WHAT I WISH MARCO RUBIO HAD TIME TO SAY TO DEBATE QUESTION OF WHETHER HE'S "ANTI-LATINO"

The following is my comment in the HotAir.com thread "Debate moderator to Rubio: How’s it feel to be anti-Latino?" authored by Ed Morrissey.  Here is the video of a question put to conservative Republican Marco Rubio, the former Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives and current candidate for U.S. Senate,  as posted originally at Townhall.com/Tipsheet:

Let’s examine that question:

Mr. Rubio, you are running on what many commentators have described as one of the most anti-Latino platforms around. You support the Arizona immigration law, you oppose the DREAM act, you oppose a pathway to citizenship, ah, you support English as an official language. All those issues are issues that appeal to the most conservative elements of the Republican party, to the Tea Party, and has made you a darling of the Tea Party movement across the country and gotten you enormous support from the Tea Party. How can Florida voters feel comfortable that you are not beholden to interests from without the state, and the Tea Party, the most conservative elements of the Tea Party?

When a person asks a long, specifically detailed question like this, it’s like a DNA test confirming their lack of critical thinking skills as well as their acceptance of leftist propaganda about what is “good” for subdivided ethnic groups.

Rubio seemed ready for it, and gave a great answer. However, as a right-of-center black man, I wish he could have had time to politely — but forcefully — blast the question as prejudicial and bigoted, and dare the moderator to logically defend it.

For example: “Many commentators” call Rubio’s platform “anti-Latino.” What makes it so, praytell? Because he supports SB 1070, which has negatively impacted law-abiding Latinos how, exactly? He opposes the DREAM act, which helps native-born and naturalized Latinos how, exactly? He supposedly opposes a “pathway to citizenship” when his parents were legal Latino immigrants? How, exactly? He supports English as an official language, which hurts Latinos how, exactly?

Notice how the seamlessly the question turns from one accusing Rubio of self-hatred and extremism into one that also brings in the accusation of carpetbagging: He’s “a darling of the Tea Party movement across the country,” and thus, Florida voters aren’t supposed to feel comfortable that he’s not “beholden” to out-of-state interests? (Wow, that’s refreshing — usually it’s Northerners who are bitching and moaning about Republicans being beholden to the Deep South!) Dude acts as if he hasn’t checked the polls and noticed that Rubio is in the lead in Florida, which is a pretty good indicator that Sunshine Staters don’t see the Tea Party agenda as being “from without.”

The moderator — or, whoever wrote that question — designed it to have so many objectionable premises that Rubio wouldn’t be able to address them all. With the time Rubio was given, he did better than I ever could have expected.