Category: Politics

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Help Make Eid an Observed School Holiday

I had heard about this issue rumbling around the state of New York for a while now but I got this concrete petition from my cousin over at Chill Yo Islam Yo and even heard about from my dad today. New York City has the nation’s largest school system. A 2008 study by Columbia University’s Teachers College estimates at least 10 percent of the city’s 1.1 million students are Muslim.

Supporters say the school board needs to be inclusive of the growing number of Muslim students in New York. Mayor Michael Bloomberg spoke out against approving the holidays this week, saying it would open the door to other religious groups asking for days off. The Mayor seems to have no issues of celebrating Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur with two days off every year however…

As all of you might know already their has been aggressive efforts to make Eid al-Fitr and Eid Al-Adha an observed school holiday. This comes by no surprise,  since their are around 800,000 Muslim New Yorkers and about 10% percent of children who attend NYC public schools are Muslim.

Recently, the resolution was almost passed until Mayor Bloomberg pulled a stunt on the Muslim community and rejected it. His excuse? It will give too many days off for students when added to existing school holidays. Come on Mr.Mayor, keep it real! You’re jewish, listen to Rabbi Moshe Edelman.

Insh’Allah the resolution gets past and Mayor Bloomberg stops being shady, after all American Muslims are productive members of society as well.

chillyoislamyo.com, Chill Yo Islam Yo, Aug 2009

[download id=”3″]

Print it, sign it, do what you need to do with it to pass the word. You can send your signed copy to the following address:

The Honorable Micheal Bloomberg
Office of the Mayor
City Hall
New York, NY, 10007

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The Mess That Is Hoboken

This has been quite a mess in Hoboken of a first month by Mayor Peter Cammarano where 33% of our last 3 mayors have NOT been arrested by the FBI – a pretty fascinating statistic courtesy of http://www.hoboken.org/ and probably a telling sign of the state of the cities in New Jersey.

Take a look at the portion of an e-mail that I have quoted below which shows Hoboken Revolt vehemently trying to educate their followers about laws in place regarding situations like this in Hoboken and in New Jersey:

If he (Cammarano) doesn’t resign and he has to take a leave of absence to attend to a personal matter, he can appoint an interim Mayor. That interim can be any one of his Directors or the Council President. At the moment, he has two approved Directors – John Pope and James Farina. Under the Faulkner Act, he has the right to appoint his Directors on a temporary 30 day basis that he can renew ever 30 days. Getting approval from the Council on his Director choices is really just ceremony.

Therefore, he can appoint Terry LaBruno, Angel Alicea, Todd Poole, etc. today if he wanted to so that he can appoint one of them Mayor should he decide to take a leave of absence. We would not be able to recall a newly appointed Mayor for the first year of his/her term as Mayor.

I wasn’t too familiar with The Faulkner Act and even when I tried to look it up a couple of places it seemed a little vague. So I went to the one person I knew would be able to tell me about it — Professor Wharton at Stevens. If there is something you want to know on politics, he’s your guy at Stevens. He even wrote a chapter once upon a time regarding the Washington Nationals and the role politics has played and plagued with that franchise.

He replied in an e-mail to me saying that the Act was originally enacted decades ago (in 1950) to allow for more flexibility for the public to participate in open elections and establish effective local governance (at least ideally) of former or at least notoriously corrupt or problematic local NJ municipalities, including just about every city in Hudson County.

He went on to say that the mayor can and probably will stay in office right now because technically and legally he’s not guilty – yet.

As far as appointing the director mayor, he went on to say that it is rare but can happen when a mayor is away from office:

… that’s rare but can happen when the mayor is away at times for a day or a week at a time; it’s more symbolic than substance (the same thing takes place when the Gov leaves for a day or two and an official, like the Senate president takes over or now that we’ll have a Lt Gov after January). Also, keep in mind Hoboken is still under the auspices of Judy Trapodi – the state appointed monitor for finances so home rule remain a concern as to who can “adjust” or change things. In reality, the mayor has little control on everything, without Trapodi’s input and the city council’s.

I can’t wait to get back on campus in Hoboken in less than a month and take another Wharton class. In the meantime, e-mails will do and hopefully this shed some light on the ever evolving mess that is the Mayor’s office in Hoboken.

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For The People, By The People?

