Moving comfortably through the marchers, he circulated easily among friends and strangers before ascending the easterly footing in front of the façade of the Original City Hall to speak.
This was how he summarized his remarks:
“I started telling everyone the facts of the prop. I wanted to make sure everyone knew what they were ditching school for, because i knew the majority of them just hopped on the wagon and followed everyone to get out of class.
“I said "HR 4437 is a House Resolution, which is going to make undocumented, illegal aliens felons. It would make it a criminal act to be in this country illegally, which currently is a civil violation.
“It makes it a crime for a person, or any organization to knowingly help anyone who is here undocumented.
“It allows the government to invade the privacy of suspected illegals or their helpers in case they are terrorists.
“It makes new taxes to build barriers along the Mexican border. It grants state and local law enforcement agencies ‘inherent authority’ to enforce immigration laws.
Profiling Would Grow Worse
“It expands racial profiling, and it even makes it illegal for aliens to attend churches. It requires churches to check legal status of parishoners.
“(President) Bush’s guest worker program is crap because it creates an underclass of foreign workers. We want legislation to protect, unify, and address future immigrants.
“This does little to address the root causes of immigration to the U.S., or the underlying social and economic conditions.
“This bill is an assault on basic civil liberties and Constitutional values.
“If this is passed, the government can prosecute almost anyone who is suspected of having contact with an ‘alien.’"
After that, Mr. Martinez said, “I started to talk about the country.
“This country,” I said, “cannot exist with the separation of our identities, because if we really knew who we are, we wouldn’t let them push their unfair agenda on our homelands.
“Latin America is a huge colony of countries whose leaders are cowards in the face of economic imperialism.
“The U.S. forces the Third World to buy unnecessary material goods while exporting huge natural resources.
“Most Latinos are here because of the great inflation caused by American companies. Aside from that, many are seeking a life away from the public democracies funded by the U.S. Colonial society makes us fight and look at each other different.
“This gang violence needs to stop: Culver City vs. Venice.
“All violence needs to end because, in the end, we’re all the same. Until that stops, we’ll be living in a country that has taught us to be subservient.
Non-Americans Are Less?
“The attitude that is fed to us is that outside of America live a lesser people. (To hell with) them. Let them fend for themselves.
“No, that is wrong. No matter how much you want to dye your hair blonde, put fake eyes in, or follow an anorexic standard of beauty, you will never be them.
“This is what this culture, or lack of culture, is feeding us.
“We are given the idea that if we didn’t have these people to exploit, the U.S. wouldn’t be rich enough to give us these petty material things.
“We need to realize that classism is the real issue here. We’re all in the same boat, and it’s sinking.
“If we keep on worrying about kicking each other off of the boat we’re all in, we are going to miss out on gaining a better standard of living as a whole.
“We Are the Machine.
Without us, democracy without equality is just a good idea, man. If we don’t realize our net worth in the market, all we’re going to be is a commodity."
Without us, democracy without equality is just a good idea, man. If we don’t realize our net worth in the market, all we’re going to be is a commodity."
As a footnote, Mr. Martinez told thefrontpageonline.com
That his information and inspiration came “from my hero, the underground political hip hop artist, Immortal Technique.
“His music helped me make my speech.”
