CNN Blows It: APAS Have Supported Blacks
February 25, 2008
During Black History Month and Lunar New Year, CNN ran a Feb. 8 story pitting Asian Pacific Americans against African Americans with lines like “fearful of a black presidential candidate [Barack Obama].” One criticism, led by S.B. Woo’s 80-20 Initiative, is that CNN interviewed mostly English-limited APA voters about Clinton garnering 75 percent of the California APA vote. The problem — 86 percent of 14 million APAs in 2003 were predominantly English-literate, while predominantly Asian-language speaking residents are 14 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Education. …
APAs + BLACKS = BROWN: APAs keyed the 1999 re-election of S.F. Mayor Willie Brown against former Board of Supervisors President Tom Ammiano. Brown edged Ammiano, 57-43 percent citywide, but won by huge 2-to-1, if not 3-to-1, APA margins. That’s hardly an anti-black APA vote. …
AND WHERE ARE THEY?: The only APAs not to support the first and only mayor of color in S.F.? APA progressives, who have also been MIA on the CNN debacle. …
PRO-CLINTON AMONG APAs: Chinese American Voter Education Committee maps show Clinton beat Obama (who won S.F.) handily in APA neighborhoods: Sunset/Richmond/North Beach/Chinatown, Excelsior, Visitacion Valley, Portola, Inner Mission, SoMa and Tenderloin. … It aligns with the pattern of winning mayoral conservative-moderates: Frank Jordan in 1991, Willie Brown in 1999, and Gavin Newsom in 2003 and 2007. …
APAs + BLACKS, PT. 2: Mayor Brown did make notable achievements — seating Mike Yaki and Fiona Ma as supervisor, backing Mabel Teng for Board president, Fred Lau as the first APA and second-longest serving police chief, hiring future state Sen. Leland Yee as his campaign manager, supporting the Fang Family acquisition of the Examiner newspaper, reappointing Bill Lee as city administrator. …
GOT TO LIKE MIKE: Yaki — anointed by AsianWeek columnist Phil Nash as 2007’s person of the year — is the U.S. Civil Rights commissioner who, last August, passionately opposed findings that affirmative action harmed African, Latino and Asian American law students. He criticized majority Republican commissioners for declaring “‘victory’ over discrimination, and while in pursuit of color-blindness at all levels, turns a blind eye to the continuing need to combat and remedy past, present and future discrimination.” The ex-Nancy Pelosi aide ripped into commissioners for replacing state advisory committees with “clones, political hacks, and singularly and sometimes spectacularly unqualified individuals …” If Dems regain White House and hold Congress, Yaki could be in the majority and chair a commission that once seated S.F. Police Commissioner Yvonne Lee. …
$4,000 TAX: Eric Mar, school trustee and supervisor candidate, has made a risky move by supporting a $4,000 parcel tax for teacher salaries over 20 years on the June ballot, which requires two-thirds support. … That could give fiscal responsibility ammo to his challengers, like American Federation of Teachers political director Alicia Wang, and possibly Planning Commissioner/Chinese Historical Society of America director Sue Lee for taxing APA property owners in Richmond District 1. …
RAILROAD JOB: While APAs built the railroad, they’re not on track as the influential S.F. Labor Council is pushing for an early March endorsement, well before APAs have declared for November supervisor races, which could help Mar. …
Reach Samson Wong at (415) 321-5886 or
swong@asianweek.com.
Comments
Got something to say?