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By Patrick Osio, Jr. 

Editor

HispanicVista.com

 

Republicans need to learn to respect if they want the Mexican American vote.

By Patrick Osio

It seems that there is a political preoccupation with who will Hispanics vote for president? The Republicans are obviously worried because political experts have said that without between 30 to 40 percent of the Hispanic vote, Romney is not going to win. This worry has given a huge boost to Florida’s Senator Marco Rubio political value and thrust him into the national spotlight. He is touted as the front runner choice for VP in the Romney ticket.

Rubio is young, handsome, articulate and very bright, and Hispanic, wow, numerous top Republicans including Tea Party followers are ready to hang their hat on Rubio’s VP chances.

But a number of Republican print, radio and television commentators say that the main preoccupations of Hispanics are the economy and jobs just like any American and thus they will vote Republican, because Obama has not come through on his promises to fix the economy, improve education and create jobs.

However take note that those who give us those opinions are mostly if not all, non Hispanics. It seems that they have not bothered to go beyond the surface of what Hispanics consider just as important as the economy, education and employment an other issue of which Republicans are sorely devoid of providing and in fact abuse  - respect.

A segment of the Republican right has made their life’s mission to perpetually insult, discriminate and, make it clear that Hispanics do not merit respect. This negatively affects the entire Republican Party mainly because party members (including Hispanic members), in the middle say nothing and do nothing to stop the onslaught of insults aimed at Hispanics under the cover that they are talking about illegal immigrants; while all brown skinned Hispanics are subjected to those insults and draconian legislation introduced and enacted into law by Republicans in various states, engulfing Hispanic citizens and legal permanent residents with abuse of their constitutional and civil rights.

Considering Marco Rubio as the messiah, who will bring together Hispanics into the Republican fold, is yet one more insult in the main ethnic group within the all inclusive name ‘Hispanic.’ The gorilla in the Hispanic community is the Mexican-American by a huge margin, were they at all taken into consideration when Rubio’s name was being promoted for VP? No.

Not withstanding this snub, would Mexican Americans warm up to Rubio? It would be a hard sale. First, because he will be seen as the ‘token’ to lure Mexican-Americans (and other Hispanic groups, mainly from Central America). Second because it is the non-Hispanics who are telling the gorilla “this is who we choose – live with it.”

An additional and major consideration is that Rubio is Cuban-American whose Spanish is as spoken in Cuba, with its unique accent and many vocabulary differences.

All Hispanic groups have a great deal of respect for Cuban Americans and what they have been able to accomplish since the exodus from Cuba starting in the 1960s. But they were the elite of Cuba displaced by the arrival of Communism, and were greeted in the U.S. with open arms and given immediate residency, plus a host of social benefits to get them started.

This is far different than the majority of immigrants from Mexico and Central America, who risked their very life crossing the border for a chance at menial and low paying wages to support their families. And while they fit the definition of the group that should be allowed entry as written on the Statue of Liberty – “give me your poor”; they have instead faced racial and ethnic discrimination, law enforcement and employment abuse; but through it all they have endured.

It is simply a question of time when the gorilla will wield an equal amount of political power.It would be far better for the Republican Party to stop playing games with Hispanics and learn to be respectful. Once they achieve this, then and only then, will there be open communication with the Hispanic community as a whole.

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Patrick Osio is Editor of HispanicVista.com. Contact at Posiojr@aol.com

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Patrick Osio is Editor of HispanicVista.com (www.hispanicvista.com) and co-founder of TransBorder Communications dedicated to binational economic development