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Twitter
Our group Twitter account is at http://www.twitter.com/aa4o
To properly send Twitters to other Asian Americans for Obama, in your
Twitter client, type "d aa4o #aa4o [your message here]".
Those of you already adding the #aa4o hashtag did a great job during the last debate.
The results are below.
Obama Shout-outs
Latest on Sun, 07:19
Raghda: I just pay off my credit cards ctllpeoemy when the bill arrives. I haven't paid a cent in interest but have received several gift cards from them [...]
ALexandre: Heres my oipoinn on Heres my oipoinn on green energy.If green energy made sense economically, then the free market would have gone that way. The research that [...]
Wendy: Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics. "There would be long-lasting ecmoonic damage. The economy would be back in recession. Tax revenues would be falling again and the deficit increasing."Sounds [...]
Marisol: Either Obama has no stomach for learedship, taking some big risks without which nothing big will be accomplished, OR he really is just a representative of the kind of people [...]
Safica: Suze is right. Most people at least use cridet cards, but YES should do so responsibly! Credit card companies need MORE laws holding them in check! [...]
The Obama campaign has launched yet another innovative initiative - Camp Obama, a two-day organizer training that will take place at locations around the country. My town of Austin will be hosting a training on August 15-16. Not only will learning organizing skills from experienced campaign staff and community organizers help bring change in this year’s election, but you’ll be able to keep these skills for life, extending this movement beyond just one election cycle. It’s just another example of Sen. Obama’s philosophy of empowering citizens to take control of government.
Here are the details from the campaign:
You have an opportunity to play a major role in this nationwide movement for change.
Dedicated volunteers like you have brought us this far. But to execute
our strategy for the general election, we need supporters to step into
one of the most important roles of our campaign.
If you’re ready to take the next step, you are invited to attend a two-day Camp Obama training session near you.
Learn more about this special opportunity and apply to attend Camp Obama right now:
SAVE THE DATE - September 13, 2008 12:00 noon - Freedom Plaza Diversity4Obama Walk4Change
Join
Asian Americans for Obama and a nationwide coalition of grassroots
supporters representing diverse ethnic, religious, age and
socio-economic backgrounds to support Senator Barack Obama’s historic
campaign for President of the United States of America. Together, we
will be holding a major event in Washington, DC, on September 13, 2008,
to stand united with Sen. Obama and take back our government, our
democracy, and our country.
Participants will include a variety of speakers, performers
(such as the Duke Ellington School of Arts Choir), and community
leaders.
Additional sponsors, speakers, and entertainment are still needed at this time. Please contact Rachele at racheletaramona@yahoo.com
with suggestions on any groups, organizations, or individuals that
would help demonstrate our support for Obama in a fair and
representative manner.
Sen. Obama’s speaking event in Berlin, Germany, begins at approximately 12 PM CST today. It’s hard to say exactly when he will begin speaking, as I’m sure there will be a number of introductory remarks by local and other figures.
One of the questions I get asked most frequently by enthusiastic Obama supporters is what they can do right now to help. In addition to participating in national events such as the Platform for Change meetings and phone calls, the Obama campaign has said that the most important task by far for our community-organizing/grassroots campaign model is registering voters.
By registering voters, we not only dramatically reshape the political landscape for the election this fall, but we bring in new or disaffected voters to the democratic process for the future. Sen. Obama has stated repeatedly that the goal of this campaign is not just to mobilize Americans to elect a president, but to reinvigorate American politics by restoring and expanding citizen involvement. Winning the election is only the beginning; as a people, our duty as citizens must be to continue to stay involved and hold government accountable.
So seek out your local Obama or Democratic campaign office, local Obama or Democratic clubs, etc. and find out about any scheduled voter registration drives. As you may have read on our site, Asian Americans for Obama recently did a drive in northern New Jersey and have several more scheduled for the tri-state area that you can sign up for through the links in this post.
If you can’t find voter registration efforts in your area - organize your own! My friend has written a GREAT How-To Guide for voter registration drives on Daily Kos - check it out today! It’s actually very easy and straightforward. Our local Vote for Change effort here in Austin was planned and is run by a small group of volunteers. My friend continues to run the effort here, with regularly scheduled registration days every Wednesday and Saturday, as well as special drives for big events. Tonight, we will register our 1,000th voter since the May 10 kick-off at the weekly free Blues on the Green concert in Austin.
As the recent report from UCLA concerning AAPIs and our growing political influence found, AAPIs are improving in voter turnout but still lag behind considerably in voter registration rates. Targeting AAPI communities with low registration rates should be one of our top priorities. If you e-mail us at AsianAmericansforObama@gmail.com with the details of your local voter registration drive, we will happily publicize it for you through our website and listserve. Feel free to submit guest blog entries with pictures and discussions of your experience, and you might see yourself on the blogs very soon!
Netroots Nation, the largest nationwide conference of progressive bloggers, took place in my hometown of Austin, TX on July 17-20. Formerly known as YearlyKos (after the popular progressive blog Daily Kos run by Markos Zuniga Moulitsas), this was Netroots Nation’s third year. Approximately 3,000 folks from all over the country (and even a few from abroad) attended dozens of panels on topics such as grassroots organizing, the subprime mortgage crisis, veterans’ issues, civil liberties, and more.
Progressive politicians and candidates were also in attendance, including Ashwin Madia, a young Indian American lawyer who served with the Marines in Iraq and is running for Congress in Minnesota’s 3rd District.
