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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
, c
andidate 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
(
n
on-
g
overnment
o
rganization) 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 show us how politics is really done in the U.S.
More importantly, w
e 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,
PS: We heard that
David Fan, Elk Grove, CA
became a PAC Life Member.
To know more about 80-20, view these videos :
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