Philippine News

08/26/2024

No to $500 Million US aid.

08/22/2024

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08/18/2024

Are national conventions and electoral college as popular and relevant as they used to be?

As the Democratic Party currently holds their convention in Chicago weeks after the Republican Party members held their own in Milwaukee a month ago on July 15-18 barely days after an assassination attempt on their frontrunner former President Donald Trump, it is timely that the importance and relevance of conventions are revisited.

National conventions are much-awaited by party leaders and members alike by both Republican and Democratic parties in the U.S. as these are crucial events where parties officially nominate presidential and vice-presidential candidates, present their platform or policies, and energize their voter base. It also where the party electorates choose their nominee and elect delegates although are usually predictable events whose outcome is determined by the preceding primaries.

In a national ethnic media briefing conducted July 19, 2024 by Ethnic Media Services named Making Sense of the Conventions and the 2024 Elections, a panel of political veterans and an electoral access expert will explore questions like how they have differed from years before where divisions within parties may happen, how it will affect voters, their ability and willingness to vote among others.

Those who spoke at the briefing were Professor (ret) of the Practice of Public Policy Communication, Sol Price School of Public Policy, University of Southern California Sherry Bebitch Jeffe who was the political analyst for NBC4 Los Angeles and is one-half of the podcast “Inside Golden State Politics,” Professor Emeritus of Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University Bill Schneider who was CNN’s Senior Political Analyst from 1990 to 2009 and has been a Visiting Professor at the University of California at Los Angeles, Boston College, and Brandeis University and Director of Voting Advocacy and Partnerships, Campaign Legal Center Jonathan Diaz.

Just as the Republican Convention in July 15-18 was really different coming only days after the assassination attempt on the life of frontrunner Trump, the Democratic National proved to be also after the very rare sudden withdrawal from the presidential nomination and race of incumbent President Joe Biden on July 21 and shortly thereafter endorsing his Vice President Kamala Harris for the nomination in the Convention.

Jeffe admits that the conventions today are more about celebrating a choice for the president that has already been made through the party primaries is not much about choosing anymore. She advanced the possibility of having President Biden exiting gracefully from the campaign, that eventually happened as she ‘predicted’ successfully, the convention, including the ongoing one, has the muscle it has not had for a very long time. But the fact that Biden openly endorsed Harris to replace him to run against Trump was something she has not mentioned.

“It used to be a two-thirds majority which created all kinds of habits and we're talking in the nineteenth century, even though the late eighteenth century. Or it could be a contested or brokered convention. Contested means in this case, Biden stays in and people can test his role as the nominee. Brokered I don't think well, I mean the smoke filled room does not exist much anymore. But it's more because of smoking and information against smoking too much, and regulation as it is that, or a few people who do determine the nominee. It doesn't happen much anymore,” Jeffe explained.

Jeffe thinks that the important thing to know is that “we don't know what the power of the convention is going to be this year, but it has diminished over the American political history and what was a powerful mechanism for choosing a party's nominee has basically become one long campaign act by the party by the party's candidate.”

Schneider was quick to add that everything changed in 1972 as a result of the 1968 problems when the conventions chose Hubert Humphrey, who had not run in a single primary but he was the favorite of the party bosses.

“The choice of the nominee was turned over to primary voters, and the process of screening the candidates which had always been done by the party bosses. Is there anything on your moral, or medical, or legal or financial record we should know about now it's done by the press because the press is what informs the ordinary voters who choose the nominee,” narrated Schneider. “The conventions are really public relations events. They're just pep rallies on television to get the party juiced up for the campaign. What the Republican Convention proved is that Donald Trump has taken complete possession of the republican party. There is no opposition anymore to Ronald Reagan in the Republican party. It used to be the party of Ronald Reagan. Now I would say the Republican party is not just the party of Donald trump. It's also the party of Archie Bunker. It's changed its base from the country club.”

Diaz added to what earlier commenters mentioned saying that the process of allocating those delegates has continued to change since the 1970s, especially recently on the Democratic party side in 2016 when a lot about super delegates were heard versus pledged delegates elaborating that the pledge to delegates are the ones allocated out to the various states and territories, and who are pledged to a candidate based on which candidate wins that State's primary or caucus.

“However, the State Party chooses to organize their primary and then super delegates are usually officials or senior members of the party who are not typically bound by the results of any State primary, and who now wouldn't get to vote on the first round at the convention but if there is no clear majority after the first round then they would get to participate in a second round of voting for a candidate,” Diaz lectured.

Diaz continued that, obviously, Joe Biden as the incoming President running for re-election has a majority of the pledged delegates from the spring and summer primaries.

