Full-Blooded Un-American

The Perrones arrived from Italy with the shirts on their back. They scratched and saved to help young Ferdinand attend medical school. He became a country doctor in upstate New York, where he spent his life treating local farmers. His two sons served in the US Navy. One had a daughter, the mother of my children. Ferdinand was not a real American.

Enrico Fermi, Hans Bethe, Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, John von Neumann, Edward Teller, and Victor Weiskopf came to America to escape Hitler. These men played key roles in the Manhattan Project and helped to establish America's military and scientific dominance over the Nazis and then the Soviet Union. They were not real Americans, either.

David Ho was born in a small Taiwanese village. He immigrated to southern California as a young boy. He was Time Magazine's Man of the Year 1996 for his role in developing life-saving protease inhibitors to treat HIV/AIDS. He's Magic Johnson's doctor, but he is not a real American.

Specialist Charles is a refugee from Sudan. His last name is withheld for security reasons because he is an Arabic translator for the US Army. He is a newly-naturalized citizen who recently was awarded a Purple Heart. He left a piece of himself in Iraq. He, his wife, and his four U.S.-born children are not real Americans.

How do we know these people are not real Americans? Because Jason Fry, age 24, of West Virginia says so. Fry offers this commentary explaining why he prefers John McCain to Barack Obama, Fry prefers "a full-blooded American."

Some people might say that Fry's views are a tad nativist and racist. In fact, however, this sagely figure has "hit upon something essential in this presidential race." So, at least, reports his Boswell, syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker. Perhaps auditioning to be the conservative counterpart to Maureen Dowd, the elegant but vacuous Parker concludes that the main issue is: "Who 'gets' America? And who doesn't?"

In case you missed it, she adds:

"It's about blood equity, heritage and commitment to hard-won American values. And roots. Some run deeper than others and therein lies the truth of Fry's political sense. ...there is a very real sense that once-upon-a-time America is getting lost in the dash to diversity. We love to boast that we are a nation of immigrants. But there's a different sense of America among those who trace their bloodlines through generations of sacrifice."

It goes on like this for two pages.

"...the truth is, Mrs. Clinton's own DNA is cobbled with many of the same values that rural and small-town Americans cling to. She understands viscerally what Barack Obama has to study."

Parker finishes her essay condemning those "who disregard the laws of the land and who dismiss the struggles that resulted in their creation. Full-blooded Americans get this. Those who hope to lead the nation better get it soon."

Take a moment to ponder how ugly these paragraphs really are. Let's start with the idea that young Jason is unique in tracing his "bloodline" through generations of sacrifice. This specifically insults Barack Obama's family, including his grandfather who served in Patton's army and was laid to rest with an American flag draped across his coffin.

The real insult goes deeper. Apparently, those of us who are not white and Christian, preferably male and working class, are only America's invited guests. We lack the bloodlines and roots of "ordinary Americans." Our DNA is cobbled with the wrong stuff.

Then there's that creepy sentence: "And roots." Too bad the Soviet Union is gone. Ms. Parker would have fit right in with their propaganda department, which labeled Jews "rootless cosmopolitans," and thus untrustworthy.

America is rapidly changing. This causes real challenges. At times, it's hard to keep up. This was true in 1855, when Walt Whitman wrote about the bustling streets of immigrant New York. This was true on those same streets fifty years later, where my grandfather left school at 11 to learn his Protestant work ethic. It remains true today, when poor immigrant kids graduate in such conspicuous numbers from New York's elite high schools.

Anyone who would label any fellow American less than "full-blooded" does not understand the animating spirit of our diverse democracy. Everyone who swears allegiance to our Constitution, learns the language, and contributes to our common life is as full-blooded as anyone needs to be.

Writing in The American Prospect, Richard Yeselson commented that Barack Obama juxtaposes "an inclusive civic nationalism" against a "discredited ethnic or racial nationalism that sees blood and race and the entitlement they bring as constitutive of national creed."

