Linda Chavez's disgrace

Linda Chavez notoriously penned a highly inflammatory column back on 11 May that was widely taken as saying, "Conservatives who oppose the current immigration reform bill, do so because they are anti-Hispanic racists." I read the column and, I have to say, found myself deeply offended and lost a tremendous amount of respect for Ms. Chavez. The best excuse I could manage to make for her was that she, like all columnists and influential bloggers, no doubt gets lots of hate mail, and because of her last name she probably gets a disproportionate amount of "you wetback bitch" hate e-mail from the Buchananite fringe. That wasn't much of an excuse but I was doing my best.

Then I heard a part of a Laura Ingraham segment -- not all, I admit, because the segment was fifteen minutes long and I didn't have that much time in between the family-of-eleven responsibilities -- in which Ms. Chavez attempted to defend herself. And her defense, it sounded to me, was basically, "Look, I said it was only 10%; so if you people took it to mean that all the people who are disagreeing with me are racists, that's because you can't read." I didn't remember her column that way at all, but, again, I didn't have lots of time to go back and check. But this gave me a new excuse for her: she's an incompetent writer who managed to give most of her readers -- certainly including myself, who has no pre-existing ax to grind with her -- the impression that she was resorting to the most shameless ad hominem distraction rather than dealing honestly with critics' arguments.

But in the last hour I had occasion to Google up the column, and before I got to the column I was looking for I found two others: one by Chavez herself, and another by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review's Dmitri Vassilios. And I am forced reluctantly to the following conclusions:

1. Chavez's original column was, absolutely, intended to accuse those who disagreed with her of racism.

2. This is not just the result of her having had a bad day, but is part of a pattern of behavior.

3. Even more damningly, Chavez is lying through her teeth about the original intent of her column.

These are weighty charges; so let me walk through my reasoning carefully.

Chavez complained bitterly to Ingraham that she didn't call everybody who disagreed with her racist, but then went right back to saying that there would be no controversy, and everybody would be perfectly cool with all these illegal aliens here, if there weren't a bunch of racist pundits making it out to be an issue. Then in her non-mea-culpa column, she makes the following assertions:

My column last week argued that "Some people just don't like Mexicans — or anyone else from south of the border," and that this sentiment was playing a pervasive and destructive role in the current immigration debate...Ten percent is not a very alarming number (Americans are among the least intolerant groups in all international studies of the issue), even though I think the group includes a disturbing number of influential voices on the right, who even if they don't personally share these views seem perfectly comfortable in the company of those who do. Those in positions of influence, whether elected leaders or talk show hosts, have a special responsibility not to inflame racial passions and animosities.

So how is it that some of my fellow conservatives have demonstrated that I am wrong to think a small group of them might not want Mexicans to come to America — even legally?

She then cherry-picks inappropriate comments from TownHall.com to show that, sure enough, it is possible to find racist conservatives in comment sections on political sites in the blogosphere.

If I may digress for a moment, I note with sardonic amusement that, in a country in which there are millions of Mexicans who hate Americans and consider us to have stolen half their country or even an entire continent -- does Ms. Chavez think that the anti-gringo prejudice rate among recent Hispanic arrivals is less than ten percent? -- Ms. Chavez has written a column that had the effect (even though she claims it was unintentional) of saying, "Hey, all y'all Hispanic people out there -- you know all those conservatives who are arguing against this bill? It's because they're Hispanic-hating racists." Um, now, do you think it might be remotely possible that such a column would have the effect of inflaming racial hatred? But Chavez seems to want other people to stop criticizing her bill -- even on the merits, and without mentioning race at all, and even with repeated denunciation of racism and clarification that racist motives were out of court -- because, "those in positions of influence, whether elected leaders or talk show hosts, have a special responsibility not to inflame racial passions and animosities." Perhaps Ms. Chavez thinks she has little influence on American popular opinion? (To be fair, that statement is far more true this week than it was last week.)

At any rate, let's look at whether (a) Ms. Chavez is willing to say, "You're a racist," when the only real evidence is that somebody dares publicly to express the opinion that the current immigration reform bill is a bad one, and (b) Ms. Chavez, in her defense of her column, is honest.

You will note the following facts:

1. The bitter reaction against her was due to the impression that she appeared to be trying to say that people who disagreed with her were doing so because they are racist, and that even when they present arguments that don't mention race -- and indeed explicitly disavow racist motivations -- this is simply due to the fact that they know better than to be honest about their true motivations.

