From: tbacane
Subject: FW: Watch a Special Memorial Day Tribute
I salute all my brothers and sisters in uniform both living and those who have paid the ultimate price! With tears in my eyes I still wonder why I was spared?
A SPECIAL MEMORIAL DAY TRIBUTE
(Photo courtesy of Tony Massey)
Visit here to watch a Special Memorial Day Tribute.
From your friends at USBA
Please share this message with others this Memorial Day.
From: Dr. Jerome L. Reide; Regional Field Director, NAACP Midwest Region III
Subject: FW: Google Alert - naacp voter registration Ohio
Judge: Law Trimming Early Voting in Ohio Is Unconstitutional
ABC News
Judge: Law Trimming Early Voting in Ohio Is Unconstitutional ... reflects that black voters use same-day voter registration and early voting options at ... The settlement in the NAACP case expanded the early voting times but did not ...
Judge: Law trimming early voting in Ohio unconstitutional - Cincinnati.com
Full Coverage
From: Take Back the Senate, Lizet Ocampo, Manager of Political Campaigns, People For The American Way
Subject: BREAKING: The Garland Effect!
PFAW's Right Wing Watch reported last night that "the Garland Effect continues to haunt Senate Republicans."
Thanks to our work and your incredible support, Republican senators up for re-election this year are facing peril due to their unprecedented obstruction of the president's Supreme Court nominee … and Mitch McConnell could LOSE his Senate majority!
YOU ARE DOING THIS! But NOW is the absolutely critical time to keep it up and make sure we don't lose our momentum!
Will you donate to PFAW to help us keep up our work against obstructionist Senate Republicans that's having such an impact?
We need to raise $45,000 by the end of the month to make sure we can sustain this level of pressure through next week's Memorial Day congressional recess.
Right Wing Watch reports: "North Carolina Senator Richard Burr is the latest Republican senator to face a spate of terrible poll numbers."
A new Public Policy Polling survey in North Carolina finds that "Burr's lead is just 3 points at 39% to 36% for [Democratic candidate] Deborah Ross" and he is increasingly unpopular, "with only 28% of voters approving of the job he's doing to 40% who disapprove."
This is undeniably in part due to his party's obstruction against filling the Supreme Court vacancy, where BY A 17-POINT MARGIN, NC voters say they're less likely to vote for a Senator who is opposed to hearings for the president's nominee.
Richard Burr now joins Rob Portman (OH), Kelly Ayotte (NH), Ron Johnson (WI), Pat Toomey (PA), Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley (IA), and even John McCain (AZ) as those whose reelection chances have been harmed by the GOP's Supreme Court obstruction.
PFAW has organizers on the ground in some of these states…
We're on the air with ads holding these senators accountable for their obstruction in others…
And, in others, we're working with progressive leaders to keep the pressure on in the media with things like newspaper op-eds and with ongoing grassroots pressure.
But we can't continue to do this vital work without you, Munsup!
Please donate now and we'll put your generous contribution to work immediately to take back the Senate and elect a PROGRESSIVE Majority>>
--
P.S. You know that, as we have in the last few election cycles since Citizens United, we face the MASSIVE challenge of being greatly outspent by right-wing groups and their big money backers.
In fact, because some of them are "not there yet" on their support of Donald Trump, many of the right-wing billionaires and corporate special interests will be pouring even MORE money into Senate races!
But we can overcome this "Trump Effect" with the "Garland Effect" if we grab sustainable leads in these crucial Senate races now.
Will you please contribute now, so we can put your generous financial investment in a progressive Senate majority to work right away?
From: Andrew J. Tierman
Subject: Fw: 1,000,000,000 birds—Just gone
I just received the newsletter below from Daily Kos Green, and it seems like a unique resource for environmental-political news. I am passing this on and encourage you to do the same, if you know persons who have the time and motivation to digest some of this information.
1,000,000,000 birds—Just gone
From: Michael Phelan, Social Security Works
Subject: Fix the Debt is back
Remember Fix the Debt—the billionaire-funded liars out to cut Social Security and Medicare? They put together a completely bogus chart (see email below) that claims Social Security is responsible for a 27% increase in federal spending.
This is what we're up against. Fix the Debt and their ilk are keeping up the pressure to make the next President—whomever it is—cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. They may call them "entitlements," but these benefits are earned.
We need to fight back. Please, donate to Social Security Works today to help us push back against this misinformation campaign.
The fact is that Social Security has never added a single penny to the national debt, and is independently funded by the payroll tax. And all we need to do is ask the wealthy to pay their fair share, and we can expand benefits for millions of Americans and strengthen the Social Security trust fund for years to come.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mike Murphy; Campaign to Fix the Debt
Date: Tue, May 17, 2016 at 5:07 PM
Subject: Tell Congress to Address the Drivers of the Debt
To: Michael Phelan
Congress is already thinking about its agenda for next year. Help us to convince lawmakers that the biggest drivers of the national debt going forward can't be ignored.
