opinions/editorials
Child Watch©
By Marian Wright Edelman
Undocumented and Unafraid Carlos Amador emigrated with his family from Mexico in 1999 at age 14. He lived in the United States as an undocumented immigrant for almost 13 years until he recently received conditional permanent residency. Higher education for someone like him seemed like an impossible dream when Carlos finished high school. But he was determined to make it happen. As he pursued his undergraduate degree, he would go straight
from working alongside his parents cleaning houses in upscale Southern California neighborhoods to his classes, never giving up. Carlos now holds his master’s degree in social welfare from the University of California-Los Angeles. All along the way he has been a leader in the undocumented immigrant youth movement and one of its most outspoken voices for change. Today, Carlos is both the project coordinator of the Dream Resource Center at UCLA and one of the co-chairs of the board of
the United We Dream Network, the largest national network of immigrant youths. The courageous self-declared “Undocumented and Unafraid” students in the United We Dream Network risk deportation as they organize and speak out tirelessly so they and others can have the right to a college education and to live and work with dignity in the country that is their home. Their efforts led to a major victory with the Obama administration’s June announcement that it would stop deporting young
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undocumented immigrants age 30 or younger without criminal records who came to the United States before age 16, have lived here for at least five years, and are students, high school graduates, or military veterans in good standing. Catherine Eusebio, who spoke alongside Carlos, repeated that determination. She came to the United States from the Philippines with her family when she was 4 years old. Today, Catherine is a graduate of the University of California-Berkeley with a de-
gree in political science. Five years ago as a high school senior desperate to go on to college, she suddenly became aware that she had spent her childhood growing up in California devoted to studying hard and doing well in school but that didn’t matter to many adults in power: “This was in 2007 when the Congress was taking up immigration reform, and so I saw this contrast: I worked really, really hard to get to where I am so I could go to
See edelman on Page 46
By Ron Busby
This MOU Is For You! Those of us in the business of maximizing opportunities for Black-owned businesses have become accustomed to acronyms… MWBEs, HUBZones, 8(a), DBE, and so on. I could probably fill a page if I worked really hard at it. Remembering all of them and their meanings demands that we slow down and make sure they’re not just shorthand for continued shortchang-
ing of the businessmen and women we work so hard for. One highlight of the U.S. Black Chamber, Inc.’s (USBC) recently completed School of Chamber Management (SCM) was the signing of an MOU – Memorandum of Understanding – between our organization and the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). According to Deputy Administrator Marie Johns, the goal of the document is to improve Black business owners’ access to loan programs and other access to capital initia-
tives; government contracting programs such as the 8(a) program and the Women-Owned Small Business Program; and ensure availability of up-to-date information and access to SBA’s extensive resource partner network. That sounds good, and if we’re able to achieve these goals, we’ll have done something that’s not been done before. What goes unsaid, however, is what this latest “treaty” between Black business and the U.S. government means to us. It means that we have a pact that guaran-
ASKIA-AT-LARGE
tees that our government will listen to us, and our perspectives, while working diligently to align federal policies with the realities of the marketplace. It means that the SBA understands that a “one-size fits all” approach to meaningful inclusion in government procurement and resource allocation has not, does not and will not work. It means, too, that the SBA believes that our approach to our mission – our 5 Pillars of Service – Advocacy, Access to Capital, Contracting, Entrepre-
neur Training, and Chamber Development – reflects our commitment to this critical work. It means that it’s easy to see that what we’re asking is “… not a hand-out, but a hand up!” It means that we recognize change is hard, but we remain encouraged. Over the last three years, SBA has provided small businesses owners and entrepreneurs with the tools they need to not only survive, but thrive in tough economic times. We
See Busby on Page 46
By Askia Muhammad
Who’s Better off Than Four Years Ago? Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s videotaped remark to wealthy supporters that 47 percent of Americans “believe they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it” and that “my job is not to worry about” people who won’t “take personal responsibility” literally went over like a lead balloon. But because of a reservoir of hatred against the enwww.washingtoninformer.com
tire Black family occupying the White House Gov. Romney still has a puncher’s chance to knock out the incumbent President Barack Obama, win the presidency and lead the country back to the brink of its destruction. Gov. Romney frequently insists that President Obama can say a lot of things to the American people, but he cannot tell them that they are better off now than they were four years ago. That’s true, but it’s true because four years ago, nearly to the day, the country was teeter-
ing on the precipice of financial ruin. In mid-September the Wall Street mega-firm Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy, and the country was introduced to the concept of banks that the administration of President George W. [for Worst in History] Bush, and both major party contenders to succeed him agreed were “too big to fail.” The bank bailout was proposed and eventually approved and more than $700 billion went into the pockets of the greedy mortgage bankers and other so-
called financial “experts” who engineered the banking crisis in the first place, with their predatory loans, and their risky “investments” – most folks now call them “bets” – in questionable credit default swaps, derivatives, and other tools that bankers used to make money by buying and selling “money,” and not by making and selling “things” that people need to live their lives. And how were these rich guys rewarded for nearly bankrupting the country? Were any of them “frog marched” out of their
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companies? Were any of them humiliated in the town squares in old-fashioned “stocks” where they could not move and where angry citizens could hurl rotten tomatoes at them like in days of yore? Absolutely not. Most of them had contracts providing them with so-called “golden parachutes” so they could land safely with lots of money in the bank, while everyone else faced the wolf at their door. So, when Gov. Romney asks
See Muhammad on Page 46
Sept. 27, 2012 - Oct. 3, 2012
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