UH Cougars' Blog

by Elizabeth Martin 

 

       “If I worked for a record company, I’d be pulling my hair out. The recorded-music business is in total confusion, looking for a way out,” CEO of Sony/ATV Music Publishing Martin Bandier said.

      The fact is record companies are losing money and becoming unnecessary middlemen in a continuously growing industry.  

How the trouble began

      In 2000, Americans bought 785.1 million albums. In 2006, they bought 588.2 million, according to Rolling Stone. And digital sales are growing rapidly, as 2006 showed a 65 percent increase in the sale of digital singles, and $600 million were spent on ringtones. 

      However, more than 5,000 record-company employees have lost their jobs since 2000, and there are now just four of the five major record labels left after the merger of Sony Music Entertainment and BMG Entertainment in 2004. About 2,700 record stores have gone out of business across the country since 2003, and in 2006, Tower Records music stores, which accounted for 2.5 percent of overall retail sales, closed. Approximately 65 percent of all music sales are now made in stores such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy, according to Rolling Stone.

      With production costs dropping, many artists are finding that being signed to a record label is more costly and inefficient than tackling the work themselves.

      Radiohead saw an opportunity to release their latest album, unsigned by any record label, through their Web site directly to the fans. They converted the album into a downloadable package and asked for donations from their fans. They received an average of $8 per album sold, sold 1.2 million albums in the first week it was ‘released’ and racked in about $10 million in profits.

      The number of albums the band sold in that first week exceeds the first-week launch sales of its previous three albums combined, according to Mashable.com.

      The album is no longer available through the band’s Web site but is now being sold on iTunes for $9.99, something new for the band, who has previously not allowed its music to be sold through Apple’s program.  

The well-made mistake 

      “The record companies have created this situation themselves,” CEO of Virgin Entertainment Group Simon Wright said.

      The last seven years have presented a series of opportunities for the industry to save itself, and one of the biggest was failing to make peace with Napster in the beginning.

      “They left billions and billions of dollars on the table by suing Napster,” CEO of management company the Firm Jeff Kwatinetz said, “The record business had an unbelievable opportunity there.”

      Because it was the first file-sharing service, Napster was being used by everyone who was downloading music.

      “It was as if everybody was listening to the same radio station,” said Kwatinetz. “Then Napster shut down, and all those 30 or 40 million people went to other [file-sharing services].”

      Seven years ago, when top executives of the music industry met with Napster CEO Hank Barry, the idea of letting his company’s 38 million users continue downloading for a monthly subscription fee (with revenues shared between the service and the labels) was discussed but never settled upon. 

And it all went downhill from there 

      Record companies waited nearly two years after Napster shut down before they launched iTunes Music Store in spring of 2003, with billions of dollars being spent on suing Napster in the meantime. Before that, labels tried to start their own subscription services, offering only music recorded on their label, but failed due to high costs and a lack of compatibility with MP3 players that were on the market.

      Hilary Rosen, then CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America believes that those two years were irreversibly detrimental to the music business.

      “That’s when we lost the users,” Rosen said. “That’s when we went from music having real value in people’s minds to music having no economic value, just emotional value.”

      CD sales for the first three months of 2008 went down 20 percent from last year, according to The Wall Street Journal.

      Apple has sold over 100 million iPods. Digital sales of individual songs have risen 54 percent already this year to 173.4 million. People are still listening to music. They just have newer, more user-friendly sources to acquire that music. 

So what happens next? 

      Big names in the industry are accepting that licensing music to video games, movies, TV shows and online subscription services is proving to be an increasing source of revenue, and it’s no wonder, considering the rise in these growingly popular sources of entertainment.

      The music publishing business, which collects songwriting royalties from radio play and other sources, is also booming as record companies look to increase their revenues.

      “Music publishing will become a more important part of the business,” CEO of Sony/ATV Music Publishing Martin Bandier said.

      CDs no longer have a stronghold on the music industry, as people are now able to look to the Internet to find their favorite tunes, whether they obtain them legally or not, in 24-hour music stores with unlimited shelf space.

       “The record industry today has evolved into a digital thinking, digitally literate business,” International Federation of the Phonographic Industry Chairman and CEO John Kennedy said. “…by 2010 we expect at least one quarter of all music sales worldwide to be digital.”

      For now, record companies are stuck in the middle between CD production and online music distribution, but physical albums are on a downward slope towards extinction. CDs will eventually follow the path of rotary phones and VHS in an ever-developing digital world, and digital music will take over as the main form of music acquisition.  

Grant Mehlhoff

            A privately owned mining company is seeking the rights to open a uranium mine near the town of Crownpoint, N.M.  The company has applied for permits to resume uranium mining just outside the formal boundaries of a Navajo reservation, but within what is widely considered Navajo Indian Country.

            Uranium Resources Inc. has assured residents that the mining will be safe and bring in much needed revenue for the tribe.

            But, members of the Navajo Nation still face a constant reminder of the true cost uranium mining can levy.  Fifty years ago, the Cold War arms race propelled the search for uranium.  Energy companies swarmed Navajo land searching for deposits.  Hundreds of mines were carved into reservation land.

            When they finally left in the 1980’s after the cost of uranium collapsed, the companies simply walked away.  They avoided suitable clean-up procedures, abandoning mines without even properly sealing them. 

            The effects of which have been devastating on the Navajo.  Gaping mines have leaked radioactive dust and allowed contaminated water to seep into drinking water sources.  High rates of cancer have been reported amongst those who worked in or lived near the closed mines.  They are 17 times more likely to face cancer than the national average, according to Democracy Now.

