by Alex Meneses Miyashita

Janet Murguía

Only four presidential candidates—all Democrats— showed up at a forum sponsored by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Oct. 3 during its annual Hispanic Heritage Month activities in Washington’ D.C., spurring 5criticism from some Latino leaders at the event.

“It’s a mistake for the other candidates not to have been here’ Janet Murguía’ president of the National Council of La Raza, told Weekly Report. “It’s a missed opportunity.”

All Democrat and Republican candidates were invited to participate, according to the CHCI. This includes eight Democrats and ten Republicans.

The quartet of Democratic candidates who spoke at CHCl’s 2007 public policy conference included Sen. Joe Biden (Del.), Sen. Hillary Clinton (N.Y.), former Sen. Mike Gravel (Alaska) and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (Ohio).

Democratic leaders at the event sharply criticized the absence of Republican candidates, stressing it was not the first time that they failed to address members of the Latino community.

“Republicans have been completely absent and I think that is an insult to our community’~ Sen. Robert Menéndez (D-N.J.) told a group of reporters in Spanish. ¢¢lf they… have rejected the opportunities to communicate with our community why they should be the president of the United States, I think the people will reject them in November of next year.~Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-Calif.) also chided them’ noting that all of the Republican candidates, except for Rep. Duncan Hunter (Calif.), refused to attend the National Association of Elected and Appointed Officials conference in Orlando in June. “This is a very clear message to the Latino community that the Republican candidates in particular do not value the Latino community and are not interested in trying tc have R diRlQ9Ue’’’She told Weekly Report.

Other recent instances in which Republican candidates have not participated in a public forum addressing issues of concern to Latinos and communities of color include a debate on PBS end another sponsored by Univisión with instant translation.

The Republican National Committee rejected the notion that the party is not interested in reaching out to Hispanics and earning their vote.

“That s just a political campaign that the Democrats want to do,” Hessy Fernandez, the director of Hispanic communications with the RNC, told Weekly Report.

Fernandez emphasized it was “ironic” that Democrats went on to criticize Republican candidates when only four of their candidates showed up at a forum put together by a “Democrat” organization.

“This organization tends to serve the interests of the Democratic Party,” she said.

The CHCh chaired by Democratic Rep. Joe Baca (Calif.), defines itself as a nonprofit nonpartisan organization.

But its 13 policy sessions were hosted by members of the all-Democratic Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Roybel-Allard said there were probably “very valid” reasons as to why four of the eight Democratic candidates failed to confirm their presence at the forum.

“It was probably a result of the (legislative schedule) conflict we have here in Washington’” she said, adding that Democratic candidates “have made an effort to show up at other events that have been put on by the Latino community.”

New Mexico GQV. Bill Richardson (D)’ the only Latino running for president, was among the absentees.

Campaign spokesperson Tom Reynolds confirmed to Weekly Report they had a prior scheduling in Nevada.

Richardson also missed the CHCl’s gala the evening of Oct. 3, an event he was confirmed to attend, because of “plane malfunctions,” Reynolds said.

An Associated Press article on Richardson’s campaign stop in Boulder City’ Nevada stated the governor “is hoping for a strong showing in Nevada, scheduled to hold the second caucus in the nation Jan. 19.”

One report had Obama’s camp excusing his absence to celebrate his wedding anniversary at home, but he made campaign stops in IOWR that day. The RNC’s Fernandez maintained the GOP candidates “ere putting forth a positive agenda that benefits Latinos,” and criticized in particular Clinton’s universal health plan as e proposal that Hispanics “don’t want.”

Clinton, the leading presidential candidate among Democrats and Republicans according to recent polls, was the only candidate at the forum who received a standing ovation from CHCI conference attendees, which to~ taled more than 600 at the forum.

