A WARNING!

This was how discrimination against AsAms was created!

80-20 is interrupting its "War Stories" series briefly.  War Story 4 will still be published on Thursday or earlier..                             A Warning !  "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"                                                                            -  George Santayana      20 years ago, from 1996 to 1998, the entire AsAm community was seriously hurt by selfish AsAm business people who didn't know U.S. laws and politics but tried to use money to influence U.S. politics in order to help their business in Asia, playing up their supposed friendship with the U.S. president, Pres. Clinton.       Don't be chasers of "presidential aura".  We could become victims again.  Why is 80-20 issuing a warning?  Because a scenario similar to the one described above may be unfolding. Read this NY Times article, entitled "How to Woo Chinese Investors: With Visa Offers and the Trump Name".     To remember the past, click on Chinagate -Wikipedia or 1996 United States Campaign finance Controlversy.  Eventually, the guilty ones like Ted Sioeng, John Huang, James Riady, Charlie Trie, Johnny Chung, and Maria Hsia either were sentenced to jail or fled the U.S.  Frankly, we couldn't care less about these individuals.  80-20 only wants to prevent the recurrence of collective damage to the AsAm community, which will help fan discrimination against us that created the glass ceiling in our workplace and higher barriers to enter elite universities against our children.     For more than 2 years, the entire AsAm community was under the joint attacks of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party and the national media. We, as a community, were portrayed as collectively selling America, and therefore untrustworthy, all for the fault of only a handful of bad AsAms. The Dem. Party, under Pres. Clinton whom the bad AsAms tried hard to please, kicked the AsAm community the hardest. Why? To distance itself from AsAms, since it took in at least $5 million of campaign money (later returned) from AsAms. The DNC even asked ALL AsAm big donors to prove their U.S. citizenship and to submit their respective tax returns of the year before, without asking for the same from all other big donors to DNC      It seems certain that the DNC request was unconstitutional.  That was why, 20 years ago, individuals like Chancellor Chang-lin Tien, Anna Chennault,  Henry Tang, Larry Ho and I established the 80-20 Initiative. Why?  So that our community would have enough money & political infrastructure to go to the courts to stop such abuse, should it recur.        80-20 has no idea if the EB-5 effort mounted by people close to Pres. Trump is legit or otherwise.  But it has the same smell of greed, money, presidential aura and preying upon Asians' and AsAms' ignorance of U.S. politics.   Beware.  Do not be so eager to participate.  Check things out.   Don't harm yourself and the collective interest of all AsAms.       A FINAL PRECAUTION:   Some Asians unknowingly equate the U.S. president to an emperor.  Since an emperor could do no wrong, many Asians will be eager to do business with anyone known to have strong White House connections.  Friends, proximity to the U.S. president doesn't keep you out of jail.  Our president doesn't have authority over everything under heaven. Take the instances, when some recent immigrants from China petitioned Pres. Obama on matters outside of his authority.  They ignored all advice that such petitions would be ignored.  They plunged ahead to get 100,000 signatures within one month and heard nothing back from the President.  They made this mistake not once or twice, but 4 times!  Friends, please check things out.   (note: the above statement applies to past petitions only, not the present or future ones.)  S. B. Woo  President and a volunteer for the past 19 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-wAÂ (Ignore the last 35 secs please http://youtu.be/h781_ECSJYM 80-20 EF Mission Statement

