It's time for America, a nation of immigrants, to tell Joe the Plumber to fuck off

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Here's Samuel Wurzelbacher's latest invective of ignorance (at a right-wing tea party, no less):

I believe in making sure our country is safe first. I believe we need to spend a little more on illegal immigrants. Get them the hell out of our damn country and close the borders down. We can do it. We've got the greatest military in the world and you're telling me we can't close our borders? — That's just ridiculous.

Now, of course, America is a nation of immigrants, many of more of them illegal, in one way or another, than just the Mexicans who so trouble the nativist bigots of the right, Joe included. And, of course, many of the illegal ones from Mexico and elsewhere down south came to America for the same reason generations upon generations did before them: in search of hope, in search of a better life for themselves and their children.

If Joe wants "our damn country" to belong to his own kind, I'm sure there are more than a few native Americans who would tell him to get the hell out, too.

In fact, let's take up Joe's idea and run with it: Let's turn America into a military-police state with a wall around it. Let's target the Other, anyone who doesn't look right, anyone who might be a little too brown for Joe's liking. It's fascism, sure, but that's what he seems to want. (Notice that he equates illegal immigrants with terrorists. Making America "safe," it seems, requires targeting Mexicans.)

Mass deportation? Hey, why not?

Well, my American friends, why don't you start with the Wurzelbachers themselves? That doesn't sound like an American name to me. In fact, it sounds downright foreign. German or something, and, hell, America fought two world wars against them. Okay, maybe the Wurzelbachers entered America "legally," but can we be sure of that? Besides, what if they were let in simply because there was a generously liberal immigration policy back then? I'm sure even Joe understands that it's just not "safe" for America to have so many un-Americans draining the public well.

Oh, fine, I guess that won't work.

Well, I'm sure many if not most of the "illegal" immigrants Joe derides are a hell of a lot more "American" than he is. Unless I'm mistaken and America really is a nation of bigoted ignorance? Unless it isn't so much a light upon a hill but a sewer of hate?

No, allow me to be a tad more optimistic this July 6, 2009.

If they care at all about their country, Americans should tell Joe the Plumber that he's not one of them and that his views are un-American.

Actually, they should tell him to fuck right off.