Well, it appears that the best place in San Diego to get an unvarnished view of what people are thinking about illegal immigration is the public train. Welcome to “Tales of the Rail, Part II.”
This morning I was running late. The fare is $2.25 (probably a $40 subsidy from the local taxpayers) but while rushing I dropped my trusty quarter down some sort of grating in the concrete and thus was tempting fate by ‘short-faring’ 3 stops. On top of this, I was knowingly committing what must be the most cardinal sin of any train commuter – carrying an open coffee mug filled to the brim. (bloggers note: Since this is a conservative blog, many of you have probably only seen public transportation trains on T.V., or in the 1970’s classic gang thriller “The Warriors.” When the train starts, 75% of the time the first 40 feet of the trip is taken at bullet train speed, giving the passengers an unbalancing jerk, and giving any hot liquids a chance to return to the wild. Thankfully the train then returns to a placid 1mph crawl for the remainder of the trip).
Anyway, today’s car was not crowded. One person a bench. In the four benches directly around me were a 55+ white blue collar man with some tattoos who looked to be on the way to work, a 65+ white poor looking man with half of his teeth and a carton of Camels, and a 65+ woman who I didn’t see much of cause she kept her face to the window opposite me. The rest of the car is white or asian.
Blue collar man didn’t appear too friendly and had one foot on my bench so I thought it was a good time to bury myself in my reading. After a few stops he looked around and said to no one in general “not too many Mexicans on the train today, huh?”
This is the conversation that followed, as best I can remember:
Old Man: “Yeah I hear all the illegals are down at San Ysidro (the border) protesting.”
Blue Collar Man: “What a bunch of crap. You’d think they’d at least send the border patrol down to sort through them. Kind of good hunting right there, I’d think.
Old Man: “Man, you know the government is going to give them what they want. They’re selling us out. I like the wall those guys are building down there that that guy started.”
Me: “Congressman Duncan Hunter”
Blue Collar Man: “Yeah I’d like to see them put up a wall all the way down the border. That’s the only way to stop this mess. A big wall with some barbed wire.”
Me: “You don’t think the President will do something about the border?”
Blue Collar Man: (says nothing but mimics spitting on the ground and rolls his eyes)
Old Man: “And they can wave the Mexican flag all day. On the other side. Now they hand out American flags at those things I see on TV. I don’t believe it. They’d all be waving Mexican flags again in two seconds if they didn’t think it would piss us off even more.”
Blue Collar Man: “You know they are going to give them more and more. You know they are. It grinds me. I fought in Vietnam. See this (blurry tattoo). They treat me like s**t. I’ve worked my whole life and I served in the Marines now these people come here like this and raise hell and now I’ve got to pay for them? The law doesn’t mean s**t anymore. Those guys don’t have the guts to do what’s right.”
Train stops at my stop. I stand up. They say good-bye. I get out and walk to my office.