This from our guest poster Bruce Kesler, who has a long history of writing about Vietnam:
The election of Vietnamese refugee Joseph Cao as a Republican in the most heavily Democrat congressional district in America (11% Republican), drawn to elect a Black (2/3rds Black population), comes as a surprise to some. Reasons given center around his community service record in post-Katrina New Orleans, the utter corruption of incumbent William Jefferson, and the reduced turnout of Blacks in this ballot postponed because of Hurricane Gustav.
Various lessons are being proposed: Republican leadership call it an example of the results of a broader ethnic base and better ethics, calling for more. BlackVoices blog says a new generation of Black politicians cannot just count on racial solidarity but must demonstrate better ethics and effectiveness. Democrats expect a better candidate to reclaim the district in 2010, but expect a fight.
While probably just a temporary balm to bashed Republican egos, this election of the first Vietnamese to Congress is notably ignored in all the state-run Vietnam news agencies which usually never miss an opportunity to herald the many accomplishments of refugee Vietnamese as if its own.
Like refugees from communist oppression in Cuba or Russia, the Vietnamese in the US lean heavily Republican, the Vietnamese by 2-1. The lesson they’ve learned is that American ideals and policies are more to be valued than among many US natives who take them for granted or, even, denigrate the US compared to tyrannical regimes and ideologies.
I’m probably unique among bloggers in writing many dozens of detailed, well-documented blog posts over the past few years about the ongoing political and religious repression in Vietnam and its ethnic cleansing brutality toward its minorities. And, probably nothing else I’ve written about has generated less interest. I won’t belabor the reader here with a repetition, but point those interested to a few good, brief introductory sources: Human Rights Watch “Speaking Up for Vietnam,” (many, many reports and analyses at HRW’s website); Former USAID worker and POW in Vietnam, tireless human rights advocate Mike Benge’s latest summary; the Montagnard Foundation’s report on ethnic cleansing (and ongoing tracking of it); and denuding of its and neighboring Laos and Cambodia’s rainforests.
The Bush administration, focused on the Middle East imbroglio, has been relatively weak in challenging Vietnam’s oppression, while encouraging the import trade from Vietnam that generates a $10+ billion deficit but enriches some US firms and entrenches the political rulers of Vietnam by creating a more prosperous, mostly quiescent urban class. Still, some in Vietnam are not so easily bought off, leading to labor strikes against more exploitive wages and conditions than even in China and the majority Buddhists and the Catholics refusing to buckle under to the state churches that are allowed. Tensions will increase as the international economic tanking slows Vietnam’s export-driven growth.
Returning to Joseph Cao, he has been heavily involved in Boat People SOS, founded to help Vietnam’s refugees. One would expect him to be a voice in Congress for Vietnam’s oppressed. But, one should expect him to concentrate more upon his district’s domestic concerns, especially if he is serious about an uphill re-election in 2010.
The new Obama administration, looking to relax US pressure on another communist relic in Cuba, is not likely to take up Vietnamese human rights more strongly. If Cao’s voice on Vietnam’s suffering population is to be magnified, it will require more Americans and Congressmen taking an interest in Vietnam’s oppression. The Vietnam Human Rights Network has easy links to most every international report on Vietnam, including from Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Freedom House, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, Reporters Without Borders, and many more, all condemning Vietnam’s continuing oppression.
Another worthy cause is the Vietnam Healing Foundation run by my good friend R.J. DelVecchio, former Marine combat photographer in Vietnam and frequent visitor since. It is the only one that tries to aid severely wounded and destitute former South Vietnamese soldiers who continue to be denied basic food or medicine by Vietnam’s regime.
Whether Joseph Cao’s election promises any lasting relief to the US from more ethical Republicans or Black politicians is open to serious question. More important to Americans’ ethical relief would be more support for Vietnam’s long-suffering people.
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