“But all that the primary determines is who the delegates that are sent to the Convention on behalf of those States are pledged to vote for to be the nominee. And if that person who they are pledged to vote for were to withdraw from contention (as what eventually happened), then the delegates are no longer bound by those pledges and so that's when you get into the various scenarios of an open or a contested convention, in which case we wouldn't know where the majority of those delegates will wind up, or who or who they would wind up, voting for,” Diaz further explained.

On the relevance and/or the need to change or modify the electoral college, Schnieder reminded that the electoral college principally has Republican supporter now because without the electoral College trump would never have become president.

“He lost the popular vote, and he won by the electoral college. So Republicans are committed to preserving the electoral college and there is nothing going to happen if they resist it because to change the electoral college you have to change the constitution. That is a very elaborate process which involves not just Congress but also the State legislatures which are now dominated by Republicans and are likely to be more dominated by Republicans. So nothing is likely to change in the electoral rules,” Schneider foresees.

Jaffe chimed in that this is in the Constitution because it was the deal that “was cut as we were framing this country between the big States and the little States.”

“If there had been simply a popular vote, the big States would have ruled every election, so we have the Senate which is two Senators each, and the House, which has four hundred and thirty-five, and then we have the electoral college which means that every State, even though there is a balance there is a formula, it doesn't wipe out the small States. It's all part of the compromises that were made at the very start of this nation,” Jaffe clarified.

Schneider continued that “most of those compromises involve the slave states, which insisted on equal representation. They knew perfectly well that as more states were admitted to the Union, there would not be more slave States, so they insisted that all States have equal representation, and we're still living with that. Wyoming which has a very small population about one twentieth the size of California has two Senators California has two Senators. Washington D.C. has doesn't have any senators but each State has two senators, no matter what size it is that is not going to change. That was originally to protect the slave States. But it's still a powerful incentive, because many of the small States are Republicans States. It's not going to change.”

On whether the electoral system is possibly contributing to the demise of this democracy, Schneider believes it is not as democracy will be preserved “and it is still basically democratic, although there are some little distortions, but it will remain democratic, and I don't think the rules will change.”

Diaz think it is worth noting that the instances “in which the popular vote and the Electoral College the popular vote winner and the Electoral College winner have been different are very few.”

“Most of the time throughout history the candidate that wins the popular vote also wins the electoral college. But I do think when you think about public confidence in the democratic system, it is difficult for everyday people who had admired in this election rules some of us are, to look at a system where the person who gets the most votes may not win and wonder how that is fair or how that is democratic. And so when you have instances like we did in 2016 where the person who gets the highest number of votes is not the person who wins the election under the rules that we have, that that contributes to you know dissatisfaction with democracy and with the electoral system, or a sense that democracy is not working.”

Captions:

Sherry Bebitch Jeffe

Bill Schneider

Jonathan Diaz

08/18/2024

Hate crimes against LGBTQ+ persist even as overall hate crime rate decrease

It is good to hear that the California Department of Justice (DOJ) reported that the overall hate crime rate decreased by 7.1% in 2023 as compared to the previous year 2022. But the gladness cannot be full when you hear that hate crimes reported against LGBTQ+ communities continue to rise at alarming rates as reported by the same office.

According to the head of DOJ chief Attorney General Rob Bonta, data reported to DOJ in 2023 shows that between 2022 and 2023, there were 405 reported hate crime events motivated by sexual orientation bias or an increase of 3.6% from the previous year and 76 hate crime events motivated by anti-transgender or anti gender-nonconforming bias or an increase of 7.04% from the previous year.

In a briefing sponsored by Ethnic Media Services & California Civil Rights Department dubbed Anti-LGBTQ+ Hate Crimes Still Rising on July 18, 2024, representatives from the California Civil Rights Department, community-based organizations that partner with the state’s first-ever multilingual hotline CA vs Hate, and LGBTQ+ advocates discussed the rise, including how people may have different experiences of hate and discrimination depending on their race, age, class, gender, sexuality, and more.

The speakers shared their perspectives on these issues and on increasing rates of hate in California and on a national level and also discussed the latest data from the first year of CA vs Hate, demonstrating how the LGBTQ+ community has helped shape the hotline and has been supported by the new reporting hotline and the services provided via the care coordination network.

Among those who shared their time for the discussion were Deputy Director of Strategic Initiatives and External Affairs, The Civil Rights Department Becky Monroe, Black Leadership Council, Director of The Coalition for Justice and Equality Across Movements, Director of The Center to End the Epidemic Toni Newman, Legal Support Staff and Grant Administrator, St. Johns Community Health Legal Services Department Andy Ruiz and Coordinator LGBTQ+ District Resource and Support, Santa Clara County Office of Education Aries Yumul.