2. In defending herself against this charge, she hypes her mention of the 10% number, both in the Ingraham segment and in her column, and she at one point seems by implication to portray her prior column as saying merely, "A small group of my fellow conservatives might not want Mexicans to come to America — even legally." But so far as I can tell she does not say, "I'm sure that there are many prominent conservatives voices in this debate whose views are sincerely held and have nothing to do with racism." Also, while she admits to having argued that the debate is being influenced by racism, she portrays herself as having said merely that racism "plays a pervasive and destructive role." That insofar as racism plays a role, it is destructive, we would all agree (except insofar as Ms. Chavez wishes to use the leftist trick of redefining "racism" to mean "believing unflattering generalizations about another culture"). But did Ms. Chavez really argue merely that it was "pervasive" in the debate, or was her previous column much more sweeping?

In short, Ms. Chavez protests angrily that people who say she's implicitly accusing everybody who publicly disagrees with her of being racists who are hiding their true motives, are misinterpreting what she says. And she appears to be complaining that they are thus misinterpreting even though her column clearly implied that only a minority of conservatives who think the bill is bad are racists. And besides, their criticism is unfair because there's a whole bunch of those racists.

Now let's look back at Ms. Chavez's original column. She does, indeed, mention the 10% number -- in a parenthetical aside in one sentence of a twenty-three sentence column. But that column also includes the following sentences, which Ms. Chavez subsequently tries to downplay in pretending that her column did not in fact say precisely what it was universally interpreted as saying.

The 10% caveat is instantly followed by the next sentence, whose only possible purpose is to imply that the number among people who disagree with her is way higher than ten percent:

"Unfortunately, among this group is a fair number of Republican members of Congress, almost all influential conservative talk radio hosts, some cable news anchors — most prominently, Lou Dobbs — and a handful of public policy 'experts' at organizations such as the Center for Immigration Studies, the Federation for American Immigration Reform, NumbersUSA, in addition to fringe groups like the Minuteman Project."

And the next paragraph -- which I defy anybody to interpret as meant to apply to a number closer to 10% of her opponents than to 100% -- is this stunner:

Stripped bare, this is what the current debate on immigration reform is all about. Fear of "the other" — of those who look or sound different, who come from poor countries with unfamiliar customs — has been at the heart of every immigration debate this country has ever had, from the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 to the floor of the U.S. Senate this week.[emphasis mine]

Got that? Not, "some of the people who think comprehensive immigration reform is a bad idea have racist motives or assumptions," or even, "most of the people..." No, racism is what the debate "is all about."

Well, perhaps she just got rhetorically carried away and didn't mean that so sweepingly? Maybe she will clarify it later in the column?

Indeed she does:

The only difference is that in the past, the xenophobes could speak freely, unconstrained by a veneer of political correctness. Today, they speak more cautiously, so they talk about the rule of law, national security, amnesty, whatever else they think might make their arguments less racially charged.

Now, if Ms. Chavez does not intend this to imply that people who list those arguments are (a) really motivated by racism and (b) dishonestly trying to hide this fact, then she is the world's most incompetent writer. For she went out of her way just one paragraph back to say that racism is what the current debate is all about. That would seem to imply that when you hear other, apparently non-racist arguments advanced, they are fraudulent masks covering up racist motives -- and when given a chance to clarify, she takes every serious argument advanced against the comprehensive reform bill by reputable conservatives and explicitly attributes the use of those arguments to a desire to "make their arguments less racially charged."

She's not done even yet.

Where once the xenophobes could advocate forced sterilization and eugenics coupled with virtually shutting off legal immigration from "undesirable" countries, now they must be content with building walls, putting troops on the border, rounding up illegal aliens on the job and deporting them, passing local ordinances to signal their distaste for immigrants' multi-family living arrangements, and doing whatever else they can to drive these people back where they came from.

Um, building walls and putting troops on the border, and rounding up people here illegally and deporting them -- that would be, um, like, enforcing the law and securing our borders. But Linda Chavez knows why we want that done -- it's because we want to "drive these people back where they came from." After all, in the previous paragraph she already told us that people who talk about "the rule of law" and "national security" are just xenophobes trying to disguise their racism. And notice that "the xenophobes" in the previous paragraph are people who argue against the President's immigration vision on grounds of the rule of law and of national security, but in this paragraph "the xenophobes" are people who advocate forced sterilization and eugenics, and in the next couple of paragraphs they'll be identified with "the No Amnesty crowd." Again, either Ms. Chavez is deliberately resorting to shameless and contemptibly slanderous demonization of people who merely commit the unforgivable sin of disagreeing with her, or else she is a spectacularly incompetent writer who should for her own safety not be allowed near a computer keyboard.

