Eric Crafton: Liar

[UPDATE}:

In comments, nm correctly points out that Crafton is technically being weaselly, though not necessarily lying.

I feel so bad now.

No, not really.

------------------------------------
It appears when I called Eric Crafton a "serial embellisher” I was being too kind.

Because Eric Crafton is a liar. He lied to the media and he lied to the people of Nashville. On January 19 he said this:

Crafton said the majority of the donors supporting his side of the campaign are private individuals. He said he has only raised about $50,000 to $60,000.

Today we learn this:

Nashville English First raised $89,722.76 for its campaign, according to campaign financial disclosures released today.

Of that, ProEnglish of Arlington, Va., contributed $82,500. A second donor, Nashville businessman Lee Beaman, gave $6,000, meaning two donors funded more than 98 percent of Nashville English First's campaign.

So, not the majority of donors after all. Not even close. And not $50-$60,000.

Eric Crafton, you flat-out lied. Did you think we wouldn’t find out? Did you think we wouldn’t care? Did you not care?


What else have you lied about, Councilman Crafton?

Jon Crisp is also, quite possibly, a liar. In July he said this:

Roughly 46,000 postcards have been sent altogether now at a cost of around $18,000, according to Crisp. Most of that, Crisp says, has come from Crafton himself, who gave around $5,000 of his own money to his campaign.

However, Crafton's name does not appear on any of the financial disclosure forms. I'm giving Crisp a pass, because it's quite possible Crafton lied to him, too.

The people of Nashville and the entire Metro Council is now put on notice: Eric Crafton is an established liar. Nothing he says can be trusted.

English Only Fails

Not only fails, but fails big: 57% to 43%, according to the local news.

Nashville, forgive me. I doubted you. I said you’d pass this lame ordinance. You surprised me yet again. I humbly apologize.

Eric Crafton, did you get the message? Drop this ridiculous campaign now. We don’t want it.

The people have spoken. Satisfied?

Miami Says: Just Vote No

Nathan Moore , one of the many conservatives opposed to Eric Crafton’s English Only bill, posted this piece of advice from Miami yesterday:

Obviously, the good folks in Nashville didn't ask for our opinion. We'd be remiss, however, not to say that we've been there and done that -- and we didn't like it. Dade County, as it was then known, enacted an English-only ordinance in 1980. It quickly became a source of endless legal headaches, heated community debate, political embarrassment and bureaucratic wrangling. Finally, it was repealed in 1993, to near-universal relief.

It is fitting that Miami should serve as a testing-ground because this is one of the most diverse communities in the country, often the first to experience the changes that eventually reach other places. In 1980, the human tide of Mariel rattled Miami and Dade County, undermining two decades of progress in absorbing smaller waves of Cuban migration. The English-only law was a reaction to the shock of Mariel.

This bears a little examination. Reactionary legislation such as this is always a response to some crisis, and the Mariel boatlift was indeed that. That was when Fidel Castro basically gave Cubans a one-time ticket to America for anyone who so desired, including prisoners and mental health patients. Wiki says 125,000 Cubans arrived in Miami over a six month period.

That kind of concentrated immigrant wave is bound to overwhelm the city economy, city services and create resentment. Human nature being what it is, it’s no surprise that the response in Miami was to circle the wagons and pass laws like English Only.

But that’s not Nashville. What “crisis” are we responding to? Yes, immigration has increased here, as it has across much of the Southeast. But certainly not of the level of a massive Mariel wave.

The new immigrants in Nashville, especially those of Hispanic origins, have provided cheap labor for our once-booming housing market. It seems to me that Nashville has absorbed these new arrivals fairly well. I’m not seeing the crisis here. The only reason anyone would think Nashville needs English Only is out of pure meanness.

Continuing on with Miami’s example:

What happened next made matters worse. There were lawsuits and legal challenges from the federal government over issues such as bilingual ballots. Civil libertarians argued that linguistic restrictions violated the equal-protection clause of the Constitution's 14th Amendment.

Mass-transit schedules were printed only in English. Doctors at the public hospital were forbidden to give Haitian mothers a brochure in Creole about caring for their infants. Bilingual signs at the zoo were permitted to remain, but when a new section opened up, the signs had to be English-only (until private funding was found).

That's the kind of nonsense that English-only laws engender. Nashville is a welcoming and inclusive community. Why trade that renown for a reputation as a center of xenophobia? The Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, whose members foresee the damage this can create, is an outspoken opponent of this measure.

