I remember making my father cry when I told him I thought we were rich because I had shoes. (I am crying now)

My father, an American citizen born in San Antonio, had his family destroyed when in they didn't allow his father back from Mexico after a family visit. A family of ten kids and their mother was sent into abject poverty in the depression when a successful house contractor was trapped in Mexico during the Mexican Reparation. Then my grandmother died of a "broken heart". My great aunt took the kids over, her husband went to the gov. for some relief and was told that the kids should be placed in an orphanage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/...

And so my Dad was just a dirty Mexican that now would be called an anchor baby. Though a second generation American daughter of a sailor who fought the Japanese in the Pacific, I too, was just a "dirty Mexican" and all of us were gerrymandered to the west side of San Antonio. My mother, a great cook, would make beans and tortillas taste great. We were poor, but the mojaditos era mas pobre. It make me so angry when people hammer away at Mexican immigrants but enjoy their spinach and strawberry salads and wonder at the lovely landscaping. "Ladies who lunch" can because Maria is caring for the children will feed them their lunch and will vacuum the carpet later.

We have been in the United States a very long time.

http://frontiers.loc.gov/...

http://frontiers.loc.gov/...

Under the treaty that ended the Mexican War, most of the Mexicans who lived in the new United States territories became U.S. citizens. The treaty also guaranteed their safety and property rights, "as if the [property] belonged to citizens of the U.S. according to the principles of the Constitution." In practice, however, the new territories were far from the centers of U.S. government, and these guarantees were not reliably enforced. By the end of the 19th century, many Mexican Americans had been deprived of their land, and found themselves living unprotected in an often hostile region.

We DIDN'T cross the border crossed US!

http://frontiers.loc.gov/...

One more important piece of land changed hands in 1854, when the U.S. bought what is now southern Arizona and New Mexico from the Mexican government for $10 million. This land deal, known as the Gadsden Purchase, brought the U.S. a much-coveted railroad route, and helped open the West to further expansion. With two strokes of a pen, the larger nation had expanded its size by one-third. And almost overnight, tens of thousands of Mexican citizens had become residents of the United States.

And never mind that many of the Mexicans of the northern part of Mexico, New Mexico and Texas were descendants of Sephardic Jews escaping the inquisition. 500 years of running

http://en.wikipedia.org/...

Where do we run to now?

No, I will never forget. I am angry that we have come around full cirlce to the same thing again. Blaming the poor for the failings and greed of the weathy.