            Noting the increase in cancer rates among its people, tribal leaders passed legislation forbidding uranium mining on Navajo Indian Country in April 2005. 

An increase in demand, however, has created a new “gold rush,” as the value of uranium soared to more than $60 a pound.  Just seven years ago, a pound was worth $6.  The increase in demand has also renewed interest in returning to mine Navajo lands.

            Mining companies are currently extracting uranium in Texas, Colorado and Wyoming, but Navajo Country is the true prize.  It is widely considered the “Saudi Arabia of uranium,” according to Mark Pelizza, a vice president of Uranium Resources Inc.

            Crownpoint, a town of roughly 3,000 Navajo, sits on the largest undeveloped uranium deposit in the country.  If the mine were to be opened, it is expected to yield 42 million pounds of uranium over 20 years and be worth more than $2.5 billion at today's prices.

            The proposed site for the mine, however, sits within a mile of the main drinking water source for more than 15,000 Navajo people.  While it’s not located within reservation boundaries, Crownpoint participates in the tribal government, making it Navajo Indian Country.

            Federal courts have traditionally recognized Indian Country as extending beyond reservation boundaries, but with all of the money involved, the ban seems destined to be challenged in court.

            Energy companies have a hard time understanding the Navajo’s reservation in allowing them back onto their land to mine uranium.  They have become increasingly frustrated by the Navajo’s opposition.

            "You tell me, what kind of a democracy is that?" asked John DeJoia, a Strathmore Minerals vice president. "They've got tremendous resources out there. They're a very poor nation. That could change."

            Legislation passed in 1980 made polluters responsible for paying all clean-up costs from toxic sites.  The Superfund law was passed to help protect families and communities from harmful toxic waste, yet nearly 1,000 mines on Navajo land still haven’t been properly dealt with.

            Representative Henry Waxman (D-California) has termed the neglect of the Navajo “an American tragedy” and is currently investigating just how this could have been allowed to happen.

            The federal government has had a long and sad history of mistreatment of this country’s indigenous peoples.  It’s about time they honor their promise and have the mines sealed and clean up the radioactive waste left behind before even considering the opening of a new mine.

Sheree´ Granger

 

 The Fight for Diversity in Fashion Continue

Bethann Hardison began to notice that women of color were becoming extinct from the fashion world. Hardison sprang into action with a rally of fashion designers, casting agents and photographers to address this problem. Nearly sold out rallies properly titled “Out of Fashion: The Absence of Color,” she has organized a total of three since September 2007, with most recent being January 23, 2008.  According to Women’s Wear Daily Hardison wanted the rallies to increase awareness about the absence of black women and stimulate those in power to promote change.

“I blame us all - the designers, the agents, myself. But for me it all starts with the fashion designer," Hardison says. "They've gotten very 'Stepford Wives,' lost in commerce, very conservative. Where is the glamour? The avant-garde? I'm trying to get designers to stop following the yellow brick road."

 

Designers have been slowly opting out women of color. “He (a black booker for a modeling agency) said he was trying to get more black models work in Paris," Washington Post fashion editor Robin Givhan said. "The problem, he said, is that [magazine] editors and designers will say that if they put the clothes on black models, people don't notice the clothes, they notice the girl -- as if the sight of a black model is so rare and distracting that people will gawk."

 

 

A few designers and casting directors are saying a reason for a shortage is because it has been difficult to find black and Asian women. According to http://diversityinc.com, Keisha Omilana and Ujjwala Raut, who are black and South Asian, respectively, insist that their "kind" and other models of color are simply not wanted because they are not considered "what's in."

 

Women of color have not been respected for decades. For instance in rap video a majority of black women selected to be in music videos are of fair skin and relaxed or processed hair. “More recently, the physical attributes historically possessed by black women were deemed undesirable by America's wider society,” fashion writer LaMont Jones writes in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “until women of other ethnic groups began to exhibit them…curvaceous derrieres weren't sexy until Jennifer Lopez came along, and full lips were unattractive until Angelina Jolie's…Black women are least likely to be perceived as attractive and worthy of respect, some observers say, which may be why groups ranging from black rap artists to black comedians to white radio hosts have no problem denigrating them.”

 

 

Designers, stylists and casting agents has come up with a uniform look of twiggy pale women to dominate their fashion shows and advertisements. "It is unfortunate that a white girl with blond hair is still the ideal of beauty," Fashion art director Frank de Jesus tells Reuters. "I wish there were more girls of color and Asian girls."

 

 

Fashion was not always this way. Hardison broke in to the fashion industry during the 1960s. She was discovered on an elevator by designer Willi Smith. From then her career took off. She became an international model, working with designers ranging from Anne Klein, Oscar de la Renta, Calvin Klein, Perris Ellis, Issey Miyake, and Ungaro. She has appeared in fashion iconic magazines like Haper’s Bazaar and Vogue. Next, Hardison began working as the head for the women’s division for Click Model Management. Soon after she retired from Click, Hardison opened her own modeling agency named Bethann Management.

 

 

Models such as Iman, Tyra banks, Naomi Campbell, and Tyson Beckford are a few of the veterans that have paved the way for people of color. “Bill Blass' former designer, Michael Vollbracht, recalled the days when booking Sheila Johnson, Pat Cleveland and other leading African-American beauties was a given,” According to Women’s Wear Daily. “After returning to the industry after a 15-year hiatus, he was surprised to learn that was no longer the case.”

According to http://TargetMarketNews.com, black women spend more than $20 billion on apparel each year.

 

 A panelist of designers, model agents and stylists discuss concerns about what motivates the industry’s outlook on diversity in fashion. Panelists and audience members talked about the designers participation in selecting a variety of models instead of leaving it up to casting agents and stylists. Panelist also mentioned that stylists and photographers should get more women of color exposure.

