Dear Governor Bobby Jindal,
Thank you for your recent thought-provoking editorial, "The End of Race," commemorating the 50th anniversary of Dr. King's speech in Washington. How did America miss such depth of insight and perspective about our nation's century-long struggle with racism, oppression, and discrimination? How did no other politician, sociologist, anthropologist, academic, or American fail to consider your ground-breaking and innovative solution to end racism: Throw out the salad bowl and bring back the melting pot.
You are sheer brilliance and I can see why the citizens of Louisiana have reelected you for a second term, why the Republican Party selected you to offer the party's response to President Obama's address to Congress. Of course. You are a living testament of how we, as a nation, can overcome racism simply by giving up our "separateness". How could we have missed that, Bobby? Or shall we call you Priyush, the name your Indian parents gave you, that you switched as a child because you connected so well to the youngest Brady boy?
You have hit the bull's eye, Bobby. As minorities, we place "far too much emphasis on our separateness, our heritage, ethnic background, skin color, etc. We live in the age of hyphenated Americans: Asian-Americans, Italian-Americans, African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Cuban-Americans, Indian-Americans, and Native Americans."
More minorities should be born from engineering professors who migrate to the country like your parents did when they moved to Louisiana from India. Why didn't we think of that? More minorities should work harder to save up their pennies so their children can attend Brown University and Oxford University like you did. For the love of our country, more of us should convert from Hinduism to Catholicism in high school just like you did. God love us for clinging on to that pesky stubborn "separateness". And just think, if more minorities would just follow in your footsteps to work for Fortune 500 companies and serve as college presidents, maybe we wouldn't be in this predicament. Maybe there would be more of us heading up states and serving in Congress.
You are right, Governor, it's time we start calling each other just Americans. It does have a nice ring to it. You are right, Governor, it's time for progress. After all, we are all "created in the image of God — skinny, fat, tall, short, dark, light, whatever." And yes, it’s time to get over it. It’s time for the end of race in America. What a novel idea. I can't believe no one else thought of that?
Your parents did it by moving to the deep south a few years after the assassination of Dr. King and they were only judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. You did it by getting elected as governor in a state where David Duke got 44 percent of the statewide vote just a few decade ago. I'm all in. I will follow your lead. I will shed my faith, get adopted into a family of engineering academics that can afford to send me to an Ivy League institution - which will in turn set me on my path to Fortune 500 employment. I will call myself Marsha, and by golly, I will once and for all, stop clinging on to separateness.
Thank you for setting me straight. God Bless America. May we all melt together in a big, happy, boiling pot of togetherness.
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