Rick Sanchez: Lowe's accommodates customer's racist request – but who is at fault here?

Finally, a story we can all agree on that takes racism to a whole other level.  A woman in Virginia doesn’t like having “black people” in her house and thereby refuses to have an order from Lowe’s delivered by an African-American driver. 

Marcus Bradley has been working for Lowe's for more than a decade. Last week, while making a routine delivery for Lowe’s Home Improvement in Danville, Va., he received a call from a manager telling him to stop his run and return the shipment.

The Lowe’s manager chose to treat a racist request as if it were something as customary as a change of address. It wasn’t. It is a serious mistake, not one for which the employee should be fired, but certainly new material for the Lowe’s training manual on diversity compliance. 

- Rick Sanchez

Assuming there was something wrong with the order or the merchandise, Bradley asked his dispatcher why the delivery had been called off; that’s when Bradley found out the problem wasn’t the merchandise, it was him.  

The order stayed the same, but a driver with fairer skin pigmentation replaced Bradley.

“I asked him why I couldn’t do it, and he said because you’re black and they don’t want you at the house,” Bradley told ABC affiliate WSET.

At this point in the story it’s hard to figure out which is worse. The fact that Lowe’s abided by the woman’s wishes and replaced Bradley with a white driver or that the woman – whose name has not been released although she’s appeared on camera – would make such a seemingly racist request.

Actually, it’s an easy choice. I defer to the elderly woman, not because I in any way agree with her. Let’s be clear, hers is a racist request, but I give her a pass. You know why?  It’s because of her age and the fear of her surroundings mostly caused by a clamorous drumbeat of violence associated with black people, which she undoubtedly watches night after night on her local news.  

I would guess the only black people she knows are the ones she sees on her talking box, and it ain’t a pretty picture. 

Grandma, you’re wrong. That man you disrespected, Marcus Bradley, is by all appearances a hard worker and good man who was just trying to take care of his family. But we understand from where you’re fear and prejudice arise. 

Unfortunately, we can’t say the same thing about the Lowe’s manager who chose to legitimize her request. The request itself should have made that proverbial bell go off in his head saying to him like the Great Gazoo in a Fred Flintstone shoulder, “This isn’t right!” 

Instead, the Lowe’s manager chose to treat a racist request as if it were something as customary as a change of address. It wasn’t. It is a serious mistake, not one for which the employee should be fired, but certainly new material for the Lowe’s training manual on diversity compliance. It’s a chapter we assumed we no longer had to read or write and which again reminds us how far we still have to go when it comes to race relations in America.

As for Lowe's Home Improvement, they chose to fire the employees who made the mistake and have apologized to Bradley. 

I’ll leave it to others to argue the propriety of that decision. What’s more important is the lesson learned. A lesson we all should heed from the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, “In the end we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” 

Rick Sanchez is a contributor for Fox News Latino.

Via: Fox News Latino

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[Commentary] Climate change and the Latino community

Climate change and its components adversely affect the Latino community. For example, the 2010 census data show that Latinos became the majority in 191 U.S. metropolitan districts, especially in areas with high vehicle traffic and power plant activity.

Furthermore, data from the American Lung Association indicate that Latinos have the highest incidence of asthma. A major issue is the impact of power plants as the largest source of carbon pollution in the U.S., accounting for approximately one-third of all domestic greenhouse emissions, a climate change component. Of concern is the connection between the asthma and the emissions.

However, there is a broader context that should worry Americans: climate change. While greenhouse emissions are the result of the power-plant operations, the results of such emissions have been global warming in the intermediate term and climate change in the long term. Invariably, global warming and climate change have been used interchangeably but are in fact distinct events in a greater set of environmental problems.

The Colorado Latino Leadership, Advocacy, and Research Organization (CLLARO) has recently completed a research project that measured the Latino community's perception about climate change. Almost half of the respondents identified themselves as bilingual or multilingual compared to English only or Spanish only. Among several survey items was one asking the respondents whether climate change is the same as global warming. The bilingual/multilingual group was almost fifty-percent more likely than the English speaking group and more than twice as likely as the Spanish speaking group to respond correctly.

Bilingualism and its cultural components can be proxies for cross cultural sensitivity — i.e., aware of events in both the Latino community and the larger one. Therefore, these findings, among others, highlight the importance of culture and more specifically cross cultural understanding of the impact of climate change on the Latino community.

Understanding such difference is key to developing strategies for dealing with the overall problem of climate change. The enforcement of the Clean Power Plan will begin the process of mitigating the adverse fall out from power plant emissions. The plan calls for cutting carbon pollution from the power sector by 30 percent from 2005 levels. The proposal also requires cutting pollution from soot and smog by over 25 percent by 2030. The results will be cleaner breathing and better health.

However, to ensure that such mitigation occurs in ways that improve the health of the Latino community, there is a need for diverse representation at the strategy table, whether that table is set by the governor, the Colorado congressional and senatorial delegation, city mayors and/or the private sector. Given the evidence, culturally responsive persons are more likely to understand the issues and recommend viable steps for improving the quality of life for the Latino community. These steps can include outreach, community education, involvement in the public policy process, and, of course, voting.

