January 12, 2007
NY Caucus of Color Annual Business Meeting ~ Jan 24
JAN 24 @ 7PM
NY CAUCUS OF COLOR ANNUAL BUSINESS MEETING
We’ve done a great job with networking and advocacy in 2006, now, let’s roll up our sleeves and GET TO WORK IN 2007!!
This will be our annual general membership meeting. Those who attended our events in the past (or just want information about getting more involved), we’re looking forward to seeing you!
SPECIAL GUEST SPEAKER:
DAVID POLLAK, STATE CO-CHAIR
NEW YORK STATE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
and, other SURPRISE GUESTS!
These meetings are working meetings where we plan the calendar for the year, join the Caucus Action committees, discuss ideas for membership and outreach initiatives, new campaign initiatives and hear from surprise guest speakers!
January 24, 2007
7:00 PM until 10:00 PM
1199SEIU Headquarters Auditorium
310 West 43rd Street (btwn 8th and 9th Aves) New York City
Subway Directions:
1, 2, 3, 7, 9, N, Q, R, S, W at Times Square (42nd St/7th Avenue) stop
B, D, F, V at Bryant Park (42nd St/6th Ave) stop
A, E, C at Port Authority Bus Terminal (42ND St/8th Ave) stop
Please take a moment to confirm your attendance by clicking this link: http://www.nycaucusofcolor.org/takeaction or call 646-530-8308.
January 12, 2007
ASK THE WHITE GUY: ‘People of Color’ and ‘People of Quality’ Are Not Exclusive
Do you have a question you’ve always wanted to ask a white guy? Well, here’s your chance. Click here to submit your questions now!
Mr. D. Whitman, friend to the Caucus of Color and resident white guy, pays us a visit once a week to let us know what’s on the mind of White
America.
Since some of you won’t believe it until you hear it from the “White man,” he answers questions from you the readers. Don’t ask me, ask D. “White” man!
So, here’s this week’s question from one of our readers:
Dear Whitman,I recently overhead a conversation between our HR director, an African-American woman, and a hiring manager, a white woman. The HR director commented that she saw her success directly tied to hiring as many “women of color as possible” to which the hiring manager responded “my goal is to hire as many people of quality as possible.” How would you respond especially in light of the fact that our past is full of double standards. Are you suggesting we address our past injustices by creating new ones? How would you have responded to the hiring manager?
Signed,Nosy in NYC
ANSWER:Dear Nosy,I don’t think that “women of color” and “people of quality” are exclusive terms. I know many high-quality women of color.
The goal of any hiring strategy should be to find a representative slate of the best quality people. However, given that talent is distributed equally and bidirectional communication links employees to markets, there are many business reasons to balance a non-representative work force by setting appropriate goals.
Since I’m not privy to the HR director’s goals, I can’t comment on her intention. It seems to me, however, that regardless of the HR director’s intention, the hiring manager may have been insubordinate.
Signed,
D. Whitman
PS – Stop eavesdropping on employees’ conversations. That will get you fired faster than showing up to work at 10:30am every day for 2 weeks! 
January 12, 2007
Oprah and Cosby: South Africa vs. South Central
Does Oprah Winfrey’s $40-million school for South African girls reveal increasing class warfare in the U.S. black community? Her comments about why she chose South Africa over South Central or some other U.S. inner city continues to divide many in the black community.
When responding to critics, who said she should have invested in U.S. inner cities, Winfrey replied: “The sense that you need to learn just isn’t there. If you ask the kids what they want or need, they will say an iPod or some sneakers,” she said in Newsweek. “In South Africa, they don’t ask for money or toys. They ask for uniforms so that they can go to school.”
“It’s a silent war that nobody wants to talk about,” said Shawn Ginwright, an associate professor of Africana studies at San Francisco State University, to Diverse Issues in Higher Education.
Ginwright contends that successful U.S. blacks, such as Winfrey and Bill Cosby, who are critical of poor blacks, represent a trend in thinking that inferior black-student performance in school is the responsibility of the students and their parents. “It’s an endorsement of a system that has worked for the black middle class. But the fact is there are millions of blacks in chocolate cities that have not made it and the system continues to ban them and keep them from making it,” Ginwright says.
Winfrey and Cosby, however, have donated millions of dollars to helping inner-city U.S. blacks, which most of those criticizing her conveniently forget.
Winfrey and Cosby are simply saying that low-income black students must raise their expectations and place greater value in education to escape poverty. They are challenging poorer black families to become engaged in their children’s education rather than wait passively for a government fix or philanthropically inclined billionaire.