 

Supermodel Naomi Campbell is an avid supporter of Hardison and has been boycotting designers, fashion shows and runways. Surprisingly, Campbell was not invited to walk at this year’s Fashion Week and did not attend.

 

 “Women of color are not a trend,” Campbell said. “That’s the bottom line. Fashion needs to go back to the way it used to be when wonderful designers like Yves St. Laurent, Gianni Versace and [Azzedine] Alaia just had a great lineup of beautiful women – white, black, Chinese, Hispanic.”

 

 

It does not have to be this way. Designers such as Heatherette, Tracy Reese and Marc Jacobs are some of the leaders that cast women of color for their shows and advertisement. “It's not the designers' fault ... at least the designers I work for," casting agent Jennifer Starr said. "Ralph Lauren, especially, is constantly asking me why there aren't more African-American models he can put in his show."

 

 

It’s time for other leaders in the fashion world to follow Lauren’s example and embrace women of color once again.

 

 

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07113/780189-314.stm> 

 http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/14/fashion/shows/14
race.html?_r=1&ref=fashion&oref=slogin

 

http://www.wwd.com/search/article/119633?query=Panel+U
rges+Runway,+Fashion+Ad+Diversity

 

 

http://www.diversityinc.com/public/2497.cfm

 

 

http://gothamist.com/2008/01/31/fashion_2.php

 

 

http://www.newsday.com/features/lifestyle/fashionweek/
ny-etlede5556549jan31,0,4847597.story

 

 

http://www.wwd.com/article/print/118885

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Scott Gonzales

              Big-named professional athletes have been changing out of their jerseys and into business suits recently, only to find that office work is a lot tougher than it looks. Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan is the most recent superstar athlete to take over a pro team’s operations, joining baseball’s Texas Rangers’ front office. Other notable stars who have assumed business-like positions post-retirement include Michael Jordan and Mario Lemieux. Judging by their past success, or lack there of, superstar athletes have proven that they do not covert into managerial positions well.

            So what will make Ryan the exception?

            On Feb. 6, Ryan was named the Rangers’ team president and was put in charge of baseball operations. He will now have a say in any moves, on or off the field, which the team makes, and he probably will be the influential factor in many of them; something previous superstars have not done extremely well.

            Jordan took over the Washington Wizards’ president of operations position in 2000. The Wizards recorded the team’s lowest winning percentage since its inaugural season in 1961-62 in Jordan’s first full year as president. Even his joining the team on the court couldn’t get the Wizards deep into the playoffs and his term as President came to an end, unsuccessfully.

            After retiring in 1997, Lemieux bought the Pittsburgh Penguins out of bankruptcy in ’99. Although he inherited a strong team, the Pens struggled after the ’00-’01 season, finishing last in the division four consecutive years. His reign looks like it may be heading in the right direction, but he has yet to bring Lord Stanley’s Cup back to Pittsburgh.

            And now it’s Ryan’s turn to showcase his management skills. One thing’s for sure; he’ll have a lot of work to do. On the other hand, after coming in last place in the AL West last season, the only direction he can go is up.

            The Rangers pitching staff is full of potentially good players that have yet to live up to the hype. The team’s offensive juggernaut of a couple years ago lost slugging first baseman Mark Texiera last year and struggled to maintain consistency throughout the season. Overall, the team has a solid core of young players, but has major holes to fill in the pitching staff – Ryan’s specialty.

            The Rangers didn’t pick Ryan just for his name though, and, at 61 years old, I wouldn’t expect him to leave his job to pitch for the team. He did recently serve as special assistant to Houston Astros general manager Tim Purpura though, so he does have some experience dealing with front office issues. Purpura helped bring Houston to the World Series in 2005, but was fired last season after the Astros continued to struggle.

            In other business ventures, Ryan has been successful. Nolan Ryan’s Guaranteed Tender Beef has been selling quality meats for a while now and recently signed a deal with San Antonio based Super S grocery stores to be the chain's exclusive fresh all natural beef supplier. He also owns Express Bank of Texas, based in Alvin, Texas, and the Waterfront Steakhouse & Grill in Three Rivers, Texas. In the baseball world, he is part owner of the AA Corpus Christi Hooks and AAA Round Rock Express, both affiliates of the Astros.

            Ryan's past business experience could be the reason he will find success in Arlington. Other successful baseball businessmen have started in smaller businesses without the baseball knowledge that Ryan has. Boston Red Sox majority owner John W. Henry started off advising companies in market trading, later establishing John W. Henry & Company, making millions and taking over the Red Sox.

            New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner began as the chairman of the American Shipbuilding Company in Cleveland, Ohio, his family’s business. Upon making millions in business transactions, he jumped at the opportunity to buy the then struggling Yankees from CBS and helped bring back dominance to the Bronx Bombers.

            Ryan has a similar grit. He is a smart baseball man and he knows what talent looks like. The Rangers are betting on it. I wouldn’t bury him should the team struggle this year, which is very likely considering their AL West opponents the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and the Seattle Mariners seem to have improved their already strong team’s during the offseason. Ryan’s determination and insistence on winning should translate well into his new role and I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Rangers take a turn for the best in the near future.

       

    

What's an omnivore to do?