If the objective is to get immigrants to learn English, there are any number of better ways to do that without alienating the growing immigrant, largely Hispanic, community. Their numbers in cities like Nashville and Atlanta have been growing for the last few years.

It makes little sense for a community to rely on language or ethnicity to forge the bonds of unity. Miami's experience has been that new arrivals strengthen us, not make us weaker. They should be welcomed, not rebuffed. We are a people with forebears from other lands whose offspring have enriched our past and our present, and ensure our common future. For evidence, look no further than our newly inaugurated 44th president, Barack Obama.

Indeed. As I wrote two days ago, it is inconceivable to me that two days after we inaugurated the son of an African immigrant to the highest office in the land we would put up a sign saying “immigrants not welcome.”

The nation is moving forward in one direction. Nashville must go with it, or be left behind.

English Under Attack!!!!!!!!

[UPDATE}:

Laura Creekmore puts it simply:

it is hard to make a case for a charter change undone by its own exceptions.

And it is even harder still when Crafton's only legitimate example to date--New York City--implemented its current policy precisely because existing policy conflicted with Federal law.

Crafton's still got nothin' ....
-----------------------------------
Yes that’s right! According to English Eric Crafton, the English language is under attack! Run for your lives!!!!

And as proof of this he brings us examples of California state legislators, oops I mean Oregon firefighters, sorry, I mean New York City services which he says by law must be provided in “up to seven languages .... at enormous cost to taxpayers.”

Oh, New York, how could you! First you allowed 9/11 to happen and now this!

(BTW, I am still waiting for the example of "English under attack" here in Nashville. Apparently Crafton still doesn't have one ....)

Of course, Crafton doesn’t give any specifics as to which services he’s talking about. This could be yet another Fox News fantasy, which he’s become fond of repeating without any fact-checking. So I am left to assume that he’s talking about the Equal Access To Human Services Act of 2003, aka Intro 38A.

It provides foreign language assistance for those seeking Medicaid, food stamps and similar forms of welfare assistance. The law was expanded this year with Executive Order 120 to include a broader range of government services, provided in the six most common languages found in New York City.

Eric Crafton, do you really want immigrant children denied food stamps or medical care because their families are not yet proficient in English?

Really?

Shame on you. For shame. Eric Crafton, what do you have against brown babies?

An overview of the 2003 law, citing 2000 census figures, states:

One in four New Yorkers, over two million people, are limited English proficient (LEP).

Wow, that’s a lot of people -- and that was five years ago. Nashville’s entire "Combined Stastistical Area”--that’s Metro Nashville and the ring counties--contains fewer people than the limited English proficient residents of New York.

One might almost think New York City was some kind of melting pot or something. Weird.

But let me go on:

Hundreds of thousands of families eligible for public assistance have historically been unable to fully access services. The New York City Human Resources Administration (HRA), which is responsible for administering government benefits such as Food Stamps, Medicaid, and welfare, was found to be in violation of Title VI of the Federal Civil Rights Act in 1999, but the agency failed to take corrective action.

Wow, so there’s like a federal law requiring equal access to government services for all?

And as some Nashville bloggers have calculated, violating Title VI puts us at risk of losing over $276,000 in federal monies that are tied to Title VI?

So why are we having this metro-wide referendum again?

And as for that “enormous cost” New York taxpayers must shoulder? Well, maybe not quite so much:

The mayor refused to be specific about how much the services will cost, saying only that it was a “relatively small” amount given the size of the city’s budget. He added: “This executive order will make our city more accessible, while helping us become the most inclusive municipal government in the nation.”

“The fundamental basis of government is its interaction with its citizens,” the mayor said before signing the executive order at City Hall on Tuesday. “If people don’t know what we do, don’t know what they should do, what the law requires them to do, don’t know how to get services, all the money that we’re spending providing those services, providing those laws, is meaningless.”

The order requires that agencies translate essential public documents, pamphlets and forms in the six languages. But its reach is broader, as it allows for the use of a telephone-based service that can link immigrants with interpreters who speak Urdu, Hindi, Arabic and dozens of others less-common languages.

A telephone-based service? Like the ones metropolitan areas around the country already use, like, say, Language Line, which I’ve already mentioned in previous posts?

So in other words, cities don’t have to keep one Urdu-proficient staff person on salary, twiddling his/her thumbs until the rare once-every-three-years occasion that an Urdu translator is needed. They simply pay for this service when they need it.

So, compliance is not so hard after all, is it?

I’m starting to think that this “English under attack” thing really isn’t amounting to very much.

