One wonders whether senior White House policy adviser Stephen Miller had any idea of the historical use of “cosmopolitan” as a derogatory term when he used it to describe a reporter for CNN. As the descendant of poor Jews, fleeing Belarus more than a century ago, he should have.
NEW YORK – President Donald Trump’s administration has announced that it wants to cut legal immigration to the United States by half, and favor well educated immigrants who speak good English. When a CNN correspondent named Jim Acosta, the son of a Cuban immigrant, challenged Trump’s senior policy adviser, Stephen Miller, by stating that the US traditionally welcomed the world’s poor, most of whom did not speak any English, Miller accused Acosta of “cosmopolitan bias.”
Acosta asked whether the new policy would mean that only people from Britain or Australia would be allowed to come. He may have been a little provocative. But the implication of Miller’s complaint was that Acosta’s “bias” was a kind of racism. Coming from an administration that panders, at least occasionally, to white supremacists, this was remarkable, to say the least.
One wonders whether Miller had any idea of the historical use of “cosmopolitan” as a derogatory term. As the descendant of poor Jews, fleeing Belarus more than a century ago, he should have.
NEW YORK – President Donald Trump’s administration has announced that it wants to cut legal immigration to the United States by half, and favor well educated immigrants who speak good English. When a CNN correspondent named Jim Acosta, the son of a Cuban immigrant, challenged Trump’s senior policy adviser, Stephen Miller, by stating that the US traditionally welcomed the world’s poor, most of whom did not speak any English, Miller accused Acosta of “cosmopolitan bias.”
Acosta asked whether the new policy would mean that only people from Britain or Australia would be allowed to come. He may have been a little provocative. But the implication of Miller’s complaint was that Acosta’s “bias” was a kind of racism. Coming from an administration that panders, at least occasionally, to white supremacists, this was remarkable, to say the least.
One wonders whether Miller had any idea of the historical use of “cosmopolitan” as a derogatory term. As the descendant of poor Jews, fleeing Belarus more than a century ago, he should have.