Anny Sivilay


        PETA has been busy the past few months, what with the protesting of Kentucky Fried Chicken, the cattle industry and Mars Candy.
        While the Humane Society is dealing with the cattle industry in the US and the recall of 143 million pounds of Westland/Hallmark beef, PETA has been investigating slaughterhouses in South America that exports kosher meat to the US.
        “We have also tried for years behind the scenes to get the important companies to end this hideous ‘shackle and hoist’ kosher slaughter method in South America but unfortunately these companies were more concerned with hiding what goes in their slaughterhouses,” said an unnamed investigator interviewed on PETA’s blog. “Undercover footage is the best way to expose the truth and ultimately hold people accountable to make conditions less cruel for the animals.”
        The interview on the organization’s blog has a video clip attached of what was captured at these slaughterhouses, with an ending message that said, “Please go vegetarian.”
        PETA is an international nonprofit organization founded in 1980 by Ingrid NewKirk and Alex Pacheco and based in Norfolk, Virginia with affiliations in the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, India and Asia-Pacific Region. They currently have 1.8 million members and supporters and claims to be the largest animal rights group in the world.
        According to PETA’s website, “PETA operates under the simple principle that animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on, or use for entertainment.”
        Just a few weeks ago PETA made news by protesting KFC, even more adamantly in Kentucky, when the activist group got wind that fried chicken is to be made the state’s official picnic food.
        According to the Associated Press, State Rep. Charles Siler is sponsoring legislation to assign the designation to KFC’s “finger lickin’ good” chicken. Siler told reporters that the late colonel’s fried chicken deserves the title because of the worldwide attention and economic benefit it has brought to the state.
        PETA has been doing battle with KFC for some time now, claiming that the chickens KFC serves are abused, even tortured.
        “If the state legislature moves forward with this one, then they should change Kentucky’s state bird from the cardinal to the debeaked, crippled, scalded, diseased, dead chicken,” said Bruce Friedrich, PETA vice president.
        Just last month PETA was in the limelight protesting the Mars candy company by parading around holding signs nearly naked, covered in colorful body paint, like the colors of M&Ms, on claims that the company tests their products on animals.
        “There’s been an explosion of interest” in animal welfare issues, says David Favre, a Michigan State University law professor and animal law specialist in an interview with USA Today. “Groups like the Humane Society of the United States and PETA have brought to our social awareness their concerns about animals and all matter of creatures.”
        According to the website Marscandykills.com the site encourages people to think before picking up a Mars candy bar, which includes such products as Snickers, M&Ms, Twix, Dove, Three Musketeers, Starburst and Skittles.
        “Mars recently funded a deadly experiment on rats to determine the effects of chocolate ingredients on their blood vessels,” writes Marscandykills.com “Experimenters force-fed the rats by shoving plastic tubes down their throats and then cut open the rats’ legs to expose an artery, which was clamped shut to block blood flow.”
        The website even includes a short video to show viewers how animals are being tested on for various products as well as a link to PETA’s letters to Mars CEO Paul Michaels, urging him to discontinue funding of all animal tests and pledge not to conduct or fund any animal tests in the future.
        Confectionarynews.com reports that Christophe Dandoy, director of communications for Mars France, admitted that the business division Symbioscience does test on animals while developing “pharmaceutical and therapeutic food ingredients,” including flavanols. Flavanols are a form of antioxidant found in chocolate, win and teas that are used as nutritional bonuses that can improve circulation and general heart health.
        “Although we do care about animals, we have to by law test on animals when developing products that contain flavanols, because of the pharmaceutical regulations,” said Dandoy.
        Animal abuse and testing aside, is PETA going too far and asking too much? According to Kay Johnson-Smith of the Animal Agriculture Alliance, an industry-supported organization that seeks to educate the public about agriculture, possibly so.
        “Ultimately, their goal is to eliminate animals being used as food,” said Smith. “There’s a real danger when we allow a very small minority of activists to dictate procedures that should be used to raise animals for food.”
        PETA doesn’t only target big businesses but apparently monks as well. According to USA Today’s story, “After months of protests by PETA, the monks at Mepkin Abbey, a Trappist monastery in Moncks Corner, S.C., announced last month they were giving up the egg production business that had sustained them for nearly 50 years.”
        The activist group targeted the monks because their chickens were kept in battery cages; a method commonly used in egg-farming but one that animal rights advocates consider cruel.
        The organization promotes going vegetarian as well as vegan but doesn’t clarify whether they are encouraging people to be vegetarians or go full out and be vegans.
        “Among other initiatives, PETA supports a measure introduced last month by a New York City councilman that would ban carriage horses that haul tourists around Manhattan. Many other cities feature such businesses,” Reported USA Today.
        It seems as though PETA will not rest until they eliminate animals from our daily diet. Perhaps they have forgotten that animals prey on one another for food and that humans are animals as well, debatably more evolved but an animal none the less. Eating, reproducing, dying and becoming a food source for another animal or organism is part of the circle of life. It’s one thing to educate the mass about animal cruelty it’s another to make people feel guilty for wanting to eat a burger or have sausage and eggs for breakfast.


Sources

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/5550780.htm
l

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5glMuef8q0G6TVo9ZWkP
cloulVu7QD8UMP9B80

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-01-27-animal-
activists_N.htm

http://www.marscandykills.com/index.asp

http://www.confectionerynews.com/news/ng.asp?n=82017-m
ars-peta-animal-testing

http://blog.peta.org/archives/2008/02/investigator_di.
php

http://www.slashfood.com/tag/flavanols/

        With the passing of Super Tuesday, it seems that while Democratic America is still undecided on whom they want for a presidential candidate, the Latinos of the Democratic Party have made up their minds. The anticipation of Super Tuesday led to a huge push in both Clinton and Obama trying to score the Hispanic vote. However, in the aftermath of the primaries, Obama still lagged behind in the Hispanic community. There seems to be two reasons for why this occurred. Latinos registered to vote in Texas and she has been a good friend with the co-founder of the United Farm Workers Union for a long time now.

