1	In the News The headlines of Hispanidad. read more...
2	UPFRONT Ruben Navarrette, Jr. Lou Dobbs and his immigration obsession. read more...
3	Dr. Eduardo Padrón Using art to truly “see.” read more...

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upfront
LOU & ME

Ruben Navarrette, Jr.

Some say I’m obsessed with immigration. Oh yeah? Have you tuned in to CNN’s Lou Dobbs Tonight? If so, you’ve seen what “obsessed” looks like. Now, Dobbs is snarling in my direction.

“A few journalists,” he said during a recent show, “are part of a network, a closed loop, if you will, of radical left-wing, open borders, amnesty-seeking advocates. One of them is a columnist by the name of Ruben Navarrette, who knows, really, in my opinion, nothing about the issue of illegal immigration or the economics of it and certainly even less about journalism. He attacked me in a column [entitled] Stirring up Anti-Latino Sentiment. This is the kind of nonsense you get from these ridiculous, small-time, closed-loop journalists seeking amnesty and open borders.”
Allow me to translate: “Look here, Mess’can, you people should be seen and not heard. I’m working this side of the street. Immigration is my meal ticket. Go back to picking peaches.”
Blame Barack Obama. The Democratic presidential nominee recently blasted Dobbs for “feeding a kind of xenophobia” that produces a mood so poisonous toward Hispanics that hate crimes doubled last year.
According to FBI statistics, hate crimes against Hispanics are up—but only by 10 percent. However, in 2007, Hispanics were the leading victims of hate crimes motivated by one’s ethnicity or national origin, representing 62.8 percent of victims of those crimes.
Many Hispanics have figured out that, thanks to the immigration debate, it’s open season on them. And Dobbs’ hands aren’t exactly clean. He is the national spokesman for grievance-filled, underachieving Americans who fear competition and feel that too many Mexicans enter the United States and, once here, change the country, culture, politics and language in unacceptable ways.
I said as much in my column. I also made reference to a report by the Media Matters Action Network that found Dobbs mentioned illegal immigration in 70 percent of his shows last year and advances myths that feed viewers resentment and fears and help create anti-immigrant hysteria. Lastly, I pointed out that Dobbs confuses legal and illegal immigration. He uses guests from groups that favor limiting immigration across the board such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform and mixes segments on border security (which deals directly with illegal immigration) with those that deal with the Spanish language, the Mexican flag and multiculturalism (which could just as easily be tied to legal immigration).
It is no wonder Dobbs is persona non grata with many Hispanics. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus is pressuring CNN—and parent company, Time Warner—to provide another show to counterbalance Dobbs. The host met with Caucus members and then insulted them during an interview with CBS’ 60 Minutes by claiming that they tried to establish how pro-Hispanic he was by asking him if he had ever eaten a taco—and an enchilada.
Imagine the reaction if Dobbs had said he had met with the Congressional Black Caucus and claimed they had asked him if he liked soul food.
In an angry letter to CBS, Rep. Joe Baca (D-CA), the chair of the caucus, insisted that they never asked Dobbs about his culinary preferences and declared that the crack was typical of the host’s belittling and condescending attitude toward Hispanics.
Dobbs has also tried to make a piñata out of the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights organization. NCLR President Janet Murguía called out Dobbs in a speech at the National Press Club in which she condemned “the level of demagoguery on cable television news.” The host dismisses the NCLR as a “socio-ethnocentric organization.”
Lou Dobbs can dish it out. But, given his response to my column, he can’t take it.
As perhaps the most widely read Hispanic columnist in the country whose work appears in 200 newspapers, I’m not out to make friends. Still, I must admit, it is satisfying to make the right enemies.

Ruben Navarrette, Jr. is a member of the editorial board of the San Diego Union Tribune, a nationally syndicated columnist, a popular speaker and a regular commentator at CNN.com.