Virginia GOP Hates The Chinese Year of the Pig

What is it with Virginia Republicans and Americans with ancestry in Asia and India?

Evidently, it wasn't enough that former Republican Senator George Allen insulted a native Virginian, whose parents immigrated from India, by calling him "macacca" and "welcoming" him to "the real Virginia and real America."

Now macacca Republicans in the Virginia House of Delegates, once again showing their true colors (or lack of color as the case may be) have shown that Allen's retort was not an isolated incident.

Recently, Del. Adam Ebbin, from Arlington, introduced what one would've thought was a non-controversial joint resolution to recognize the importance of the Lunar New Year and the contributions of the roughly 350,000 Asian/Indian/Pacific Americans living in the Commonwealth.

Fluffy resolutions like this fill the General Assembly's calendar. Rarely do they make any waves.

But Ebbin's resolution attracted an unusual amount of opposition from macacca Republicans in the House. The Rules Committee (like all committees, controlled by the GOP) removed references to the Lunar Year 4075 and the Chinese Year of the Pig, and also deleted a reference to the importance of the Coalition of Asian Pacific Americans of Virginia.

Then, after those changes, four Republicans on the committee still voted against the resolution. In the full house, 14 Republicans and an independent also voted against the resolution.

(We thank the Arlington Sun Gazette for the info on this one).

While Mrs. Curmudgeon, who is Chinese-American, barely pays attention to the Lunar New Year, she can't understand what's so offensive to these Republican legislators that they'd vote against Ebbin's resolution.

It wasn't all that long ago--1969 to be precise--that it would have been illegal for the Curmudgeon to marry Mrs. Curmudgeon under Virginia's anti-miscegenation law (struck down in the aptly named Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia). We suspect that in their hearts of hearts, some of those same legislators that voted against the Lunar New Year resolution also miss those "good ol' days."

Sadly, macacca lives on in Virginia. Let's hope the coming election at least thins the herd.