“This was an opportunity for her to talk to the Latino community that really has been very supportive of her,” Fabiola Rodríguez Ciampoli, director of Hispanic communications for Clinton’s campaign, told Weekly Report. “It was definitely an invitation we could not have missed.”
Hispanic Link.

by Alex Meneses Miyashita

The DREAM Act, an uphill battle Activists and students show support for DREAM Act, while other students endure a week-long hunger strike in the San Fr­ancisco Civic Center. (file photos by Marvin J. Ramirez)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid ( D-Nev) has stated the intention to bring the so-Galled DREAM Act to the floor of the Senate by mid November.

The legislation would offer a path to legalization to certain undocumented students who finish high school and then attend college or join the military.

The bill, which supporters expected was going to be voted on last week as part of the Department of Defense authorization | bill, was blocked by | Republican lawmakers Sept. 26 and removed by Reid from I further consideration. Bill sponsor Sen. Dick Durbin (D-111.) stated afterwards, “I am disappointed that the Republican leadership has blocked my efforts to offer the DREAM Act as an amendment to the Defense Authorization bill despite the fact that it would help to solve the military’s recruitment crisis “

Students on hunger strike.

The legislation has the support of some national Hispanic, immigrant rights and education groups.

“The Dream Act is really a question of educational opportunity for young people who have been brought up in this country,~ said National Council of La Raza vice president Cecilia Munoz.

According to supporters, an stand to benefit from the bill.

However, some Latino activists are coming out against it so long as it contains the military provisions.

Among them was the Association of Raza Educators, based in Los Angeles, which called the legislation “a ploy by the United States government to create a de-facto military draft for undocumented students.”

Hispanic Link.

­

by the El Reportero news services

Rafael Correa Delgado

President Rafael Correa’s Acuerdo País claimed to have won 80 of the 130 seats in the constituent assembly elections on 30 September. The results are not yet official and the opposition parties are clinging to the hope that the official results will give them a boost, but the preliminary results look conclusive. Indeed the opposition parties were so despondent that they refused to publish their exit poll, from Consultar, and allowed the Santiago Pérez exit poll, followed by a sampling from Participación Ciudadana, to set the agenda. Both showed Correa’s Acuerdo País winning between 77 and 80 seats.

Human rights lawsuits brought against former Bolivian president

The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) announced that it, along with other human rights lawyers, has filed two lawsuits charging former Bolivian President Gonzalo Daniel Sánchez de Lozada Sánchez Bustamante and former Bolivian Minister of Defense Jose Carlos Sánchez Berzaín for their roles in the killing of civilians during popular protests against the Bolivian government in September and October 2003.

The suits, which seek compensatory and punitive damages under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA) charge Sánchez de Lozada and Sánchez Berzaín with extrajudicial killings and crimes against humanity for their roles in the massacre of unarmed civilians, including children. In September and October 2003, Sánchez de Lozada and Sánchez Berzaín ordered Bolivian security forces to use deadly force, including the use of high-powered rifles and machine guns, to suppress popular civilian protests against government policies.

In all, during those two months forces under their leadership killed 67 men, women, and children and injured more than 400, almost all from indigenous Aymara communities.

Each of the ten plaintiffs, who are Aymara natives of Bolivia, are survivors of individuals who were killed by forces under Sánchez de Lozada’s and Sánchez Berzaín’s command.

The ten plaintiffs include among them: Eloy Rojas Mamani and Etelvina Ramos Mamani, whose 8-year-old daughter was killed in her mother’s bedroom when a single shot was fired through the window; Teofilo Baltazar Cerro, whose pregnant wife was killed after a bullet was fired through the wall of a house, killing her and her unborn child; Felicidad Rosa Huanca Quispe, whose 69-year-old father was shot and killed along a roadside; and Gonzalo Mamani Aguilar, whose father was shot and killed.

The alternatives to Chávez

The election result in Guatemala, perhaps the most fragile democracy in the region, was unusual because the populist leftwing barely featured. Yet no political commentator has rushed to proclaim that the Left’s failure means that support for President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela is ebbing. Embarrassingly for the anti-Chavistas, the two run-off candidates in Guatemala are a former general, accused of human rights abuses (Otto Pérez Molina), and a political hack, Alvaro Colom, who faces a slew of corruption allegations.

