Ezra Klein: WTF?

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March 28, 2006

WTF?

John Cole, noting a 500,000 person march that resulted in not one arrest and a fully peaceful walkout from LA County schools, sniffs that he "doesn't know what to make of it" and implies that California's immigrants are gearing up for a race riot.

March 28, 2006 | Permalink

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Comments

Maybe not one arrest, but there was more than just a little tension near the schools. There nearly were riots.

Posted by: TJ | Mar 28, 2006 11:58:53 AM

Which is not to say I agree with Cole's implication at all, or even disagree with the protestors.

Posted by: TJ | Mar 28, 2006 11:59:52 AM

Which is not to say I agree with Cole's implication at all, or even disagree with the protestors.

Posted by: TJ | Mar 28, 2006 11:59:56 AM

When the demonstrations turn into riots then there can be parallels drawn to other times past. Until then, to make such comments seems just a bit irresponsible to me.

Posted by: Adrock | Mar 28, 2006 12:23:46 PM

Cole usually is fairly reasonable as right-wingers go, so this is disappointing. Now I know why Atrios named him "Wanker of the Day" yesterday.

Posted by: Rebecca Allen,PhD,ARNP | Mar 28, 2006 12:29:13 PM

To be fair his "I don't know what to make of it" comment is (at least ostensibly) about the school walkouts, not the protests as a whole.

Posted by: Ginger Yellow | Mar 28, 2006 12:45:47 PM

One gets the feeling that the right wingnuts are really hoping for a burst of violence from the latin immigrants and illegal residents. Their disappointment that there wasn't any is palpable.

As I said below, this is not the year for Congressional action on immigration. The extreme right has too much influence now on the Republican Congress, so we should postpone action until after the 06 elections when cooler heads (including more Dems) may prevail.

Posted by: JimPortlandOR | Mar 28, 2006 1:07:34 PM

Anybody who can assume that high school kids don't have politics, or shouldn't demonstrate on behalf of those politics, is really an embarrassment. I'd been to plenty of political rallies when I was in highschool (the seventies) and I didn't do it to "get out of school." He's stunned that kids, whose families and friends are being labeled felons, who are under threat of deportation, who are being defamed by congressional leaders, are angry and want to show their anger peacefully? screw him.

aimai

Posted by: aimai | Mar 28, 2006 1:44:17 PM

Not to put words in John's mouth, but he literally does not know what to make of it. He's also updated his post...

Posted by: Pooh | Mar 28, 2006 4:50:32 PM

This just plays along with FEAR Inc. that the rightwing implements to get the greater masses to fear what's in the world outside of their homes. Blacks and Latinos are constantly characterized for being prone to violence, so when the facts come out and the riots don't begin you get befuddled pieces like Coles where they state in essence 'Well, this is just an anomaly.' Think about the fears born out of the Civil Rights movement about these uncontrollable masses pushing to take over communities and mongrelize them, as stated by the segregationist forces. If I recall correctly, the people acting peacefully were the protestors, while the 'civilized' citizens went batshit bombing churches, and using waterhoses against among other things. Look at the descriptions that came out during Hurricane Katrina about the so-called anarchy rampage at the Superdome and Convention Center that was later proved to be overstated. This commentary becomes more a view into the mindset of the author than it is a serious analysis of the issues at hand. But then again I guess it does, because fear is motivating Cole and inc. to write this stuff just as it's fear which drives many people to support these initiatives.

Posted by: kdub | Mar 28, 2006 5:01:05 PM

Well, on the plus side, comments like this (and the FireDogLake To-Do) do mean higher traffic for John, and it also means a nice influx of new lefty blood [there are a lot of us over there].

On the downside, few of the new lefties will take the time to understand where John really is on the issues and will come in guns a-blazing, when there is probably a lot of common ground between us and him.

I don't think you're being fair, Ezra, or you're looking for offense or bigotry where none was meant. I didn't read into what he read a virtual "sniff" at all, but why not try to start yet another stupid flame war - everyone's traffic numbers go up.

Posted by: ImJohnGalt | Mar 28, 2006 5:32:19 PM

Er, of course I Meant "I didn't read into what he *wrote*". Sorry 'bout that.

Posted by: ImJohnGalt | Mar 28, 2006 5:37:04 PM

I am amused by the fact that we once again have parallel events happening in the States and France. Vocal and aggressive protests in the streets for government initiatives. The two have more in common than they would care to admit.

Posted by: Raff | Mar 28, 2006 6:39:38 PM

I this is a misreading of Cole.

Posted by: washerdreyer | Mar 28, 2006 7:01:12 PM

Of course there are race riots coming. You think the white man is becoming complacement and is going allow himself to be overrun by a bunch of freeloading Mexicans trying to take back what they lost way back in the 1840's? I think not! We are going to fight for what is ours, and we are going to win.

Posted by: shoelimpy | Mar 28, 2006 7:08:55 PM

Yup, this is a definite misreading of Cole. What he said was that Californians in general have strong opinions about the issue and that Californians, given an opportunity and a reason, can throw one heck of a riot when it comes to matters of race.

Of course, "the issue" is obviously not referring to immigration - despite the structure of the sentence - and the reference to the 1993 riots following the Rodney King verdict is clearly about, um, something else entirely. Perhaps it was something that was posted by a John Kohl for a college history paper. 'Cause mentioning immigration, race relations and a huge riot all in the space of two sentences is no reason to think that Cole was actually, you know, trying to make a connection between them or anything.

Posted by: Stephen | Mar 28, 2006 7:16:28 PM

I think there's a fair degree of distance between noting that a lot of possible markers (passionate feeling on both sides of an issue and recent instances of violent outbreaks) for a disturbance are present and "impl[ing] that California's immigrants are gearing up for a race riot." Is it wrong to note that if something went badly wrong (an incident with the not-exactly-revered LAPD or perhaps even a hit and run with a motorist), things could get real ugly real fast?

Posted by: Pooh | Mar 28, 2006 7:25:37 PM

what a dick...unless it is "the right' 500,000 people marching, the meaning is unclear. ezra you were correct to call him out...he was being obtuse, ignorant or sloppily revealing a racist bent.

Posted by: jon | Mar 28, 2006 7:45:42 PM

I organized a full school walk-out my senior year of high school to protest Prop 13 (yeah, I'm old) budget cuts. Some of the people who walked out were Latino. Some were even African-American. I don't recall anyone worrying about a race riot.

Posted by: Roxanne | Mar 28, 2006 9:01:50 PM

The only thing I was curious about was whether they just wanted to cut class or if there was something to it. Nothing more, nothing less.

I say enough stupid things on my own that you don't need to be doing creative interpretations of my writings in order to make me look bad. And that is precisely what Ezra has done.

Posted by: John cole | Mar 29, 2006 8:43:03 AM

John's writing has been incredibly sloppy of late, and his attempts to justify some truly stupid statements (e.g., his statement that the "Jane Hamshers of the left" obviously does not include Jane Hamsher herself) have been off-the-wall loony. But in this instance, Ezra, you're making far too much of it.

Posted by: Bombadil | Mar 29, 2006 8:48:45 AM

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