Realpolitik

Realpolitik - how such feats are done.

Realpolitik That 80-20 Attends or Has  Attended To (1) Realpolitik In the Tripling of AsAm Federal Judges:       On Jan. 31, 2008, presidential candidate Obama wrote me promising to "make it a top priority" of his "administration to nominate qualified AsAms to serve as life-tenured federal" District Court judges, Appeals Court judges and Supreme Court Justices. Today, the number of AsAm federal judges has tripled; those on the Appeals Court increased from zero to 4,  and 2 of the 4 have been prominently mentioned as possible future Supreme Court Justices.

Was there realpolitik behind the scene?  Of course.

      80-20 Board Members wrote/called repeatedly many Democratic senior senators asking them to nominate an AsAm as 1 of his/her 3 nominees to Pres. Obama, when a federal judge seat in his/her state became vacant.   When it came to our knowledge that our request was honored, but NOT beforehand, 80-20 PAC donated to that senator.

(2)  Realpolitik to thank President Obama:  PAC spent about $60,000 for Pres. Obama's re-election campaign in 2012, and delivered a 73 to 23 bloc vote to him.

(3)  Realpolitik in College Admissions Nationwide:  Harvard was ordered by the court to give 6-yrs of its admissions record to SFFA (Students For Fair Admissions), led by Ed Blum.  In addition, SFFA lawyers took the deposition of Harvard President Drew Faust and took possession of Princeton's admission records which were also ordered by the court to go to SFFA.  Saying thank you to Blum is only proper.  But a realpolitik way is for 80-20 EF to donate $15,000 to SFFA, and help it recruit members.   Look, we are making progress in the admissions fight.  The vise is tightening!

(4) Realpolitik in DOJ's profiling of Chinese Americans: When attorney Pete Zeidenberg did an outstanding job defending Sherry Chen & Prof. Xiaoxing Xi, 80-20 EF organized a banquet to honor Zeidenberg  & raised $18,000 for Sherry Chen to pay off her then legal debt to Zeidenberg.

(5) Realpolitik in STOPPING DOJ's profiling of Chinese Americans:

We donated to Delaware senators and its only congressman AFTER they'd written letters to DOJ urging it to stop profiling AsAms in its investigation of stealing of national secrets. We also donated to Cong. Ted Lieu who led a group of Congresspersons in that fight. The profiling had led towrongful charges against Sherry Chen and Prof. Xi.  RESULT?   On April, 2016, NY Times published this front page article: 

           "  After Missteps, US Tightens Rules for Espionage Cases "

(6) Realpolitik to induce Elected AsAms to serve our rightful concerns:

80-20 donated generously to elected officials who share our rightful concerns like Ted Lieu and Fiona Ma,  80-20 also punished those who didn't, e.g. former CA Sen. Leland Yee and former Assemblyman Paul Fong who betrayed our community in the "stop SCA5 fight" in CA.  SCA5 stands for Senate Constitutional Amendment No. 5.  After SCA5 was stopped, 80-20 publicly announced to drive them out of politics.  Within a year, both were out of politics.

   Does the AsAm community NEED at least one org. to attend to REALPOLITIK/ SELF-EMPOWERMENT?

                          
Want to Do Your Share?

1. To donate to SELF (Self Empowerment Long-term Fund):  Click here.

Sending a check? Send to Stephen Lin, 969 Acalanes Rd, Lafayette CA 94549

2. To sign the petition to stop the discrimination against AsAm students, click here. Thank you.

3. To join Students For Fair Admissions, SFFA, click here.

     Step by painstaking steps, we empowered ourselves on a broad front, thanks to YOUR support.  

S. B. Woo 

President and a volunteer for the past 18 years
80-20 Educational Foundation, Inc, a 501 C-3 organization,
http://www.80-20educationalfoundation.org/index.php

To know more about 80-20, view these videos :
https://youtu.be/dB3eGVqG-wA (Ignore the last 35 secs. The election is over.)
http://youtu.be/h781_ECSJYM
80-20 EF Mission Statement