Update:
Here's video of the racist:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nONjlZ8YMkA&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nONjlZ8YMkA&mode=related&search=
Update II: ACLU defends flag display at tavern.
Update III: A reader at Kos suggests that the bar owner certainly has a case against Broussard for trespassing, destruction of private property, brandishing a weapon (assault), among other causes for civil and criminal action.
Madison, Wisconsin - After helping winterize my family’s home this weekend, my father gave me some stamps commemorating the 60th anniversary of the desegregation case, Mendez v. Westminster School District (California) (1947).
I had never heard of that case, but it turns out Mendez is the Mexican-American and Latino legal precedent to Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the landmark decision still despised by racists the nation-over for its obliteration of the bigoted “separate but equal" doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896).
After reading up on Mendez, it made me think of the millions of heroes whose names we will never know who have advanced the cause for social justice in this country.
Thurgood Marshall, who argued Brown before the U.S. Supreme Court seven years after Mendez helped write an amicus brief filed by the NAACP in the Mendez case, along with briefs filed by the ACLU, the American Jewish Congress, and the Japanese American Citizens League.
Who knows all the forces that won the Mendez victory, but the fact that World War II saw legions of Hispanic Medal of Honor recipients may have helped.
The fight against discrimination and hate has countless allies and many enemies, seen and unseen.
Racist Fascist Jim Broussard
So, it came as no great surprise to me yesterday when a veterans’ e-mail newsletter that I receive boasted that an American believed he possessed the right to invade the private property of a Reno, Nevada tavern owned by a Mexican-American and cut down a Mexican flag flying above an American flag (pictured above).
According to WorldNetDaily.com: “After hearing a Reno bar was flying a Mexican flag above a U.S. flag, an angered U.S. Army veteran took matters into his own hands, drove to the site and cut down the banners in front of a stunned group of Hispanic patrons.”
The bigot in question identified himself as one “Jim Broussard,” according to WorldNetDaily.com, and he is one of the allies of discrimination and hate.
WorldNetDaily.com quotes Broussard:
"I'm Jim Broussard, and I took this flag down in honor of my country with … a knife from the United States Army. … I'm a veteran; I'm not going to see this done to my country. If they want to fight us, then they need to be men, and they need to come and fight us. But I want somebody to fight me for this flag. They're not going to get it back. … I was immediately infuriated and felt a duty to do something about it. I feel there's a lot of this turning-our-heads-on-things in concern with the Hispanic community and the things they do. They seem impervious to our laws in a lot of situations."
I’ve had my dealings with the likes of racists like Jim Broussard before and they share several traits: Ignorance, hate, cowardice, and a sociopathic sense of entitlement to inflict their authoritarian, sick vision of: White America rules!
My ethnic heritage is Irish-Mexican. The Mexican part comes from my father who hails from Aurora, Illinois. And I have been both the recipient of oral history and eyewitness experience in seeing how Mexican-Americans handle the likes of the bigoted Jim Broussard.
Put it this way, it’s direct and confrontational. And Jim Broussard and his pathetic moment of racist pride would not win the day were he to attempt to pull this crap in a Mexican bar in Aurora. The SOB would have an even worse time in an Irish bar.
In May last year, I was privileged to attend a ceremony in Aurora honoring a relative who was a pioneering Hispanic police officer and listen to his daughter who ridiculed the racists (after all we are all “spics,” as the bigots say) for the fools that all racists are.
I would have loved to see Broussard there.
There is a report that the Hispanic community in Reno is considering legal and political action against Broussard.
That’s a good idea.
Brother Jesse and Brother Al, I think we may just need you really soon over in Reno.
###
The fight against discrimination and hate has countless allies and many enemies, seen and unseen.
Racist Fascist Jim Broussard
So, it came as no great surprise to me yesterday when a veterans’ e-mail newsletter that I receive boasted that an American believed he possessed the right to invade the private property of a Reno, Nevada tavern owned by a Mexican-American and cut down a Mexican flag flying above an American flag (pictured above).
According to WorldNetDaily.com: “After hearing a Reno bar was flying a Mexican flag above a U.S. flag, an angered U.S. Army veteran took matters into his own hands, drove to the site and cut down the banners in front of a stunned group of Hispanic patrons.”
The bigot in question identified himself as one “Jim Broussard,” according to WorldNetDaily.com, and he is one of the allies of discrimination and hate.
WorldNetDaily.com quotes Broussard:
"I'm Jim Broussard, and I took this flag down in honor of my country with … a knife from the United States Army. … I'm a veteran; I'm not going to see this done to my country. If they want to fight us, then they need to be men, and they need to come and fight us. But I want somebody to fight me for this flag. They're not going to get it back. … I was immediately infuriated and felt a duty to do something about it. I feel there's a lot of this turning-our-heads-on-things in concern with the Hispanic community and the things they do. They seem impervious to our laws in a lot of situations."
I’ve had my dealings with the likes of racists like Jim Broussard before and they share several traits: Ignorance, hate, cowardice, and a sociopathic sense of entitlement to inflict their authoritarian, sick vision of: White America rules!
My ethnic heritage is Irish-Mexican. The Mexican part comes from my father who hails from Aurora, Illinois. And I have been both the recipient of oral history and eyewitness experience in seeing how Mexican-Americans handle the likes of the bigoted Jim Broussard.
Put it this way, it’s direct and confrontational. And Jim Broussard and his pathetic moment of racist pride would not win the day were he to attempt to pull this crap in a Mexican bar in Aurora. The SOB would have an even worse time in an Irish bar.
In May last year, I was privileged to attend a ceremony in Aurora honoring a relative who was a pioneering Hispanic police officer and listen to his daughter who ridiculed the racists (after all we are all “spics,” as the bigots say) for the fools that all racists are.
I would have loved to see Broussard there.
There is a report that the Hispanic community in Reno is considering legal and political action against Broussard.
That’s a good idea.
Brother Jesse and Brother Al, I think we may just need you really soon over in Reno.
###
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