Cheap Seats 2024 By Rich Trzupek

By George - 03/06

By Rich Trzupek
  We used to be a nation that prized character. We are increasingly becoming a nation of caricatures instead. The recent kerfuffle between Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and actor George Takei is the latest example of this regrettable trend.
  Jose Antonio Ibarra is an illegal immigrant who was detained, then let go, in New York City. Some time after that he moved to Georgia, where he is alleged to have beaten Laken Riley, a young college student, to death.
  Reacting to the incident Speaker Johnson said: ”Every parent, and every American, is saddened—and outraged—to hear about the loss of University of Georgia student Laken Riley. Our prayers are with her family and friends as they mourn this tragedy.”
  ”The brutal murderer who took the life of Laken was one of the millions of illegal aliens that the Biden Administration simply released and unleashed upon our country,” the House speaker added. ”For Laken, and the countless many others lost to this border catastrophe, House Republicans will continue to fight tooth and nail for a return to law and order. Mr. President, use your existing statutory authority and CLOSE THE BORDER!”
  It is always unfortunate when someone uses a personal tragedy to score political points, even if it is for a cause with which we might agree. But, everybody does it. In the scheme of the things, Johnson’s remarks were rather mild.
  Not so for Takei, who blasted the Speaker. ”I know your type of politician,” he shot back. ”Men like you smeared my community during World War II by preying upon people’s fears of others who didn’t look like them. It led to the internment and 125,000 shattered lives. Never again.”
  Now, I have some sympathy for George. I don’t wish to demonize him. I don’t care about his politics. I don’t care about his sexual preferences. I certainly accept the fact that he gets to be bitter about Japanese internment on the West Coast during World War II, since he himself was interred as a child.
  But there’s much regrettable over-simplification contained in George’s brief retort. Yes people who belong to one group have a history of treating people who belong to others groups like crap. Sometimes looks are involved, sometimes race, sometimes religion, etc.
  My Polish ancestors were serfs for Russian and Prussian land-barons long after the United States freed its slaves, for example. Many Poles who immigrated here struggled to find menial jobs and were routinely derided as ”dumb Polacks”, or ”DPs” for short. The Irish, the Italians, the Chinese, the Germans, the Czechs, the Vietnamese and just about every other group that jumped into the melting pot got burned at first.
  In that context, accusing the Speaker of racism is a rather weak knee jerk reaction. It assumes a motivation that George has no way of knowing, and it presumes that prejudice and conservatism are inseparable.
  The last point is somewhat ironic since it was the Democrat Party that approved and implemented West Coast internment. Not sure why Democrats get a free pass on some of the lousy decisions they made historically – resisting attempts to end slavery springs immediately to mind – but no matter. If George wants to paint all Republicans with a broad, ugly brush, I’ll suggest he weakens his argument rather than improves it.
  Is it not somehow possible that a reasonable person, even a Republican, can support orderly immigration, finding the current chaos along our southern border troubling? I really don’t care where immigrants come from, so long as we have a system in place to make sure we’re not letting in criminals, druggies, gang members, etc. We kinda used to do that and we didn’t think it was racist. It was called ”looking out for one’s own best interests.”
  Those of use who are disturbed by the chaos at the southern border are not concerned about the color of an immigrants skin, but the content of their character. Our government has an obligation to its citizens to enable immigration procedures designed to ignore the former and ensure the latter. Pretty sure Dr. King would agree with that.
  Email: richtrzupek@gmail.com