Actions and reactions

My first semester in graduate school was also my urban economics professor's first at the university.  I think "urban economics" was the name of the course.  One of the readings that he--a recent transplant from Canada--had for us was about Monterey Park.

Most of the natives were familiar with the place but a couple of us foreigners and out-of-staters had no idea where Monterey Park was.  This essay was all about how the city's population had dramatically changed--seemingly overnight--so much so that even the signage in front of commercial establishments were appearing in Chinese.  And the local whites were upset.

I, as a foreigner, couldn't understand what the big deal was.  Why were the whites so upset?  Yes, there was a time in America's history when the immigrant Chinese were ill-treated.  But, wasn't that history?

Thus, in fall 1987, as a foreign student in Los Angeles, I was introduced to a rapidly changing America, starting with a community that was only a few miles east of the university where I was engaged in intellectual discussions.

What I didn't know then was this: It had been just about two decades since the US had gotten rid of its racist immigration laws.  In 1965, LBJ and the Democrats passed a sweeping immigration reform that followed the Civil Rights Act.  A new immigration regime allowed non-whites to come to the country.  The initial trickles quickly became a stream and then a wave of non-whites.  Monterey Park had become Chinese majority, with a Chinese-American mayor to boot.  And quite a few white folk were angry.

I didn't know then that I was in the relatively early part of the gushing stream of immigrants from India.

Source

I was in an international setting--on campus and in the city. A bubble that normalized my status.  From my first day, I didn't know anything other than believing all these were the norm!

Almost 30 years after the LBJ-led immigration reform, in 1994, the reactionaries struck.  An anti-immigrant hateful rhetoric clinched a second-term for a Republican governor in California!

But, immigrants continued to move to California.  Silicon technology was altering the economic landscape at warped speeds, and the population from India kept up with this pace.  The stream from India became a huge wave.

All thanks to the reform that was passed by Congress and signed into law by LBJ on October 3, 1965.

But, LBJ had no idea that his immigration reform would lead to the browning of America.

Source

Fifty years later, in June 2015, the reaction to LBJ opening the immigration gates to non-whites came in the form of tRump.

The hateful rhetoric that helped a Republican win the governor's office in 1994 was also the reason why the party lost California.  It is now a state where Republicans are an endangered species, who mostly yell and scream from its inland valleys.  I cannot imagine the hateful rhetoric that has made a success out of tRump and the Republicans having a lasting effect beyond another election cycle.

Better days are ahead.