Oprah’s HIV Test
Meanwhile, Winfrey is moving forward. Demonstrating leadership, she took an HIV test Saturday and encouraged students at her new school and their loved ones to follow suit, in a bid to inspire more openness about the disease that is devastating South Africa’s youth. An estimated 5.4 million of South Africa’s 48 million people are infected with the AIDS virus. In 2006, an estimated 950 people died per day from AIDS-related diseases, while 1,400 were infected each day—a total of 530,000 new infections—according to an authoritative report by the Actuarial Society of South Africa and the Medical Research Council, reported MSNBC.
At an open day for families at her academy, Winfrey promised the 152 pupils free HIV testing, counseling and—if necessary—treatment. “To be a great leader you must be of sound mind, body and spirit. Part of leadership is having the courage to demonstrate true action. Today I have taken the test to demonstrate why it’s so important,” Winfrey was quoted as saying on MSNBC.
Leadership is the cornerstone of Winfrey’s school, and when choosing her academy’s leaders, Winfrey cast a wide net. Winfrey plucked two black educators from Germantown Friends School, a 161-year-old Philadelphia-based Quaker school, to lead the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Joan Countryman, a former math teacher and administrator at Germantown Friends School, is the acting head of Winfrey’s boarding school. And Nomvuyo Mzamane, a native of South Africa, resigned from Germantown late last month as assistant head of operations at the school to prepare to become the academy’s permanent head.
“Who would have thought that two black women educators from Germantown Friends would suddenly show up at this place?” Countryman said to the Inquirer.
Blackmailing Oprah?
Winfrey was in the news this weekend because she allegedly was the target of blackmail, according to the FBI.
A man has been charged with trying to extort $1.5 million from Winfrey by threatening to release recorded telephone conversations he claimed would hurt her reputation. Keifer Bonvillain, 36, targeted a person identified only as “a public figure and the owner of a Chicago-based company,” according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court. The Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, citing unnamed sources, reported Saturday that Bonvillain’s target was Winfrey. Bonvillain, of Atlanta, was arrested Dec. 15 in the parking lot of an Atlanta hotel and released on $20,000 bail. He was scheduled for a preliminary hearing in Chicago today.
December 28, 2006
We Need A Few YOUNG DEMOCRATS
CAUCUS OF COLOR LEADERSHIP POSITIONS AVAILABLE
We’re looking for motivated, committed progressive young people of color to take on leadership positions within the NY Caucus of Color.
We are also looking for more leaders and members for our committees: Political Action, Membership, Finance/Fundraising, Media/Communications, Community Service and Policy/Research as well as organizers for our Speakers Series and Film Series.
Applicants must complete the online survey application by midnight on Thursday, January 11th. Each appointment is made by the Chair, with advice and consent of the Steering Committee and the announcements will be made at the Annual Business Meeting.Each committee has a need for a CHAIR, CO-CHAIR and new members.
LIST OF COMMITTEES:
Political Action:
The Political Action Team establishes and maintains Caucus of Color’s relationships with elected representatives, public officials, and other philosophically aligned groups and organizations. It helps the organization build coalitions to elect progressive candidates to office and advance positive public policy.
Membership/Outreach:
The Membership/Outreach Team is the main muscle of the organization and will organize volunteers working on the ground in various neighborhoods all over the state. We need people who can be the lead organizers of neighborhood and campus-based teams working for outreach. These teams will be on the front-line, making connections to local political clubs and activist groups, registering new voters, collecting petition signatures, and distributing flyers in neighborhoods.
Media/Communications:
This team works to publicize the events and issues of the organization through the press. The team is the primary point of contact for media inquiries and press interviews. There are openings for people with media or writing experience to coordinate national media, local media, and media targeting people of color, as well as liaisons to the website and special events/fundraising team. The next steps for this team include creating all-purpose press releases, boilerplate language, talking point sheets, and a comprehensive press contact list. The Committee is responsible for the visual identity of Caucus of Color and for communicating the progressive message through design. It also develops collateral (buttons, t-shirts, etc.) and flyers and signs for use by other teams such as Outreach.
Finance/Fundraising:
The Finance/Fundraising Team will be the primary group organizing events and solicitations to support the organization financially. We need people with experience or familiarity in developing funding pitches and organizing events on a budget.
Policy/Research:
The Policy/Research Team investigates issues targeted by the organization and crafts strategy for targeting particular advocacy campaigns. The group needs people who can do both online and offline research.