Monroe opened the discussion in their mission is to protect people of California from all forms of unlawful discrimination and that hate crimes is a fact and that acts of hate do not happen in a vacuum but happen in the context of other forms of civil rights protections.

“It makes sense that the California Civil Rights Department would be the home to this work because we enforce protections against employment, discrimination, housing. We provide civil legal services and civil support and civil legal enforcement with respect to hate violence. Enforcing all forms of civil rights, protections is critical to addressing and combating hate,” Monroe informed. “I think it is important to note that we know this data state, like federal data, is under reported for many reasons and that hearing directly from the community who may not feel safe to report or from communities who have reported but it's still not being shared accurately.”

“On the chart included in the Attorney General’s Office most recent report that while we noticed that there is underreporting it is still important to note trends. In here, you see hate on the basis of sexual orientation increased 3.6%. You see the data around Anti-LGBTQ data may not match what the community uses, and that's an important note. But based on the data we have, that's an increase of 86%. If you look at hate crimes, targeting people based on sexual orientation between 2021 and 2022 increased 29%. So we have a consistent increase in acts of hate, and I think that is important to flag,” Monroe believes.

Monroe continues that the broader message here is that it is known there is a continuing increase hearing directly from communities that this is a time and “this is indeed a call to action and a crisis that we all need to respond to.”

Newman talked about black transwomen with data from the human rights campaign that reported that as of 2024, nineteen transgender and gender expansive people whose lives were tragically taken to violent means, including gun, on intimate partner and violence in 2024.

“Out of those, 68% of the victims were people of color, 32% were black transgender women. What we're finding is that of the deaths of the LGBTQ and of trans folk. Over 40 on the average per year, which is a big number, are transwomen of color,” Newman stated. “I have 30 years of lived experience as a transwoman of color, had graduated from Wake Forest and found myself homeless, without family and friends. So I have lived through what it is to be on the streets, have no home, and what hate looks like up close and personal. It is still going on not at that rate. But these this type of hate is still occurring.”

Newman added that the depth of transwomen in the United States remains a critical issue highlighting three intersections – racism, transphobia and systemic violence. Transgender women, particularly those of color, disproportionately have high rates of violence and fatality over any of the trans community, male or female, of any other race.

“Since 2013, over 85% of transgender and gender nonconforming people who were killed were people of color, and most of that were black transwomen making up two-thirds of these victims. In 2013, HRC and the FBI started tracking transgender hate. This violence that we see are occurring at high numbers. Last year was 23 transgender folk 19 of those were transwomen of color. The year before was almost 30, over 24 of those were transwomen of color, mainly black. So black, transwomen of color are facing high death rates in the United States, as well as violence, job discrimination and hate,” rued Newman. “It occurs nationwide with States like Texas, Florida, and California, having the highest number of reported fatalities. And we here at Trends can work, or addressing in and combating the violence by trying to give every transgender individual a job as well as chance can work.”

Ruiz echoed that events such as hate incidents, hate speech, and hate crimes definitely have escalated and rise in violence towards LGBTQ people.

“Specifically, I address this issue regarding the political atmosphere and landscape. There are a lot of bills currently in the United States that are targeting transgender people. And definitely, during these times of political turmoil, as I like to call them, a lot of violence starts to escalate,” Ruiz lamented. “My work that I've created and done here with stop the hate was as the first staff attorney hired at St. John's and predominantly a lot of my work was educating folks about their rights when it comes to being victims of hate crimes and part of that work also meant having to engage law enforcement, use restorative justice, and other methods to provide some sort of justice for individuals that are facing these crimes. What I found in my work, that the highest populations that were being targeted were LGBTIQ+ people, transgender individuals, as well as undocumented people.”

Yumul admitted that there's a lot in the day to day that is done and that legislation is great, but does not change the hearts and minds of people.

“And those of us educators, nonprofit and organizers who are really on the ground, we are trying to get folks together to understand the work that we're doing to benefit everybody. There are public forums that we do and go about planning. There's a lot of things that we do with our community that really do go unnoticed. And I think that if we bring that to life, then we're part of the community. We are talking and listening to each other. We're really trying to make everything better for everybody,” Yumul advises.

