Cesar Chavez, California, and President's Day

California evidently does not celebrate President's day as a holiday . Of course, state workers have been getting about one UNPAID holiday per week. Meanwhile, Cesar Chavez' birthday reamins a holiday in California. This means that, in California, Cesar Chavez is regarded as a greater man than George Washingon and Abraham Lincoln, just as nationally Martin Luthor King, Jr. is regarded as a greater man (albeit with somewhat more credentials than Cesar Chaz). Nope. These are not unrelated things. California is an example of the leftist "mecca" you get when leftists take full control. It is not pretty, and they (leftists) are about to bring the same sort of paradise to the whole country.


What is the reason Cesar Chavez gets a holiday still celebrated in California, while even the founder of the oucntry (and its savior--Lincoln) gets short shrift). As best I can tell, it is because Cesar Chavea is a leftist hero--not because he did any great things for the country as a whole, or even Hispanics as a whole. In case you forget, Cesar Chavez (of the "boycott grapes", or "boycott lettuce", or whatever, leftist causes on behalf of those migrant farm workers) was a union organizer of migrant farm workers, and crusader for giving them a better deal. Now the purpose of this entry is ot to trash Cesar Chavez, or say that he was not a worthy man fighting a worthy cause. That is the leftist ploy here. They propose a minority leftist hero for "holiday" status, and then rely on politics to get their way. The theory is that it is no skin off of anybody's nose to declare a holiday (except poor employers), and they dare you to try to trash the leftist hero. I am not interested in trashing Cesar Chavez. I merely state a fact: You are a leftist LOON if you think the accomplishments of Cesar Chavez--worthy as they may have been--were worthy of wither a state or national (movement to that effect) holiday.


You know as well as I do how this works. Leftists (not even Hispanics in general, most of whom have probably never heard of Cesar Chavez, and at least don't think he ever did anything for them) decide to push for a "Cesar Chavez" holiday as a lefits substitute for declaring a holiday honoring Lationos (or Hisapnics, or wahtever you want to label them). Then leftists push the idea that you are dishnoring Hispanics by failing to support the holiday. That is how Martin Luthor King, Jr. came to be the ONLY American honored with a national holiday named after him. The probblem that leftists have with Cesar Chavez is, of course, that he did not do much. He may have been a hero of leftists, and even of migrant farm workers, but he did not lead a general civil rights movement (as King can be argued to have done).


Do Hispanics really want to be saddled with the "migrant farm worker" tag? It is true that most migrant farm workers were Hspanic. However, most Hispanics are not migrant farm workers. In fact, only a VERY small number of Hispanics are migrant farm workers--even in California. My daughters, for example, were never migrant farm workers (although 50% Hispanic). Their mother (100% Hispanic) was never a migrant farm worker. Their 100% Hispanic grandparents (on mother's side) were never migrant farm wokrers. Every member of their mother's family that I ever met was not a migrant farm worker, although I could not tell you that there was never a migrant farm worker somewhere in the family at some time. In fact, I have been around Hispanics all of my life (having spent all of my adult life essentially in the El Paso area), and none of them has ever mentioned "mirgrant farm worker" or Cesar Chavez to me. I will be blunt: I do not think Hipanics generally identify with migrant farm workers. That is not to say they do not sympathize with them--especially if they are told Cesar Chavez is an Hispnic hero who fought for Hispanic farm workers--but they have higher aspirations than being a migrant farm workerr.


Nope. I am not disparaging migrant farm workers. As with all laboring work, it is honest toil. And I have no doubt migrant farm workers have been exploited by big agriculture (and even small agriculture). However, what is the manin benefit of being a migrant farm worker? Right. It is hoping for better things for your children. That hope is what leftists have virtually destroyed in California, and are in the process of destroying for us all. It certainly does not help that hope to "sell" Cesar Chavez as a greater man than he was (giving him every benefit of the doubt). There have to be hundreds of thousands of Americans at least as worthy of having a holiday named after them as much or more than Cesar Chavez does. It is basically an insult to Hispanics (typical for leftists, who are the primary racists in our society today--although Hispanics are primarily of the Caucasian race) to suggest that a worthy, but minor, figure such as Cesar Chavez is deserving of s state or natioinal holiday just because he is Hispanic (and fought for a group that was primarily Hispanic).


You should see the point here. There are few more obvious examples of how we have lost our way than California "honoring" Cesar Chavez more than it honors Washington or Lincoln. This elevation of symbol over reality, and lefitist politics over everything else, explains why California is in such bad straits. It also explains why the country seems about to follow where California has led.


P.S. Yes, Cesar Chavez was a big hero among the leftists at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin, when I was in law school from 1971-1973. I know whereof I speak when I call him a "lefitst hero", much more than he was ever an Hisapnic hero". Cesar Chavez was good at making his cause a national leftist cause. He was not so good at advancing the "cause" of Hispanics generally. Again, this is not to denigrate his "cause" as unjust. It is to say he was, and is, more a leftist hero than anything else, whose accomplishments were of minor overall significance (worthy as they may have been). Chavez used leftists, but leftists used him, as well, to try to advance the leftist, anti-capitalist message. Of course, we have now reached the point where even Wall Street and big business are abandoning the message of the "free market". This shows how far left the country has swung, seeminlgly almost by inadvertence. We will regret it.