As American as Fernando: Valenzuela becomes U.S. citizen

By Yvonne Carrasco
Dodgers.mlblogs.com
July 22, 2015










Thirty-six years after first entering the U.S., 34 years since Fernandomania began and 25 years after his unforgettable no-hitter at Dodger Stadium, Fernando Valenzuela has added another benchmark to his American dream.

Today, Valenzuela became a U.S. citizen.

The Dodgers’ legendary lefty raised his right hand and took the Oath of Allegiance at a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) naturalization ceremony to become a U.S. citizen this morning in downtown Los Angeles. While a private and smaller ceremony could have been an option, Valenzuela chose to join nearly 8,000 Angelenos hailing from more than 130 countries in taking this big step.

Valenzuela also shared this special day with his wife Linda, who became a U.S. citizen a few months ago and with whom he’s shared every major moment of his life and career, and his family.

Valenzuela, a native of Etchohuaquila in Sonora, Mexico and a living example of the American dream, now has the rights and privileges that come with U.S. citizenship. Valenzuela first moved to the U.S. in 1979 shortly after signing with the Dodgers on July 6 that same year. His career in MLB, both as a player and broadcaster, spans more than three decades.

The Dodgers extend their congratulations today to one of the most iconic Dodgers of all time. Valenzuela’s cultural impact on Los Angeles and on baseball is immeasurable. What we do know is that our stadium is always filled with faces he directly inspired, fans whose parents or grandparents proudly noted that someone who looked like them and who came from Mexico was a Dodger and was selling out the stadium each of his starts. Regardless of background, however, today we are all proud Americans just like Valenzuela.

To learn more on naturalization and the process of becoming a U.S. citizen, please visit the USCIS website. If you’d like to read the Oath of Allegiance that Valenzuela took this morning, you can view that here.

President Obama should not be so quick to penalize the IRS for questioning Tea Party groups, argues Stephen Nuño. (Photo/Getty Images )

Opinion: Time for Republicans to recover grand in Grand Old Party

by Stephen A. Nuño, @StephenANuno 

Conservatives should not need to be told this, but there is more to leadership than being smart.  A Harvard law graduate, Senator Ted Cruz is smart but a seriously flawed individual who has taken on a cultish following of political amateurs who have no greater sense of achievement beyond their noses.

Ted Cruz came out swinging like William Wallace and ended up looking like a prostrate George Wallace.  At a political rally in which he attempted to gather the troops, someone showed up with a Confederate flag.  Jonathon Capehart of the Washington Post was repulsed by the display, and pointed out that the Confederate Flag was seen as a “hostile act” by black families.

The confederate flag represents much more than that.
It represents separatism, slavery, and a Dark Age culture of backwardness towards minorities and women. It is the opposite of how we should aspire to be as a country.

No other flag has been flown in this country to support an economic and social system that so systematically destroyed the lives of so many Americans.  The murder, subjugation, and tyranny over the hearts and minds of not only millions of people, but generations of American families is unprecedented and should no longer be accepted in civilized society.

It is more than a hostile act to display that flag on the lawn of a black family; it is a terrorist act.  It is a hateful act.  It is a shameful act.

And yet when the flag was waved at their rally, neither Ted Cruz nor Sarah Palin bothered to say anything. Not that we should be surprised, since Senator Cruz is an admiring fan of one of this country’s grandest supporters of Jim Crow in the Senate, Jesse Helms.

Ted Cruz was warned before this latest episode of holding the government hostage over the attempt to extend health care to working class and poor families that he and his confederacy of dunces would ultimately lose a showdown between the President and the Senate. Yet Cruz ignored those warnings, he ignored the costs it imposed on working families, on our distressed financial system, and on the poor.

If there is anything salvageable in the Republican Party it will come from those who believe in honorable opposition for the benefit of the country.

Currently, there is nothing grand about this party.  There are no more grand ideas to improve the country, improve our society, and move forward as a nation.

Where Ronald Reagan once envisioned a grand economic and social cooperative between Mexico and Canada, today’s Republicans build walls and quite literally try to convince people that freedom lies within one’s right not to have health care.

This is a party of fear and resentment, whose only display of grandeur is in the remarkable littleness of its leaders. The utter lack of courage to stand up to populism, to succumb to the anxiety of a changing society, and to profit off the misery of its fellow neighbors without one scintilla of effort to try to educate their constituency is an utter failure of what a political party is supposed to do.

Our democracy needs a responsible opposition. Today we have none.

The GOP was once an innovator of ideas in an era of lethargy.  They may not have always been right, but they did think big.  Embracing a global economy, families of all stripes, spirituality in its many positive forms, and our pride in improving opportunities for our future entrepreneurs should be the nexus of where the GOP goes from here.  Driving forward with both eyes on the review mirror is neither conservative, nor healthy.

Perhaps some day the GOP will embrace the power of diversity in society as they do their portfolios. Hopefully that day comes sooner rather than later, because the Democrats are content that it comes later rather than sooner.


Stephen A. Nuño, Ph.D., NBC Latino contributor and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and International Affairs at Northern Arizona University. He is currently writing a book on Republican outreach into the Latino Community.