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Dreamers’ drama upended again

Posted on November 17, 2020 by Joe Grimm

This stalled handoff from the outgoing Trump administration to the incoming Biden administration has made life even more uncertain, if that is possible, for Daca recipients, called Dreamers.

Daca means Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. It is an Obama-era program that protects people brought into he United States as young children from deportation.

As an Obama immigration initiative, it was targeted for removal throughout the Trump administration. One of the chief architects of that removal has been Chad Wolf, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Trump frequently appointed people as “acting” to speed their way into jobs and to make it easier for him to later remove them, as he has often done.

Wolf issued an order in the summer suspending the program, pending review by the department. However, U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufisa in New York City has ruled that the “acting” end-run violates orders of succession and promotion. The judge wrote, “the actions taken by purported acting secretaries, who were not properly in their roles according to the lawful order of succession, were taken without legal authority.” He has written that Wolf’s suspension order is null.

Daca advocates are calling this a win for them, but note that the game is not over. It’s another twist on the roller coaster they have been riding for several years.

To learn more about Dreamers and immigration, get “100 Questions and Answers About Immigrants to the U.S.” It is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Diwali, Kamala Harris’ election coincide

Posted on November 16, 2020 by Joe Grimm

Diwali, the Indian festival of lights celebrated this month, receives some extra attention because Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris, who won this month, is of Indian and Jamaican descent.

The festival is celebrated in Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism, ancient religions that originated in India.

The holiday celebrates the triumph of good over evil and is both religious and cultural. It has prayer, recommitment, sweets, treats and visits with family. And, yes, in this year of COVID-19, Diwali requires certain accommodations about visits and distancing to ensure safety.

Deepavali, the Sanskrit name for the holiday, predominates in South India,. It means “row of lights.” The five-day holiday is celebrated in temples and at home altars.

The holiday brought out Twitter-greetings from President Donald J. Trump, President-Elect Joe Biden, Harris, of course, and others in national offices.

“100 Questions and Answers About Indian Americans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Gen Z, Millennial voters powered Boomer

Posted on November 15, 2020 by Joe Grimm

The youngest voters appear to have boosted the oldest presidential candidate in U.S. history into the White House.

Biden will turn 78 on Nov. 20 and would become the oldest president. Next closest? Ronald Reagan, who left office at age 77.

The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University posted, “Our data revealed that more than 10 million youth cast early and absentee ballots. Young voters turned out at a higher rate than in recent elections: our analysis suggests that, based on votes counted as of midday Nov. 7, an estimated 49%-52% of young people participated in the election—and when all votes are counted (using this method and data available at this point) we project that youth voter turnout may be as high as 53-56%. Regardless of estimate methodology, our analysis shows that youth voter turnout is up compared to 2016.

Biden’s running mate, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, 56, is from the first wave of Millennials. She was born on Oct. 20, 1964, weeks before what the Pew Research Center calls the start of the Gen X birth years. That makes her one of the oldest Millennials and sets up the very real possibility that we might never see a Gen Xer in the Oval Office.

“100 Questions and Answers About Gen X and 100 Questions About Millennials” is available in one double guide from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Navajos helped flip Arizona

Posted on November 14, 2020 by Joe Grimm

The Navajo Nation, which figured prominently in President-Elect Joe Biden’s win in the swing state of Arizona, illustrates three top issues in Election 2020.

One issue is access to the vote. Many tribal members lack the physical address they need to register to vote. They worked with Google to register using GPS coordinates. The Navajo Nation is the largest reservation within the United States and while most of its 17 million acres are in Arizona, it stretches into Utah and New Mexico.

The second issue is COVID-19, which has hit Indigenous people and Navajos in particular especially hard. The tribe has lost many elders and is again dealing with a urge in infections, according to National Public Radio, which told the story. Voter registration forms were distributed in Zip-loc bags to ensure contactless registering.

Finally a campaign to get people to ride to the polls on horseback helped get out younger voters. Navajo voters turnout set a record, despite the obstacles.