                  One of those reasons was that Hilary Clinton has an already established Latino vote. They remember the good ole’ days of the Bill Clinton years and believe that time can be relieved with another Clinton in the Presidency. Another plus for Clinton is the Latino women's vote. Of course Hillary leads in women's votes all over the nation, but in the Latino community, "Hispanic culture is matriarchal" says Washington Post's Jose Antonio Vargas. Having a matriarchal community means that the woman lead the family and if they would like to see a woman president, then usually the rest of the family follows her lead. Not to mention, Hispanics see Hillary as much older and wiser than Obama, who is still figuring out how to walk on his own two feet in the political world.

            The other main reason why Clinton is managing to keep the Latino vote on her side is because Obama is not only a new face to many Latinos across America, but he also got a late start on courting their voters. It looks like Obama did try to pull every trick in the book in states like California, Arizona and New Mexico to attempt to woo the Hispanics to his side of the Democratic bed. It just seems that he was a little late to the playing field and Clinton already had them snuggled up close to her side with a 2 to 1 win in almost every major Latino state.

            The good news for Obama is that he can still win over Latinos in the upcoming Texas primary in March. He already has a head start in young Latino voters; they are more likely to vote for him while their parents still sway toward the enticing, safe choice of Clinton. Young Hispanics relate more to Obama because he is much younger than all of his rivals in both parties; he also knows what it is like to struggle with being different and having a parent who is an immigrant. He has an immigration policy including driver’s licenses for all immigrants regardless of status, which is an enticing new menu item young Latino voters are willing to try out should he become the President.

            One family in the Latino community, old and young, have made a decisive vote for Obama over Clinton. The Garcias reason that his position on issues, while similar to Clinton’s, are better when it comes to economy, health care and the war. Mr. Dennis Garcia also believes that while he would still vote for Clinton if she got the Democratic nomination, she would lose the Presidential elections to the Republican candidate. Mr. Garcia said, “She is known throughout the Republican realm as the BLEEP. Republicans would come out in droves just to vote against her even if they did not like the Republican nominee. Republicans do not want her to win at any cost.”

If Obama is not able to attract the sentiment of more Texas and Ohio Hispanic voters, who feel the same way as the Garcias, in the upcoming primaries in March, his dream for change will die with his nomination. And, if that happens, he may as well be leaning on the wall of losers next to Romney, Edwards, and Guiliani at the great Presidential “Prom” as Clinton is crowned Queen and McCain as King.

Elizabeth Luna

African American Voters Got a Little Love for Ron Paul

 

 

 

African American Voters Got a Little Love for Ron Paul

 

             I thought I needed to clean out my ears.  I was doing some research for this paper on the popular video sharing website, YouTube.com, and I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.  Two intelligent, urban, hip hop looking, Black men were making their arguments as to why young Black voters should support GOP candidate, Ron Paul.  I had to press rewind because I was sure they were having some discussion about Sean Paul, a popular hip-hop reggae artist.

   But no, sure enough, they were talking about the conservative, Texas Republican Congressman, Ron Paul, and how he is would be the best candidate to become the next president of the United States.  Matter of fact, I came across several articles and video footage on YouTube.com that show Blacks proclaiming their support for Ron Paul.

  Blacks have historically supported candidates from the Democratic Party, unless you talk about Abraham Lincoln, who signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1865, freeing the slaves in the South. According to usadauly.com, CNN’s 2004’s exit polls said President Bush only received 11% of African American votes in the general election against Democrat, John Kerry.  On October 24, 2008, Ron Paul’s website, www.ronpaul2008.com, collected data from the public opinion service, the Rasmussen Reports, which said that Mr. Paul is the highest polling Republican among Black voters in this 2008 election campaign so far. The site asked 1200 Black voters if they preferred Ron Paul to Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, and 33% of them supported Paul over Clinton and 31% over Obama. 

Today, February 4, 2008, the Rasmussen Reports says that Clinton is leading Obama 48% to 38% in the race for the Democratic nomination and that Ron Paul is a distant 4th at 6% behind Mike Huckabee (21%), Mitt Romney (29%), and John McCain at 33%, who is leading the Republican Presidential Nomination thus far.  Therefore, it is highly unlikely that Ron Paul will win the Republican nod for president, but he has an intriguing platform that resonates with a lot of Black voters that is worth looking at.

            One of Congressman Paul’s stances is that he wants to do away with federal tax bills and the IRS.  He believes, like most Republicans, in a small government, in which people rely on themselves instead of depending on tax funded government agencies to better their lives. During one of Paul’s speeches I viewed on the Internet, he said that he doesn’t believe that our forefathers, who wrote our constitution, intended for us to fork over up to half of our earnings to the government.  In doing my research, I found that many poor blacks agreed with this concept because they would obviously receive more of the money they earned.  A clip on Youtube.com, which votegopher.com says that Paul is the most viewed presidential candidate besides Obama, a young black women from the inner city was telling a CNN correspondent that she was donating her last $30 to Mr. Paul, and supporting him because she said that a lot of people believe the government will save poor people with its federal funded social programs, but it is not true, and has not worked in the past because situations in her impoverished neighborhood have not changed.

