I wish we could keep the hate message out of our Third of July Parade. All of us who participate in the parade gather at the fairgrounds waiting our turns to line up for a chance to show our best to the spectators who line the streets. Most of the kids are having a great time watching, gathering candy, screaming with delight and generally their families are feeling pretty good most of the time.

Then comes along the guys from MNSirproject.com hauling hate down the road as if their message board — pulled by a Hummer! — is some kind of bold stroke of genius. The message, to me, reads like baring false witness against our neighbors — that is, Mexican people. Nativist groups in America have been around since probably about 1790 so their message today is really nothing more than regurgitated rubbish from a past we are not so proud of and certainly do not want to repeat.

Take the nativist priest Father Charles Coughlin for example. In 1936 this priest was well on his way to embarrassing most Catholics with his vitriolic attacks against Jews and his praise for Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. I would ask this question: Does such a hateful messgae belong in our Independence Day parade?

Ted Hinnenkamp

Albert Lea