Applause for today's " Americanize immigrants "

John J. Miller's column today ( May 27 ) " We must rediscover


    how to Americanize immigrants " was  more rational and benign in

    tone than most Left or Right perspectives on this sensitive issue.

        At its worst the Right offers the vision of the Nazi gas chamber

    as a " final solution " to  assimilation problem. Even the more

    reasonable " liberal ' left is downright embarrassed by displays of

    patriotic sentiment. They seem to think that American History is

    - when honestly told - a shocking tale of WASP depravity .


          Is it " politically correct " to admire every culture and

    civilization but one's own - which has a claim to being the best

    in the world, even with its many problems ?

          The new immigrants will not be imposed upon by asking them to

    be " patriotic Americans " . In its best sense that is not just a

    pop phrase suggesting " Joe " types - pot bellied, red necked, gun

    swinging idiots.

           I feel a little like Rhett in "  Gone with the Wind ". He had

    an impulse to defend a  lost cause ( not a moral one in my opinion )

    when it was clearly lost, when Atlanta was burning and the Old South

    was gone forever.