Un... er, one cheesesteak, please
Speaking of impolitic political opinions arising where they should be beside the point -- remember when a venerable Philadelphia cheesesteak shop got into the immigration debate? Back in 2005, Geno's Steaks owner Joe Vento posted a sign that asked customers to speak English when they ordered, right around the time Wisconsin Republican Rep. James F. Sensenbrenner was readying the house bill that would turn Good Samaritans into criminals, and would mobilize a vast pro-immigration movement.
Many immigration bills have have died on the floor since then, but the matter of Vento's sign was only put to rest yesterday, when a city panel ruled that the sign wasn't discriminatory:
In a 2-1 vote, a Commission on Human Relations panel found that two signs at Geno's Steaks telling customers, "This is America: WHEN ORDERING 'PLEASE SPEAK ENGLISH,'" do not violate the city's Fair Practices Ordinance.
Shop owner Joe Vento has said he posted the signs in October 2005 because of concerns over immigration reform and an increasing number of people in the area who could not order in English.
Vento has said he never refused service to anyone because they couldn't speak English. But critics argued that the signs discourage customers of certain backgrounds from eating at the shop.
Cheesesteak joints have a habit of entering high-profile national political debates: During the 2004 election, candidate John F. Kerry suffered flak for ordering his sub with Swiss cheese at Geno's rival Pat's, located across the street. (How elitist! How European!) Kerry only narrowly won the state. (It should be noted that President Bush claimed to eat his with classic Cheese Whiz, but one reporter found that Bush actually orders American cheese -- a good cheese for the heartland, perhaps, but not for Philadelphia.)
Why can't taco stands get this kind of action?
Note to Clinton and Obama: to win Pennsylvania, or at least Philadelphia, get the Cheese Whiz, and speak English.
*Photos courtesy Associated Press.
and would mobilize a vast pro-immigration movement.
Given that the McCain-Kennedy 'done deal' amnesty was defeated due to a groundswell of populist opposition, and that the defeat shocked the Bush administration into letting ICE do its job, and that a variety of states and cities have passed their own measures attempting to deal with the problem of illegal immigration, surely the mobilization on the restrictionist side was vaster.
Posted by: Mitchell Young | March 21, 2008 at 04:53 AM
Geno is such a GREAT AMERICAN!!!!
Posted by: Larry Maynard | March 21, 2008 at 12:48 PM
Here is the real news on cheesecake:
Did you know that over 70% of the food at your grocery contains genetically engineered ingredients that some independent tests have shown to be harmful to mammals? Did you know many of these crops contain pesticides in every cell that cannot be washed off? Did you know gm crops are allowed a heavier residue of the endocrine disrupting pesticides?
Did you know you have been eating this for over 10 years?
Did you know cross-contamination of conventional and organic crops and seeds has occurred and cannot be stopped? Did you know the EU has rejected our contaminated rice and corn shipments?
Did you know?
March 20
http://www.thecampaign.org/
http://www.bioneers.org/node/1950
http://www.psrast.org/intro1.htm
Did you know food crops like rice and safflower are being used to produce pharmaceuticals?
Did you know that cross-contamination of other genetically engineered rice crops has already occurred and cannot be explained or prevented by the government?
Posted by: persephone | March 21, 2008 at 12:54 PM
In L.A., the non English speaking demand that the servers speak their language. But what do you expect from a city that willingly harbors illegal immigrants,caters to their every need at the expense of the taxpayers, and has a major newspaper that supports this mess.
Posted by: kuni | March 22, 2008 at 09:48 AM