August 2019 – Pensamientos

It was the other way around! Consider the following:

El Paso, Texas, was founded by Spanish Fray Garcia de San Francisco in 1680 when it became a preliminary base for governing the territory of New Mexico; Spaniards traveled traveled back and forth from what is now Santa Fe to El Paso for many years.
San Antonio, Texas, rose from a Spanish mission founded in 1718 by Fray Antonio de Olivares and from a Spanish military fort names the Presidio San Antonio de Bexar, founded the same year. The mission later became known as “The Alamo.”
The Vice President of the Republic of Texas, before Texas joined the Union, was a Mexican by the name of Lorenzo de Zavala who fought for the independence of Texas from Mexico in 1836. He stands in for the many Mexicans who also fought for Texas independence, many of whom died at the Alamo alongside the better known American heroes, like Davey Crocket.

So, what can we say about President Trump’s insistence that “Hispanics are invading Texas?”

He’s an ignoramus (I’ve said it before).

Worse, still, the El Paso shooter seems to have picked up on Trump’s dogged claims of “invasion” and took it upon himself to kill “invading” “Hispanics” or Mexicans.

It looks like to me that Trump is guilty of inciting terrorism in El Paso and the deaths of thirty one people. That’s the man we have in the White House.

THEY LOOK LIKE ME….NEXT TIME IT MIGHT BE YOU OR ME

They look like me. In the victims and survivors of the Ohio and El Paso shootings, today, August 5, 2019, I saw people who look like me, or my relatives or my friends. The El Paso shooter was attacking “Hispanic immigrants.”

Well, that’s me, folks, even if I might feel safe because I’m not an immigrant. The psychos out there don’t know the difference between a Hispanic immigrant and one who is not an immigrant (most Americans can’t distinguish between a different-looking immigrant and an American born one). So, I say to my relatives and my friends, we can’t get too comfortable in our middle class homes and middle class cars, going to our middle class jobs. Why?

Because here is one more bit of proof that we must be forever vigilant. We run a great risk in dismissing these things because, who knows, the next time, it might be you or me.

We can’t be shocked. Mentally unstable people abound on our streets. Guns abound too; our gun laws encourage their being everywhere—even military type guns. And, we now have a racist president who openly attacks Americans of color.

So, there you have it. The psychos will pick up a gun or a knife and go after someone who looks like you or me because our simple-minded president mentioned it as an American problem. They’ll think they’re helping him out, like the El Paso shooter. It’s happened before.

What can we do?

1) Let’s be vigilant and avoid losing ourselves in the banality of our lives;

2) Let’s pay more attention to our leaders and what they do or don’t do,

3) And, keep score.

3) Our turn will come when we vote, when we fill out a ballot and give our support to a government leader who is not what we have today. Save our democracy, save our nation and save ourselves.