You can learn more in “100 Questions, 500 Nations: A Guide to Native America,” available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Before there was a Veterans Day …

Posted on November 9, 2020 by Joe Grimm

… it was called Armistice Day. It commemorated the day when the fighting stopped during World War I. The formal end was the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11 That was to have been “the war to end all wars.”

However, it was not and, in 1954, Nov. 11 became a holiday to honor American Veterans of all wars.

Cover of the Bias Busters guide, “100 Questions and Answers About Veterans: A Guide for Civilians”

Today, there are about 18 million veterans of several wars. They regularly deal with stereotypes and misconceptions, some of them borne of good intentions, but that can cause some hard feelings even so.

This Bias Busters guide is not for veterans, but civilians, giving them accurate, straightforward information they need to better understand and appreciate military personnel. Among the questions:

How are commissioned and noncommissioned officers different?
How common is it for veterans to be homeless?
What is the GI Bill?
What are the meanings of Memorial Day and Veterans Day?

“100 Questions and Answers About Veterans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Can we do better by vets than free tacos?

Posted on November 8, 2020 by Joe Grimm

Headline on Military Times website touts "From free tacos to haircuts and lube jobs

Headline ours “From free tacos to haircuts and lube jobs, Veterans Day discounts and deals are waiting.

Thank goodness for the taco makers, the barbers and the oil changers. They are ding their part to appreciate veterans.

Cover of the Bias Busters guide, “100 Questions and Answers About Veterans: A Guide for Civilians”

This is not a sarcastic or snide appeal that we should move tour support for veterans up to a national scale. That is a good idea. But this is for the rest of us who can step up and join small and large businesses in showing our respect, too.

It starts with some understanding.

Rushing up to someone in a veterans ball cap and thanking them for their service and then rushing is off is not just too little, it might also be off-putting, no matter how well-intentioned.

To appreciate and respect veterans at the individual level, first learn about them and why, depending on the circumstances, this greeting is for some a burden and not a blessing.

It’s easy. “100 Questions and Answers About Veterans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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1 million Muslims vote; Trump support grows

Posted on November 7, 2020 by Joe Grimm

Polling of 844 households by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) showed a Muslim turnout of 84%. About 69% of respondents said they voted for former Vice President Joe Biden and 17% said they voted for President Donald Trump.

In the 2016 election, the report said, Trump received 13 percent of the Muslim vote.

CAIR is the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization.

The organization estimated that more than 1 million Muslims voted.

CAIR Director of Government Affairs Robert S. McCaw said, “Muslims vote and there is no denying the role our community plays in local, state and national politics.”

Learn more. “100 Questions and Answers About Muslim Americans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Trump’s Latino vote still strong

Posted on November 6, 2020 by Joe Grimm

The Republican Party’s continuing support from Hispanic voters still surprises pundits. Should it?

Electoral College heavyweights Texas and Florida both went for Trump this week with plus-40% support from Latinos. This is not new. But people keep waiting for the Hispanic vote to shift given Trump’s comments about Puerto Ricans, Mexican and others. So what is going on?

Although former Vice President Joe Biden won the Latino vote in those states, it was no landslide. NBC News reported “in Texas, 41% to 47% of Hispanic voters backed Trump in several heavily Latino border counties in the Rio Grande Valley region, a Democratic stronghold. In Florida, Trump won 45% of the Latino vote, an 11-point improvement from his 2016 performance.”

What is happening?

USA Today columnist Ruben Navarrette Jr. wrote, “Trump is the most anti-Latino president Americans have seen in nearly seven decades, since before we even started keeping track of the Latino vote in 1960. And yet, here we are, with his reelection hopes buoyed by stronger-than-expected support from Latino voters across the country.”

Navarrette wrote that the issue is not what Trump says, it is that Democrats do not appreciate the diversity and concerns of Hispanic voters. He attributed the surprise to outdated and insulting generalizations of who Hispanic voters are.

