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FROM THE MARGINS | BY PATRICK AZADIAN
Los Angeles Times Valley Edition | Glendale News-Press | June 17 2006

Thank you for the lessons

Councilman's Frank Quintero's attempt to win the Democratic nomination for the 43rd California Assembly seat coincided with some potentially priceless lessons.

In September 2005, an article appeared in the Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion titled "Proposal to close the access to Atwater Village, residents site tensions between Hispanics and Armenians [as the cause]."

The article talked about Glendale City Council's controversial proposal to close a railroad crossing following the horrific January train wreck that killed 11 and injured nearly 200 others.

Quintero, the only City Councilman to be quoted in the article, stated that the closure was a "bad idea."

The author, Jorge Morales Almada, made it clear that the mayor of Glendale (Rafi Manoukian, at the time) is of Armenian origin, and two of the four City Council members are also Armenian. He even managed to find an Armenian, albeit with a dubious first and last name combination (Vreje Boghokian, literally translates into 'Vengence Protest -ian'), to state that Armenians want to control the city and have ill feelings toward Latinos.

The author concluded with a quote from an Atwater resident, who said the Armenians wanted to make Glendale an exclusive zone. "That's why they don't like Latinos."

Case closed! Armenian don't like Latinos, and the proposed closing of a railroad crossing was an "Armenian" conspiracy to keep Latinos out.

There was a great lesson to be learned from such an award-winning piece of journalism. Whenever there is a tragedy, and your city council members swiftly (and probably naively) move to avoid similar accidents, always look for ethnic hatred as the root cause for their motivation. And of course, never forget their ancestry. In such cases, always assume a cigar is never a cigar, but maybe a surface-to-air missile.

An even more precious lesson can be extrapolated from this piece.

If it's so easy to keep American citizens moving from one city to another, the anti-immigrant movement can now deploy the same tactics to keep illegal immigrants from coming to America. Priceless, indeed!

Here is how it's done. First, elect an American-Armenian majority to the U.S. Congress; second, build a railroad track on our mutual borders with Canada and Mexico (call me dense, but I am assuming Canadian illegals are as illegal as the ones from Mexico); third, construct railroad crossings at certain locations, and finally close the same crossings and make people drive a mile up the track to enter into America. I can just see the would-be illegal immigrants scratching their bamboozled heads and thinking: "Hmmm... this looks just way too dangerous. I think I rather live with unemployment, poverty and an uncertain future for my children than take this insane risk. Back to Saskatchewan (or Tijuana), I go!"

But the most important lesson here had to do with how to fire up an ethnic constituency to vote. If you want to help a candidate of a certain ethnic group, plant the seeds of hatred and divisiveness early. This may guarantee a high voter turnout for your brother-in-arm.

Within the same context of planting bigotry, just a few weeks before the elections, a mailer sent out by the so-called "Latino Leadership Fund" targeted certain households in an attempt to brand the Armenian community as "terrorists."

The message of the mailer was clear: Despite his stereotypically fine Caucasian looks, Paul Krekorian (the eventual winner in the nomination race) is actually an Armenian. Please don't forget this when voting. Furthermore, beware that Armenians are terrorists.

As it turned out, the Latino Leadership Fund represented neither Latinos nor their leadership. Who was behind it? Your guess is as good as mine.

"Political material such as the anti-Krekorian mailer is damaging to Latinos, Armenians, and to anyone who believes that working together different groups can create a city of justice for all People," Los Angeles City Council President Eric Garcetti said.

In a statement addressed to the Armenian National Committee, an Armenian-American grassroots political organization, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa denounced such election tactics. He said: "Armenians and Latinos share common struggles, hopes and dreams in America... Any attempts to inflame relations between these communities should be denounced as beyond the pale of acceptable campaign tactics."

At the end of the day, voters chose to steer clear of the damaging lessons imposed upon them during the elections.

But questions remain. Who will take responsibility for the polarized climate? In the long run, as residents, are we resolute enough not to yield to election tactics which attempt to inflame our tribal instincts and racial prejudices? And more importantly, are we bright enough to starve the seeds of divisiveness and hatred planted in our backyards during these elections?

It all depends on how fertile our soil is for such seeds and how often we choose to water it.

Copyright 2006 Glendale News Press