As part of the national strategy to deal with climate change, CLLARO supports the Clean Power Plan and will encourage members of the Latino community to support it also. The improvement in the quality of health and life within the Latino community and the overall Colorado community merits such support.

Christine Alonzo is executive director of the Colorado Latino Leadership Advocacy Research Organization. CLLARO will host a Research Expo on Aug.13 at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts from 5 to 7 p.m.

Via: Denver Post

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Opinion: GOP targets Latinos’ ability to vote

Even as a diverse coalition of Americans unite around the principle that voting rights are an essential American principle that needs to be protected, the Republican Party remains firmly committed to doing the opposite. Their continued push for policies that make it more difficult for people to vote disproportionately affects minority and young voters.

Republicans – including leading Presidential candidates – have for years been pushing initiatives that make it harder to vote. Jeb Bush supports states’ efforts to enact voter ID laws, and as governor, he restricted early voting and infamously purged 12,000 eligible voters before the 2000 presidential election. Marco Rubio asked, “What’s the big deal?” with voter ID laws. Scott Walker enacted what has been described as “one of the most restrictive voter ID laws in the country.”

Voter ID laws systematically target Latinos’ and other minorities’ ability to vote. In 2012, measures to restrict voting could have affected over 10 million Latino voters. A Brennan Center for Justice study reported, “In Colorado, Florida, and Virginia, the number of eligible Latino citizens that could be affected by these barriers exceeds the margin of victory in each of those states during the 2008 presidential election.”

And it’s no accident that these laws disproportionately affect Latinos. A separate study from last year found “a solid link between legislator support for voter ID laws and bias toward Latino voters, as measured in their responses to constituent e-mails.” And yet another study that was released earlier this year found that even in states without voter ID laws, Latinos were targeted: “Election officials themselves also appear to be biased against minority voters, and Latinos in particular. For example, poll workers are more likely to ask minority voters to show identification, including in states without voter identification laws.”

Some Republicans have explicitly made known their intentions of suppressing Latino and African-American voters in order to win elections. Over 30 years ago, ALEC-founder and co-founder of the Heritage Foundation Paul Weyrich spoke plainly:  “I don’t want everybody to vote…As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.” Republican after Republican has continued in his footsteps: An Ohio GOP County Chair stated he supports limits on early voting because, “I really actually feel we shouldn’t contort the voting process to accommodate the urban – read African-American – voter-turnout machine.” Pennsylvania House Speaker Mike Turzaibelieved voter ID laws would “allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.” Former GOP Precinct Chair Don Yeltonused the “n” word as he tried to deny that a voter ID law in North Carolina was racist (and he explained that “the law is going to kick the Democrats in the butt”). Conservative activist and notoriouslyanti-immigrant Phyllis Schlafly said, “The reduction in the number of days allowed for early voting is particularly important because early voting plays a major role in Obama’s ground game.” Schlafly’s Eagle Forum endorsed Marco Rubio in his run for Senate (here’s a lovely picture of the two of them) and applauded Scott Walker for his opposition to legal immigration.

Via: Fox News Latino

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Latino donors set sights on GOP lawmakers who oppose immigration overhaul

A network of Latino donors that played a pivotal role in raising money for President Obama’s reelection is now focused on a new campaign: an effort to oust lawmakers who stand in the way of overhauling immigration laws.

The Latino Victory Project, a new political advocacy organization modeled after the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, is planning to spend as much as $20 million on campaigns targeting members of Congress who have sizable Latino communities in their districts but oppose comprehensive immigration reform.

At a private meeting for about 30 donors, fundraisers and union leaders Friday, leaders of the group laid out a strategy to make the issue central in next year’s midterm elections if Congress does not pass a bill, identifying 10 House Republicans who would be vulnerable to pressure from Latino constituents.

Members of the group agreed to spend $1 million to $2 million in each of the targeted districts. The effort will begin in coming weeks with a campaign aimed at persuading the lawmakers to back an immigration measure this year. If that fails, the group plans to run a barrage of radio and TV ads against them next year.

“We’re all very united,” said Amalia Perea Mahoney, an art gallery owner in Chicago, who joined donors from Washington, Florida, Texas, California, New York and Massachusetts at Friday’s gathering at a hotel in the District. “I think it’s a pivotal moment.”

Tom Snyder, the AFL-CIO’s immigration campaign manager, said, “There was agreement in the room that if we don’t see action in the House, we know who we’re going after.”

Via: Washington Post

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Stop enforcing border laws, say progressives

The federal government should stop deporting illegal immigrants, and should instead create a pan-American zone where Latinos can freely migrate into the United States, says Arturo Carmona, the director of Presente.org, a grassroots Latino organization.

Polls show that Americans are in favor of letting the 11 million illegal immigrants stay, so there’s no point in deporting them, he told The Daily Caller.

