Racist teabaggers at Rep. Himes (D-CT) townhall heckle Bishop for asking question in Spanish.

[jefferson_dem]

Run time: 03:20 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAEIcsOL2n4   Posted on YouTube: September 03, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: September 04, 2009 By DU Member: jefferson_dem Views on DU: 3652

 
At the Norwalk town hall meeting on health care, Rep. Jim Himes (CT-04) takes question in Spanish from Stamord Bishop Emilio Alvarez. Himes was born in Peru and is fluent in Spanish. The anti-health care people in the crowd display their racism quite clearly.

[wryter2000]

1. Et tu, Connecticut?

There are bigots everywhere.

[jefferson_dem]

3. Watching this video really struck me in a big way...

Somewhere in between abject anger and sadness.

Aside from sheer political disagreements, these are some of the nastiest human beings i've ever seen on public display. Fuck them all. They cannot win. Period.

[zoff]

39. Himes represents one of the wealthiest counties ...

... in the country. If not THE wealthiest. Were talkin' old, old, old money and not nouveau riche. In other words, it's a more or less conservative district. I'm not surprised to find bigots there.

[CTyankee]

43. These weren't folks from Greenwich, I can assure you!

I've worked extensively in Fairfield County. These weren't affluent matrons from Cos Cob or New Canaan or the Darien elite. There are pockets of bigotry everywhere and I've seen them in a lot less affluent areas of the County. Sorry to say, they are often the people who need the health care reform the most...

[ihavenobias]

2. The fact that the right still pretends there is no racial component to their antics is astounding.

It's really insane.

[drm604]

7. The thing is, I think many of them really believe it.

They've convinced themselves that they're not racists when, for many of them, it's a core part of their belief system.

[Crowman2009]

4. Muy Bueno! Great way to get those bloated tea-baggers all confused!

And when they get confused, they get angry for no apparent reason. Hell, if you ask them anything, they get angry for no apparent reason.

I can't wait for someone to speak Ebonics! That way the numbskulls will start having a Michael Richards-style fit and really discredit their companies, oops I mean grass roots movement. LOL

[asdjrocky]

6. I like your spunk.

Welcome to DU Crowman :hi:!

[mzteris]

9. maybe they need my 10 year old

to translate for them.

He's pretty fluent in Spanish from attending Spanish immersion public Charter schools. He wants to start learning Japanese or Arabic in middle school if possible.

My older son is nearly fluent in Chinese - from different Chinese "saturday schools", a university student we pay to whom we pay $10 a "class" (she also gets to practice her English!), and attending Concordia Language Villages. He's trying to teach himself Russian now.

What is it with arrogant Americans anyway?

[Altoid_Cyclist]

5. Ok, this really sucks. I expect that type of thing here but not in CT.

That's one of the things that I really miss about Connecticut. It's been 20 years since I lived there, and back then people seemed to accept each other more readily than they do here. I just hope that these idiots were brought in from somewhere else.

[ooglymoogly]

16. You can bus rabid folks anywhere.

and by the by, Connecticut the state, is a company town. Hartford ins. etc, etc, etc. Not hard to find enough soulless insurance co. employees to man the battle lines with just the merest of threats of unemployment. I would not be surprised if Lieberman was not in the background behind the curtain chortling in his fist.

[espiral]

20. Connecticut is a US state

This does not surprise me in the least. The entire USA is dominated by obnoxious behavior, backward thinking, free-market mentality and cultural illiteracy. Does the state of Connecticut get some sort of special gold-star exemption? If anything, states like that are even worse for cloaking it in the sheer amount of hypocrisy and pretense that they do. It is easy enough to use the South and the Midwest as scapegoats, isn't it?

[Altoid_Cyclist]

41. You do have a point about the problems being nation wide.

I was just trying to hold out some hope that some areas aren't as blatant about their biases as what I see every day here. Of course, as you said, it's sometimes worse when it is a covert ideology. Here it's usually pretty obvious that there's an extreme amount of xenophobia, homophobia and/or racism. I knew a lot of people in CT who were less than shining examples of tolerance, but here it's so common due in part I think, to it being such a rural area that you just can't escape it. Of course, if CT was perfect they wouldn't have JL as one of their Senators.