Eric Crafton is going to have to do a lot better than this.

It is inconceivable to me that two days after the nation swore in its first African American president, ushering in a brand new day in our country's race relations, that Nashville would take this regressive step. Eric Crafton is out of touch with the direction this nation is moving. Nashville does not need to go with him.

They Just Don’t Get It

Once again, for the gray-matter impaired:

It is not “racist” to speak English, or require English proficiency. This is America. We speak English here. That is no secret.

It IS racist to by law prohibit the use of any other languages to better communicate with people. We are a nation of immigrants. It is divisive and exclusive. It can even be dangerous. And it is completely, wholely unnecessary.

The “War On English” is a farce. Not one of Eric Crafton’s examples of “English under attack” has held up to scrutiny. They’ve all been misrepresentations of actual law or outright lies.

And now Crafton is afraid to reveal his funding sources because he’s afraid of death threats? I’m calling bullshit on that one. Crafty Crafton’s racist money stream is more like it.

So all of you yahoos calling me a racist for not offering my blog in Tagalog need to get a clue. That's not what English Only says. English Only says I can't offer my blog in Tagalog (and yes, this is an analogy. I realize the referendum has nothing to do with my actual blog, since I am not a part of Metro government.)

If you don’t understand what the argument is about, you shouldn’t be opening your mouths.

More Crafton Bogus Language Hysteria, Oregon Division

Once again, Eric Crafton picks on a favorite punching bag of the wingnut right: “liberal” Oregon. And once again, his allegations, culled from Fox News, are just ... well, wrong.

The homepage of Crafton’s English Only website prominently displays this Fox News clip about an Oregon state rule requiring firefighters for the Dept. of Foresty be bi-lingual. Crew bosses are even being “laid off or demoted” because of the rule, warned the Fox News anchor.

Oregon’s ABC affiliate, KATU, interviewed this Oregon firefighter on the rule:

Jaime Pickering, a squad boss overseeing 20 firefighters, says the rule means "job losses for Americans. The white people."

Ah yes, you just can't hide the bigotry of the English Only crowd. Hate to break it to you, Mr. Pickering, but Americans come in all sorts of colors.

According to Fox News and KATU, the rule, which applies to contractors not state employees, was enacted because there were so few firefighters in the state, contractors were hiring people from out of state who do not speak English. The state thought it was a good idea to require crew bosses to speak both English and the language of their firefighters, hence the rule.

I guess Eric Crafton hopes this will push some "war on English" fear buttons. But, as with so much that one hears on Fox News or coming out of Crafton’s mouth, it’s all wrong.

From the Oregon Dept. of Forestry website, under “Contracting for Wildland Firefighters”:

English is the language of wildland firefighting.  It is the national standard.  It is spoken in briefings and on two-way radios, and is the language of operating plans, reports and other documents.

Hispanic and Native American contract crews have operated in the west with bilingual leadership since the 1960s.
 
The number of Hispanic crews in the Northwest has increased markedly in recent years. A count of Spanish surnames on crew rosters suggests that about 85 percent of current contract firefighters are of Hispanic descent. This rough estimate doesn’t indicate how many crew members speak English.
 
There is no contract requirement that supervisors on contract crews speak any language other than English. There is a requirement that supervisors be able to communicate with the workers for whom they are responsible. This is essential to ensure that all personnel are made aware of safety hazards that can develop quickly in firefighting.
 
Consequently, if private companies elect to hire crew members who do not speak English, those supervisors must be bilingual or multilingual.

[...]

Public agencies have not found it necessary to require all frontline crew members to speak English. Bilingual supervision has proved successful in ensuring adequate crew safety and performance.
 
Due to the nature of the work, English proficiency is required for direct employment by ODF.
 
No ODF employees have been fired or demoted because of any language requirement; there is no requirement other than English proficiency for agency employees.

Once again, Fox News and Eric Crafton are wrong wrong wrong.

Hoping to scare Nashvillians into passing their pet referendum, Crafton & crew have resorted to fear mongering and outright lies. Way to keep it classy, guys.

At Least He’s Picking On New York For A Change

The Nashville Scene points us to Eric Crafton’s fear-mongering radio ad:

It begins with strains of "America the Beautiful."


"America. One nation, under God, indivisible-until now." The ad goes on to say that English is "under attack" It cites examples of government services in New York City being offered in multiple languages, and presents the amendment as a way of preventing the same thing from happening in Nashville.

English is "under attack"? Really? The--pardon the pun--lingua franca of global commerce is "under attack"? Is he nuts?

