Category Archives: race

Emil Guillermo: Obama’s final State of the Union could have been great had the nation been ready for Obama

I kept shaking my head.  That’s SMH, for those into social media.

President Obama did some great things during his first seven years, but they will always be shortchanged as long as the politics in this country stays as it is.

The president, you’ll recall,  was the nation’s first African American president, and has the middle name Hussein.

And that’s why he had to remind the country about the fear of change and the fear of foreigners this week.

It was an appeal to diversity in our democracy before it’s too late.

Read my whole column on the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund blog.

 

 

Emil Guillermo: Obama says regulating guns is our “shared responsibility.” So why don’t we see more Asian American voices included in the gun debate? That CNN Town Hall was like a Lions Club meeting in a white suburb. Asian Americans are 5% of the nation, and 20% of the most noted mass killings since 1984.

Really. What does it take for a little more inclusion.

See my piece on the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund blog

I saw just one Asian American.

It was like watching a network cop drama or legal drama and seeing a juror. Or person walking by.

But we know Asian Americans are not immune to gun violence in America.

(Oh, there’s one! An Asian American in the back? Next to the bald guy….).

See my piece at http://www.aaldef.org/blog

gunshowasiancnn

Emil Guillermo: Trumping Kim Jong Un’s “bomb” claim in news cycle, Trump says, “China should solve that problem.” So a Trump presidency’s foreign policy on a big issue like N.Korea is essentially a business solution: You outsource it. And then he tells CNN, he’d get Mexico to help pay to build his wall or tax their trade. Talk radio campaign stuff.

It’s all business with Trump. China can handle North Korea? “They can handle it so easily,” he says to CNN. “They’re taunting us.” Trump’s answer is to use the leverage of taxing trade.

Trump laughs at the politicians who think he’s kidding. And then on his wall along the Mexican border, says Mexico will have to pay for it. Or he’ll put tariffs on trade. Everything is easy with Trump. Unfortunately, it’s not that easy in real life.

Emil Guillermo: That “militia” of outsiders from Arizona and Nevada occupying a federal wildlife reserve in Oregon are armed trespassers and not patriots. If people of color took over a federal housing project the National Guard would have been brought in post-haste. The Bundy gang is like a gun-fueled “White Lives Matter” movement. They are anti-government thugs looking for the spotlight.

If they vote, they’re likely Trump or Cruz guys. But you don’t hear much from either of them about these yahoos fueled by the Second Amendment up in Oregon.
They are giving camo a bad name.