"Even an opening 'hola' might not have helped Smith, who faced long odds for simply being a gringa.

"U.S.-Mexico relations worsened in the past year after the U.S. National Guard was sent to the U.S.-Mexico border to assist the U.S. Border Patrol and help build hundreds of miles of wall to keep out illegal migrants.

"Mexicans are also upset over a U.S. Senate proposal for a sweeping immigration reform bill that would limit the consideration of family ties, capping visas for foreign parents of U.S. citizens at 40,000 a year. The plan would change a system that favored family ties for four decades.

"Many Mexicans also feel that the United States exerts its influence to tip the balance in its favor, whether in global politics or sports events.

"On Tuesday, Mexican media lamented the fact that their contestant, Rosa Maria Ojeda, did not make it to the top five in the pageant while Smith did, despite falling down on the runway. Smith's fifth place finish only added to the theory that the United States always is favored.

"The Mexican newspaper El Universal said Ojeda's fans were not as upset about her top-10 finish as they were that 'the judges did not penalize that fact that Miss USA totally fell on her seat after she stepped on her dress.'"

"The newspaper said that when the show went to a commercial break, an NBC representative warned the audience of 9,000 to behave because 'this gives the world a bad image of Mexico.'"

If you've seen the video, did anyone else think the audience was shouting "gringa" and not "Mexico", as this article claims?  Who are the racists, Linda Chavez?

The excerpt quoted above puts all the strain on the United States for bad relations with Mexico.  It's not our fault that Mexico's economy is so bad that its primary source of income is money sent back from the United States (called "remittances").  Now I ask - What types of people do you want working in this country: those who work here to contribute to our own country's well-being...or to another country's well-being?

The NBC representative is right in that the audience makes Mexico as a whole look bad by booing the U.S. contestant.  More importantly, though, doesn't the U.S. seem weak, here?  This poor woman, obviously a fantastic representation of what it means to be an American, competes on an international stages, gets villified by a foreign audience, and is subsequently remembered only for falling and getting booed instead of finishing in fifth place. 

Few are sticking up for her, as many stories play up sympathy for Mexicans like the AP does - see ABC News, but particularly Reuters, offering this gem: "This year's contest was marked by controversy, with a handful of Mexicans booing Smith in the run-up to the finals because of what they saw as U.S. unfriendliness toward illegal immigrants."

Defense, as usual, has to come from the blogs: Michelle Malkin, Sister Toldjah, and Tammy Bruce, among others.

Bruce hits a home run:

"Rachel Smith, our entrant and a Tennessee girl, a state being overrun by the same sort of people who maliciously boo'd this young woman...Despite the characterization that there was a 'handful' of Mexicans who boo'd, it was thunderous. How dare they, with all this nation has done, and now because they want a free pass to ravage this nation further and we resists, they boo this young woman."

Back to Chavez' idea that Latinos have too many babies...well, do they?

Heather MacDonald:

"...Hispanic women have the highest unmarried birthrate in the country – over three times that of whites and Asians, and nearly 1 ½ times that of black women, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Every 1,000 unmarried Hispanic women bore 92 children in 2003 (the latest year for which data exist), compared with 28 children for unmarried white women, 22 for unmarried Asian women, and 66 for unmarried black women."

And...as a result...

"Despite the strong family support, the prevalence of single parenting among Hispanics is producing the inevitable slide into the welfare system. 'The girls aren't marrying the guys, so they are married to the state,' Dr. Sanchez observes. Hispanics now dominate the federal Women, Infants and Children free food program; Hispanic enrollment grew more than 25 percent from 1996 to 2002, while black enrollment dropped 12 percent and white enrollment dropped 6.5 percent.

"Illegal immigrants can get welfare programs for their American-born children. Amy Braun works for Mary's Shelter, a home for young single mothers who are homeless or in crisis, in Orange County, Calif. It has become 'culturally OK' for the Hispanic population to use the shelter and welfare system, Ms. Braun says.'"

Oops - is it racist to point these facts out, Linda Chavez?  Michael Gerson?  President Bush???  All of you who are supposed to be conservatives?

Important reading material:

LaShawn Barber on why this is bad for low-income blacks.

Ann Coulter on the true motivation of liberals and amnesty - importing a slave class.

Amanda Carpenter on the cost to taxpayers.

And must-read Thomas Sowell's three part series "The Amnesty Fraud", found here.