War Story 3 - How to Defeat an intended CA law

Saluting Those Who Demonstrated to Stop SCA-5

How Defeating SCA-5 Empowered Us Twice    The bigger empowerment is neither known nor appreciated thus far.        Background Info: The time was Jan. 30, 2014.  The Democratic majority in the Cafornia Senate had passed "Senate Constitutional Amendment 5", SCA-5, with a 2/3 vote.  If CA's lower chamber, the  Assembly, would also have passed it with a 2/3 vote, the amendment would become a part of CA's constitution,   The new law would have permitted  "race preference admissions" by CA colleges.   Off-hand, the passing of SCA-5 seemed assured, since 2/3 of the Assembly members were Democrats.       Nationally, the elite colleges had used such admissions policies to discriminate against AsAm students.  For example, AsAm applicants were forced to yield 140 SAT points to white applicants in order to gain equal access, all other qualifications being equal.  Can you imagine asking minority students to give advantages to the majority students and calling it an affirmative action?   It is blatant and despicable discrimination against AsAm children.       There were many AsAm members in the CA Senate and Assembly. All were Democrats.  Initially, they all supported SCA-5, seemingly assuring the passage of SCA-5.  See how elected AsAm officials may actually workagainst our core interests?      The Battle:    1. 80-20 sprang to action. We mostly worked on the AsAm politicians. Other organizations mostly worked on organizing demonstrations. 2. CA state Sen. Ted Lieu was the first to agree with 80-20, causing the Dems to lose their 2/3 vote in the senate. Soon, many AsAm Assemblypersons declared their oppositions to SCA-5. The Dems lost its "assured" 2/3 vote for SCA-5 in both the Senate & the Assembly. On 3/17/2015, SCA-5 was declared DEAD.          Empowerment 1:   Our community successfully defended our core interests!     Empowerment 2:  We made sure that elected AsAm officials will henceforth share our rightful concerns.   The following is why: 1. While the battles were raging, Sen. Leland Yee & Assemblyman Paul Fong, who was the Chair of the AsAm Assembly Caucus, were particularly obstinate. 2. To prevent the recurrence of such outrageous betrayal in the future, 80-20 declared on 3/21/2014 to drive them out of politics. Click here to verify. See 3. Q (2). In less than a year, both were driven out of politics. 3.  AsAm elected officials had witnessed what had happened to Sen. Leland Yee and Assemblyman Paul Fong when they ignored our core interests.This is an extremely important empowerment, that people outside of politics may NOT understand until it is clearly stated and explained.     The Jewish-Am leadership of AIPAC is particularly effective in punishing politicians who work against their core interests. They were known to have driven out 2 US senators and a few Congresspersons. So most U.S. politicians choose to be cooperative on issues that AIPAC cares deeply about. That is why the Jewish-Ams, through AIPAC, pack so much political clout.         Want to do YOUR share to empower ourselves? 1. Donate to SELF (Self Empowerment Long-term Fund):  Click here. Sending a check? Send to Stephen Lin, 969 Acalanes Rd, Lafayette CA 94549. 2. Sign the petition to stop the discrimination against AsAm students, click here.   Thank you. 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-wAÂ (Ignore the last 35 secs. The election is over.) http://youtu.be/h781_ECSJYM 80-20 EF Mission Statement

War Story 2: fierce political struggles with...

Info on 2008 & 2016 elections that you may not know

War Story 2       You be the judge. Did these two struggles with presidential candidate Clinton, one in 2008 and another in 2016, result in empowering you?                                       In 2008   Background Info:  In early Dec. 2008 Sen. Hillary was the odds-on winner for the Democratic nomination against 8 other candidates.  By then, Sen. Biden and Sen. Dodd had each already answered 80-20's questionnaire with 6 yeses. However, Sen. Clinton, instead of answering 80-20's questionnaire, chose to send us a statement that was full of sweet words, signifying nothing.  Had we accepted her statements, then all other presidential candidates would follow suit, instead of answering with 6 yeses.  80-20 tried reasoning with her campaign.  When that failed, we stepped up to meet the challenge.     The Battle: See date and subject title of 80-20's e-newsletters when the battle was raging.  12/1/07           Clinton's statement vs. 80-20's questions 12/3/07           Faxes from AsAms to Sen. Clinton 12/5/07           Spreading Outrage Against Sen. Clinton     Empowerment: 6 days after the "outrage" email, candidate Clinton graciously replied with 6 yeses and signed it. See below. To see her complete reply, click here. With that momentum, 80-20 eventually got ALL 9 Democratic presidential candidates, including the eventual nominee Obama to answer with 6-yeses.                                                           The 2nd struggle In 2016     Each presidential campaign is a GOLDEN opportunity for America's minorities to advance toward EQUAL Opportunity by bargaining with the prospective president. In 2016, 80-20 went to work again.    Background Info: The CA Democratic Primary, where 80-20 has influence, was coming up soon.  Neither Clinton nor Sanders had answered our questionnaire.  As a result, 80-20 didn't have the leverage to play one candidate against the other.  So we decided to gamble and finesse Sec. Clinton since she was the odds-on candidate to win the Democratic nomination.      The Finesse: Even without Sanders' support, 80-20 made a tactical decision calling on AsAms to vote for Sanders in the coming CA primary, UNLESS Sec. Clinton would answer our questionnaire satisfactorily. That broke the "blockade" or "logjam".      It Worked:  Within 2 days, Sec. Clinton answered our questionnaire. Click here to read her reply.  In 2016, she didn't answer any organization's questionnaire with just yes or no, so we accepted her statements addressing our questions.      Empowerment: Some of her answers were great, but one was not satisfactory. So we traded by asking for two areas of 80-20 input on her future appointments, were she to became the president. She agreed. As a result, 80-20 endorsed her for the CA Democratic primary. By the way, that was the first time that a presidential candidate has, in writing, agreed to give an AsAm NGO (non-government organization) input into future appointments.     Good news came in pairs. Seeing that Hillary had replied to 80-20, Sen. Sanders' camp also wanted to answer our questionnaire. But we respectfully declined, because we had already endorsed Sec. Clinton for the coming CA primary.        The above war story shows us how politics is really done in the U.S.  More importantly, we must NOT underestimate our own strength.  When we have the courage to fight, we shall empower ourselves! 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 P.S.:  We heard that David Fan, Elk Grove, CA became a PAC Life Member. To know more about 80-20, view these videos : https://youtu.be/dB3eGVqG-wAÂ (Ignore the last 35 secs. The election is over.) http://youtu.be/h781_ECSJYM 80-20 EF Mission Statement

