We need to elect more people like Mr Ted Lieu

Warrigal

Warrigal

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Sydney, Australia
Not just in the US but everywhere. People who have received much in life who are prepared to speak up for people who have received little.

A congressman eloquently schools someone who insulted people with 10th-grade educations.

Laura Willard

Everybody has value — and he recognizes that simple fact.

Rep. Ted Lieu is an Ivy League-educated congressman who represents the 33rd district in California.
At an Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing, he felt that a witness, through his tone, insulted the place of immigrants in the United States.

I wonder how often that happens. *sarcasm font*
Lieu didn't stand by silently. Here's what he said:

"I think it's easy for people like you and me, who wear suits and ties and work in offices, to cast aspersions on those with 10th grade educations. And I certainly hope you're not saying that only those with college degrees or high school degrees should be eligible for federal benefits.

But let's talk about some of these folks with the 10th grade educations, such as Maria Isabel Jimenez. She was a farm worker, 17 years old. She worked for nine hours one day on a farm near Stockton in brutal heat, without shade or water, and then she collapsed. She was taken to the hospital. Her body temperature was 108.4 degrees. She died two days later.

When I was in the California state legislature, I had the opportunity to meet — over many years —many farm workers who've had families die in brutal conditions in the heat, so that you and I can have less expensive orange juice, cheaper artichokes, less expensive garlic.

And I just want to suggest that people like Maria Isabel Jimenez... that her net contribution in dying so that you and I can have cheaper grocery bills so that we can spend less, she's given far more to American society than you or I ever will." ​


So, basically, Lieu is saying that a higher education, nicer clothes, and a better-paying job do not make someone more important or a better person?

And in fact, many of the people who don't have those things are contributing just as much if not more to society than those who do?
Gasp! Radical ideas.

Now, I know what you might be thinking: We should expect everyone to feel this way!
But alas, many of our senators and representatives seem out of touch with the people whose best interests they're supposed to be considering.

Anyone else hope we can have more Mr. Lieus in Congress?
Click to expand...

It really is up to the voters to vote for the best people, not just their labels.
 

I have just taken the time to listen to the inaugural speech of a man elected to our state parliament recently.

I've been aware of him for a number of years because he was the headmaster of a boys school I am familiar with. As a teen I attended school dances there and my husband was a student there in the first two years of its existence. At that time the demographic was mostly Australian born kids of British ancestry. Later the area experienced an influx of Lebanese people, both Christian and Muslim as a consequence of the war. The school became a battle ground between the Aussies (Skips) and the Lebanese (Lebbos) and it was failing badly with few of the boys doing well or even trying.

Along came a man called Jijad Dib. Yes, his first name is Jihad and he is a muslim.

Mr Dib is an enlightened man who believed in his students and he has turned the culture of the school on its head. So impressive has this been that our ABC has featured it on TV programs and Mr Dib had given a TEDx talk on how it was done. http://www.abc.net.au/tv/bigideas/stories/2014/05/21/4009340.htm

His electorate is now majority muslim because it contains a very big mosque at its centre but this man has values that I can endorse and I really wish that he was my local member. Mine has been re-elected by a campaign of dirty tricks and a last minute smear campaign against his opponent, suggesting among other things that he is a paedophile. He isn't.

I long for the day when we have less self serving politicians and more like Jihad Dib and Ted Lieu.
 
I agree that both men displayed a great deal of character and would that we had more people in government like them.

I hadn't been aware that OZ had a significant Muslim population. Are these mostly recent arrivals or do they have a long history in OZ?

And let me get one more thing straight, is OZ an entirely acceptable abbreviation for Australia, or does it bring with it a connotation of some sort?
 
The first Muslims in Australia were Afghan camel drivers who carried supplies to outback towns across very arid country. They were lonely men who mostly married Aboriginal women. Their camels were eventually turned loose after the development of the rail lines and they became the ancestors of our feral population of disease free animals that we now sell to the Middle East. Camel races are held annually in Alice Springs.

More recently we have taken in a lot of muslim refugees from the wars in Lebanon, other parts of the Middle East and from Asia. Our northern neighbour, Indonesia, is the largest Muslim nation in the world.

We have one Muslim member of Federal parliament and he is also quite worthy of his position.
 
An early Afghan cameleer.

681497-110820-cameleer.jpg
 
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