Speaker of the House Paul Ryan is leading an effort to craft a legislative agenda for next year. Campaign to Fix the Debt co-chairs Ed Rendell and Judd Gregg sent a letter to Speaker Ryan urging him to address entitlement reform because spending on Social Security, Medicare and other federal health care, in addition to debt interest payments, will be the biggest contributors to the national debt and will increasingly crowd out spending on other priorities.
In addition, as Maya MacGuineas, head of Fix the Debt, recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal, Social Security and Medicare face serious funding shortfalls that will eventually result in severe cuts to all beneficiaries unless these programs are reformed. That's why it's so important that you encourage your representatives to put entitlement reform on the agenda for next year.
Send a letter to your Members of Congress today asking them to put entitlement reform on next year's legislative agenda.
Entitlement reform, in addition to tax reform that reduces the deficit and= promotes growth, is essential to fixing the debt.
Thank you,
From: Judy Burnette
Subject: "Appeals Court Reverses Fraud Finding Against Bank of America" | Business News | US News
http://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2016-05-23/appeals-court-reverses-fraud-finding-against-bank-of-america
Another taste of things to come in Hillary or Donald's world ...! - Judy B.
From: Matt, Mark, Hannah, Emily, and the rest of the MoveOn for Bernie team
Subject: Bernie Sanders, Bill McKibben, and Keith Ellison need you
Bernie Sanders won "unprecedented say over the Democratic Party platform" this week and named progressive powerhouses, including climate change author and visionary Bill McKibben and Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Keith Ellison, to the party's platform drafting committee.1
Progressives now hold a majority of seats on this committee, which will set the Democratic Party's policy platform for the next four years.2
Every vote and every delegate that Bernie wins in California and the other states voting on June 7 will give Bernie's committee members more leverage to write the "strongest progressive agenda that any political party has ever seen" at the Democratic convention.3
California has more delegates at stake than any other state, and a new poll out yesterday shows the race in California is a dead heat.4
Can you help Bernie win California by calling Californians this weekend to help identify Bernie supporters? Bernie's staff and volunteers will then make sure those supporters get out and vote. Call from your own home or meet up with a friend and call together.
Democratic Party operatives typically appoint the 15-member drafting committee. But the strength of Bernie's political revolution forced party officials to the table to negotiate with Bernie's campaign.
Bernie was able to appoint five members, who will be fighting for the Democratic Party to officially embrace a $15 minimum wage, break up big banks, ban fracking, and end our corrupt campaign finance system.
If Bernie wins big on June 7, his team will have the momentum and power to shape the Democratic Party platform for the next four years and beyond.
Will you sign up for one or more shifts this weekend to call Californians? Calling is fun and easy with Bernie's state-of-the-art tools, and it's the most effective way you can make a difference.
Sources:
1. "Sanders wins greater say in Democratic platform; names pro-Palestinian activist," The Washington Post, May 23, 2016
https://act.moveon.org/go/3928?t=4&akid=165429.1195276.m4-mNU
2. "The Democratic Platform Committee Now Has a Progressive Majority. Thanks, Bernie Sanders." The Nation, May 24, 2016
http://act.moveon.org/go/3909?t=6&akid=165429.1195276.m4-mNU
3. Ibid.
4. "California Up for Grabs, Poll Finds, as Clinton and Sanders Battle," The New York Times, May 26, 2016
http://act.moveon.org/go/3929?t=8&akid=165429.1195276.m4-mNU
Want to support our work? We're going all out to help Bernie Sanders win the Democratic nomination and change the Democratic Party. But we can't do it without small-dollar donations from people like you. Click here to chip in.
PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
From: Thomas Scott
Subject: yellowface and : Asian-brain drain by abagond
Asian brain drain (The story behind the myth)
Wed 25 May 2016 by abagond
New nurses during an oathtaking ceremony in Pasay city, Philippines in 2010. (EPA/DENNIS M. SABANGAN)
The Asian brain drain (1965- ) is the flow of highly educated people from Asia to the US: doctors from India, nurses from the Philippines, engineers from China, and so on. It is the "truth" behind the Model Minority stereotype, which racializes a false correlation.
People have been coming to the US from Asia for hundreds of years for all kinds of reasons. But most Asians came as part of three main waves:
1. 1849 to 1934: mostly field workers, especially from China, Japan and the Philippines.
2. 1965 to present: the brain drain, especially from Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, India, the Philippines and South Korea.
3. 1970s to 1980s: refugees, especially from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.
Of the three, the brain drain is the one that middle-class White Americans most frequently come across.
Each of these waves is a creature of US law: who the US was willing to let in when and why, based on the country's needs and its level of racism. Asia, unlike Mexico, is separated from the US by an ocean. That makes it much easier to control who gets in.
The brain drain itself was created by the 1965 Immigration Act. It overturned the racist immigration act of 1924 and favoured those with skills the US needed, like in medicine and engineering. Almost by definition, such people will be better at school, science and mathematics than most Americans. It has nothing to do with being "Asian" and everything to do with who the US lets in and why.
The Model Minority stereotype was created in 1966 in the pages of the New York Times. It was based on the first wave, which truly did pull itself up by its bootstraps. Yet the stereotype did not catch on till the 1980s when the children of the brain drain started applying to top universities in large numbers and getting in.
