[redwitch]

It doesn't scare me but it certainly angers me. People should have the right to express their views. They should not be killed for that.

As to the comments about political correctness, here's my view. Used correctly, being PC is the right thing to do. It is showing an acceptance of another's beliefs and respecting them as individuals. To me, this is exactly what everyone should be doing. However, it does not mean kowtowing to another. It does not mean having ballots printed in myriad languages. It does not mean having to deny one's own beliefs to accommodate another.

English was not my first language. It was my fifth. My parents firmly believed we would learn the language of the country in which we resided. We would learn their customs and accept that they had a right to their customs as much as we did ours. My poor mother could not pick up a new language to save her life, but she tried.

America has gotten confused and somehow decided that people have the right to practice their customs everywhere, not just in their homes. No demands are made to integrate into our melting pot. We go out of our way to accommodate those coming here. It is well past time that the government and corporations stop with the Spanish option on phones, etc. Foreigners in the past were forced to learn English. It made assimilation possible. Today, there is no need to assimilate.

You don't like our laws? Then work within the legal framework to change them. Don't demand that you have special laws just for your group. Peaceful protest has been proven to make a difference.

Some of the issues we've brought upon ourselves. Americans have always relegated newcomers into their own ghettos and enclaves. It was easier for a group that looked like our forefathers to move out and become part of the upwardly mobile. It is not so easy for people of color to move out and up, especially when they don't speak English and have no need to learn it. We need to quit bending over backwards but it has to start at the top, not with the average man.