Editorial free speech

I try to stay as au courant as possible with current trends in America. Because I am lazy, I do this mostly through reading the op-ed pieces that I can find on-line; one of usual haunts is Yahoo!'s section [located here] b/c of the large number of writers that it includes.

Today this article jumped out at me for being overly dramatic and a bit offensive. Entitled "GOP Declares Open War on Brown People," the author [Pachacutec ?] takes a very narrow and biased look at how the Republican candidates are beginning to discuss illegal immigration. Some of the phrases and ideas that I found offensive included the title [the party hasn't declared war on anyone, and "Brown People" is an offensive term when what is really at the core is illegal immigrants, not all Hispanics], the phrases "the White House's announcement last Friday that they will cooperate with larger efforts to rally the bigoted GOP base" and "the decades-old pancake makeup covering the hateful racist core of the GOP has flaked so hard it's falling right off, and we're about to witness quite the Klan rally for the soul of the Republican Party heading into 2008."
I also disliked the last sentence of the article, which was simply "Jackboots de rigeur." This is of course a reference to Nazi fascists, who wore the boots while persecuting and murdering millions during WW2. The author is trying to create a relationship between Nazi Germany and the Republican party, who is "against brown people."

I completely disagree with the article and find it intellectually dishonest to equate being against illegal immigration with being against immigrants or Hispanics. Are there people who are against illegal immigrants who are also hateful bigots, or who hate Hispanics, or who want to "close the borders" to all immigrants? Absolutely. But just because someone is against illegal immigrants does not mean that he or she hates "brown people" or has "declared war" against them. That's just taking it too far.

Articles like this only inflame what is already a volatile and controversial topic. This issue deserves better and more responsible debate from both sides instead of a crude attempt at gaining support by outright lying and fear-mongering.