Yeselson understands something important that Parker misses: We're all in this together. The fifth-generation West Virginia coal miner is no more American than the first-generation Arab-American doctor who goes to Appalachia to work off his medical school debt. Americans grieve equally for the Kansas farm boy who died for freedom at Normandy. We celebrate equally when some immigrant's son develops a desperately needed vaccine.

Parker's column is one of many to appear lately that seek to spread the same disgraceful memes: Barack Obama is faintly unpatriotic and un-American. It's depressing, but sadly unsurprising, that many as many as ¼ of the Kentucky primary voters who supported for Hillary Clinton reported to pollsters that race was a significant factor in their vote. There some good people here, but they are doing wrong. I trust, come November, that most Americans will have the decency to do better.

Jason Fry doesn't get it. Fortunately, he's only 24 and probably redeemable. Life being what it is, he'll probably find a Vietnamese-American girlfriend who will educate him.

As for Kathleen Parker -- who hides behind this young man to make ugly insinuations -- she is another story. She is being excoriated across the web for this column and others.

She fully deserves it. In attacking the content of Barack Obama's DNA to impugn the content of his character, she is the real un-American in this 2008 campaign.

Postscript: Bravo for the excellent comments as of 5/21 am. These are terrific.

Comments

[eciaccio]

If nothing else, Barack Obama's campaign will continue to flush out the virulent racists of our country. Unfortunately, these "American as apple pie" racists seem either oblivious, lacking shame, or (somehow) both. If the GOP realizes its only chance of defeating Obama is to exacerbate our nation's historical but still-simmering racism, it will do it, either through "Swiftboat" groups, McCain's not-so-veiled insinuations, or both. If that fractures our country even more than it already is split, the GOP, which lied us into illegal wars of aggression, torture, and destruction of our Bill of Rights, won't blink an eye. In many ways, this election campaign and its results WILL be a defining moment for our thankfully declining anti-ecology, corporatist-militarist-racist-sexist empire. But what it defines us as may not be very pleasant for many of us to acknowledge.

[chappelforpres]

"Who 'gets' America? And who doesn't?...It's about blood equity, heritage and commitment to hard-won American values. And roots." - Kathleen Parker

Who "gets" America? Kathleen? Obviously not you! But, thankfully, Obama seems to.

he clearly sees a deeply disturbing and problematic America. An unsettling morass of endless war, corporate greed, grinding poverty, "special" interests, substandard health-care, declining wages and rapidly evaporating opportunity. Not the white, blue collar, provincial America, you seem to be waning nostalgic about. Poorly educated, unread, untraveled and decidedly fear-ridden. Most of them living paycheck to paycheck, mired in dead end manufacturing / service jobs that could evaporate overnight. An there, looming on the horizon, ever growing numbers of even hungrier Hispanic's, willing to work , as hard, for less.

The discussion about Obama should be; Is he a leader capable of resuscitating a nation seemingly on the precipice? Not a arcane discussion on some fanciful, genealogical litmus test he must pass to meet your muster!

[shep1900]

Wasn't John McCain technically not born here? Yes, of course he's an American citizen, but if Ms.Perker wanted to get technical.....

[loax]

I wnet looking for this article and I founf it. it is most disturbing article to read. What is Ms Parkers heritage. does she qualify to be a "Real American" To say that any person who is not born in this country, and who does not have roots that go back to when America was first settled lends a socialist thought towards other people. I do not look at my neighbors as anything but Americans who have cometo share in a democracy through their ancestors or themselves. It almost read like Ms Parker would like to re-establish the concentration camps of Nazi Germany to make sure we dont let "those" people in. What a sad life she must have not to be able to enjoy and share the cultures of other nations that are now here as citizens

[Dailyfare]

"once-upon-a-time America is getting lost in the dash to diversity"

When has this country NOT been diverse? There hasn't been any "dash to diversity". Instead, Ms. Parker seeks to whitewash this nation's early demographics to make a case for discounting Senator Obama as a qualified presidential candidate.

Ms. Parker - sorry. That train has left the station.

[murphysgirl]

More complaints need to be held against Parker. She needs to be called to the carpet on her racist propaganda piece.