Community Service:
The Community Service team organizes Caucus of Color’s involvement in community service projects.
Speaker Series:
This group responsible for developing, implementing, and coordinating Speaker Series and programs designed to intellectually stimulate the members. This committee identifies, invites, and introduces speakers for its Speakers Series. Recent speakers included: David Paterson, Eliot Spitzer, Chuck D, Leecia Eve, NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly, WABC-TV anchor Sade Baderinwa, Congressmen Charles Rangel and Gregory Meeks, former Manhattan Borough President C. Virginia Fields, and Charlie King.
Film Series:
This group will organize movie nights, theater trips and film festivals to watch political and social justice films.
Applicants must complete the online survey application by midnight on Thursday, January 11th.
As per our Constitution, any vacancies shall be filled by appointment of the Chair of the NY Caucus of Color Steering Committee, subject to the advice & consent of the Steering Committee.
The positions of all Committee Chairs and Co-Chairs shall serve as full members of the Caucus of Color Steering Committee. The Steering Committee works together to plan and promote all Caucus of Color events throughout the state. This includes attending and representing the NY Caucus of Color at meetings and political events around the state and at National Young Democrats of America meetings.
In addition, we would love for you to join us for our
NY YOUNG DEMOCRATS CAUCUS OF COLOR ANNUAL BUSINESS MEETING
The event will be our general membership (and those who seek to learn more about joining) meeting and special surprise guest speakers.
Wednesday, January 24th, 2007
7:00pm
1199 SEIU Headquarters Auditorium
310 West 43rd Street, NYC
The selections for the Committee Chairs will be announced at the Annual Business Meeting.
To confirm your attendance, click this link: http://www.nycaucusofcolor.org/takeaction
December 28, 2006
Capitol Hill: A Dearth of Diversity
DiversityInc’s recent investigation on the U.S. Senate’s glaring lack of diversity within the ranks of its employees has sparked the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) to action. The CBC is demanding that incoming Democratic leaders hire more people of color to work for House committees and on lawmakers’ staffs, saying the dearth of diversity on Capitol Hill is a significant issue.
DiversityInc magazine’s June 2006 article “Who Is Worst for Diversity? The United States Senate” found that of the 4,100 U.S. Senate employees across the country, only 6 percent were people of color. The exposé also found that people of color were virtually nonexistent when it came to filling influential Washington, D.C.-based Senate aide positions. Although each senator generally employs at least 10 senior-level aides, DiversityInc found only 7.6 percent of the approximate 1,000 positions were held by people of color. Of that 7.6 percent, 2.9 percent were black, 2.8 percent were Asian American and 1.9 percent were Latino.
In a letter to House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi and the leaders of the Democratic Steering Committee, the CBC said the party must increase the number of people of color working for committees and subcommittees, which will be controlled by Democrats.
The hiring of blacks, Latinos, Asian Americans and other people of color has “been a major problem” for years, said outgoing CBC Chairman Melvin Watt, D-N.C., to The Washington Times. “All you have to do is look at the composition of committees, subcommittees and leadership staffs,” Watt said, adding that the lack of diversity extends to legislators’ staffs.
Pelosi, D-Calif., has promised to make diverse hiring a priority for incoming committee chairman and has met with the incoming CBC chairman, Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, D-Mich.
“This is the right time to address this, and we will be working with the speaker to increase those numbers,” Kilpatrick said.
December 28, 2006
There’s Nothing “Goode” About Islamophobia
A Republican congressman has told constituents that unless immigration is tightened, “many more Muslims” will be elected and follow the lead of a recently elected lawmaker who plans to use the Quran at his ceremonial swearing-in.
Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., made the comments in a letter sent earlier this month to hundreds of constituents who had written to him about Rep.-elect Keith Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat and the first Muslim elected to Congress. Goode’s letter triggered angry responses from a
New Jersey congressman and an Islamic civil-rights group.
In the letter, Goode wrote, “The Muslim representative from
Minnesota was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.”
Goode said the
U.S. needs to stop undocumented immigration “totally” and reduce legal immigration.
Goode added: “I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the
United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the
United States of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped.”
Ellison was born in
Detroit and converted to Islam in college. He did not return telephone messages left Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J., wrote to Goode on Wednesday saying that he was “greatly disappointed and in fact startled” by Goode’s letter.
“I take your remarks as personally offensive to the large community of Muslim Americans I represent in the Eighth District of New Jersey,” Pascrell wrote.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on Goode to apologize.
