Holy multiculturalism, Batman!

Call Lou Dobbs, the CNN hothead, who goes postal at the mention of Mexicans, and goes nuclear when talking about people in LA celebrating Cinco de Mayo. Here’s a news flash that will rock the mundo of the CNN gordito: The University Interscholastic League is recognizing mariachi as category in its statewide music competitions.

Yep, that UIL, the one that governs high school sports in Texas as well as a number of other statewide competitions. This is serious. When the UIL recognizes something, it’s like the word of Zeus in the world of Texas public school competitions.  The UIL doesn’t do anything lightly, so going the mariachi route is the official nod that playing traditional Mexican music in the state’s public schools is not only OK, but on equal footing with traditional, all-American contests in band, choir and football.

“The bottom line is we thought this would have a lot of statewide attractiveness,” said Richard Floyd, the UIL’s state director of music, in an article in the Houston Chronicle.

Good point there, Rich, since high schools and middle schools in the Rio Grande Valley have had mariachi music programs for many years now. Good to see the rest of Texas catching up. High schools in La Joya and Edcouch-Elsa, in particular, have been known for years for the quality of their mariachi programs, but really it’s all over the Valley. Go to one of these concerts at a Valley high school, and you won’t only see locals there, but Winter Texans, too.

It’s no wonder. It’s great music, and the way the kids get plugged into these classics is something to see and hear. A Jan. 28 article in the Chronicle points to just how much these youngsters enjoy being part of these programs.

“I can’t live without mariachi,” said 13-year-old Alex Solis, who is half Hispanic and half Asian.

“It helps us stay on the right path, and it does teach you more about yourself and your history,” said another 13-year-old, Sabrina Rosas, of being involved in mariachi at Patrick Henry Middle School in Sugarland.

What a delicious irony, no? Students at a school named after an American revolutionary era icon playing Mexican music in a program officially recognized by the state of Texas.

Take a bite out of that one, Lou, as Alex Solis in Sugarland, Texas, strums on his guitarron, the sweet sounds of mariachi filling up another band hall in the Lone Star state.

Here’s how Patrick Henry would put it in the 21st Century: Give me liberty or give me a guitarron. Either one sounds good to me.

The seal-the-border crusade of right-tilting, talk show listening Americans is taking a hit these days with the demise of their preferred presidential candidates and the rise of Republican frontrunner John McCain, who is reviled by our friends on the right for believing immigrants are God’s children, too.

Alas, with McCain dispatching GOP flip-flopper Mitt Romney in Florida’s key primary on Tuesday, the way is clear for the Arizona senator to have a fairly easy time of it on his way to the Republican nomination. The immigration issue that so boils the blood of the far right of the Republican Party is rapidly losing steam, with questions about the issue given only a passing glance at the latest GOP presidential debates. So much for the issue that was to define the GOP contest.

All of this hardly means that efforts have stopped to tighten the flow of people across the border so we can prevent a terrorist attack from the farm workers, landscapers, and hotel cleaning ladies who would do our country harm by working. No, thankfully, very soon Americans will need to show all sorts of identification for a simple jaunt across an international bridge, not that everyone is happy about it.

“We’re not going to stand for it,” one member of Congress recently told USA Today. “There will be such a tie-up at the border, it will be the worst the world has ever seen.”

A U.S. senator holds similar views, telling USA Today that the new cumbersome ID requirments are “unwise, ill-considered and counterproductive.”

The politicians with the thundering views on the new regs aren’t from these parts. Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., is the member of Congress cited above, with Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., questioning the wisdom of the new rules. All of which goes to show that for all of the noise on right-wing radio about the southern border, (i.e. the need to keep Mexicans out from contaminating our national identity), issues of commerce and business are also important on the U.S.-Canadian border as well.

Here’s the rub: Beginning Jan. 31, U.S. and Canadian citizens ages 19 and above will have to show a government ID and a second ID such as a birth certificate, or a government document indicating naturalization, citizenship or birth abroad.

In the mix of confusion about this issue, the feds tried to make some amends by saying the U.S. State Department will take applications for a new border crossing guard that will help facilitate routine back-and-forths across the bridges. After all of the recent long delays to get passports, I’m sure the application process for these crossing cards will go smoothly, no?

Meanwhile back at the bridges, a recent Government Accountability Office report says our federal government ought to put more time and money to improving ports of entry rather than policing remote stretches of the border. The GAO study reported that about half of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in America entered at a legal port of entry. Gee, does that mean spending more money on improving staffing and facilities at bridges and immigration offices would be resources better spent than building a costly but ineffective fence that is largely a symbolic barrier to ease the worries of Betty Lou in Iowa and Bobby Joe in Alabama that we’re finally doing something to keep Mexicans out?

Sealing the border is a dicey proposition. A simple fence will get the job done in the minds of our simplistic thinking friends on the far right, but the new GOP frontrunner, McCain of Arizona, knows better, as do we who actually live on the border. The same seems to be the case for our fellow Americans living up north who see business and commerce cross the northern border on a daily basis. At least our friends up north won’t have to put with a border fence of their own, being that Canadian immigrants won’t erode America’s national identity the way Mexicans do.

Neither border will ever be sealed, nor fully secured in the sense that the talk show crowd wants. It will be increasingly harder to get across, though. Better make sure you have all of your goverment-approved documents in tow, especially if you’re a Hispanic American. And while you’re at, make sure to put your 2-ounce tube of tooth paste and hand soap in a little plastic bag for inspectors as well, as is required at airports these days. Never know when a new regulation might pop up to protect us from the ominous threats posed by farms workers, landscapers and hotel cleaning ladies.