Am I the only one picking up a "War On Christmas" vibe here?

Personally, I don’t see what anyone loses by offering government services in multiple languages. But so what. That’s New York City. Again, I ask: of what relevance is it to us here in Nashville what they do in New York City?

New York is America’s most populous, diverse city. Walk down any street in New York and you will hear a variety of languages spoken all around you. It’s the home of the freaking United Nations. Maybe multi-lingual government services are needed in New York. Who cares? In case Eric Crafton hasn’t noticed, Nashville is not New York. Trust me, we aren’t even close.

If the whole language war thing were truly an issue for us here in Nashville, Crafton wouldn’t have to keep trotting out examples of how they do things in California and New York. He’d cite some examples right here at home. The fact that he can’t seem to find any that would muster the proper amount of outrage tells me this really is only an issue in Crafton’s mind.

Of course, by picking on coastal metropolitan areas like New York City and Oakland, this campaign hits some nice "coastal elite" hot buttons. He could easily pick on some small towns in Texas, which I suggested earlier, but that doesn't push the same social and cultural buttons. I'm sure that worked very well in some of the smaller communities where the English Only movement has found success.

But Nashville isn't Culpeper, Virginia. We're the "third coast." I question how well the big city-vs-small town message resonates here. Indeed, I question how well it works at all these days. It certainly seemed to cause a big push-back in the last election when the GOP tried to use it.

Anyway, as Crafton's campaign gets increasingly squirrelly, he's starting to remind me of Bill O'Reilly, picking up factually-flawed stories from WorldNet Daily and repeating the juicy bits, promoting the idea there is a "war" going on that only he and a handful of anti-immigrant crusaders can see.

It's all very strange.

Are There Answers In The Money?

Well this isn’t exactly a surprise:

Nashville voters may have to wait until after the Jan. 22 English Only special election to find out how the Nashville English First group has funded its controversial referendum campaign.

Leaders with the English Only referendum movement to make English the official language of Metro government would not say if they intended to file the group’s financial disclosure statement by today’s deadline when reached by the The City Paper this week.

In fact, according to Davidson County Election Commission employees, a representative from Nashville English First inquired about what the penalty would be if the committee missed the filing deadline.

Gee, I wonder what they’re hiding? Something so distasteful that they’re afraid financial disclosure would hurt support for their measure, perhaps? Funding from one of the many anti-immigrant hate groups, perhaps?

Or a certain political party, maybe?

It would be irresponsible not to speculate. After all, we already know English Only received $20,000 and legal assistance from one-man nativist machine John Tanton, a noted bigot and anti-Catholic who once warned that high Latino birth rates meant they would soon outbreed whites, causing all sorts of other horrors.

So what is Crafton's group afraid of? What are they hiding? It’s got to be really, really bad or they wouldn’t take the risk of looking like they’re hiding something. Which is how they look right now. But we won’t know ... until it’s too late.

Here’s something I don’t hear mentioned much in the English Only debate: Where is this rash of council meetings, commission meetings, board memos, etc. that are taking place in a foreign language? Near as I can tell the only time a foreign language was spoken at Metro Council it was Crafton himself speaking in Japanese in his now-famous fear-mongering stunt. I’ve been to plenty of council meetings, planning commission meetings, zoning hearings, etc. English has always been spoken every time.

To the best of my knowledge, federal law already requires that translators be provided for emergency services and in court, something very easily accommodated through the miracle of private enterprise via a company like Language Line Services.

Critics have said the entire savings per year to Metro would be $3,100, and yet we’re paying ten times that amount on the special election. This just doesn’t add up.

I’m just not seeing the urgency. This was a tough sell for Crafton from the get-go, and I’m just really puzzled as to why he decided to put this forward and put his reputation on the line to begin with. None of it makes sense, and I wonder if the financial disclosure wouldn’t clear some of this mystery up.

The only town I’ve been able to find where Spanish is used in official business is tiny El Cenizo, Texas, on the Texas-Mexico border. CNN’s Ed Lavandera visited a couple of years ago and learned most residents are bi-lingual, but Spanish is their first language. So council meeting agendas are offered in both English and Spanish, and the meetings are conducted in Spanish. The result has been increased community participation by town citizens and an improved quality of life in El Cenizo:

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Reyes says this was nothing more than a dusty border outpost until 1999, but, now, with the city and its people speaking the same language, streets are paved. There's a police force and a fire station.

REYES: Well, there's like good, positive things happening. And you get to that with the support and the collaboration of the residents that reside in this..

