The rising Asian-American presence in US politics

In a recent episode of his show Patriot Act, Hasan Minhaj looked at the increased role that Asian-Americans are playing in US politics along with their rise in numbers, and that this demographic has been a key factor in changing some congressional districts from Republican to Democratic and that they could play a significant role in the 2020 elections. He says that Andrew Yang’s candidacy is one sign of this. He also talked with Cory Booker who has apparently had a lot of success reaching out to the Asian-American bloc.

But against this is the fact that their views are not homogeneous and indeed a large number of Indian-Americans have supported the Modi-Trump rightwing nationalistic program. One thing that surprised me was Minhaj pointing out that Asian-Americans tend to be below average in voter registration and actual voting.

Minhaj also traced the history of immigration laws such as the notorious Chinese exclusion act of 1882 and the 1924 law that largely shut down immigration from non-white countries before it was changed in 1965 following passage of the Civil Rights Act.

You can see the full show.

Curious understanding of the word ‘divisive’

The Hallmark TV channel, that has become synonymous with bland programming and anodyne content, had shown an ad from a wedding planning company called Zola that features a lesbian couple briefly kissing at the altar on their wedding day. This of course caused anti-gay bigots to get the vapors and an obscure conservative group called One Million Moms, part of the American Family Association, contacted the Hallmark CEO to complain and the company pulled four Zola ads that featured same-sex couples but not two that did not.
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What to expect from right-wingers after the Labour defeat

It is clear that the right wing and the Democratic party establishment in the US in the form of right-wingers Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg and pretty much the entire media establishment will seize on the UK election results to argue that progressive policies have no future and that Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren should not be the Democratic nominee. They will also likely seize upon the tactics that the right wing used in the UK and try to smear at least Sanders with the idea that he coddles anti-Semites. Although that would require real contortions since he is the first Jewish candidate with a fighting chance of becoming president, we have seen that this will not stop the rabid right from attempting it. The process has already started with people trawling to find anything that can be used against him.
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The carbon bucket will soon overflow

A graphic from the Global Carbon Project vividly illustrates how close we are to a tipping point in climate change.

Doesn’t ICE have better things to do?

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (more commonly known by its acronym ICE) has been at the center of the controversies over the inhumane treatment of immigrants with their policies or separating families and keeping children in extremely cold cages with little food or sanitation facilities and required to sleep on concrete floors with thin blankets.

But they spread their cruelty widely and the Detroit Free Press reports on an elaborate scheme in which they set up an entirely phony university to entice students, some of whom were in the US legally, to enroll in them and then used that to deport them.
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What is the benefit of remote starting cars?

I came across this tragic item of a person who was killed when a car that had been remotely started moved.

A New York man has died after being crushed by an empty car accidentally started by remote control.

Michael Kosanovich, 21, had been standing between two parked 2002 Lexus IS300s, on 6 December, when one of them had been started remotely by its owner, police said.

The car rolled forward and he was pinned between the two vehicles.

Bystanders tried to push them apart but as they did so, the car rolled forward and crushed him again.

Mr Kosanovich was taken to hospital with severe trauma to his torso and legs, according to the New York Police Department (NYPD). He died of his injuries on 7 December.

The NYPD said Mr Kosanovich had been inspecting one of the vehicles at the time of the accident, intending to buy it.

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Knives are less dangerous than guns, duh!

There is a reason that there is a saying that one does not bring a knife to a gunfight and that is because while a knife in the hands of a killer is dangerous, it is nowhere near as lethal as someone armed with a variety of high-powered guns. But that has not stopped gun nuts in the US from pointing to the knife attacks in London as to why gun control does not work because, according to their ‘logic’, if people’s guns are taken away, they will use knives instead. People like Donald Trump paint a lurid picture of knife attacks that have no relation to reality, like in this speech last year.
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Samantha Bee updates us on impeachment

I have to say that I find the whole thing utterly depressing, especially watching the craven subservience of the Republicans to Donald Trump. To add to that is the fact that Democrats are now painting a picture of the FBI as if it were an impartial, purely investigative body of great integrity and ignoring its ugly history of multiple violations of people’s civil rights and outright racism, even if it may or may not have done bad things in this particular case.