Fire and ICE

by Mona Shaw

The latest ICE raid on May 8 happened 18 miles from my front door. It also reminded me of how I lost faith in Democrats.  I know some think this came about when I flew off the handle one day in some purist tantrum.  It didn’t happen that way at all.  The truth is much more embarrassing.

My disenchantment with Democrats began during the Clinton administration.  After a spate of unconscionable legislation and policies, from GATT to NAFTA to DOMA to DADT, the 1996 Welfare Reform Act horrified me most of all.  I was so fed up that I voted for Monica Moorehead of the Workers World Party for president that year.

But I waffled in my resolve.  I waffled a lot.  I still thought there was value in working for local candidates, and I volunteered for them and cut them checks.  I even voted for John Kerry in 2004, because George W. Bush for an unabashed war criminal, and I was still beguiled into believing that Democrats were against war for profit. I couldn’t envision a 2018 when G.W. would be considered an affable teddy bear by the party.

Indeed, Democratic candidates were a consistent presence at peace festivals and rallies during all the Bush administration.  They often spoke and held their peace signs high. It was at one such gathering that I met Dave Loebsack.  You could always count on him being there.  The first time I met Dave, I mispronounced his last name.  He was more than a little piqued at my mistake and corrected me in a patently snotty tone.  I was quite embarrassed and apologized profusely.  He didn’t accept my apology and just glared at me and walked away.

“People are touchy about their name,” I rationalized.

I swept it under the rug and volunteered for his campaign just the same.

The day he was elected I made phone calls on his behalf until the polls closed.  I was thrilled he was elected.  As Republicans go, Jim Leach had been a very moderate one and voted like a Democrat as often as not.  I knew it would be even better. 

I was excited in early January, 2007, when I learned that he was going to hold a town hall meeting a block from the mobile home park where I lived. I was the first to arrive.

He was still giddy about his win and talked about watching “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”  (He has yet to participate in a filibuster.)  He eschewed suggestions that G.W. Bush should be impeached for his war crimes.

“Do you want Dick Cheney for president,” he asked.

“Impeach him too,” I suggested. 

He told me to “Get serious,” and shot me that look he’d given me at the festival.

I was embarrassed and intimidated and decided to move to safer ground and ask a soft ball question.

“What are you thinking about the ICE raid in Marshalltown last month?” I asked.

“I don’t know anything about it,” he said.

My response was a reflex, and my surprise was real.  The Swift raid had been on the front page of the Des Moines Register for weeks and had received national news.  I thought everyone knew about it.

“Really?” I asked.

“I’ve been a little busy,” he said.

His tone was so hostile that others noticed and became quiet.

He gave a nervous laugh and said, “I guess I don’t suffer fools and trouble-makers gladly.”

The subject was abruptly changed.  All but one or two present continued to fawn over him.

I checked out mentally after that.  I was too worried.  It wasn’t that he didn’t know, though that was sad.  It was that he didn’t care that he didn’t know.

His response disillusioned me.  Not because he was rude to me, but because he had exposed to me his modus operandi for dealing with statements he didn’t like.  His M.O. was to shame and discredit the person who asked or said those things.

I also knew that it wasn’t in his instinctive repertoire to care about the families that had been destroyed by the raid.  He didn’t know an Esperanza or a Jorge or a Consuelo or any of the other Latinos who comprised a good third of my trailer park. My neighbors were devastated and now being terrorized.  He had not seen them weeping while shoveling their walk.  He not driven slowly by my trailer to read the sign I’d put in my front window condemning the raid.  I had to do that.  I wanted them to know that this white neighbor was on their side.  He didn’t see Jorge shovel my walk after that.

“Do any of these upper middle-class Democrats really care about the folks?” I had to wonder.

Or, do they just adopt “positions” that are quickly minimized when the rubber hits the road?

I had to pay closer attention. He had stoked my belly’s fire for the truth.  My disappointing discoveries were many and profound.  The rug became very lumpy.