            Furthermore, another controversial position of Paul’s is to do away with the war on drugs in the United States. On CNN, He said that he would pardon all Blacks, whites and everybody who was convicted of non-violent drug acts if he were elected. At website, www.onteissues.org/TX/Ron_Paul_Drugs.htm, in the spirit (no pun intended) of Franklin D. Roosevelt signing a law on March 23, 1933 to repeal prohibition and allow people to drink and purchase alcohol freely, Paul suggests that the policing of drugs doesn’t work just as the prohibition of alcohol did not work.  He says that people should have the individual right to use and possess drugs, and America has spent too much money (500 Billion Dollars since the 1970s) in trying to stop them while they do it anyway.  Furthermore, he states that Blacks are punished more severely by the war on drugs because they make up 14% of those who use drugs, yet 36% of those who are arrested are black and it ends up that 63% of individuals that crowd our prisons are Black. A couple of video clips on Youtube.com (I love You Tube) show home made video clips of young Blacks expressing their support of Paul and his desire to abolish the war on drugs.

 One young Black man, whose video clip can be seen at http://youtube.com/watch?v=7ji_Ft23BDw agrees that too many Blacks, and all Americans for that matter, are caught up in the criminal justice system for minor infractions of having small traces of drugs on them.  In addition to that, the last statement that young man makes, which I am going to close this paper out with is, “Black America and people of color should stop voting skin color, and everything that is Black is not right and everything that is white is not wrong. Check out the issues of Ron Paul, you might find them surprising, and you might find that he is speaking for you.” -

--Ontario Hayes

Work Cited

 

 1. Brown, Maple. USA Daily. 25 Oct. 2007. <http://www.usadaily.comarticle.cfm? Articled=137617>.

 

2. On the Issue. 23 Dec. 2007. <http://www.ontheissues.org/Ron_paul_Drugs.htm>.

 

 3. <http://www.ronpaul2008.com/oress-release/15ron-paul-is
-highest-po...>.

Parenthetical Citation

 

  4. Vote Gopher. 2007. <http://votgopher.com/canidate.php?issue=28&can=7>.

 

  5. You Tube. 4 Feb. 2008 <http://youtube.com/watch? V=YaFaOfiOWtI>.

 

  6. You Tube. 4 Feb. 2008 <http://youtube.com/watch? V=7ji_Ft23BDw&feature=related>.

 

 

 

           

 

 

            

By Anny Sivilay

 

Going into Super Tuesday, Democratic candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton campaigned to get the Latino votes in California, Nevada and New York, states with a high population of Hispanics.

“In California, Hispanics make up about 40 percent of the population, and they are expected to account for about 20 percent of the Democratic vote,” reported NPR.

A story written by the New York Times talked about the different tactics the candidates use to woo the Hispanic community.

While Obama was getting the crowd excited by pumping his fist and chanting with the crowd “Si, se puede!” or “Yes, we can!” Clinton was reaching out to the community in her own way.

“She flew to a Mexican-American enclave, the East Los Angeles neighborhood, to eat at King Taco, ordered in Spanish by the Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, who has emerged as an important supporter,” reported the New York Times.
According to the 2006 US Bureau Census website, it’s estimated that about 24.4 percent of Nevada’s population is Hispanic and about 16.3 percent of New York’s population is Hispanic.

Obama and Clinton each appeal to the Hispanic community for different reasons. Clinton, being a junior senator from New York will no doubt get the Latino vote from that state. The battle was over the other two states, California and Nevada.

Senator Obama may appeal to young voters and many minorities on account of him being a minority himself, but the ethnic tension between Blacks and Hispanics will most likely work against him.

Black-Brown Divide, an article in which Newsweek interviews Earl Hutchinson, political analyst and author, explains the ethnic tension between the two races.

“The tensions between blacks and Latinos and negative perceptions that have marred relations between these groups for so long unfortunately still resonate, and I believe there will still be reluctance among many Latinos to vote for an African-American candidate,” said Hutchinson. “It can be devastating for Obama and good for Hillary Clinton, especially given the fact that the Latino vote is growing and could be a much more significant factor, depending on the turnout.”

In Latino Community, Female Voters Push Clinton Over the Top, a story in the Washington Post explains why Clinton may have the upper hand when it comes to the Hispanic community.

The Clintons had been involved with the Latino community far longer than Obama, noted Cassandra Butts, a senior Obama strategist.

"I'm not prepared to say brown people won't vote for a black guy," she said. "If both of them were equally well-known, if they had worked the community as long, you might be able to draw that conclusion, but it's an apples-to-oranges comparison."

Another aspect working for Clinton is that the Hispanic culture revolves around family, a culture that really honors and respects their mothers and many women see her as a mother, being that she is one herself, making her identifiable to them, as mentioned in the New York Times article, In Obama’s Pursuit of Latinos, Race Plays Role.

So it was no surprise to find Clinton getting the majority of the Latino votes in Nevada in mid January and then winning the Latino vote by a 2-to-1 margin in New York, California and New Jersey as reported by NPR on February 6, 2008.

Clinton and Obama are running a close race because the Democrats still don’t have a nominee for the upcoming presidential election, making the March primaries an important factor. The two candidates will be battling for votes in Ohio and Texas and if the voting trend for Hispanics continue it doesn’t look good for Obama in Texas. As reported by the Associated Press, almost one-half of Democratic primary voters will likely be Latinos.

According to Hispanic voters to play significant role, a story recently published in the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, Clintons people have already made plans to send campaign staffers to Texas this week, while Obama’s camp plans to open 10 field offices across the state.

“Though Obama is making gains with Hispanics and could pull in more support before March 4, the advantage at the moment with Texas Latinos goes to Clinton because she and her husband have a history of reaching out to the group,” said Lydia Camarillo, vice president of the nonpartisan Southwest Voter Registration Education Project.

The Democrats won’t have a presidential nominee until after the March primaries, will Clinton take the ticket or can Obama come up and win Texas?