(CROSSTALK)

LAVANDERA (on camera): And do you think that happened because city business here is conducted in Spanish?

REYES: That's right. You know, we speak their language.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Most of El Cenizo's residents are Mexican-Americans here legally. Reyes says, since city council meetings are conducted in Spanish, more people participate.

(on camera): What do you say to those people who say, you know, by God, this is the United States; you need to speak English?

[...]

JUAN ALEJANDRO, EL CENIZO, TEXAS, POLICE CHIEF: And, if people get upset by it, then so be it. So be it. Get upset, because you're not here. You're not in this situation, and you're not helping us.

LAVANDERA: People here like to joke that the official language should be Spanglish, a little bit of both languages, so everyone can understand.

I’m sure this just horrifies the Eric Craftons of the world but here’s a heads-up: Nashville is not El Cenizo, Texas, nor is it Oakland, California. What do we care how they do things elsewhere? We’re not them. We’re not a border town populated predominantly by Mexican immigrants, or a city populated by Chinese immigrants. There just isn’t a big problem here.

Why’d you do it, Eric? Why?

Hey Eric Crafton: Leave California Aloooooooone!

Did I call Eric Crafton a “serial embellisher” yesterday? Why yes I did. And, courtesy of Pith In The Wind, here he goes again:

Crafton: In fact, out in Oakland California, they have a law in the books that says if you apply for government job that interacts with the public, then you not only have to be able to speak English, but you have to be able to speak Spanish or Chinese. So I just don't think that's the road we have to travel.

But Pith’s Caleb talked to Oakland's Equal Access Director Monique Tsang, who after hearing Crafton’s take on their ordinance came to the following conclusion:

"I think he's confused."

Uh, yeah. Me too.

I don’t know why Crafton has it out for California, anyway. What did California ever do to him? And you know what, Oakland California is not Nashville Tennessee. Completely different city, population and circumstances. Why are people like Eric Crafton so threatened by what people do in California, anyway?

So I’m going to ask Eric Crafton to leave California alone. Why don’t you pick on Texas for a while? Here’s some fresh bait for you: In November 2007, Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo told Fox News’ John Gibson that there are cities in Texas “that have changed to Spanish as the official language.”

So go pick on Texas for a while, will ya?

The Humiliation Of Eric Crafton

It’s been a busy day for Nashville’s nattering nabob of nativisim, Eric Crafton. A recap:

Last Wednesday Eric Crafton spoke at the English First Only debate at the law offices of Waller Landsden Dortch & Davis. Blogger Mack reports that Crafton told the audience that he got the idea for English Only “after watching a news broadcast that mentioned the fact that a few members of California’s legislature do not speak English.”

Crafton then tells New York Times reporter Robbie Brown that he “happened to see a state legislature meeting in California where several of the state representatives had interpreters at their desk because they couldn’t speak English.” Not a news report, mind you, but he saw the meeting. The interpreters were not on the phone but at their desks.

Sean Braisted calls the office of the clerk of the California State Assembly and learns that no, all state Assemblymen and women speak English.

Southern Beale calls the office of the Secretary of the state Senate and learns likewise that all California state Senators speak English.

The Nashville Scene’s Caleb talks to Crafton and learns what he meant to say was that

he THINKS he saw something LIKE IT--possibly in a local council meeting rather than on the state legislative level--on a Fox News segment "two or three years ago."

Brilliant! This is why I love blogs.

So what have we learned, children? We’ve learned that Eric Crafton is a serial embellisher, without the good sense to know that if you spin a yarn to a New York Times reporter, someone might call you on it.

We’ve learned that bloggers will do what New York Times reporters will not: namely, make a couple of quick phone calls.

And we’ve learned the city of Nashville is some $300,000 in the hole and our reputation has been tarnished all because of something Eric Crafton might or might not have seen on Fox News, that bastion of journalistic credibility.

Hey, Eric Crafton! I THINK I saw a Bellevue resident at the post office today mailing petitions for your recall! Or maybe it was just something like it.

Name One, Mr. Crafton

[UPDATE]:

Sean Braisted does my homework for me. He calls the Chief Clerk of the California Assembly and determines Eric Crafton is, indeed, full of shit.

However, the Assembly is just one chamber of the state legislature. So taking a cue from Braisted, I just spoke to Zach Twilla in the office of the California Secretary of the Senate and was told that no, there are no state Senators who do not speak English either, although he says there are many who are bi-lingual. In addition, since Nov. 4, 1984 English has been the official language of the state of California (as it is here in Tennessee), so unless Crafton happened upon a meeting of the state Senate pre-1984--that's 22 years ago--I'd say he's making it all up.

