Gustavo Arellano

Amin David and Curt Pringle in 2002

Exposing the bowdlerizing of local history by politicians and the lords of OC has been this infernal rag raison d'etre since its founding, and while we've seen some whoppers over the years (discredited blogger Matt Cunningham denying that he ever outed sex-abuse victims despite the fact he did, the county's overall amnesia regarding our Klan days), few efforts are more laughable than what Los Amigos chair/Anaheim City School District trustee/lead plaintiff in the ACLU district-election lawsuit against Anaheim/OC Weekly 2012 Scariest Person Jose Moreno tried to pull yesterday on KPFK-FM 90.7.

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Dana strums as D.C. burns ...

John Boehner should be removed as Speaker of the House if he forwards to members the "Gang of Eight" immigration bill being debated in the Senate, Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-The Moon) reportedly says. Marco Rubio's future presidential nomination could hinge on the legislation's success, but Rohrabacher accused the Florida senator and GOP colleague of using "weasel words" to promote immigration reform.

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Panga, not to be confused with the Hasbro game Jenga, is a boat used to ferry undocumented immigrants from south of the border into the U.S. illegally. But the crafts are being used in a game of sorts, a cat-and-mouse game with local authorities.

The cat won the latest round.

Twenty men and four women were arrested this morning in Laguna Beach, where they allegedly tried to enter the country illegally on a 25-foot panga, according to the U.S. Border Patrol.

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A Mexican man who piloted a boat bound for Newport Beach with seven undocumented immigrants on board--then ran out of gas 20 miles from Oceanside where he threatened to shoot anyone who called authorities for help--could get a 90-year prison sentence after being convicted in federal court.

Jesus Quinones-Chavez, 57, of Torreon, Coahuila, is scheduled to discover his fate Sept. 30.

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Jose Medrano-Hernandez enjoys the genuine admiration of his girlfriend, his children, his neighbors and many of his past employers throughout Orange County, including in Newport Beach, Dana Point and Laguna Beach.

They all insist Medrano-Hernandez worked hard all day at construction or handyman jobs to feed a Santa Ana house with nine occupants and, though often exhausted, was always kind and considerate.

But to law enforcement agents in the U.S. Government, Medrano-Hernandez is a relentless "illegal alien."

He's been deported back to his native Mexico numerous times: May 1997, April 2000, May 2006 and August 2006, according to Department of Homeland Security records.

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I think it was about a decade ago that I first encountered the work of UCLA professor Otto Santa Ana--how else do you explain how I was able to obtain a galley of his excellent Brown Tide Rising: Metaphors of Latinos in Contemporary American Public Discourse, which was finally published in 2002? I must've bugged him while I was a grad student at UCLA or something...anyhoo, the profe is perhaps the nation's premier expert on the depiction of Mexicans in mainstream news, and his latest book, Juan in a Hundred: The Representation of Latinos on Network News, is a brilliant exposé of how the TV MSM not only barely acknowledges Latinos and stereotypes them when they do, but how when talking about Mexi issues, the panelists are almost always gabachos. He'll be my guest NEXT THURSDAY, May 30, at the Fullerton Public Library as part of my monthly "Gustavo's Awesome Lecture Series!"

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Assemblywoman Quirk-Silva

The Trust Act made its way once more through the California Assembly yesterday by a final vote of 44-22. The legislation was vetoed late last year when it reached the desk of Democratic Governor Jerry Brown. Supporters say the bill authored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano will limit deportations fueled by the fingerprint-sharing federal Secure Communities program while restoring confidence between law enforcement and largely immigrant, Latino communities. It heads to the Senate next.

Locally, our ostensibly Democrat assemblymembers joined the state's troglodytic GOP in not supporting the bill. Assemblyman Tom Daly, whose 69th District is the most heavily Latino in Orange County, unsurprisingly voted against it. Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva, who edged out Republican Chris Norby last year thanks in no small part to the demographics and boundaries of the newly drawn 65th District, abstained.

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On Tuesday, May 14, the ASUCI DREAMer community and other concerned UCI Anteaters will hold an immigration rally at UCI's Student Center Terrace at noon.

The Student Center Terrace will serve as a platform for students, professors, and activists to voice their reasonable angst over the inaction towards a more comprehensive system of immigration reform that would service the needs of the more than 11 million undocumented citizens in the country; at the very least, issues such as lack of worker benefits for immigrants, denial of educational rights for students, the fucked-up militarization of the nation's borders and staggering numbers of imprisoned undocumented immigrants have yet to be addressed. What the rally will strive for is to spark community awareness through dialogue and discussion of past experiences and knowledge of immigration reform.

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Currently on Capitol Hill, there's a raging debate over what kind of amnesty will America get shoved down its throat (or, conversely, up its tucchus). But you know you're starting to enter the silly season when a U.S. senator starts hailing Disney's entry system for its theme parks as a model on which to create a better United States border and port of entry system for immigrants and visitors.

That's what John Cornyn, Republican senator from Texas just proposed at a hearing on the subject. Telling a packed house of onlookers, he noted, "If biometric systems are good enough for the Magic Kingdom, they're good enough for the USA." He's referring, of course, to Disneyland's recently instituted efforts to take pictures of parkgoers to ensure that people don't pass along tickets among each other.

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International Workers' Day in Orange County will be marked by not one, but two marches in two cities. Starting off this morning, the Orange County Labor Federation will assemble at 11 a.m. outside Anaheim City Hall; from there, a march is to go to a rally in La Palma Park. Later today in SanTana, the Orange County May Day Coalition will host its annual May Day event at 2 p.m. The initial gathering spot, as always, is Sasscer Park on the corner Fourth and Ross streets, with a march and rally will follow.

"The city of Anaheim has gone through a lot, not only with social unrest and civil rights cases but also some of the worst employers are here," says Julio Perez, political director of the OC Labor Federation, of the
chosen location for their mobilization.

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