Now that the Pew Research Center announced that Asian Americans are the "highest-income, best-educated and fastest-growing racial group in the United States," and since the buzz on the Democratic victory is the changing demographics of the American electorate, I was hoping that the national media would include our voice more in the coverage of the elections last night. Nope. Not...
This is what a politician looks like when the media have him under an intense spotlight for a controversial statement. Nice work by 9News investigative reporter and 9 pm anchor Kyle Clark, who contacted me yesterday to confirm that Republican Congressman Mike Coffman had indeed sent a surrogate to attend an Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month event over the...
President Obama never fails to inspire with his speeches, and for me, especially his speeches in support of the Asian American community. The video above is from his speech in Washington DC on May 18 at the 18th Annual Gala of the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies. And while I'm at it, I'm embedding Obama's historic interview yesterday with...
This about takes the cake for lame-ass non-issues. WUSA9, Gannett's DC affiliate (and sister station to Denver's KUSA 9News, the top-rated station in Denver and home to Adele Arakawa, the Japanese American top-rated anchor), posted this video and text followup about the Obama girls' private school serving Asian food on Dec. 7: "Sidwell Friends School, Sasha and Malia Obama's School,...
Big news for Asian Americans (and for the South Asian community): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, the affable and seemingly tireless chief medical correspondent for CNN (and a practicing neurosurgeon), is President-elect Barack Obama's choice to serve as Surgeon General of the United States.
According to the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz:
Gupta has told administration officials that he wants the job, and the final vetting process is under way. He has asked for a few days to figure out the financial and logistical details of moving his family from Atlanta to Washington but is expected to accept the offer.It'll be great to have another Asian American high up in the Obama administration, and the pres is smart to hook Gupta, because he's so well-known and well-liked, not to mention trusted, by the general public. But it'll be a loss for journalism, and one less prominent Asian American journalist in the national media.
The national organization APIA Vote made it abundantly clear during both the Democratic National Convention and the Republican National Convention, where they did a lot of recruiting and convened caucuses: Asian American Pacific Islanders are not involved enough in politics.
We're not great at getting the vote out, we don't participate as much as we could at the grassroots local level, and not enough Asian Americans run for and serve in elected office. A lot of that is cultural -- many of us are raised with the admonition: Don't bring attention to yourself. Don't make waves. The nail that sticks out gets nailed down (a particularly vivid Japanese saying that my mom has used on me).
This logic steers us away from public career fields such as news media (oops, sorry, screwed that one up, mom) and politics. Given the range of offices and opportunities, relatively few AAPI politicians have national profiles.
They include former Congressman and Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta, Former washington Governor Gary Locke, Congressman Mike Honda of California, current Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, Illinois Veterans Affiars Director Tammy Duckworth, Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawai'i, Senator Daniel Akaka of Hawai'i... OK, Hawai'i skews the curve.
But Louisiana, which is probably not on most peoples' list of Asian-rich states, now boasts two AAPIs in nationally notable positions: Bobby Jindal (left) is the country's first-ever Indian American Governor, and as of last weekend, Ahn Joseph Cao (above right) is the country's first Vietnamese American Congressman.
The kicker: both are Republicans, which really shouldn't surprise anyone but still has some people pondering the preponderance of party affiliations among the Asian American community.
Jindal, for one, was one of John McCain's possible choices for running mate, and he's been touted as a possible presidential candidate for 2012, given his moderate social agenda and conservative fiscal outlook. Cao fled Vietnam during the Saigon with his mother (his father was imprisoned by the Viet Cong for seven years) with the wave of "boat people" refugees, and managed to defeat an incumbent Democrat in a Democratic stronghold district.
Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders definitely seem more engaged with the political process these days. Maybe it's the DNC being in Denver that's made me sensitive to everything that's going on. Maybe it's Obama's Hawai'i connections. Or maybe AAPIs are finally coming out of the shadows and fighting to have our voices heard, and not be invisible anymore.
Here's an email being distributed by the group, Asian Americans for Obama, by the Hawai'ian-born actress Kelly Hu, who showed up unannounced at an AAPI Caucus meeting during the DNC (shown above):