Ben Stein Dreemz
Think of Me as a Wandering Minstrel
I
travel around the country meeting men and women, listening to them, mingling with them, hearing of their problems and their triumphs,
and then speak to them from my heart of what I have learned as a columnist for The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, as a speech writer for Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford, as a trial lawyer, as an economist in the fi eld of international trade, as a university teacher about law and economics at three major universities, as a novelist, as a screen writer, as a very well-known comedic actor, and mostly as a husband and father in this miraculous place we call America. What I see before me is a dream
come true: a place where anyone, of any station in life, can work hard, learn a skill and a craft, save, invest, even if modestly, and then marry and have children and raise up those children with pride in their country, their values, and, above all, in themselves. Martin Luther King, Jr., famously said: “America is essentially a dream.” And that it is. It is a dream that I see coming true all around me day and night. A few examples: Recently I fell and hurt my knees.
from Russia. Her respiratory therapy nurse is from the Czech Republic. The doctor who takes her vital signs all through the day is from Ghana. Obviously, they are not all people of color, but the
point is the same. They come from faraway places with strange sounding names and work like madmen here to build a life for themselves and their families. Our housekeepers are from El Salvador, probably
What I see before
me is a dream come true, where anyone
can work hard, learn a skill, and raise a family with pride in their country, their values, and themselves.
I have to go through the airport on a wheelchair now. The airlines all provide them and I fi nd that a majority of them are pushed by men and women of color, usually from Africa or South Asia. I always ask these people where they are from.
Often, they say places where I know there to be bloody civil wars and strife. Terrifying places like Somalia. How they got to America I have no idea. But I know that they do a great job pushing me and getting me to my gate on time. Whatever violence is taking place in their homes, they are working hard here, and making my life a lot easier. My wife is chronically ill with some kind of respiratory infection that leaves her exhausted, gasping for breath, sweating, dizzy. Her main nurse is
26 NEWSMAX | JANUARY 2019
the most violent place there has ever been in the Western Hemisphere post-Cold War. These two women work like Trojans all through the day and we can and do count on them for everything and we would trust them with anything. Yet, they left El Salvador on the top of a freight train.
Now, they live in a house that
has its own swimming pool — their house, not my house. At my favorite restaurant, Mr.
Chow, on Camden Drive in Beverly Hills, almost all of the waitstaff and all of the cooking staff are from Africa or Asia. They do their tasks with an almost balletic skill. The
same applies to the Santa Palm Taco House, where I get my chili and where almost no one speaks English. They whip up a fabulous meal almost for free, and understand far more of my English than I do of their Spanish.
I
know many immigrants wind up on welfare. I know that a certain large number of them commit crimes.
But they also, in large numbers, tear out the lungs of chickens, mine coal in hellish conditions, dig highway infrastructure gutters, and do a million other jobs that Americans simply won’t do. I am with those who say a nation needs borders
and we need ours. But we also need to understand and appreciate those who work harder than we would ever dream of working, and that is their dream and we are darned lucky they have that dream. That dream keeps America working.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92