 

Sources 

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.p
hp?storyId=18716086http://www.newswe
ek.com/id/104725http://www.washingto
npost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/19/AR200801190
2429.htmlhttp://www.npr.org/template
s/story/story.php?storyId=18608312ht
tp://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/15/us/politics/15hispanic.
html?ref=politicshttp://www.caller.c
om/news/2008/feb/07/march-4-primary-texas-key-for-both-
parties/

Elizabeth Martin

 

The youth vote has the potential to be one of the most influential in the 2008 presidential election. And with all of the activity generated on social networking Web sites like Facebook and MySpace, the involvement of young adults in the presidential race appears to literally be growing by the minute.

 

In the early primaries, 18-29-year-olds were already getting involved. Young adults in that age range made up 14 percent of voters in the South Carolina primary (up from 9 percent in 2004) and in Iowa the young voter turnout increased an astounding 135 percent from 2004, according to the LA Times.

 

According to the AP, the turnout among young voters in the 2004 election was the highest since 1972, and this year experts are anticipating the turnout to reach levels of the 1960s – around 50 percent.

 

From the beginning of his running for the presidency, Barack Obama has had an increasing number of supportive groups created on both Facebook and MySpace. The same day he anounced his decision to run, one student created a group called “Barack Obama (One Million Strong for Barack).”

 

Farouk Olu Aregbe, a student government adviser at the University of Missouri at Columbia, could not have foreseen his group growing to its current 447,233 members. The page lists links to Web sites for information about Obama, donations to his campaign and even and online store for Obama merchandise.

 

While the other candidates have their support groups growing on these social networking sites, the apparent largest group formed is one of opposite intentions. “Stop Hillary Clinton: One Million Strong AGAINST Hillary” is well on its way to gaining its goal of a million members. At 10:38 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 6, the group had 782,487 members. By 10:40 a.m., the amount grew to 782,491 members. Another refresh of the page at 10:40 a.m. and two more members had already joined. By 10:55 a.m., 782,538 people had joined the group. You get the idea.

 

Obama has had the most support from young voters so far. He claimed 57 percent of 17- to 29-year olds’ votes in the Iowa Democratic caucuses, according to exit polls. He also claimed 67 percent of the 18- to 29-year-old voters in South Carolina, according to the AP.

 

Being the youngest candidate may have helped Obama to gain support from young voters, in that he knew how to connect with them. Perhaps his young(er) mind locked on to the idea early on because he knew just how many under-30-year-old voters there are and what kind of impact they can make.

 

It appears to all stem back to the early days of Iowa caucuses, in which 17-year-olds can vote if they will turn 18 before the general election, according to Time Magazine– who has its own impressive standing as the fourth most read consumer magazine among college students. Obama met with student leaders from the areas where he held rallies across the state and hired a youth-vote coordinator who has worked with Rock the Vote to successfully mobilize the student vote.

 

Since then, Obama has spent money on radio and television ads aimed specifically at students. But Web sites like Facebook and MySpace have made it easy for the candidates to gain support from the young voters. With 65 billion page views per month, Facebook is the largest of the Internet social networking sites and has a market share of more than 85 percent of four-year U.S. universities, according to Time. It’s no wonder groups like “One Million Strong for Barack” are getting so much attention.

 

So maybe it is the fact that Obama is the youngest candidate that attracts the young voters to his ideas and to support him in the upcoming election. Maybe it was his grass-roots campaigning early on in Iowa that gained all the support. Either way, it has obviously paid off, giving him the most youth support thus far in the nomination race.

 

As far as the Facebook and MySpace group members, close to a million members in one group aimed at keeping another Clinton out of office gives a promising outlook as to how large the youth turnout will be in this year’s general election. Here’s hoping they are actually as eager and enthusiastic as they appear.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

by Scott Gonzales

            Super Tuesday was a chance for Americans to have a say in who will run for U.S. President in the upcoming election. So to perform their civil duties, people showed up in record numbers to cast their vote and help decide the fate of this great nation. It’s too bad that some voters were not permitted to do so.

            Sticking to custom more than common sense, 21 states still hold closed primaries in which voters can only cast ballots for the party they registered under, leaving those registered as independent, Libertarian, Green or any party other than the Republican or Democratic Party, ineligible to vote.

            While many state’s primaries and caucuses were decided by margins great enough to keep this issue from affecting the outcome, it could have played a deciding factor on others.

            Connecticut, a state in which the Democratic primary was decided by four percentage points (14,518 votes), may have been a lot closer or even gone the other way if outside parties were allowed to vote. As the fastest growing group of voters in the U.S., Independents voices should not be shunned from involvement in such an important decision.

            Missouri holds an open primary, one in which any registered voter can cast a ballot for either party, and turned out to have the closest race for the nomination during Super Tuesday. It is no secret that independents tend to favor candidates Barack Obama and John McCain. With 29 percent of Missouri’s voters registered as independent as of Jan. 2008 according to usnews.com, they must have made a difference in the primary’s outcome, as both races were won by one percent (9,997 votes in the Democratic race and 8,677 votes in the Republican race). The winners – Obama and McCain.

            New Mexico resembled what’s wrong with closed primaries on Tuesday. New York Senator Hillary Clinton won the primary by one percent (1,092 votes) over Obama. With 18 percent of the states voters registered as third-party affiliates as of Sep. 2007, this vote could have easily swung the other way.

            Texas will hold its primary Mar. 4 and it is open to all comers. In Texas, a voter becomes affiliated with a party after they vote in that party’s primary and remains affiliated with them until the year’s end. It will be interesting to see how third-party voters influence the race in Texas, a predominantly Republican state.

