Who said those people protesting immigration reform were racist?

Occasionally I post stuff about the immigration debate here in our most wonderful nation. I do this because as an immigrant myself, I know all too well about the need for reform. That, plus the racism associated with the topic cannot be ignored. Last week DHS (Department of Homeland Security) secretary Janet Napolitano held a press conference announcing plans to attack the immigration reform issue by next January. Hopefully we'll be past the health care reform quagmire so that we can focus solely on this issue.

Last weekend, there were anti-immigration tea parties held all across the nation to express the usual vitriol as anti-immigration groups and organizations do. Organizations who are well connected and heavily funded by recognized hate groups. One such hate group is the organization founded by John Tanton known as F.A.I.R. (Federation for American Immigrant Reform) - group that got its start by funds from the Pioneer Foundation, a conservative organization who are of the belief that some races are genetically superior to others.

"As Whites see their power and control over their lives declining, will they simply go quietly into the night? Or will there be an explosion?" - John Tanton (F.A.I.R.  Founder & Director)

[Click to checkout a list of Congressmen connected to FAIR]

A key figure in the Pioneer Fund nexus is Roger Pearson. He was one of the main PF recipients ($787,400 as of 1993) and was editor of two important racist journals:  The Mankind Quarterly (articles from which are frequently cited in The Bell Curve) and The Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies  (which has published racist articles by Jensen, Levin, Gottfredson, and other PF recipients). A book Old Nazis, the New Right, and the Republican Party, by Russ Bellant, provides the following information about Pearson:

In spite of, or perhaps because of, his fascist past, Pearson became an influential political player when he moved to Washington, D.C. in 1975. He became the editor of the American Security Council's Journal of International Relations and served on the board of the ASC's American Foreign Policy Institute. The ASC was formed and run by retired military officers, corporate executives, and conservative politicians to promote a program of heavy military spending, support for cold war policies, aid to the Nicaraguan contras and UNITA in Angola, etc. Its political arm is the Coalition for Peace Through Strength, whose constituent organizations have ties to the fascist right, which Bellant details. The ASC was a highly influential organization during the Reagan and Bush administrations, with close ties to the military, the National Security Council, and State Dept. officials. Pearson's co-editors on the ASC's journal was James Angleton, former CIA deputy director for counterintelligence, and Robert Richardson, a retired Air Force general later revealed to be aiding gunrunning to Libya. So Pearson moved in high governmental and political circles.

During this time Pearson became associated with the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank influential in forming Reagan administration policy. Pearson was close to Edwin Fuelner, president of the Heritage Foundation, and joined the editorial board of Policy Review, the monthly HF magazine. In turn HF official Stuart Butler and editorial board member Ernest van den Haag (the long time writer for the National Review, who has publicly stated his opposition to school integration and support for Shockley's sterilization proposals), joined the advisory committee of Pearson's Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies. (Read More Here)

So as you can see, just with this one organization alone, just like Big Pharma and the anti-health care reform "grass-roots" organizations, their influence and power extends well beyond the normal eye can see. Yes folks, there is power in the almighty dollar. And coupled with a voice - or a bunch of noisemakers, depending on how you're looking at it - they can be quite effective, just like the voice of  a young man who goes by the name of "Robert Erickson". Check him out as he spoke at an anti-immigration tea party last weekend:







Wasn't that genius or what?!! The look of shock and horror on the faces of the idiots in the crowd was priceless. Surely something like this isn't going to happen at every anti-immigration protest in th months to come. However, I just wanted you to realize that when this debate starts next year, the disinformation, fear-mongering, and blatant racist rhetoric will rear it's ugly head even more than it already has within out national political discourse, so get ready.

What this kid, and the other members of his group did was brave, and is to be commended. Let's hope that next year there will be more brave soldiers in the fight for equality for a people who have already been dehumanized by being labeled as being illegal. Immigrants have had a positive contribution to this country economically and otherwise, as have everyone who came here, be it by choice or by force.

Besides, isn't there a statue somewhere in this country that says:

"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Hat-tip to the blog: stuff white people do