Eric Crafton: liar liar pants on fire.
--------------------------------

I’m going to call bullshit on this nativist fantasy:

“I happened to see a state legislature meeting in California where several of the state representatives had interpreters at their desk because they couldn’t speak English,” Mr. Crafton said. “That’s not the vision I have for Nashville.”

I’m a native of California. I was born there, lived there for 25 years. I find this charge that there is not just one but “several” California state legislators who need translators to fulfill their duties in the state Senate or state Assembly to not have any credibility.

Then again, maybe he’s talking about Austrian Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

So please name them, Mr. Crafton. Please produce a transcript. Please give me a date when this happened. Until I see some evidence, I’m saying you’re full of shit.

More likely, he read about it in one of John Tanton's bullshit propaganda pieces.

First Nashville, Then The World

Told ya so :

But Mr. Crafton insists that momentum is on his side in Nashville and across the country. “We’ll make English the official language here,” he said. “After that happens, we’re going to go city to city, show them how we’ve done it here, and let the dominos fall.”

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

If Crafton can get money from an out-of-state hate group to shove this down our throats, and if California can pass Prop. 8 using out of state money from homophobes, then I don’t understand why immigrant’s rights groups are not seeing our English Only measure for the national threat it is and pouring resources into the Nashville battle.

Maybe they are and I just don’t know about it.

The Architect Of English Only

Sean Braisted must donate to the same causes that I do: the Southern Poverty Law Center has plowed through the letters of anti-immigration crusader John Tanton, stored in a file at the Bentley Historical Library at the University of Michigan. The result: an explosive look at the racist/nationalist who has donated $20,000 to seeing Eric Crafton’s English Only referendum become Metro Nashville law.

I first wrote about John Tanton last August. The man clearly holds fringe, racist beliefs: Jews, Catholics, Latinos, Asians, African-Americans--anyone who is not a white Christian is a threat to white supremacy, in his twisted worldview:

John Tanton has not merely flirted with and adopted many of the core ideas of white nationalism over the past three decades. He has carried on correspondences with some of the key leaders of the white nationalist movement, meeting and even vacationing with some of them, and pushing many of their central ideas.

Over the years, his closest friend on the white nationalist scene seems to have been Jared Taylor, the man who began publishing American Renaissance, a racist, pseudo-scientific magazine focusing on race, intelligence and eugenics, in 1990. ("When blacks are left entirely to their own devices," Taylor wrote in its pages a few years ago, "Western civilization — any kind of civilization — disappears.")

What’s frightening is that Tanton has legitimized his fringe views via groups like U.S. English and FAIR, which have exported the mechanism for enforcing these views to communities all around the country. If Nashville approves Crafton’s English Only referendum, we will be the largest city in the country to approve a major plank in John Tanton’s bigoted platform.

Yesterday Braisted posted :

The question we must ask ourselves is how much of a foot in the door do we want to allow the white nationalists from outside Nashville to have? Do we want this city to be the beacon of hope for every two bit hack who thinks his genetic makeup is superior to all others?

I’m going to take this a step further. I don’t think we need to worry about giving white nationalists from outside Nashville a foot in the door so much as we need to worry about empowering those already here. A legislative win will only emboldens the bigotry of Tennessee's nativist groups. If this is a success in Nashville, it will spread across the state.

Racism exists in Nashville just as it exists everywhere in some form or another. Do we want to endorse such beliefs in a special election?

I hope not.

We Said No No No But He Heard Yes Yes Yes

Early voting for Nashville’s English Only referendum begins today. This referendum making English the official language of the city of Nashville has been universally reviled across a broad spectrum of our community:

• It has been opposed by Nashville Mayor Karl Dean, who notes English Only will inhibit the city’s economic development outreach to foreign countries.

• It has been opposed by our college and university leaders, who say the measure would negatively impact education.

• It has been opposed the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, noting (among other things) that a city with an unwelcoming and regressive image will have trouble luring international businesses.

• It has been opposed by the Nashville Convention & Visitors Bureau because it “sends the wrong message” to visitors, those employed in the hospitality industry, and business leaders.

• It has been opposed by a diverse coalition of Christian, Jewish and Muslim faith leaders, who note this goes against their respective religious traditions of hospitality and welcoming the foreigner.

• It has cost the city over $300,000.

• It was forced down the throats of Nashville voters with out of state financing from a renowned racist.