[mzteris]

8. helps lose the hispanic vote -

and shows how crass and classless they all are.

My god, what a rude, ignorant bunch.

[asdjrocky]

10. The first or second time Himes points out Alvarez is clergy-

I heard a woman yell, "Then he should speak English." Sometimes the stupidity stuns me. Is that a requirement? If you're clergy, you have to speak English? What happens to someone who is a clergy and they can't speak English?

[PA Democrat]

17. I guess her God only speaks English.

These people are so filled with hate, it astounds me.

[asdjrocky]

19. Yeah. You said it right.

Wish I would have thought of that. "Her God only speaks English." I'm going to use that, by the way.

[shadowknows69]

36. Well everyone knows the oldest translations of the Bible were in English right?

Oh wait.

[CTyankee]

44. English. If it was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for me!

nt

[Wetzelbill]

11. it's astounding, it really is

The element of racism that is mainstream within the GOP, horrible.

[AsahinaKimi]

12. This is a very sad commentary on our country...

Everyone KNOWS America is a melting pot. In California we have telephone books printed in so many languages. Our public transportation systems have signs in English, Spanish and Chinese. I have been to the California Department of Rehabilitation and seen signs written in nearly every language, including Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Tagalog, Farsi, Hindi, Russian, Greek, and so many others. The people in this city get along fairly well..

Yet, this one guy gets up in CT and requests to speaks Spanish, to better communicate his thoughts, and these people are so insecure as to scream out "Speak English!!".

The last 8 years of the Bush administration has allowed this to foster and grow like an ignored
weed in the garden. Education is the only answer to this.. I sure hope we find a way to teach our
children what "racism" is.. and to give them guidelines to appreciate people for who they are and
that together we are better and stronger, then divided by ignorance.

hada no iro yori, anatano kokoro no houga motto daiji desu.

("Your heart matters more than your skin color.")

[Crowman2009]

13. Well not all of the country! It's usually the dumb ones who yell the loudest and stick...

...their beer bellies in the camera. Which in turn allows them to get the most attention.

[damntexdem]

14. Driving on I-35 in Texas, I went into a gas station store.

The people in line ahead of me were trying to communicate with the clerk, speaking Spanish to one another and then trying to say what they wanted in English.

After they left, the clerk turned to me and said: "Well, good, now someone will talk to me in English."

Of course I then did my whole transaction in Spanish.

The idiots who reject the very idea of learning another language deserve to be excluded from communication.

[stlsaxman]

15. i LOVE that the room applauded him when his question was finished!

[theFrankFactor]

18. I Really Would Like to Know What Percentage of this "Great" Land is Populated by these ASSHOLES.

[Joe the Liberal]

21. As would I.....

I generally like to think it's a very small percentage that the media pays a lot of attention to so it seems larger than it really is.

[TheEuclideanOne]

27. There are websites that will show you exactly how many sex offenders live in your neighborhood.

I was told never to look at this site because you really DO NOT WANT TO KNOW just how many of these peope live REALLY close to you. I think that the same thing applies here. It falls into the "be careful what you wish for" category. It is pretty frightening, I must say, to see what sounded like the entire audience acting like this just because this guy don't talk proper Mercan. I have also had debates in some public forums with professional colleagues of mine(computer geeks) and was amazed to find my position to be way outnumbered.

[espiral]

22. Distinction re: the word "racist"

A lot of what goes on in areas like this one is not so much "racism" as it is xenophobia, cultural imperialism, anxiety over change, and fear of bilingualism. I do not in any way approve of these people's sad behavior; however, to brand them "racists" for resenting the Spanish question is a little bit overblown. I am a Spanish speaker & have noticed that a lot of their attitude stems from resentment over being left out of discussions when they do not understand the language. They wonder what is being said about important subjects; and given that the majority of the US is still not bilingual, their concerns are understandable. Until truly bilingual education is achieved in the school system, this will be a problem, since the older generations lack proficiency in the second language through no fault of their own.

