Oh, No She D'in't.

In a display of callous cultural insensitivity and total cluelessness that has come to define the present Republican party, Texas Republican legislator Betty Brown asked that Asian-Americans simplify their names to make it easier on poll workers.

During a House hearing on voter legislation, in which Democrats accused Republicans of trying to muster through a bill that would require unduly strict identification procedures at polling places, Ramey Ko tried to explain to the assembly that for many naturalized Asian-Americans who speak English as a second language, complicated ID and voter procedure can be daunting and intimidating, thereby discouraging their participation as voters.

Brown replied:

“Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?”

Then, because apparently she felt she hadn't been ignorant or disrespectful enough, she told Ko:

“Can’t you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that’s easier for Americans to deal with?”

Bless her. She really thought she was helping. Her road to Hell is so paved with good intentions, it's hard not to want to just run up to her and give her a great big hug, right around the neck.

Democrats are calling Brown's remarks insensitive and disrespectful. Republicans are saying it's not a racial issue -- that Brown was simply trying to solve and identification problem. And I'm actually going to side with Republicans here. That really was what Brown was trying to do. Solve a problem. Unfortunately, her solution involved doing what thoughtless white folks have been doing to naturalized Americans for years -- stripping them of their dignity, culture and identity, simply because the pronunciation of their names has proven a challenge.

The fact that Brown still sees nothing wrong with what she said, and that her fellow Republicans are furthering her lack of cultural empathy only indicate that every day, the GOP is heading down the path of the Whigs and the Bullmoose parties.

~C~