My prediction: it will pass.

Welcome to Nashville, where ignorance is bliss.

If Nashville does approve this measure it will be the largest city to do so, but it will by no means be the last. Expect success in Nashville to be followed by English Only measures across the state and across the country. Conservatives are at their best when they're beating up on brown people.

English First’s Tainted Money Trail

[UPDATE]:

The Tennessean is on top of the story. Kudos to Michael Cass. Apologies for any mean thing I ever said about the Tennessean.

-------------------------------------

Our local media is finally getting some answers on who is funding Eric Crafton’s English First amendment. Apparently nearly $20,000 and legal assistance came from a national group called ProEnglish, which is part of a larger group called U.S. Inc. Their founder, John Tanton, is on ProEnglish’s board of directors. The Tennessean identified Tanton as “a Michigan eye surgeon” who “also founded the Federation for American Immigration Reform” (FAIR).

Isn't that nice.

Well, I did a little Googling of my own, and found (rather easily, I might add) that the Southern Poverty Law Center lists FAIR as a hate group.

And there’s more. Lots more: here’s what the SPLC has to say about Tanton, FAIR and U.S. Inc.:

For decades, John Tanton has operated a nativist empire out of his U.S. Inc. foundation's headquarters in Petoskey, Mich. Even as he simultaneously runs his own hate group — The Social Contract Press, listed for many years by the Southern Poverty Law Center because of its anti-Latino and white supremacist writings — Tanton has remained the house intellectual for FAIR. In fact, U.S. Inc. bankrolls much of FAIR's lobbying activity and, at least until 2005, Tanton ran its Research and Publications Committee, the group that fashions and then disseminates FAIR's position papers. In its 2004 annual report, FAIR highlighted its own main ideologue, singing Tanton's praises for "visionary qualities that have not waned one bit."

But what, exactly, is Tanton's vision?

As long ago as 1988, when a series of internal 1986 documents known as the WITAN memos were leaked to the press, Tanton's bigoted attitudes have been known. In the memos, written to colleagues on the staff of FAIR, Tanton warned of a coming "Latin onslaught" and worried that high Latino birth rates would lead "the present majority to hand over its political power to a group that is simply more fertile." Tanton repeatedly demeaned Latinos in the memos, asking whether they would "bring with them the tradition of the mordida [bribe], the lack of involvement in public affairs" and also questioning Latinos' "educability."

Echoing his 19th-century nativist forebears who feared Catholic immigrants from Italy and Ireland, Tanton has often attacked Catholics in terms not so different from those used by the Klan and the Know-Nothing Party of the 1840s. In the WITAN memos, for instance, he worried that Latino immigrants would endanger the separation of church and state and undermine support for public schooling. Never one to miss a threatening and fertile Catholic, Tanton even reminded his colleagues, "Keep in mind that many of the Vietnamese coming in are also Catholic."

The leaked memos caused an uproar. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Walter Cronkite quit the board of a group Tanton headed, U.S. English, after the memos became public in 1988. U.S. English Executive Director Linda Chavez — a former Reagan Administration official and, later, a conservative commentator — also left, calling Tanton's views "anti-Hispanic, anti-Catholic and not excusable."

You can read one of Tanton's race-bating WITAN memos here.

According to the SPLC, Mr. Tanton is a one-man, anti-immigrant empire. The list of 13 groups Tanton has founded or funded includes U.S. Inc., U.S. English, NumbersUSA, Pro English, and The Social Contract Press. Several of these groups are avowed hate groups.

John Tanton is a shady character, to be sure. Look what American Progress dug up:

The Tanton-owned Social Contract Press publishes the views of white nationalists such as John Vinson, including a gem about how God prefers racial separation. Tanton also publishes Camp of the Saints, a racist screed that uses fiction to warn white Europeans about an impending invasion of immigrants from India who will overrun the government, kidnap white women and make them into prostitutes.

If members of the mainstream press did their homework, they'd discover that it is pretty easy to get to the bottom of Tanton's network. Dig just a little deeper and they would find what the Southern Poverty Law Center reports—that Tanton received large sums of early money for FAIR from the Pioneer Fund, possibly the last remaining funder of eugenics in the country.

You remember eugenics; it's best-known proponents were the Nazis who tried to demonstrate the power of this pseudo-science by executing millions of Jews, disabled people, and others who did not meet their views of racial purity. A visit to the Pioneer Fund's website is a walk back in time, and not a pleasant one. It contains biographies of board members and grant recipient scholars who support such ideas as black people having smaller brains than people of European or Asian descent, and women being genetically predisposed to have lower IQs than men.