“Representative Goode’s Islamophobic remarks send a message of intolerance that is unworthy of anyone elected to public office,” CAIR’s national legislative director, Corey Saylor, said Tuesday night. “There can be no reasonable defense for such bigotry.”
Goode spokesperson Linwood Duncan said Wednesday that no apology was forthcoming.
“The only statement the congressman has is that he stands by the letter,”
Duncan said.
The letter was made public by John Cruickshank, the chairman of the Piedmont group of the Sierra Club in central
Virginia, who had received it after writing to Goode about environmental issues.
Duncan said that Goode’s office had sent the letter to Cruickshank by mistake. (AP)
December 28, 2006
Convention Confusion
The Associated Press reports today that the Democratic National Committee will delay an official decision on where to host the party’s 2008 national convention. The choice is between New York and Denver, with each city posing unique advantages and potential deal-breakers.
The AP reports that Denver “which has mounted an enthusiastic campaign to win the convention, has struggled with labor issues, fundraising and logistical challenges such as finding sufficient hotel rooms.”
“The problems are different in New York, which hosted the 2004 Republican National Convention and eagerly sought the 2008 Democratic gathering as recently as a few months ago. Since then, [Mayor Michael] Bloomberg has committed to several other multimillion-dollar fundraising efforts, including creation of the city’s World Trade Center memorial.”
“While New York’s host committee has pledged to raise the money necessary to hold the convention, Bloomberg said Tuesday that the fundraising would be significantly more difficult than he once believed.”
The DNC probably won’t make an announcement until January. That’s also when we’ll get the official announcement about the Young Democrats of America 2007 national convention. That meeting has been confirmed for July 18-21 in Dallas.
December 28, 2006
Can Obama be Elected? Here’s What They’re Saying
Seems like everyone wants Sen. Barack Obama to run. Conservative columnist George Will gave his reasons why Obama should run now.
He said what people see in Obama reveals more about them than about him but the time for action is now. “Some of his public utterances have the sponginess of Polonius’s bromides for Laertes and if he waits to run, there will be many fresher faces by then.”
Jonathan Alter wrote in Newsweek (and in his blog) citing Jeh Johnson, a corporate attorney and former general counsel of the Air Force under President Clinton, who said the American voter will be ready to try a leader who projects better on the world stage, and “Barack’s multicultural heritage will represent that change.”
Greg Mankiw, the famous economist of Harvard University, wrote in his blog that using Bayes theorem, Obama’s possiblility to win is the greatest among all possible presidential candidates.
Veteran New Hampshire Democratic activist Mary Rauh, who was at Obama’s book-signing in
Portsmouth, N.H. (See also: ‘Obamamania’ Strikes New Hampshire: Is Barack Finally Ready to Run?) last weekend, told MSNBC.com “I don’t think it’s enough of a burden with enough people to matter; and I think the converse may be true.”
Michael Fauntroy, who teaches political science at George Mason University in Virginia and is the author of the new book, Republicans and the Black Vote, told MSNBC.com, “In the wider American society, there are some African-Americans, Michael Jordan for example, who are seen as transcending race and, for lack of better phrase, ‘don’t scare white people.’” He said Obama fits in that category.
Obama himself addressed the issues of skin color and identity during his tour of New Hampshire last weekend. (See also: ‘Obamamania’ Strikes New Hampshire: Is Barack Finally Ready to Run?)
In his speech in Portsmouth, Obama reminded the audience that when he successfully ran for the Senate in
Illinois two years ago, he was well-received in downstate Cairo, Ill., a city that had been racially segregated in the late 1960s and used to have a white separatist White Citizens’ Council.
But 2004’s victory may not necessarily illustrate the future road. The 2004 white Republican Senate candidate in Illinois, Jack Ryan, was forced out of the race because of to tawdry details of his divorce being made public. With only three months until Election Day, the Republican Party in Illinois substituted Alan Keyes, the black social conservative orator who wasn’t even living in Illinois at the time. That means Obama didn’t prove he can defeat a white candidate in the general election.
Also, Obama’s middle name ”Hussein” also put him on the hot spot. Obama almost brings up his membership in the United Church of Christ (One of the most liberal churches in the United States) in every speech. Some haves suggested that he is doing this partly to dispel any mistaken notion some people might have that he’s a Muslim.
“Obama is saying that he’s a member of that church to make it known that he’s a Christian,” Fauntroy told MSNBC.com, ” And he is also sending a message to Democrats and leftward people that his policies are guided by a leftward interpretation of faith.”
