Liberty, she takes his remark literally, completely ignoring the point of what the Statue of Liberty is all about. I wonder if she was one of those who ate Freedom Fries when the French wouldn’t participate in our war on Iraq, conveniently forgetting that it was that nation which gave us the Statue of Liberty, because of what our own stood for.

How appropriate that, on the same page as Mrs. LaBonte’s rant, appeared an article entitled A Story of Kindness Through Action. It was about an easily-irritated man who felt entitled, without knowing all the facts, to make a very caustic comment, making sure the woman using a welfare card overheard, because she was slowing up a supermarket checkout line. Hearing his remark caused her to burst into tears, then flee. Turns out, she was hardly more than old enough to vote, yet trying to raise three children, orphaned when their father/her brother died fighting in Afghanistan. Once the crank learned of the great harm he’d done, he set about making dramatic amends.

The very first soldier to die for US in Afghanistan was a Guatemalan national. An orphan on the streets of Guatemala City because his parents had been killed by US-imposed dictator’s troops, he survived until he was old enough to sneak across our borders, and, scrawny-built from earlier malnutrition, looked younger than he was, so did another sneaky thing by getting into a program for immigrant minors in order to stay. Talented, and wanting to become an architect, he joined the Marines in exchange for an education down the line. Out of our US largesse, we awarded him posthumous citizenship.

No, Guatemalan is definitely not Mexican, but many of the latter are on the rolls of the dead in service to our country.

What do you suppose Mrs. LaBonte will do when she recognizes her own duplicity and complicity in making the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave--this country we all love--a lesser, downright ugly place?

Yes, the US immigration policies are and have always been a mess. If we really are free and brave the way we sing out, then we can come up with solutions reflecting the best in our humanity rather than our worst.

Sincerely,

Jane Leatherman Van Praag

jlvanpraag@sbcglobal.net

254.527.4694

P. O. Box 354

Bartlett, TX 76511-0354