If members of the mainstream press did their homework, we’d all have ponies and ride to ice cream castles in the sky.

Sorry, but come on, people. This stuff isn’t hard.

Every right wing bigot has to have his slush fund for spreading hate, and it’s no surprise to learn that Richard Mellon Scaife is a big Tanton supporter

Tanton's most important funding source for the last two decades may well have been the Scaife family, heirs to the Mellon Bank fortune.

Richard Mellon Scaife, a reclusive figure, has been instrumental in establishing right-wing organizations like the Heritage Foundation and supporting causes like the "Arkansas Project," an effort to dig up dirt on President Clinton.

Scaife family foundations, including those controlled by Scaife's sister, Cordelia May Scaife, provided some $1.4 million to FAIR from 1986-2000.

These foundations, along with private trusts controlled by Scaife family members, have also provided millions of dollars to other anti-immigration groups.

Other foundations that have supported the Tanton network include:

• The McConnell Foundation, whose president, Scott McConnell, is on both FAIR and the Center for Immigration Studies' boards;
• The Shea Foundation, which also funds the Council of Conservative Citizens; and
• The Weeden, Salisbury, Smith Richardson, Blair and Sikes foundations.

There’s more than enough here to cause alarm. I wonder if those thousands of citizens who signed their name to Nashville’s English First petition realize they just gave their name and address to a hate group network who will probably hit them up for funds and support for their future battle against the “savages.”

Thanks a lot, Eric Crafton. Look what slipped in when you opened the barn door. Is this really the kind of people Nashville needs to be doing business with? At least now we know why Crafton was so secretive about his money source.

I Get Mail

Today's mail contained two--TWO--petitions from the English First people. There are six signature lines. I guess we're supposed to take this around to our neighbors or something. As if.

They must be sending these things to every registered voter in the county: Last month 30,000 postcards were mailed out. Imagine.

I'm thinking about how much money it has taken for all of the robocalls, mailings, petitions, etc. There's some big bucks behind this amendment push, no doubt about it. Yet the financing of this campaign is all very murky. Eric Crafton won't say where the financial backing for his initiative is coming from, except the cryptic "from folks."

I still can't believe that there isn't a reporter in this town who has been able to find out where all the money for this stuff is coming from. No, scratch that, I can believe it. Short of recycling record company press releases and AP wire copy, our local press is basically useless.

I have an idea. I bet if we scratched the surface we'd find some of the usual GOP moneybags behind this effort. Immigrants are the perfect whipping-boy for Republicans desperate for an issue that will beat their voters to the polls this November in progressive Nashville. They've already used up the gay-baiting issue, and there wasn't time to get an abortion measure on the ballot for this November. But the GOP has to be careful not to offend Latino voters; McSame has been busy courting Latino voters, promising pathways to citizenship at secret meetings.

All of which is the kind of stuff that would make the immigrant-hating GOP base in Nashville want to stay home come November. But: ta da! Lookie here! A piece of election year candy for you! Come, come out and vote! Vote for this useless piece of legislation that declares something that doesn't need to be codified in the Metro charter, and be sure to cast your vote for the GOP candidates while you're in the voting booth.

Maybe I'm just being cynical. But I really don't understand why we voters don't have a right to know who is funding this monumental campaign. And no, Eric Crafton, "just folks" just doesn't cut it.

I Get Phone Calls

Including this robocall, yesterday:

Please help Metro Councilman Eric Crafton make English the official language of city government in Nashville. He needs to collect 15,000 signed petitions by August 15 to put a referendum on the ballot to let the voters decide if they want their government to operate in English, or pay for their government to operate in languages ranging from Spanish to Arabic.

OMG. Let’s count the wingnut dog whistles in that one, shall we?

Taxpayers funding government operations in languages ranging from Spanish to Arabic? Oh, noes! The terrorists are coming! The terrorists are coming! And they can talk to our police officers and ER workers!

I just came from a week in Scandinavia, where everyone spoke English. The bank ATM machines all offer a choice of languages, including the native Norwegian (or Swedish), French and English. The sky did not fall. A great chasm did not appear and swallow Stockholm whole. They are thriving.

I don’t know what’s worse, Eric Crafton continuing to flog this dead horse legislation or his obvious fearmongering tactics to manipulate public opinion.

Get over yourself, Eric Crafton. America is a melting pot. Multiple languages have always existed here. Deal with it.