Posted on 08/17/2003 6:06:06 PM PDT by churchillbuff
MEChA If Arnold Schwarzenegger can be hounded by Tim Noah for his social support of Kurt Waldheim, then surely it's fair to query Cruz Bustamante about his collegiate affiliation with the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán, or MEChA.
....Bustamante attended Fresno State University, where he served in the student senate and began dabbling in community politics, learning about partisan politics first-hand. "I wasn't the most radical Mechista [M.E.Ch.A, which stands for Movimiento Estudiantil de Aztlan, is a Chicano student organization known for its ethnocentric views]. At the same time, there were a lot Vietnam veteranos attending school. They were like big brothers, and they taught me a lot." It's tempting to dismiss this as a youthful affiliation that means nothing today -- but that temptation would be wrong. There are certain associations that are socially tainting (and justly so) in the modern day, and they don't have statutes of limitations. Former Klansmen and former Nazis don't get a pass unless they spend a great deal of time and energy apologizing for and explaining themselves in a convincing manner. (This rule doesn't apply to former communists, of course, because they mean well.) Not being "the most radical Mechista" in your past isn't much of a defense when the Mechista ideology itself is inherently loathesome, treasonous, and racist.
MEChA -- which exists mostly as a series of student organizations at universities across the country -- is premised upon the notion of a distinct "Chicano" race with an inalienable right to a homeland called Aztlán, encompassing roughly the area ceded by Mexico to the United States in 1848. This isn't benign ethnic identity politics (inasmuch as such politics can be benign) -- as the rhetoric from the founding documents of the movement make clear. From El Plan de Santa Barbara:
The widespread use of the term Chicano today signals a rebirth of pride and confidence. Chicanismo simply embodies and ancient truth: that a person is never closer to his/her true self as when he/she is close to his/her community. Chicanismo draws its faith and strength from two main sources: from the just struggle of our people and from an objective analysis of our community's strategic needs.... Commitment to the struggle for Chicano liberation is the operative definition of the ideology used here. Chicanismo involves a crucial distinction in political consciousness between a Mexican American (or Hispanic) and a Chicano mentality. The Mexican American or Hispanic is a person who lacks self-respect and pride in one's ethnic and cultural background. Thus, the Chicano acts with confidence and with a range of alternatives in the political world. He is capable of developing and effective ideology through action.
Mexican Americans (or Hispanics) must be viewed as potential Chicanos. Chicanismo is flexible enough to relate to the varying levels of consciousness within La Raza. Regional variations must always be kept in mind as well as the different levels of development, composition, maturity, achievement, and experience in political action. Cultural nationalism is a means of total Chicano liberation.
There are definite advantages to cultural nationalism, but no inherent limitations. A Chicano ideology, especially as it involves cultural nationalism, should be positively phrased in the form of propositions to the Movement. Chicanismo is a concept that integrates self-awareness with cultural identity, a necessary step in developing political consciousness. As such, it serves as a basis for political action, flexible enough to include the possibility of coalitions. The related concept of La Raza provides an internationalist scope of Chicanismo, and La Raza Cosmica furnishes a philosophical precedent.
Swap out the terminology, and it might as well be an appeal to the German Volk. Or a paean to the New Soviet Man. Or an exhortation to White identity. Turn to the Santa Barbara Plan's companion document, the Plan Espiritual de Aztlán, and things don't improve -- they get worse:
In the spirit of a new people that is conscious not only of its proud historical heritage but also of the brutal "gringo" invasion of our territories, we, the Chicano inhabitants and civilizers of the northern land of Aztlán from whence came our forefathers, reclaiming the land of their birth and consecrating the determination of our people of the sun, declare that the call of our blood is our power, our responsibility, and our inevitable destiny. We are free and sovereign to determine those tasks which are justly called for by our house, our land, the sweat of our brows, and by our hearts. Aztlán belongs to those who plant the seeds, water the fields, and gather the crops and not to the foreign Europeans. We do not recognize capricious frontiers on the bronze continent
Brotherhood unites us, and love for our brothers makes us a people whose time has come and who struggles against the foreigner "gabacho" who exploits our riches and destroys our culture. With our heart in our hands and our hands in the soil, we declare the independence of our mestizo nation. We are a bronze people with a bronze culture. Before the world, before all of North America, before all our brothers in the bronze continent, we are a nation, we are a union of free pueblos, we are Aztlán.
Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada.
El Plan Espiritual de Aztlán sets the theme that the Chicanos (La Raza de Bronze) must use their nationalism as the key or common denominator for mass mobilization and organization. Once we are committed to the idea and philosophy of El Plan de Aztlán, we can only conclude that social, economic, cultural, and political independence is the only road to total liberation from oppression, exploitation, and racism....
Nationalism as the key to organization transcends all religious, political, class, and economic factions or boundaries. Nationalism is the common denominator that all members of La Raza can agree upon.
And there you have it -- secessionism, racism, and implicit violence. But don't take my word for it, nor my reading of these documents. Take theirs.
According to Miguel Perez, mechista of Cal State Northridge, "The ultimate ideology is the liberation of Aztlan. [Communism would be closest]....Non-Chicanos would have to be expelled....opposition groups would have to be quashed because you have to keep the power." Sadly, MEChA's memes are not restricted to its formal membership. To participate in MEChA is to participate in an ideology (centered on Aztlán and Chicanismo) that extends beyond mere student groups.