Even as both a leftist and a Spanish speaker, I do not think that either party acted particularly wisely here. The minister should have asked the question in English, given the time and current circumstances, or asked it of Himes through a simultaneous translator like they do in the UN/ONU; meanwhile, the audience should have piped down and behaved like civilized adults.

But to call their poor response to a frustrating (for both sides) situation "racism" is not apt.

[quiet.american]

24. You give these thugs far too much credit. nt

[espiral]

26. Try thinking a bit more critically. Namecalling is...

...no better than that which we claim to oppose. Have you actually dealt with many of the working-class people being endlessly manipulated by the right wing, the media and the anxiety of having sea-change sprung upon them without adequate preparation? Somehow, I doubt it; otherwise, you would be able to look past your own emotions and regard them with a modicum of human respect. If more of us on the left would be willing to do this, we could reach them. But it's easier to sit up there in the ivory tower and call them names, isn't it?

Classism and ethnic prejudice are no ethically better than racism itself.

[quiet.american]

28. You give these thugs far too much credit. nt

[espiral]

29. not taking the bait; goodnight.

[quiet.american]

30. Buenos noches. (And by the way, your assumptions about who I am are dead wrong.) nt

[byronius]

23. The dull thuggery of the incompetent. They stain us all.

Himes dealt with it well.

[Hav]

25. .

What really hit me here was how bad their behaviour actually is. When did it become ok for adults to behave like little spoilt brats? Typical mob mentality I guess.
I worry for the kids who see things like this and grow up believing that it's just alright to act in such a disrespectful and rude manner towards other human beings.

[DearAbby]

31. Here here

well said

[Billsmile]

33. Smart People Don't Act Like Jerks

The Connecticut events I've been to, so far, have been and anti-Lieberman Iran war thing in New Haven, a MoveOn health care thing at Dodd's office & an Obama organized public option thing in Lieberman's building (the staff came down to great us).

These events were all small at best & everyone was well behaved.

This town hall event obviously brought out the FOX crowd, but it does show the racism that exists in Connecticut.

I work in a CT manufacturing facility that employs many Spanish speaking folks. Sometimes the "reverse racism" thing rears its ugly head.

There are one or two towns not to drive through if you're an African American as you have a good chance of being stopped by police.

After being educated by Air America, Nova M, and the Thom Hartmann show I decided to take folks on and talk about politics. Now a "liberal" reputation follows me around.

Have found that Representative Joe Courtney's staffers are way hipper than Lieberman's or Dodds!

[REACTIVATED IN CT]

45. Welcome to DU !

From one CT resident to another !

[Enrique]

32. the GOP's id has been unleashed

the restraints have been removed.

[likesmountains 52]

34. Those people really scare me. How sad this is.

[knixphan]

35. Get this around.

Just posted on my facebook page. Shameful.

http://www.facebook.com/people/James-Parris/598423721?_fb_noscript=1

[jwirr]

37. As a 5th generation German American this saddens me. When I went to

college I had to have a second language to be able to get in but the one I should have spoken naturally was denied to me because of WWI & WWII. So this German American had to learn French in order to get into college. Let us stop this nonsense NOW.

[tomm2thumbs]

38. if the guy really was trying to support the issue, we'll see if it has the intended effect

I'm not a big fan of giving Fox more video to play all night long and a means to create wedge issues that distract from health care

[Critters2]

40. The thing that strikes me, having lived in both New England and the Midwest,

is that this bishop may very well not have been an immigrant. I worked in a Latino neighborhood in NE (Chelsea, MA), knew lots of Latinos. But they were mostly Puerto Ricans, not Mexicans or other immigrants as here in the Midwest. So, they were lifelong Americans, as certainly as me...or those morons yelling at that Bishop.

Yes, that's right, Connecticut morons....there are Americans whose native language is Spanish.

Morons.

[bitchkitty]

42. What assholes.

The rudeness is inexcusable. These are the people that go to Europe, sit in public places and complain loudly about the populace, and get furious when their waiter doesn't speak English.

These people should be in the dictionary next to the phrase "Ugly Americans."