[CornellRedneck]

I find it singular that so many poor whites still cling to the old "free, white and 21," canard that was popular when I was growing up in the 50s-60s. When you have very little to cling to, you hold on to it all the harder.

[lynnn]

Parker's article sounded better in it's original German.

[vipersdad]

Clever comment but offensive to those of us with German Ancestry. I had relatives who opposed Hitler in the 1930's and fled Germany. I understand you're making the Nazi connection, just as Bush did in his Chamberlain analogy the other day. There were a large number of Nazi sympathizers in this country pre WWII and there are some still today. The problem you describe metaphorically is not a German Problem, but a human frailty and one to guard against. As long as we equate things like this to being "German" we forget the lessons of Ruanda, Cambodia, the Soviet Union and countless other places where Genocide was waged against human beings.

Rant over.

[altohone]

I'm half German, but thought it was funny.

I understand your point, and laughing at ourselves isn't very German, but it helps a lot.
Most probably are educated enough to know he was referring to the past, since modern Germany was one of the few good friends that tried to prevent our launching an unjust war of choice.

We have the advantage of knowing the horrors a lying government can commit, but I don't think the comment encourages genocide.

[Rule Of Law]

LOL

[Pocho]

The racist white kid in poor straights doesn't have much but does one thing, that which he believes some do not. He hangs on to that for the little sense of self worth offered.

Bullying enlarges space in a group by diminshing that of another sensed vulnerable. It can be done with insulting beliefs emphasizing another's incompetence. A mob is created when others join the bully. When the loser has no space, another is chosen. That is what is happening here. The others with more, whether considering themselves conservative or liberal, but little value of self worth pretend to be above that but deep down play the same game.

If you are from or have lived long in the US, or probably many other nations as well, consider racism and other crimes of the nation as part of your make up no matter who or what color you are. It is taught well and has to be for it is the grease that allows the wheels of commerce to turn. People who fight each other do not fight those who keep them fighting.

You can run but you can't hide from it. It shows. It always does. The best you and I can do is devote our lives to fighting it. The problem is that you can't fight it effectively until you recognize it in yourself, realize your part in it, and take responsibility for that. When you know who you are, then you can deal with what others are.

[Merlin7]

Parker, who increasingly sounds like a Berlin columnist circa 1938, is a product of the Orlando Sentinel, which shares many of her professional characteristics. This is not surprising, as Orlando is the buckle on Florida's own Bible Belt and the Sentinel is obliged to balance its timidly progressive editorial positions with hefty doses of right-wing tub-thumping. This is a community, mind you, with many residents who actually believe they will be bodily transported to heaven any day now, snatched skyward like passengers on a defective bungee ride at nearby Disney World. With her superficial cleverness and patriotic posturing, Parker personifies the modern South, which is still a boiling cauldron of stupidity and racism and ever eager to embrace the worst aspects of Republican politics.

[flanardiente]

I have more respect for the woman in Pennsylvania and the voters in Kentucky who proclaimed their racism openly and honestly than for people like Mr Fry, who try to hide it behind some Thomas Kincaide-like vision of Americana, and especially for manipulators like Mss Parker and Noonan (who used to be a damn good writer, what happened, Peggy?). I wonder if Mr Fry knows that the West was settled in large numbers by Jews and blacks, not just sturdy monosyllabic Anglo-Saxon cowboys, or that Mohawks helped build the skyline of New York, that Chinese and the Irish--at one time considered on a par--built the railroads, that Mexicans fought and died at the side of Davy Crockett at the Alamo, and that Spanish-speaking Americans are the most highly decorated of all ethnic groups that have served in the military.

For the record, I have ancestors who fought on both sides of the Civil War, both sides of the Revolutionary War (including one Hessian mercenary who came over to fight the rebels, switched sides and settled in Pennsylvania afterward), and ancestors who were native to this continent ten thousand or more years before Europe dumped its trash here. Mr Fry needs to grow up.

[CornellRedneck]

Bravo!

[HAP]

These are great comments.

[clearthinker2008]

I don't have respect for any of them. So you admit it, big deal.