And, just because Linda-before-the-storm didn't have the sense to realize that Linda-after-the-storm might want to backpedal, and might want to be able to pretend that she really only meant that a small percentage of those who disagreed with her were motivated by racism, she wraps it up with this categorical statement:

"But we need to quit pretending that the 'No Amnesty' crowd is anything other than what it is: a tiny group of angry, frightened and prejudiced loudmouths backed by political opportunists who exploit them."

Um, should the rest of us return the favor and quit pretending that Linda Chavez is anything other than what she gives every evidence of being?

And that brings us to Dmitri Vassilios. Ms. Chavez might try to tell her friend Laura that she does not simply label as "racist" anybody who disagrees with her on no evidence other than their disagreement -- at least, I certainly got the impression that, in that interview, she was trying to claim that she does not consider "this person thinks the bill is a bad idea" as proof that "this person is a racist." But here is Mr. Vassilios's version of his interaction with Ms. Chavez:

1. Mr. Vassilios writes this column on the disastrous effects the government's inability to control the border has had on the Arizona border, which column, as he subsequently and quite correctly notes, never mentions race. It does, however, cite at length a pamphlet warning about high crime rates on the border -- a pamphlet handed out not by the Border Patrol or the National Guard or the local sheriff's department, but by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which gives the pamphlet to Americans wishing to visit the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona. It also gives the testimony of a local woman whose house has been repeatedly broken into by illegals, and of a staff member at the visitor services department who speaks of cars being stolen, of visitors being robbed by illegally-present bandits, of murders, of rapes. It closes by criticizing President Bush for his cavalier attitude toward illegal immigration.

2. His article, along with three government reports about the impact of illegal immigration on infrastructure and crime, is forwarded to Ms. Chavez by an independent researcher.

3. Ms. Chavez's e-mailed response to the researcher (who forwarded it on to Mr. Vassilios): "Don't email to us your racist propaganda again."

4. Mr. Vassilios tried to contact Ms. Chavez about the whole incident, and his side of the what-happened-next story is this:

Immigration pundit Linda Chavez could have said the e-mail message was a hoax, a merry mix-up like in one of those screwball 1940s comedies or that she did not consider my writing to be "racist propaganda." What she said was "no comment." Her office manager said "it's just not that big of a deal. Honestly, we don't have time for something like this. It's just silliness."

Now, from where I sit, that looks a whole lot like, "This person disagrees with me; so even though none of his arguments have anything to do with race, he must be a racist."

Is it possible that Ms. Chavez's side of the story might provide some conveniently-omitted details? Sure. Is it possible that Ms. Chavez does not really assume that almost all those who disagree with her does so because they are evil people, and that those whose arguments do not appear to be based on evil motives are just trying to disguise their true nature? I imagine so. Would Ms. Chavez prefer that I give her the benefit of the doubt? I'm sure she would.

But would she return the favor if I were to observe that I am deeply opposed to the immigration bill on grounds of national security implications, the precedent for the rule of law, the likelihood that the bill will greatly accelerate the pace of illegal immigration and render future enforcement even more hopelessly difficult than it already is, the likelihood that neither Bush nor his predecessor will actually attempt to enforce the provisions that would shut down the immigration flow, and by the immense financial and economic cost that I believe the bill will impose on the American economy and the American taxpayer? Or would she say that I am just a Mexican-hating racist trying to hide my true motivations?

I leave it to you, and to Dmitri Vassilaros, to decide.

P.S.: Remember that Ms. Chavez doesn't know that I have spent time with my parents in Mexican slums helping build churches, that when I lived in Austin I more or less informally adopted the extended family of a young man I knew was here illegally and eventually helped pay for the medical bills of his mother back home in southern Mexico, that I not only took in a Brazilian high school exchange student for a year but also brought him back to the States at my expense a couple of years later and provided him with a car and paid his college tuition, that I know the names of and chat with most of the people who man the cash registers at BP even though 95% of them speak English with a heavy Mexican accent -- which would be why I habitually talk to them in my limited but enthusiastic Spanish. If Ms. Chavez really wanted to know whether I hate people from south of the border, she could talk to Edgar or to Luz or to Annabella or to Lorena (who, like me, has twin boys) or to July (whose name I pronounce correctly) or to Higro.

But if she knew my views on immigration...hmmm, what do you think are the odds she would bother to ask the people who know me to enlighten her as to my character before she dispatched me to my demonized pigeonhole?