Blame it on Mexico

Last night I was working on a few chores, trying to get some things done so I could get to bed. The TV was on, but I really wasn't paying much attention to it. I'm not really sure what was on, something on Cinemax is all I know and certainly all you need to know.

Something new came on the TV. I still wasn't paying any attention. But as I was finishing my task, putting away some music CDs, something on the show caught my attention. It wasn't the plan, but I started watching it.

It was some sort of movie in a documentary style. Nothing I recognized. It had an odd premise, which was that Latinos throughout California were disappearing. In a short period of time, all the Latinos in California were gone and the state was cut off from the rest of the nation by an odd, thick fog right at the state's borders with Mexico, Nevada, and ostensibly Arizona and Oregon too.

In spite of my plan to go to bed, I watched. Throughout the movie there were facts sprinkled on the screen about the human and economic impact Latinos have on California. Percentage of teachers in schools, how much they spend on goods and services, number of workers in various professions.

The plot of the movie may have been a little fantastic and unbelievable, but the premise that the loss of all the Latinos at once would cripple California is easy to believe and understand. Half of California's population is Latino -- Mexican, Central American, South American, Caribbean Islanders.

As much as some Anglos and others may wish "those Mexicans would go back where they came from" the Latino population is the frame, engine, fuel and transmission moving the California economy.

The movie, a comedy "mockumentary" called "A Day Without a Mexican," had a very serious message, one I care about intimately. My daughter is a "half-Mexican" Latina and she faces the same bigotry and stereotypes that the movie was shining a spotlight on.

Unfortunately, the people who most need to see the message probably never will. I am convinced that most of the clamoring about border security and illegal aliens bleeding social services is more about bigotry, ignorance and elitism than it is about terrorist threats or fiscal responsibility. And all that crap about people saying farmers and service industry folks should just pay people better to get "Americans" to do labor-intensive, grimy jobs doesn't fly. If people are worried about a small fraction of their tax payments going to social services for illegal immigrants, and it's a matter of money not bigotry, do you think they would want to pay $3 for an orange or $12 for their Big Mac value meal?

Frankly, California is much further along in not only accepting is Latino population but embracing is Mexican and Latino heritage. And if the Latino community ever embraces the ballot box it will control the state not only economically but politically as well.

States like Oregon and Washington, still have much to learn from California in embracing their Latino residents not just as a necessary evil but as friends and neighbors and peers.

Bigotry