Just Plain Mean

I've been considering the meanness abroad in America. It's everywhere. I saw once again shots of the damned crazy Tea Party people with their anti-immigrant signs. You've seen these things, right? Signs on the streets and in the hands of the yahoos at countless rallies condemning the "foreign" president and illegal immigrants. These people don't want to spend a cent on immigrants or their children. They don't want to spend a cent on poor people or their children.

America! Is this a great country or what?

We are a mean-spirited, heartless people. Of course, there are millions of exceptions, but in the main, in the aggregate, we are a small-minded nation of bigots. There's no escaping this judgment. Our bloody history stands in judgment of us. Slaughter of the Native Americans, the Know-Nothings, the Klan, our chronic anti-immigrant posture against . . . well, you name it: Chinese, Mexicans, Italians, Catholics, Jews, Irish, Vietnamese, and on and on.

Read the sign, people. This is who we are.