There always seems to be someone Americans are afraid of

What's the biggest evil ever perpetrated in American history?

Certainly the genocide of Native Americans would be way up there, and chattel slavery is right there with it. But people are quick to dismiss those, saying sure they were bad, but both of those things ended long before any of us were born.

America, 1942

But 1942 wasn't that long ago, and even if most of us weren't alive then, it was a modern enough era that there are plenty of radio broadcasts and movie newsreels still in existence to remind us of what happened.

We have never been a particularly tolerant nation when it comes to other races and ethnicities. Many of us are descended from the British, who for all intents and purposes invented racism.

We justified what we did to Native Americans by saying they were savages, even though in some ways they were more spiritual than the average settler. We justified slavery with a Biblical fable about Noah's duskier son gazing on him when he was naked and passed out drunk.

Maybe it's unfair to call it racism. Maybe more than anything else it's just xenophobia. Nearly two-thirds of Americans have never traveled outside the U.S., and well under half even have a passport.

It isn't just about us not traveling either. Large parts of this country aren't big tourist destinations for international travelers. Folks living in Nebraska or West Virginia aren't likely to encounter tourists from Japan, Italy or Nigeria. So their knowledge of people from different cultures is limited to what they see on television.


We incarcerated thousands of American citizens who had never committed a crime during World War II simply because they were of Japanese ancestry. Their parents had been born in Japan and while they had been allowed to immigrate, they couldn't become U.S. citizens. The children were born here and had U.S. citizenship, but when the war started, all of a sudden anyone who looked Asian was suspect.

When it was pointed out there had not been one single act of sabotage, those who hated the Japanese had that in itself was highly suspicious. More than 110,000 people were sent to internment camps away from the West Coast, and 62 percent of those interned were U.S. citizens.

There was no excuse for it, and it was certainly the shame of the greatest liberal president ever. Franklin Roosevelt was the one who signed the executive order interning more than 110,000 people.

Our prejudices showed in another way. In the late 1930s, when Adolf Hitler was willing to allow some German Jews to leave if other countries would accept them, the United States refused to expand its immigration quota for foreign Jews.

When it comes down to it, we don't like anybody very much. That's why it was to surprise at all when Donald Trump channeled his inner Adolf and suggested we needed to consider closing mosques and maybe even identify Muslims by making them wear identifying badges.

Is there anyone we actually do like?

One of the targets of the Ku Klux Klan was Roman Catholics, who weren't seen as true Christians. Many of them were Irish and Italian immigrants, and both of those groups had their own problems with discrimination.

If you look at the big picture, it really is strange how many different types of people we have negative thoughts about. That's one reason it should come as no surprise that so many so-called good Americans are totally opposed to giving any help to Syrian refugees.

Trump apparently has decided his route to the Republican nomination if not the White House runs through channeling anger and getting the votes of people who have no use for politicians.

We keep hearing that GOP insiders will never allow that to happen, but at this point Trump is beginning to look like a wildfire out of control.

As for the refugees, more than half of state governors say that won't allow any from Syria to come to their states.

They don't really have that authority, but they can certain make a fuss about it.

The great irony is that France -- the victim of last week's attacks -- won't allow itself to be intimidated. The French will take even more refugees than they originally intended.

Who would have thought the "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" would turn out to be better world citizens and tougher guys than us?