Will the Mass Marchs Fuel a Backlash?

Marc Cooper writes in LA Weely about whether the immigrant marchs this week will result in a backlash like those against Prop 187 did in 1994. His answer is no. See http://www.laweekly.com/dissonance/13024/whose-backlash/

Here is a summary:

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. At least in physics. In politics, however, the equation isn’t always symmetrical. A mild push might invite a whopping Sunday punch. Likewise, an unbridled onslaught might go completely unanswered.

So what about this nationwide chain reaction of immigrant demonstrations, school walkouts, a freeway blockade, and Saturday’s historic rally that brought hundreds of thousands into the streets of Los Angeles? Will this feisty and largely unanticipated show of force by an “illegal” underclass — replete with flapping Mexican flags — provoke some ferocious, crushing backlash of xenophobia and reprisal? Are we in for an amped-up repeat of 1994, when a much smaller downtown demo of Latinos helped fuel, a few weeks later, a revanchist white-voter turnout in favor of the rights-stealing Proposition 187?

This nightmare scenario is what some analysts are predicting. Problem is, they’ve got it backward. The feared nativist backlash has been in full motion now for some time — long before the humongous immigrant demonstration last weekend. The groveling media suck-up to the minuscule Minutemen show (hundreds of journalists shamelessly traipsing behind a few score vigilantes) a year ago established a twisted and ugly frame for a national debate that had been delayed way too long. The Lou Dobbsian jibber-jabber about “broken borders” reached its crescendo last Christmas, when the House passed the outrageous Sensenbrenner bill that would deem all so-called illegal aliens — and their employers — felons. (Undocumented workers currently are in violation of civil, not criminal, codes.)

KJ