Iran strengthens ties with South America

CARACAS, Venezuela– The presidets of Iran and Venezuela secured an alliance aimed at countering the United States while the Iranian president reached out to a new ally in Bolivia and declared that together, “no one can defeat us.” After being vilified during his U.N. visit this week, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad traveled on to friendlier territory Thursday, first stopping in Bolivia – where he pledged $1 billion in investment – and then visiting Venezuela to meet President Hugo Chavez.

by Adolfo Flores

­Rubén Salazar

For those who followed his career firsthand and others who came to know him only as a martyr, there will soon be a new way to remember pioneer Chicano journalist Ruben Salazar. Early next year, he will be 5memorialized on a first-class postage stamp.

Salazar’s international exploits with the Los Angeles Times included war correspondent in Vietnam and Latin America bureau chief based in Mexico City. Returning to Los Angeles, he investigated and exposed rampant police brutality as a Times columnist and news director with the city’s Spanish-language television station KMEX.

During the National Chicano Moratorium march through East Los Angeles on Aug. 29, 1970, his ascending career was cut short at age 42. An L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy shot him through the head with an armor-piercing tear-gas projectile. He died instantly in the Silver Dollar Cafe, where he and his crew had taken a lunch break. A coroner’s jury ruled only that he died “at the hands of another.” No charges were ever brought.

Three years ago, former journalist Olga Briseño, who directs the Media, Democracy and Policy Initiative at the University of Arizona in Tucson, chose to ignite a campaign to share Salazar’s story with a commemorative postage stamp.

“He was a very successful, respected journalist at a time in which there was great change in how Latinos looked at themselves and were treated,” she says.

While attending a National Council of La Raza conference, she met U.S. Post Office spokesperson Augustine Ruiz Jr. She asked him why Cesar Chavez was the last Latino to be commemorated on a stamp.

“Who do you recommend?” answered Ruiz. Briseño recommended Salazar. Ruíz continued to serve as an advisor to Briseño throughout the process.

Last year Briseño mailed the Citizens Stamp Advisory Committee a package that weighed exactly ten pounds.

It included resolutions and more than 1,300 signatures from state and U.S. legislators to people in coffee shops around the country.

The committee reviews 50,000 submissions a year, says Ruiz. Of those, its members recommend 30 to the Postmaster General who makes the final selections.

Salazar’s 4t-cent stamp will be one in a block honoring the contributions of five eminent journalists. The block is expected to be released next March, the same month as Salazar’s birthday. The other journalists’ names will be released during the unveiling at the JW Marriott Hotel in Washington, D.C., Oct. 5.

Salazar began his career with the El Paso Times, across the river from Juarez, Mexico, where he was born. Lisa Salazar Johnson, one of his three children, was nine years old when her father was killed.

At first no one would tell her what had happened, she recounts. “The TV was on and it said’ Newsman Salazar Slain.’ I didn’t know what’ slain meant.”

At that point her grandmother explained to her what had happened.

Johnson says she can’t believe that after 37 years her father’s name still means something.

She says she will work to ensure that it continues to do so long after the stamp is unveiled.

Danny Villanueva, KMEX general manager when Salazar was killed, remembers when Ruben received hate mail for expose police malfeasance, he would post the letters on his office wall. “He would say, if they were angry enough to write, at least he made them think about the topic.”

Salazar’s stories put him on police radar to the point Villanueva was visited by some departmental representatives.

While they never directly asked, they made their point clear that they wanted Salazar dead. “When I refused, they said they had a pretty big file on me too,” recounts Villanueva.

He defines Salazar, “He was very honest. He was unwavering. He would attack Latino politicians if he thought they were wrong on a subject. If that bothered some people, too bad.”

Hispanic Link.