A disputed national presidential election is verified by a supreme authority electing a leader who clearly did not have support of the majority of the people who cast the ballot.

Sounds familiar?

It should remind you less of the election in Iran right now but more of the bitter end to the 2000 Presidential Election right here in the United States of America between Al Gore and the eventual selected winner George W. Bush.

I just don’t understand what moral grounds the United States really has to stand on when peaceful protesters outside the convention of their own National Party Conventions are thrown in jail and where dirty political tricks are played into fooling uninformed voters, that they can not only foreign elections but get to determine who should be the winner?

Don’t confuse my argument into saying I support the results of Iran because there certainly seems like there might have been wrongdoings committed but until you know for sure, it’s the same thing to say the previous administration willing let a ‘terrorist’ attack happen on their watch. You can certainly say both things but you just don’t have any solid ground to stand on when you do.

You have mayoral elections in cities like Hoboken, NJ where you have law enforcement parking their cars in front of a candidate’s rally that they don’t support. You probably have elections in Illinois where if only six out of every five eligible voter votes, it is considered a success.

We, as a nation, are very proud of a very proud of a very flawed democratic system where has elected on more than one occasion a President who did not win the popular count. We also hold into high regard a foreign policy where we don’t support one communist government because they are of no use to us (except for holding onto a land of theirs known as Guantanamo Bay) but completely willing to support another in the far East and turn a blind eye towards the civil and humanitarian pleas of their people.

Maybe it is in the best long-term interest of our nation to worry more about domestic issues like our continuously failing economy or the lack of healthcare coverage to millions of Americans rather than trying to forcefully determine the fate of an election being conducted on foreign soil. We often try to get too wrap into trying and installing a leader that is more aligned with the ‘Western’ ideals as a quick fix solution rather than trying to see why a problem in the region exists in the first place. That type of mentality did wonders for the people in Afghanistan; it did wonders for those still dying in Iraq. Why not go for the trifecta and do it for the people in Iran as well?

You might not like what you read up there but at least I’m willing to say it. Sound off and let me know what you think.

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Poll Finds U.S. Muslims Thriving, but Not Content

 

An excellent find by Chill yo Islam Yo from the New York Times on the state of contentment of American-Muslims as opposed to Muslims all around the world. THe general consensus seems to be that they doing pretty well but they are not very content. 

 

A Gallup poll of Muslims in the United States has found that they are far more likely than people in Muslim countries to see themselves as thriving.

In fact, the only countries where Muslims are more likely to see themselves as thriving are Saudi Arabia and Germany, according to the poll.

And yet, within the United States, Muslims are the least content religious group, when compared with Jews, Mormons, Protestants and Roman Catholics.

Gallup researchers say that is because the largest segment of American Muslims are African-Americans (35 percent, including first-generation immigrants), and they generally report lower levels of income, education, employment and well-being than other Americans.

But American Muslims are not one homogeneous group, the study makes clear. Asian-American Muslims (from countries like India and Pakistan) have more income and education and are more likely to be thriving than other American Muslims. In fact, their quality of life indicators are higher than for most other Americans, except for American Jews.

“We discovered how diverse Muslim Americans are,” said Dalia Mogahed, executive director and senior analyst of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, which financed the poll. “Ethnically, politically and economically, they are in every way a cross-section of the nation. They are the only religious community without a majority race.”

The Gallup study is significant because it is the first to examine a randomly selected sample of American Muslims. Gallup interviewed more than 300,000 people by telephone in 2008 while conducting broader polls, and focused on 946 who identified themselves as Muslims. (The margin of sampling error is plus or minus four percentage points.)

Previous studies of American Muslims located respondents based on surnames, mosque attendance or geographic clusters, which polling experts say can skew the results.

Gallup asked an extensive battery of questions, producing a picture of American Muslims through the prisms of race, gender, class, age and education. The international comparisons were possible because of earlier Gallup studies of Muslims overseas.

American Muslim women, contrary to stereotype, are more likely than American Muslim men to have college and post-graduate degrees. They are more highly educated than women in every other religious group except Jews. American Muslim women also report incomes more nearly equal to men, compared with women and men of other faiths.

Muslim women in the United States attend mosque as frequently as Muslim men — a contrast with many Muslim countries where the mosques are primarily for men. American Muslims are generally very religious, saying that religion is an important part of their daily lives (80 percent), more than any other group except Mormons (85 percent). The figure for Americans in general is 65 percent.