            Independent voters are Americans who deserve to be heard in these primaries. States need to adjust their primary voting policies to allow them to take part in important political issues and allow them to take advantage of their voting rights. With one of the most important presidential races to ever take place in this country happening now, it is a shame that this is even an issue. 

Grant Mehlhoff

Arizona Senator John McCain’s successful Super Tuesday did more than just separate himself from his Republican opponents Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee.  It also proved that the now-frontrunner for the GOP nomination could stand up against the combined might of the Rush Limbaugh and right-wing radio.

Throughout the run-up to Tuesday’s primaries, conservative talk radio hosts Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and the likes saturated the airwaves doing all they could to turn their millions of listeners against McCain.  They threw their support behind Romney, hoping to sway their audience to follow right along.

Normally good partisans, these conservative radio hosts turned against one of their own.  They attacked McCain’s policies, both social and economic, and questioned his conservatism.  To them, McCain is nothing more than a Democrat in disguise.

“If, this autumn, voters must choose between Clinton and McCain, they will face, at least stylistically, an echo, not a choice,” Limbaugh said. 

Coulter took it a step further.  Last week Coulter said that if McCain wins the Republican nomination, the author of “Godless: The Church of Liberalism” will do the unimaginable and campaign for - gasp - Hillary Clinton.

“If he's our candidate, then Hillary is going to be our girl, because she's more conservative than he is," Coulter said. "I think she would be stronger on the war on terrorism.  John McCain is not only bad for Republicanism, which he definitely is -- he is bad for the country.”

But Tuesday the voters had a chance to speak for themselves.  When the polls finally reported in, McCain took a decisive lead in the race for nomination, winning nine of the 22 states holding primaries.  He picked up key wins in California, New York, New Jersey and Missouri, amassing more than 500 delegates.

Tuesday’s results pushed McCain’s number of delegates to 680.  His next closest competitor, Romney, has less than half with 270.  To secure the nomination, McCain needs to reach 1,191 total delegates.

“I think they’ve made their case against me, pretty eloquently,” McCain said.  “A majority of Republicans across the country have expressed a different view."

McCain plans to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference Thursday in Washington.  He hopes to unite a splintering party and reassure his fellow Republicans of their common principles. 

“We should coalesce around those and respectfully disagree on others,” he said.

Yet, McCain’s campaign was the big winner this week.  His success has shown that the once influential right-wing radio has lost its clout.  No longer can it rally listeners and influence elections like it has throughout the past decade.

“Conservative radio talkers bragged their influence helped put George W. Bush in office,” CNN’s Carol Costello said.  “How times have changed.  And those same talkers aren't bragging anymore. Voters have betrayed them, despite what's playing on Rush Limbaugh's show.”

But these radio programs continue to post healthy ratings.  Limbaugh and Hannity alone draw 25 million weekly listeners to their shows, according to The Washington Post.  Why, then, have their audiences fallen out of step with the shows’ hosts?

The voting bloc that played such an important role in the election and re-election of President Bush has changed significantly over the past few years. 

The movement has fractured as the interests of many conservatives broadened beyond social issues, such as abortion and gay rights, to the current economic downturn and the war in Iraq.

Is it possible that the conservative talk radio no longer has a finger on the pulse of the Republican voting base.  Have Republicans become so weary of President Bush that they have stumbled out of lockstep with the right-wing media, which lobbied so fiercely to put Bush in the White House?

by Scott Gonzales

When Sen. George Mitchell’s report to Major League Baseball, which investigated athletes who may have used illegal substances, was released Dec. 13, it named current players as well as those who have played in previous seasons. Since then, the players named have denied, admitted or challenged the reports.

            The next step, you would think, would be to start handing out punishments to the players for their wrong doings. With big brother keeping an eye on baseball and how they are handling this situation, MLB surely wants to move past this situation as quickly as possible.

            What happens to a player that is found guilty of using performance enhancing drugs?

            The current drug policy states that a player who receives a positive test result will be suspended for 50 days on their first offense, 100 days on the second and slapped with a lifetime ban from the sport on the third. This policy was passed in Nov. 2005 after congress demanded a tougher drug policy be put into place.

            The previous punishments were 10 days on the first offense, 30 days on the second, and 60 on the third. Player bans would not come until at least the fifth offense.

            So the question now is how do we punish those who are found guilty of the allegations they face stemming from the Mitchell report?

            Because the dates the players are said to have used the performance enhancers span both the old and new policy periods, it is unclear whether they should adhere to the rules that were in place when the usage took place or if they should follow the current rules.

            Well if baseball is truly committed to cleaning up the game, they need to place the strongest penalty possible on these players.

            Although we do not know exactly when steroids entered the world of baseball, they became a major topic during the 1998 season when oversized sluggers Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa went after the single season homerun record. Since then, the topic has bloomed into the black rose of Americas pastime.

            With Congress putting heat on the game to clean up its act, baseball has since been looking for the perfect solution while trying to keep the on-field action in the limelight. Unfortunately, its been hard to watch a game, or even hear the word baseball, without mention of drug use.

            If we've learned one thing, it's that everybody's not going to agree to whatever punishment is put in place. The best thing to do in this situation is to put the game first. Baseball was around long before steroids and the players that use them, and it will be around long after – if we do the right thing.

            These people need to be made examples of. If they are found guilty of use, a minimum punishment of one season's suspension without pay should be placed on these players. Let them think about what they did and hit them in the pocket. Let those years of drug use to get them in the physical shape they thought they needed go to waste by sitting on their couch and watching the players who did it the right way fill their positions. And let the younger generation of possible users see that illegal behavior will not be tolerated.