Mechista fellow-travellers are people like Professor of Chicano Studies at the University of New Mexico Charles Truxillo, who proposes the formation of an Aztlán-style polity called La Republica del Norte "by any means necessary." Truxillo is a self-described disciple of Chicano "activist" Reies Lopez Tijerina, whose primary contribution to the struggle was to lead an armed gang into the courthouse at Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico in June 1967; once there they shot two court employees in cold blood, severely beat a third (all three were Mexican-Americans), and took twenty hostages before fleeing. Truxillo's political justification for the formation of his desired Republica closely parallels the nutcase theories of neo-secessionist and neo-Confederate movements in the American southeast.
Mechista fellow-travellers are also people like Hector Carreon and Ernesto Cienfuegos, who vigorously tout the idea of Aztlán via their website. I wouldn't click on this link at work -- aztlan.net is a hate site as surely as any Aryan Nations site is. Their target of choice? The Jews, of course. As with MEChA proper, Carreon and Cienfuegos generally don't get called on their true colors when they pop up in the mainstream press. Former LA Times columnist Agustin Gurza, who has written before about racism in Latino communities, described aztlan.net as merely "an online Whittier-based Chicano magazine."
The confluence of the fringes -- Islamists supporting anti-Semites supporting secessionists supporting Chicanistas supporting communists -- is not new phenomenon. But it is disturbing nonetheless, and those who participate in it deserve to face some tough questions.
Which brings us back to Lieutenant Governor of California Cruz Bustamante. He "wasn't the most radical Mechista," but he was a Mechista, with all the baggage and bad company that entails. I don't think, as Lowell Ponte does, that Bustamante secretly considers himself a future ruler of the Alta California province of Aztlán. But I do think he's morally compromised by his past with this group and this ideology, and it's something he must face squarely and publicly. Association with known racists combined with racist Freudian slips in the recent past would have already raised the hackles of every self-described "progressive" from the Oregon border to San Diego if he had an (R) after his name. Why not now? With a new poll showing him leading Schwarzenegger, Californians deserve nothing less from the man who may well be their next governor.
But will they or their media step up to the plate?
ADDENDUM: Two supplementary items:
This post was a difficult one to source, and I've tried to stick as closely as possible to facts and citations that I felt were reliable. Part of the problem is that some of the most diligent catalogers of nutcases like the Mechistas are borderline nutcases themselves -- the American Patrol, for example. Where I've linked to such sites, it's only after I've satisfied myself that the citation is factually correct, and that no more mainstream URL is available.
I'm well aware that there is a legitimate case to be made for Hispanic and Latino self-assertion in the United States. The New York Review of Books has a fairly decent history of Hispanics' historical problems in America; and even the murderous crazy Reies Lopez Tijerina attached his name to a worthy cause (which -- thanks, Reies -- he sullied with his savagery). I'm technically Hispanic myself; though I've never experienced a shred of anti-Hispanic racism or discrimination (I "pass," as they used to say), family members have, and so I don't critique MEChA, the Chicano movement, etc., from a position of total personal ignorance. If there is a legitimate case to be made for Hispanic and Latino self-assertion in the United States, that assertion can and must be done as Americans. My family and, I suspect, the majority of Hispanics in this country did just that; that Cruz Bustamante allied, however briefly, with those who did not is indeed a thing of wonder and dismay in my eyes.
UPDATE: Turns out that the Southern Poverty Law Center lists aztlan.net as a hate group. Elsewhere, Jeanne d'Arc has some questions for Schwarzenegger about his association with US English. They're just questions, although it should be noted that the problem with US English involves distasteful individuals rather than a fundamentally evil ideology.
UPDATE 2: Kevin Drum, in comments here, dismisses MEChA as nothing more than "a minority [group] blowing off steam." Obviously he's not sympathetic to any of the stated aims or premises of Mechista ideology (at least from what I've read at his site), so I can only take this as an example of the see-no-evil mentality that allows these groups to exist with some measure of mainstream acceptability. A pity indeed.
Bustamante is a professional Mexican; a fifth columnist who is no more an American than Santiago Creel or Ernesto Derbez. He's a college dropout who only has his position solely because of his ethnicity and racist views. Period. He is like David Duke with a gang membership. The man is not only worthless, but extremely dangerous as well. That man gets elected and it is going to hit the fan.
Federal officials should be manning the polls making sure all voters are citizens.... especially during this election.
Are you or us freepers going to let him have a free pass?
Busta is a Supremacist...time to let the left taste there own medicine
Then then the Hollywierdos won't hafta travel to 'leave the country'
Nothing but vice and dysfunction has come from that state since Reagan - so where's the loss?
Plus, you just KNOW that when Cali goes belly up, the rest of the nation is going to asked to bail her out.
He has to since Bustamante no recorded birth certificate in Tulare County. No proof of US citizenship except the ancedotal statements of admitted illegal aliens who used him as an anchor baby.
That must have been the repulsive propagandist Armando Navarro, a worthless blob of refuse who California taxpayers are shelling out big bucks for. California is broke, yet we taxpayers are paying the freight of crap like Navarro. Incredible. By the way, Busta-vato is the product of so called 'professors' like Navarro.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.