By political ideology, Muslims were spread across the spectrum from liberal to conservative, with about 4 in 10 saying they were moderates. By party identification, Muslims resembled Jews more than any other religious group, with small minorities registered as Republicans, roughly half Democrats and about a third independents.

There are clear signs of social alienation, however. Lower percentages of Muslims register to vote or volunteer their time than adherents of other faiths. They are less likely to be satisfied with the area where they live. These indicators are “worrying,” said Ahmed Younis, a senior analyst at the Muslim studies center.

“There is still a sense among American Muslims of being excluded from the mainstream,” Mr. Younis said, “and among young people that’s more acute.”

But the perception is far worse among Muslims in England and France, the study found.

Mr. Younis said the finding “reinforces the proposition that the integration process for American Muslims is, on the whole, a much more successful endeavor than it is for European Muslims.”

Chill Yo Islam Yo, May 2009

 

You should read the whole article.

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Specter Swap: A Gimmick or Wake Up Call?

I think the worst kept secret in the political world was made official today with veteran Republican Senator Arlen Specter switching his party affiliation to become a Democrat.

To me, this is more of a survival tactic played by the senator since he was more than likely going to lose the upcoming republican primary for the 2010 election. Now if you are the democrats, you welcome him and take him in with open arms because he is one of the most respected people in congress regardless of which political hat he decides to wear. However, with the GOP fighting with every last breath they have to keep Al Franken from being seated in Minnesota, the problem still remains of having 60 seats to prevent a filibuster. Specter probably would have voted in line with the democrats against a filibuster even if he didn’t switch so it doesn’t really solve anything. In turn, Specter probably gets a less competitive primary challenge on this side or the aisle with the party backing him in the 2010 race.

Now if you are one of the very few moderates remaining on the conservative side, this really just brings to the forefront most of the problems you are facing. There is no longer exists such a thing as a moderate Republican. It’s either you are with the extreme right wing base with the likes of Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly and Bachmann and that is a real shame. It shouldn’t matter if the vast majority of the people in this country are leaning moderately or completely liberal now, there should always be a respectable and honest but not lunatic opposition on the other side. You should have base a voice of reason from the minority to keep the party in power of over-extending their reach of power but we just don’t have that anymore in this country and it is quite a shame.

I have always tried to respect a person’s view within reason regardless of whether I agreed with it or completely disagreed because the critics always tell you your faults. They may not necessarily express in the way you might like it, but more likely than not they will tell you something about trying to appeal to more people. It’s quite unfortunate that a vast majority just disregards the republican minority now as nothing but a party of no but that is nobody’s fault but the Republican Party’s. They have, for far too long relied on the politics of fear and isolation to shove their legislation through and the masses have finally woken up.

As a self-identified moderate liberal, I think it is more important in today’s times than ever which so many politicians getting caught up in a power struggle rather than representing their constituents. Living in one of the very few political systems that institutes a two-party system which is quite undemocratic as it is, and now having one of the two parties run by people who have extremists views is not a step in the right direction of democracy in this country. Since the 3rd parties can only spout off their mouths and exert very little influence into the political system that is in play right now, it is that much more crucial to moderate and reform the conservative base.

The Republicans will need a purge sooner or later of these people with radical fundamentalist views at the forefront and the public face of its party. As the next generation of younger constituents who are naturally more liberal to begin with begin to grow up, the GOP faces a major threat of facing the situation they had a couple of decades ago where they are down to 150 seats in congress. You already notice the slight change with the likes of Megan McCain calling for the Roves of her party to step away since they are no longer relevant and are hurting the progressive cause of their party.

As for people my age, two of the most conservative people I know are shifting their views in polar opposite directions. One is becoming much more liberal fiscally and towards economic policies to support a system where the government plays a bigger role in helping people get back up on their feet. On the other hand, the other one is becoming more and more conservative by the day. You almost get a feel of an old and battered athlete who doesn’t know when to retire and admit his time has come and gone. Resorting to out of context quotes and unsubstantiated rumors as “facts” to try to pick up any dirt or score cheap points in a political discussion.

Now for Senator Specter, we will very quickly find out whether he jumped ship simply to save and extend his political career or whether his political philosophy has really become more in line with the Democrats.