In eight days the voters of Florida, a group known for having a hard time at the voting booth under any conditions, will have to struggle with a particularly tough issue on election day. Not only will the voters have to decide whether or not to vote for the hottest chick ever to run for Vice President, they will also have to decide if Asian immigrants should be allowed to own land in the state.
In 1926, Florida passed a constitutional amendment gave the government the power to keep Asian immigrants from owning land in the Sunshine State. Apparently, the Japanese were really good farmers back then, so Florida and a bunch of other states decided that it would be "Best for America"™ to just make it so those crafty Japanese keep out of here. In retaliaton the Japanese started mass producing VCRs, which paved the way for Blockbuster to flourish and build video rental stores in every city, town, and other place in the United States. Blockbuster then nearly toppled the United States' economy by seizing approximately 75% of the Gross Domestic Production, in the form of exhorbitant late fees, in 1994 and 1995. Finally in the late '90s, crisis was averted as the economy was saved by the Internet Bubble.
Now, we will have to decide if we can be the bigger person, and forgive the Japanese for being such good farmers and causing so much stress in our lives as we rushed to Blockbuster on Sunday evenings to return videos that we didn't even watch the night before. We will have to decide if it's ok for the Japs to own land around here, now that all the Blockbuster foolishness is behind us, and all the farmland has been turned into deed restricted communities full of crazy people.
Now most rational people would think that repealing an unenforceable, racist, and downright silly constitutional amendment from almost a century ago would be easy. A slamdunk. A no-brainer.
These people have not spent much time in Florida. See, here's how all this happened:
- About 10 years ago, Alabama and Mississippi repealed some laws against interracial marriage, and some law students decided to see what other silly laws they could find that were passed a century or so ago when racism was all the rage.
- The law students found these "No Japanese Farmers Allowed" laws were still on the books in about a dozen states.
- The law students contacted the states and told them that they had silly laws banning Japanese farming on thier books.
- All of the states promptly repealed the silly "No Japanese Farmers Allowed" laws, acknowledging that such legislation was pretty stupid.
- Except for Florida
See, the thing is that although the original state constitutional amendment was never enforced, and later invalidated by the state Supreme Court, and is definitely one of those things you would see in a "Wacky Laws That Still Exist" book, there are members of the state legislature that don't want to get rid of it. We're talking about Florida, remember.
The main issue here is that some people are just dingalings. The original 1926 amendment uses the words "aliens ineligible for citizenship" to refer to those crafty Japanese farmers. Back then, Asians were not allowed to become U.S. citizens, so the wording of the 1926 amendment did not have to sound like KKK members wrote it, although KKK members most likely did write it.
So now, in the year 2008, a bunch of members of the state legislature have decided that maybe the thing makes sense, what with the thing being anti-alien and all. Dennis Ross, a Republican Legislator from Lakeland, says that with things being the way they are, repealing the amendment could open the door to allow members of the Taliban to come to our beautiful state of sunshine and buy up all those foreclosed houses that are everwhere. So he voted against giving voters a chance to overturn the amendment. Along with thirty other Republicans in the state legislature.
So take that, stupid Taliban guys who want to come here and buy our foreclosed houses. Here in Florida it's "No Terrorists Allowed". So you all just stay holed up in those caves in the mountains and don't even think about snatching up any of our abandoned houses here in the Sunshine State. You Taliban guys just head straight to Mississippi and buy up their abandonded houses. They will sell you a house AND let you marry someone who is not your same color. They LOVE terrorists in Mississippi.
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