SAN DIEGO -- It wasn't
surprising that the Mexican government would hire an American
public relations firm to improve its image in the United States.
Nor was it surprising
that Mexican President Vicente Fox tapped my friend, Dallas-based
political consultant Rob Allyn, to be Mexico's goodwill ambassador.
Allyn worked on Fox's 2000 presidential campaign, after which
a Dallas magazine dubbed the consultant ``Mr. Mexico.''
What was surprising
was that a simple business deal would result in so many people
becoming so unhinged.
Suddenly, the Republican
strategist is being inundated with angry and insulting e-mails,
calls and nasty comments posted on Web logs. Immigration restrictionists
are threatening to picket Allyn's office and asking that ``patriots''
boycott his firm. One zealot wrote Allyn demanding that the consultant
``register as a foreign alien agent'' and calling him ``disgusting
and treasonous.''
From those cable
TV shows that bottom-feed off the immigration issue, I glean that
Allyn is doing a ``PR campaign for illegal immigrants'' and generating
public support for a guest worker plan backed by the Mexican government.
Not quite, Allyn
told me from his office in Dallas.
``We've been hired
to promote the image of Mexico,'' he said, ``and specifically
to let people know the facts about the real Mexico and where Mexico
stands today.''
Besides doing media
interviews, Allyn plans to organize trade missions between the
two countries, produce media material to show progress in Mexico,
and conduct polling to gauge attitudes in the United States.
If Allyn wants to
know what Americans think of Mexico and Mexicans -- and for that
matter, Mexican-Americans -- all he has to do is read my e-mail.
But it's not pretty.
In the words of one
reader: ``Mexico has nothing that any red-blooded American would
want. Mexico is a filthy, unlawful country which is trying with
all its might to influence the U.S. to change its laws to benefit
illegals.''
Another reader complained
about ``illegal Hispanics" with their ``high crime rates,
lack of education, large families living on the taxpayers' dole,
failure to assimilate, flooding our emergency rooms and depressing
wages for poor working citizens.''
Allyn, who is to
earn about $720,000 for his efforts, should have asked Fox for
more money.
The way the consultant
sees it, ``perceptions lag reality'' and Americans don't know
as much about Mexico and Mexicans as they think they do.
I'll buy that. But
that works both ways. Mexicans don't know as much about the United
States as they think they do. And that goes double for Mexican
presidents.
When I suggested
that Fox had done himself no favors by labeling as ``shameful''
U.S efforts to curb illegal immigration, Allyn declined to comment
but said he'd pass on my concerns to his client.
So let me add this:
Most Americans don't like it when Mexico meddles in the internal
affairs of the United States -- especially since Mexicans bristle
when Americans meddle in the affairs of Mexico and especially
since there wouldn't be so many illegal immigrants in this country
if the Mexican government took more seriously its obligation to
provide opportunities for its own people rather than relying on
the billions of dollars that immigrants send home in remittances.
For Allyn, there's
a lot of positive news south of the border, including ``that Mexico
is a democracy today, with clean elections, that the Mexican government
has made huge progress in cleaning up corruption, and that there
is economic stability.''
There's also trade.
According to Allyn, Americans export $111 billion in goods each
year to Mexico.
``Mexico is America's
second-largest trading partner (after Canada). That's more than
Japan. More than Germany. More than China,'' he said.
``Mexico is a huge
customer for us. We should treat it with respect.''
Good luck with that,
amigo. For many Americans, Mexico serves only one purpose and
that's to provide something to which they can feel superior. Consider
the reader who, in a recent e-mail to me, referred to ``our little
brothers to the South.''
While Allyn hasn't
been hired to represent Mexican immigrants per se, he expects
to go to bat for them. That's fine with him. He thinks the immigrants
get a bad rap.
``I continue to be
astonished at how people can work up so much animosity toward
hard-working, family-oriented people who are enduring huge hardships
to seek a better life,'' he said. Some of that has roots in something
that has been part of this dialogue since the advent of immigrants:
racism.
It's something Allyn
acknowledges: ``You can smell it. It's like bad art. You know
it when you see it.''
Mr. Mexico is right
on the money. And often, those who can't see it just don't want
to.
©
2005, The San Diego Union-Tribune
