As an Obama supporter, I was surprised to see Obama accused of being "anti-Asian". After all, that would mean that he hates his own sister.
But, as we speak, there is an Asian-American group engaging in a misinformation campaign to that effect.
Embarassing? Yes, but only for the group in question.
It reminds me of pretty much every other drummed-up controversy about him -- not only is it without merit, but the truth is so far from the slur so as to make the exact opposite point of what was originally intended:
We've seen this script before. Another recent line of attack is that Obama is anti-worker because his plan doesn't force adults to buy health insurance. Except it now turns out the Executive Board of the union on whose behalf the attack was made is appalled by and never approved the actions of this 527 against Obama and opposes mandates, to boot.
The blogosphere was flooded with claims that Obama wasn't progressive enough, until Hillary started criticizing him as too progressive.
The pattern was repeated with gay activists over McClurkin. According to some diaries right here at Daily Kos, Obama doesn't even care about black people.
The story is generally the same: a futile attempt by self-interested, self-appointed leaders of various constituencies to torpedo Obama's candidacy because they lined up behind what they thought would be "inevitable" and now find themselves on the outside looking in. The problem is that there's never any substance to the smear, so it just backfires.
The "80/20" story is no different. I won't go into all of the details, which were covered pretty well in other diaries here and here, but the basic outline is that 80/20 is an Asian-American PAC who issued a set of demands to the candidates on "behalf" of the Asian community that the Obama campaign refused to meet.
The campaign did, however, take the time to put out an official response:
Thank you for contacting Obama for America regarding the 80-20 Educational Foundation questionnaire and Barack Obama’s commitment to Asian Americans.
Barack Obama has worked to advance the interests of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) his entire life. Born in Hawaii, a majority AAPI state, spending part of his childhood in Indonesia, having Asian Americans in his multi-racial and multi-ethnic family, and working with the vibrant AAPI communities of Chicago, Obama understands the aspirations and needs of AAPIs. As president, Obama will work closely with AAPI leaders and advocate for the top priorities for AAPIs across the nation.
Barack Obama is committed to appointing qualified AAPIs to high-level positions in his administration, and he will strengthen the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Barack Obama will also build upon his work as a civil rights lawyer and community organizer to end racial discrimination and advance equal opportunity in the workplace and the federal government. Finally, as a former constitutional law lecturer, Obama understands the importance of a diverse judiciary and he is committed to increasing the representation of qualified minorities and women, including qualified Asian Americans, when there are vacancies in the federal judiciary, including the Supreme Court.
We regret that our staff was unable to reach agreement with leadership of the 80-20 Educational Foundation over concerns with the wording of the questionnaire, despite the fact that modifications to the questionnaire were made for other campaigns.
The Obama campaign is proud of its efforts to reach out and engage the Asian American community by providing an official statement to the Asian American Action Fund (AAA Fund), participating in the Iowa Heartland Presidential Forum, creating an Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) National Leadership Council of key AAPI activists around the country to advise the campaign on AAPI outreach, and sending top campaign surrogates to appear at candidate forums sponsored by Asian Pacific Americans for Progress (APAP) and the AAA Fund. The Obama campaign is also the only major campaign to have a campaign-sponsored Asian Americans outreach webpage linked off of its main website. The Obama campaign is also proud of its endorsement by the AAA Fund of Greater Chicago.
Senator Obama looks forward to continuing his long record of advocacy for Asian Americans as president.
Sincerely,
Obama for America
For me, that's more than I need to dispel this "issue." But I'm also reminded of Obama's AAPI sibling. There are, after all, people who are hated by their own close family members (Rudolph Giuliani, for example), but in this particular case, his half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, who calls him a 'Feminist', has been hitting the campaign trail for her bro.
Barack Obama rolls out a new campaign weapon this week: his half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, who hits the campaign trail on Thursday. The 37-year-old Soetoro-Ng, a high-school teacher in Honolulu whose red hatchback is plastered with her brother’s bumper stickers, says she always knew Barack was destined for great things. "My mom and I had a joke that he would become the first black president," she told NEWSWEEK. "He was so smart, but also wise beyond his years. He had so commanding a presence. He was like a little big man. We called him ‘the little big man,’ because in many ways he was an old man when he was a kid."
About a decade younger than Obama, she has those familiar wide-set eyes, the generous grin, the measured speaking cadence. They share a mother, Ann Dunham. They share, too, the absence of a father. Her father, an Indonesian business executive, and her mother divorced not long after Soetoro-Ng was born. Obama also grew up without knowing his father, Barack Obama Sr., who returned to his native Kenya. Even by the multicultural standards of Hawaii, the half-siblings grew up knowing their home was scarcely the social norm, with strands connecting Kansas, Kenya and Jakarta. Soetoro-Ng says that Barack helped her sift through those complexities. "He really took over a great many of the responsibilities of raising me," she says—crediting her brother with introducing her to the works of Toni Morrison and James Baldwin (in his book "Dreams of My Father" Barack recalls scolding Soetoro-Ng for watching TV and neglecting the stack of books he’d given her)—and taking her through the streets of Chicago and New York. They spent summers together in Honolulu, Chicago and Somerville, Mass.
Soetoro-Ng plans to fly from her home in Honolulu to Chicago and then strike out for such key early states as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. It’s her first real foray into politics—though she admits bashfully to taking part in some protest marches as a teenager. Don’t look to Soetoro-Ng to help Obama start throwing punches, as he’s promised, at his rivals. Her motherly sensibilities seem far afield from the instinct for the political jugular. Requests to engage on even mildly controversial topics in the campaign are politely rebuffed. The toughest thing she’d say about her sibling? "He could be bossy, but he was never mean. He still is."
Yes, I'm well aware of that old canard of the subconscious racist: "some of my best friends are black". But this is close family, and Maya has more than vouched for her bro'. Check me if I'm wrong, but I believe that Barack Obama would be not only the first black president, but also the first President with Asian family members and the first President to (partially) grown up in the Far East. Anti-Asian? I highly doubt it.