Letters to the Editor

Do you know the way to San Antonio? With enough work for all, including illegal immigrants, the booming Texas city is the future face of the American workforce. By Cary Cardwell [2006-05-02]

• Plascencia jumped in front of the line

  Anyone can write a human interest story focusing on a single immigrant and use it to make any point they want. So I'll write one about the opposite of Plascencia, the immigrant who jumped the long list of people from Asia and Europe who applied for a visa about the same time Plascencia sneaked in to this country illegally. The people from Asia and Europe are still waiting.

  I'll call my guy Jesus, because that's his real name and he's currently in our county lock-up. Jesus came across the Rio Bravo at a remote spot just south of Larado. He made his way north all the way to Denver where he had relatives who concealed him from authorities. If you believe we are a country of laws, Jesus and his relatives have both committed federal crimes. The first thing Jesus did was to get a forged birth certificate. From there, it was easy to get a Colorado drivers license. The Social Security card was a little harder, but he simply adopted the SSN that about 200 other illegals were using on a fake SS card. Now Jesus got a job. He was washing dishes in LoDo.

  Jesus turned out to be a hard worker, just like the open borders people like to hold up as an example. But although Jesus worked hard, in his free time, his life was hell. He came here for a better life but he really didn't count on how lonely he would be. His relatives who had come to this country a generation ago now were assimilated. They spoke English. He did not. They had accumulated nice things. He had none.

  Jesus was a stranger in a strange land. All his life he dreamed of coming to America and now here he was and it was not what he dreamed it would be. Jesus became resentful when ever he saw Gringos driving BMWs and spending $250 on food and wine in the restaurant where he slaved away cleaning the remains of their dinners off of fine china.

  Jesus became bitter. He needed a way to release his anger. One day he saw a man leave his car running while dropping off some dry cleaning and Jesus impulsively jumped behind the wheel and took off. He got a bottle of taquila and went cruising up and down Federal Boulevard, looking cool. He ran a red light and t-boned a Suburban. Jesus ran away, leaving a woman and her two kids injured and no recourse but to pay their own medical and car damage themselves.

  A few weeks later, Jesus met a Mexican-American girl and began courting her. But after a few weeks, she didn't like him anymore. She didn't like the way Jesus was always trying to grope her. Jesus was miserable. He was a proud man, but no matter how he tried, he couldn't get her to give in. He hated all this teasing. So one evening he'd had enough. All she needed was a strong man to overcome her resistance and once he was having her, she would learn to enjoy it. He didn't understand the culture. Here in America, they call this date-rape.

  She told her mother, who called police. They came for Jesus at his workplace. They placed him under arrest. The City and County of Denver assigned him a biligual public defender. His relatives would not bond him out. While he was in the county lockup, the Denver police ran his paper and none of it matched. They called the INS. The INS said forget it, they had stacks of cases ahead of this one.

  The public defender got Jesus off pleading to a lesser offense and away he went. He got a job at a meat processing plant north of Denver. He hung out with other illegal single men at an apartment complex where there was a nightly parade of crack users coming and going. Jesus liked crack. It made him feel on top of the world. But working in a stinking turkey factory didn't give him enough to stay on top of the world for long. So he bought a hot .25 cal semi-auto pistol and went looking for some cash. He decided on a self-serve gas station. The seventy-something retired man who worked there was nice to everybody he met. He thought the best of people. When Jesus came in, the old man smiled and greeted him. Jesus poked the gun in his face. The old man said OK and opened the cash drawer and stood back while Jesus helped himself. Then for no particular reason at all, he pumped three slugs into the old man's heart and lungs and watched him die.

  Jesus didn't get far. The old man had triggered the silent alarm and the cops saw Jesus strolling up the street a block away with his hands in his pockets. They found the money and the gun. Jesus was charged with homicide. Jesus has been assigned another bilingual public defender at the expense of you and I, to represent him in court.

  Now, isn't that just another wonderful "undocumented worker" story? Warms your heart, don't it?

  -- Garry Owen
  [Read Garry Owen's other letters]
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