The brain drain did not pull itself up by its bootstraps: it bought a plane ticket. Anyone who comes to the US as a doctor, nurse, engineer or even a foreign university student is already better educated than most White Americans. And their children are bound to do better too. Whites with the same sort of background in terms of education or parents's education do just as well if not better.
The US also drains brains from:
· Latin America,
· the Caribbean,
· Africa, and
· Britain.
Most Americans do not notice that, partly because of racial stereotypes, partly because the numbers are lower. They overlook the fact that Nigerian Americans, for example, are just as much of a "model minority" as Asian Americans.
Other places that receive brain drains: Canada, Australia, Singapore, Western Europe and the Persian Gulf states.
Brain drains generally flow from poorer or less stable regions to richer and more stable ones. The Caribbean is the worst hit: countries like Jamaica and Haiti lose over 80% of their people with university educations. But Asia, because of its size, produces a far larger brain drain.
See also:
· Welcome to Asian American History Month 2016
· Asian Americans
o Taiwanese Americans
o Filipino Americans
· Model Minority stereotype
· Bootstrap Myth
· Amy Chua
· The Asian quota
· The Asian Supremacy argument
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
yellowface
Thu 26 May 2016 by abagond
White Entertainment Television: a scene from "How I Met Your Mother", 2014.
Yellowface (1700s- ) is where someone of another race is made to look East Asian. Hollywood has been doing it for over a hundred years. Like blackface, it is dehumanizing and pushes stereotypes.
An extremely incomplete list:
· 1870s: minstrel shows
· 1885: The Mikado – still being presented in yellowface in 2014
· 1908: New York Age
· 1915: Madame Butterfly
· 1922: Fu Manchu
· 1931-49: Charlie Chan series
· 1936: Flash Gordon – Ming the Merciless
· 1937: The Good Earth – Luise Rainier, who won an Oscar
· 1944: Dragon Seed – Katherine Hepburn
· 1955: Love is a Many-Splendored Thing – Jennifer Jones
· 1956: The Conqueror – John Wayne
· 1956: Teahouse of the August Moon – Marlon Brando
· 1961: Breakfast at Tiffany's – Mickey Rooney as Mr Yunioshi
· 1962: Dr. No
· 1964: Seven Faces of Dr Lao – Tony Randall
· 1972-75: Kung Fu – David Carradine
· 1976: Murder By Death – Peter Sellers
· 1982: The Year of Living Dangerously – Linda Hunt, who won an Oscar
· 1987: The Fires of Fu Manchu
· 1991: Miss Saigon – Jonathan Pryce
· 2006: Crank – David Carradine, still at it.
· 2007: Norbit – Eddie Murphy
· 2012: Cloud Atlas
· 2014: How I Met Your Mother: Slapsgiving 3: Slappointment in Slapmarra
· 2015: Aloha – Emma Stone
· 2016: Dr Strange – Tilda Swinton
There is also "The Ghost in the Shell" (2017) where producers were thinking of using computer effects to make Scarlett Johansson look Asian.
The most infamous example is Mr Yunioshi in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" (1961), Audrey Hepburn's best-known film. Mickey Rooney's Yunioshi is like a Second World War propaganda stereotype come to life, buckteeth and everything.
The most heartbreaking example is the lead female part for "The Good Earth" (1937), set in China. Anna May Wong, a Chinese American actress then at the height of her powers, wanted the lead. They gave it to a White woman instead, who went on to win an Oscar, the only person ever to win an Oscar for playing an Asian woman (Linda Hunt played an Asian man). It was one of the few films of the time that put Chinese people in a good light.
When MGM offered Wong the part of a wicked concubine instead, she said:
"You're asking me – with my Chinese blood – to do the only unsympathetic role in the picture, featuring an all-American cast portraying Chinese characters."
An Asian American would not notably star as an unembarrassing character till 1966. That was when George Takei played Mr Sulu on "Star Trek" (1966-1969). He was even allowed to speak English with an American accent!
The most damaging example of yellowface was Fu Manchu, the Yellow Peril made flesh, shown regularly in the 1920s on Saturday afternoons in cinemas across the US. It almost certainly helped to lead to the Japanese American internment.
Why yellowface? Some say it is money: White actors draw larger audiences. But it is more than just that:
1. Entertainment value: Dehumanizing other races has been a form of White entertainment since the 1700s.
2. Lack of empathy: Whites do not see people of other races as having deep feelings. That might be fine for bad guys and even action heroes, but not for love stories or serious drama. A White actor in yellowface will seem deeper and realer.
– Abagond, 2016.
See also:
· Welcome to Asian American History Month 2016
· blackface
· White American writers:
o Zora Neale Hurston: What White Publishers Won't Print – of White empathy and Hollywood
o Three ways Americans write about Asians
· Hollywood
o Hollywood whitewashing
· David Carradine
· Yellow Peril
· Anna May Wong
· The Japanese American internment
End of M PEN e-Newsletter