Besides, the deportations are an insult to all Latinos, he suggested. “It makes no rational sense to treat a population with such indignity,” said Carmona, a longtime community activist who was picked in January 2012 to head the organization, which claims 250,000 members.

Carmona’s group doesn’t distinguish between the 11 million illegal immigrants and the 30 million legal immigrants in the country.

“Millions of immigrants [are] suffering under the boot of terrible and failed immigration policies of the past five years … [which has led to] the destruction of families of immigrants” because of deportations, said an Oct. 18 statement from Carmona’s group.

Carmona’s group is extreme, but it has the same worldview as the more prominent progressives based in Washington D.C., said Mark Krikorian, the director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which wants to reduce the current annual inflow of 1 million people.

“I wish [Presente.org was covered] more in the media because they’re pretty hard core… they’re more of a loose cannon and are willing to say what the [D.C.-based] progressives want, without couching it in comfortable fluff,” he told TheDC.

“I don’t think the [progressives] disagree with [Carmona] in any way,” he said.

Via: Daily Caller
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Senate bill to boost immigrant-voters bloc by 32 million voters in 2036

The Senate’s immigration rewrite would boost the number of new immigrants eligible to vote by 10 million in 2024 and by 32 million in 2036, according to a new report by the Center for immigration Studies.

The flood of new voters could greatly aid the Democratic party, which won the Latino and Asian voting blocs by more than 40 percentage points in 2012.

“The current level of immigration plus the additions from [the Senate immigration bill] S.744 would create nearly 10 million [extra] potential voting-age citizens by 2024, and more than 32 million by 2036,” said the Oct. 10 report, “How Many New Voters Would S.744 Create?”

The current immigration rate brings in roughly 1 million legal immigrants per year, and will add almost 15 million new voters by 2036, said the report. That inflow will create a 3-million-vote advantage for Democrats in 2036, assuming half of the eligible immigrant voters cast ballots and also that the Democrats maintain their 40-point advantage.

The additional immigrants added by the Senate’s “Gang of Eight” bill would add another 4-million-vote advantage to the Democrats’ tally in 2036, even if only 50 percent turn out to vote.

The combination of existing and increased immigration could provide Democrats with a 7-million-vote advantage from new immigrants in 2036. That margin is greater than Obama’s advantage of 4.5 million votes in 2012.

The CIS report does not discuss the economic impact of the new immigrants, which proponents say will be beneficial to America, and critics say will be harmful to Americans.

The GOP’s leaders in the House have declared they support a major rewrite of immigration law, but have yet to schedule floor votes. Polls show that increased immigration is very unpopular, especially among the voters needed in 2014 to re-eleect the GOP majority in the House.

Via: Daily Caller

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HUD's New 'Fair Housing' Rule Establishes Diversity Data for Every Neighborhood in U.S.

To ensure that "every American is able to choose to live in a community they feel proud of," HUD has published a new fair-housing regulation intended to give people access to better neighborhoods than the ones they currently live in.

The goal is to help communities understand "fair housing barriers" and "establish clear goals" for "improving integrated living patterns and overcoming historic patterns of segregation."

“This proposed rule represents a 21st century approach to fair housing, a step forward to ensuring that every American is able to choose to live in a community they feel proud of – where they have a fair shot at reaching their full potential in life,” said HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan.

“For the first time ever," Donovan added, "HUD will provide data for every neighborhood in the country, detailing the access African American, Latino, Asian, and other communities have to local assets, including schools, jobs, transportation, and other important neighborhood resources that can play a role in helping people move into the middle class."

Via: CNS News

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CHURCHES USING 'SOULS TO POLLS' TO RALLY VOTE

It's not just the collection plate that's getting passed around this fall at hundreds of mainly African-American and Latino churches in presidential battleground states and across the nation.

Exhorting congregations to register to vote, church leaders are distributing registration cards in the middle of services, and many are pledging caravans of "souls to the polls" to deliver the vote.

The stepped-up effort in many states is a response by activists worried that new election rules, from tougher photo identification requirements to fewer days of early voting, are unfairly targeting minority voters _ specifically, African-Americans who tend to vote heavily for Democrats. Some leaders compare their registration and get-out-the-vote efforts to the racial struggle that led to the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

"In light of all this, we are saying just let our people vote," said the Rev. Dawn Riley Duval, social justice minister at the Shorter Community A.M.E. Church in Denver. "The people are being oppressed by these measures. It has ignited a sense of urgency and collective power that we can take by engaging in the process."

In key swing states such as Florida and Ohio, proponents of the new election rules deny they are aimed at suppressing the minority vote in hopes of helping Republicans win more races. Reasons for their enactment vary between rooting out fraud and purging ineligible voters to streamlining the voting process.

But to some African-American leaders like the Rev. F.E. Perry, a Cleveland-based bishop in Ohio's Church of God in Christ, it's as if the 1960s barriers to black civil rights have returned all over again.

"We've come too far to sit idly by and watch that happen," Perry said. "We want to get souls to the polls. Whatever it takes to get them there, that's what we're going to do."

Via Breitbart

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