War Stories

Self-Empowerment came from fighting for ourselves

80-20 has NOT been completely transparent about the battles we fought in order to achieve self-empowerment for our community. Now, however, that Pres. Obama has successfully completed his 2 terms, and Sec. Clinton is not likely to be our next president, 80-20 can tell these war stories without unduly offending these two former political leaders.                               WAR STORY 1       The 1st "War Story" tells how 80-20 struggled against and then worked with Obama, including how Pres. Obama fulfilled his promises to us and how we gratefully thanked him.  It is a near perfect example of self- empowerment through fighting for ourselves.      Background Info:The time was 2008, 8 of the 9 Democratic presidential candidates had already answered 80-20's questionnaire with 6 yeses to its 6 questions. But candidate Obama had not. Since he was the expected winner of the Dem. primary, 80-20 was forced to begin a fierce struggle against him.      The Battles:  See date & subject title of 80-20's e-newsletters when the battles were raging:    Date                      Subject Title of 80-20's e-newsletter    12/17/07                      Call to Action - fax Sen. Obama 12/20/07                      Faxes from AsAms to Sen. Obama 12/27/07                      Call to Action - Defeat Obama 12/28/07          Reactions to "Call to Action - Defeat Obama 12/31/07                      Defeat Obama (The contents of above e-newslettters have since been DELETED from our website. The titles are kept. To verify, click here.)      Empowerment Coming As a Result of the Battles:        The following email reported that Obama had replied with 6 yeses. 01/02/08  Good News    Click here to see Obama's signed reply addressed to S. B. Woo, President, 80-20 Educational Foundation.  The first 3 questions were about removing the glass ceilings, which he only partly honored.  The last 3 questions were about increasing the number of AsAm federal judges, which he completely fulfilled. See the graph below:  TO SUMMARIZE:       The total number of AsAm federal judges with life-tenure TRIPLED.  The number of AsAm federal Appeals Court judges increased from 0 to 4.  Two of 4 were mentioned as potential future Supreme Court Justices by the nation's largest newspapers.  Saying THANKS  to Obama with our Bloc Votes: 80-20 PAC spent about $60,000 to lead the AsAm community to say "THANKS" with our bloc votes. In 2008, the bloc vote was +37 points in favor of Obama. In 2012, seeing that Obama had honored about 75% of his promises to our community, the bloc vote was enlarged to +47 pts! Next week, we'll publish "War Story 2".  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

2 New Videos: Internment Camp and Chinese Exclusion Act

Learn From History

Two New Videos (1) Internment Camp from Today's NY Times:            THE DAILY 360 2:24 Vivid Memories of Internment Camp  Alexander Thompson for The New York Times. Technology by Samsung. Please turn up the volume of your computer and that of the video.  The voice is very low, perhaps saddened by the crushing experience.  Please click below: https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000005024375/japanese-internment-tule-lake-360-video.html    (2) The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, a PBS documentary:     Click here :   https://vimeo.com/212649865/c9bf68d8bd  You need to use this password: CEA410, which unfortunately has a time limit.  Hopefully, it is still valid when you use it.  If it's not, don't worry.   It'll soon be aired publicly.                              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. 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 The URL for this email is http://conta.cc/2qmVRMq, in case you want to pass it to your FaceBook friends.  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - FOR FACEBOOK USERS: As you know SOCIAL MEDIA is an important way of getting our message out instantly. We are actively seeking to increase our FACEBOOK impact by gaining more followers and making regular, timely posts of interest to Asian Americans. Would YOU please go here to our FB page and "LIKE" it now? Then, click the "Invite Friends" tab and click to invite at least 10 (and hopefully many more) Asian American friends to also like the page.  Thank you for your help! The more we can broadcast our message on social media, the better we'll be able to unify Asian Americans behind the goals we share.  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  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