Netroots Nation exemplifies the kind of citizen-driven activism that is redefining politics through Sen. Obama’s campaign and beyond. Bloggers have created a new kind of interaction between politicians and constituents, as the groundbreaking and historic open Q&A session with Speaker Nancy Pelosi demonstrated. Those of us who attended the Q&A also received a surprise treat - an unannounced visit by Vice President Al Gore.
This year, I helped facilitate the AAPI Caucus at Netroots Nation. While AAPIs are still a relatively small minority in the world of political blogging, AAPIs are an active and visible part of the blogosphere as a whole. At the Caucus, we discussed ways to bring more AAPIs into the political side of blogging, as well as how to reach out to AAPIs on politics through the Internet.
Comedian and blogger Katie Halper put together this light-hearted look at the Caucus experience at Netroots Nation. The AAPI Caucus is featured at the 3:09 minute mark.
As Asian Americans, our community is often lauded in the media for our emphasis on education. We see story after story in the news about the recent immigrant who became valedictorian or the child of refugees who won the National Science Fair. But the part of the story that is often glossed over is the hard work and sacrifice of both parents and children (and not infrequently, other extended family) that made such accomplishments possible.
In a time when tuition rights are skyrocketing and living expenses are on the rise, more and more Asian American families struggle to provide their children with the dream of a first class education. More and more parents are seeing their kids be offered the best opportunities, only to have to turn them down because of financial obstacles. The challenges facing Asian American families today are precisely why it is so important to have a President that understands the real world of education.
As Sen. Obama often says, he and Michelle went to school at a time when it was still possible for a hard working middle class family to send their kids to the best schools. Even then, however, Barack and Michelle needed help. As an article in yesterday’s Chicago Sun-Times explains, the Obamas still needed to take out over $80,000 in loans between the two of them to finish law school. They didn’t finish paying off these loans until Sen. Obama got his book deal in 2004 after he sprung onto the national scene with his amazing Senate race and historic DNC speech.
Beyond just loans, however, the Chicago Sun-Times learned that Barack and Michelle held a variety of jobs throughout their school years to earn money, including making sandwiches and selling subscriptions to the New York Times.
A Harris Poll announced today shows Barack Obama leading John McCain among registered voters 44 percent to 35 percent. The poll was conducted online with almost 2,700 registered voters, but does not include Asian Americans or Pacific Islanders. The poll announcement does not even mention that AAPIs were not included due to statistically small numbers of responses.
With AAPIs making up 4.4 percent of the population, about 118 of the roll respondents should have been AAPI. I know there’s a flaw in that reasoning, but you get my drift.
This reminds me of this article from May pointing our how AAPIs are largely ignored by pollsters and the news media:
Similarly, public opinion polls in election politics rarely include Asian Americans because organizers don’t believe it’s worth the cost of providing so many different language interpreters for so few people being polled, says [Dr. Andrew Aoki, associate professor of political science at Augsburg College]. He adds that the methodology of polling also has inherent drawbacks that work against Asian inclusion.
For instance, if a national poll calls for 600 respondents, that would call for 10 to 25 Asians to reflect their share of the general population. However, a sample of less than 30 in such a poll is too little from which to draw reliable conclusions, Aoki says. So Asians would be excluded.
[Ed. - If you haven't had the chance yet, check out the AAPI Platform for Change initiative. A link has also been added to the "Join Us for Updates" list at the right side of the page.]
Aloha,
Thank you to all of participants who called into [Sunday's] national conference call focusing on Asian American, South Asian and Pacific Islander issues as part of Barack Obama’s "Listening to America: the Democratic Platform for Change" initiative. We had almost 120 people register for the call and 42 responses to our online survey.
The call was hosted by Asian Americans for Obama, South Asians for Obama and APA for Progress and leaders from those groups — Ramey Ko, Anhoni Patel and Curtis Chin, respectively — welcomed the call participants.
Our special guest speakers included Obama campaign AAPI Voter Outreach Director Charmaine Manansala and Deputy Director Betsy Kim, Clinton campaign AAPI Director Irene Bueno and National Platform Director Michael Yaki. Jennifer Van der Heide, Congressman Mike Honda’s chief of staff, also joined us and welcomed everyone.
The Obama for America campaign has launched Ka Leo O AAPI, a newsletter for the Asian American & Pacific Islander community. You can sign up at http://my.barackobama.com/AAPIforObama to receive the newsletter, plus all the latest news, happenings, events, and more from the Obama campaign’s AAPI Vote team.
Last Sunday, July 13, we had a great turnout for our Asian American Voter Registration drive in Northern New Jersey. Paul Lee, local Obama supporter and leader in the Korean-American community in northern New Jersey, organized three voter registration sites among the towns of Ridegefield, Fort Lee and Palisades Park, all predominately Korean-American communities. With over 15 enthusiastic Obama volunteers, we were able to register over 40 new voters in the span of only two and a half hours, but more importantly, we were able to demonstrate to the Korean American community in northern New Jersey the Obama campaign’s commitment to increasing the diversity of voices heard in the political process.
Volunteers will continue their efforts to register more Asian American voters in the tri-state area by organizing another voter registration drive at the annual Dragon Boat festival in Flushing Meadow Park in Queens on August 2 and August 3. You can sign up to these events here:
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July 25th, 2008 