Captions:

Becky Monroe

Toni Newman

Andy Ruiz

Aries Yumul

08/15/2024

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08/12/2024

TAGLISH WEBINAR ON WILDFIRE SAFETY & PREVENTION ON TUESDAY, AUGUST 20, 2024

EVENT TITLE: Wildfire Safety and Prevention Webinar
TYPE OF EVENT: online via Zoom
ORGANIZER(S): Philippine American Press Club and PG&E
WHAT: A Taglish (Tagalog and English) webinar for Filipino American communities in Northern California
DESCRIPTION: With climate change increasing wildfire risks, this webinar offers crucial information on staying safe.
WHEN: Tuesday, August 20, 2024
WHERE: bit.ly/KaligtasanSaWildfirePGE�Meeting ID: 844 9707 2353�Passcode: Mabuhay
WHAT TIME: 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m., PDT
HOW MUCH: Free.
NO NEED TO RSVP.
WEBSITE: http://www.papcusa.org/

🔴⚪️🔵

The Philippine American Press Club (http://www.papcusa.org/), established in 1988, was founded by former members of the National Press Club of the Philippines who had immigrated to the San Francisco Bay Area and saw the need for a US-based Filipino American media group. All fierce advocates for truth, fairness, and excellence in journalism, they realized the vital role of media education and advocacy for the fast-growing Filipino population.

Here are some tips I have gathered through my few years living in high wildfire-prone regions in Northern California. Whether you live full-time or part-time in these zones, go on camping trips, or experience a very dry summer, where the grass and trees seem to be more brown than green --- this is for us!

· Know your location: Always have your exact longitude and latitude ready for emergency responders.
· Prepare a "Go Bag": Include essentials like non-perishable food, water, a first-aid kit, medications, and important documents. More at https://readyforwildfire.org/prepare-for-wildfire/emergency-supply-kit/.
· Connect with neighbors: Establish a phone tree or other alert system to share wildfire warnings quickly. One neighbor could oversee three other neighbors for wildfire alerts. In my neighborhood, whenever we hear four car honks in succession, it means there is a wildfire close to us.

Let's share this important webinar to save lives and property in our community and inspire them to attend the webinar. With climate change, we never know how safe we are from wildfires.

08/08/2024

08/08/2024

Where is your integrity AFP and PNP? Our Country is under Narco Politics..

08/08/2024

Where is the Religious group?

08/03/2024

https://www.youtube.com/live/7oLgsyeBDzo?si=DCUl1f9qMlxOABO6

Ito Na Ang Isa Sa Voltes 5 | Star Witness Sa Polvoron LIVE With Cathy B

08/02/2024

California summer safety campaign in full swing

Very much like the previous years, news of wildfires dominates local newspapers as what are happening in Northern California particularly the park fire in and around Chico that is affecting the Butte, Plumas, Shasta and Tehama Counties, although arson is suspected to be the cause of this fire. And as the summer season is strongly being felt in many areas in California, hotter and drier conditions means that Californians will likely face higher risks of wildfires, wildfire smoke, heat, power outages and dangerous water conditions. These conditions pose significant challenges for California’s most at-risk populations.

This July 2, 2024 briefing dubbed as Stay Cool California! Listos California Summer of Safety Campaign, conducted by Listos California in partnership with Ethnic Media Services and California Black Media included resources available to help communities prepare for climate related challenges.

California’s most vulnerable populations will continue to be kept informed through ongoing series of statewide ethnic media briefings by Ethnic Media Services and California Black Media in partnership with Listos California, a program of the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES) with briefings focusing on sharing vital information and resources available to all Californians to ensure their safety over the summer months and will be provided by frontline experts.

At the briefing moderated by Executive Director of California Black Media Regina Brown Wilson were Senior Advisor, Listos California Sonya Harris, City of Sacramento Fire Department Captain Andrew Ramos, Assistant Health Officer for the State of California and Director of Population Health, California Department of Public Health Dr. Rita Nguyen, CalOSHA Program Senior Safety Engineer Communications and Outreach, California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) Charlene Gloriani, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s David Lawrence, and CalOES’s Amy Palmer.

Meteorologist Lawrence a meteorologist with the National Weather Service reminded all that “we are just at the beginning stages of what looks to be a fairly long duration of a heat event across much of the state of California where temperatures are obviously hot in many areas and will ramp up in intensity heading through probably at least many weeks to come.

“The longevity of this particular event is what we're most concerned with. We'll see daytime high temperatures. For many interior areas reaching anywhere between 100 to a115 degrees each afternoon. And the bigger story is likely to be over the long haul overnight low temperatures not providing much relief as readings only dip into the 70s, perhaps holding in the lower 80s for some locations so we won't see those cool overnight temperatures to give us that relief,” Lawrence added.

The two factors, the length of this heat wave and those very warm overnight temperatures are very likely to compound the impacts from this particular heat events leading to excessive heat warnings for a large majority of the state of California. The big story here is that this is a long duration of heat potentially expecting a significant health safety and other impacts again due to the duration of this heat.