They are not as Catholic as the stereotypes suggest, they are split almost evenly on abortion, and their top issues are jobs, the economy and health care. The idea that Trump’s machismo appeals to Hispanic men falls on its face, Navarrette writes, because the engine of the voting bloc is Latinas.

Navarrette concludes: “Let’s stop trying to figure out what’s wrong with Latino voters. There is nothing wrong with us. We’re complicated, unpredictable and hard to characterize. But we’re not broken.

“It’s the political system that is busted, and that includes the choices that appear on the ballot. Going forward, if you want to understand us, a good first step is to not insult us.”

Start to improve your understanding with the quick read, “100 Questions and Answers About Hispanics and Latinos.” It is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Transgender candidates make history

Posted on November 5, 2020 by Joe Grimm

The Victory Fund is celebrating the 2020 election, focused as it is not on the top of the ballot, where confusion was ahead, but down ballot where openly transgender candidates made their best showing ever.

The lead story for the LGBTQ Victory Fund is Sarah McBride, headlined as “Sarah McBride Becomes First Trans State Senator in US History.” McBride won Delaware’s 1st District.The fund endorsed 312 candidates in the election and noted that the number of out trans candidates was dramatically higher than in any previous election.

According to McBride’s campaign site, she is steeped in Democratic and progressive politics and has worked for Delaware’s governor, attorney general and in the Obama administration. She has also addressed the Democratic National Convention and taught public policy at the University of Delaware’s Biden Institute.

McBride is a spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy organization. She has also addressed the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. She has also taught public policy at the University of Delaware’s Biden Institute.

Other candidates the Victory Fund noted are:

Stephanie Byers of Kansas
Madeline Eden of Texas
Jessica Katzenmeyer of Wisconsin
Taylor Small of Vermont

Additionally, three of the four incumbent out trans state legislators were up for re-election:

Lisa Bunker and Gerri Cannon in New Hampshire
Brianna Titone in Colorado

Victory Fund reported that a sweep would more than double the number of trans state legislators from four to nine.

Want to know more about gender identity? “100 Questions and Answers About Gender Identity” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Black Latter-day Saints supported

Posted on November 4, 2020 by Joe Grimm

The Salt Lake Tribune reports that support for Black lives by Elder Dallin H. Oaks, the next-in-line to run The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has buoyed Black spirits.

The Tribune quoted Darius Gray, who joined the church more than a decade before it removed its priesthood and temple ban on Blacks, this way: “The speech was a “monumental moment,” said Darius Gray, who joined the Utah-based faith in 1964, more than a decade before the church removed its priesthood and temple ban on Blacks.

The newspaper wrote that “Oaks ‘boldly emphasized the most basic of Christian truths when stating that Black lives matter,’ said Gray, who co-founded the Genesis Group in 1971, a support organization for Black Latter-day Saints. ‘Those simple words have given solace to millions around the world, not just in the USA, while they’ve simultaneously been mischaracterized as everything opposite of what it means to be American.'”

As the Bias Busters class worked on our latest guide, which is about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the issue of racial equity in the church took some scrutiny.

African Americans were barred from full membership for more than a century. Although that ended in 1978, the hurt is still there.

This is how we handled the question in the guide:

Historically, did the church exclude people of color?
The Book of Mormon states, “black and white, bond and free, male and female; … all are alike unto God.” In the early days of the church, some Blacks were ordained as priests. However, in 1852, Brigham Young forbade any Blacker men from being ordained. Other restrictions followed his death. Black men and women were not allowed to participate in temple endowment or sealing ordinances. In 1978, then-president Spencer Kimball had a revelation saying Blacks could become priests. The ban was removed without apology. Today’s church includes Black, Asian and Latino Apostles at the quorum level. An estimated 6% of Latter-day Saints are Black.

Oaks, who is in line to succeed Russell M. Nelson and become the church’s 18th president, may be laying down some markers as to what he will do in his term.

“100 Questions and Answers About Latter-day Saints” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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