Palmer of California Office of Emergency Services (CalOES) is thankful that community-based organizations, the media and various governmental agencies are with them saying, “it's moments like these that were so grateful for your partnership obviously the disaster landscape is changing and we're looking at multiple disasters. We're in one of those moments right now. Obviously, we're preparing for extreme heat, wildfires, smoke power outages. But we will remain activated monitoring events and resource needs and responding to needs around the state.”

Dr. Nguyen of CDPH reiterates that heat waves and heat alerts are really critical to saving lives in California and regrets that “people really do underestimate exactly how dangerous heat waves can be for Californians and heat waves such as this one kills more people directly than any other weather-related hazard.”

“Certain groups are certainly at higher risk of a heat related-health impact and those include those who are unhoused, those working outdoors, or those who are working indoors without air conditioning, older adults, pregnant people, infants, children and people with disabilities, those with chronic health conditions and lower income populations,” Nguyen enumerated.

“So the good news is they are preventable. Some of the illnesses that can relate that are related to heat include heat cramps which you can feel in your muscles, heat exhaustion and heat stroke. The symptoms are actually very similar between heat exhaustion and stroke. When it gets more severe than it's considered heat stroke and it's a life-threatening emergency for which you should seek 911 support.”

“Some of the warning signs of heat related illness include things like heavy sweating, muscle cramps, weakness, headache, nausea or vomiting, illness, tiredness, irritability and dizziness. The most worrisome symptoms are if people are getting confused or passing out or vomiting, we should really seek medical attention right away,” Nguyen urged. “So the three things we try to say in terms of tips is stay hydrated, stay cool, and stay informed.”

Gloriani of Cal OSHA informed that office regulations on heat include one on heat illness prevention and outdoor places of employment.

“Employees have rights to access to water shade and the weather must be monitored and workers must be watched for acclimatization during high heat. Employees must also be trained on heat illness. Employees have right to access to water, which means that potable drinking water is clean and available at no cost and be in enough quantities. Access to shade is required when temperatures exceed 80°F keeping in mind that shaded areas must not cause exposure to another health or safety hazard,” Gloriani underscored. “When temperatures exceed 95 degrees, a buddy system should be in place and employees must be monitored for signs of heat illness. They must also be encouraged to drink water. Also, when temperatures exceed 95 degrees, cool down rest periods are required every 2 hours.

Employees have a right to file a complaint of workplace hazards to CalOSHA. They have a right to exercise their labor rights without retaliation or discrimination. If you have been retaliated against, please contact the Labor Commissioner's Office.

Ramos of City of Sacramento fire department and the Cal OES Swift Water Rescue Team 7 stated that they conduct about 30 water-related rescues a year “which is a lot and unfortunately a majority of those go with deaths in the drowning.”

Ramos announced that there is a need to increase the awareness of the drownings and to really emphasize the need to wear a life jacket.

“As you've heard many times, the bodies of water now are colder and deeper and faster than normal. We have some really fast moving, waterways right now. Although they may appear to be safe to wander into, we would say use extreme caution. We cannot have all of our emergency staff along the rivers’ edge to help out personnel that that need it,” Ramos stressed.

Ramos also offered some very useful tips: remember that life vest can save your life, make sure that the children's life jacket is properly fastened and check that the vest that it's not going above their head, make sure that it's tight around the larger part of their body and it's comfortable to wear so they can still move about.

Listos advisor Harris echoed that extreme weather events are really creating a complex environment for California and that the beautiful wet weather experienced created a lot of additional growth and wildfire prone areas and also creates water conditions that can be quite dangerous.

“It is fortunate that the governor and his foresight in 2019 following the campfire, along with the partnership with the legislature, funded a pilot for Listos California in 2019 and since then, we've been doing a lot of learning, a lot of listening, and a lot of working alongside trusted messengers, whether that be our partners, in ethnic media, or the nearly 100 community-based organization that we've had on the team for the last year or so,” Harris is grateful.

Harris added that they have learned between in their informative research is that Californians are ready to do their part, are excited to be more prepared and that's mostly because they know that those steps will help their families stay safer.

Captions:

Regina Brown Wilson

Sonya Harris

Andrew Ramos

Dr. Rita Nguyen

Charlene Gloriani

Amy Palmer

07/29/2024

07/22/2024

07/22/2024

https://www.youtube.com/live/zeEeRO-chbQ?si=4_fngqqT9MjKlfgm

07/22/2024

https://youtu.be/W1Bdhkn-af4?si=FjFDWLmdT3f1Gsc9

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