Yesterday, a friend and co-worker forwarded me an article in the New York Times, written by Indiana senator Evan Bayh, and posed the question "This article is... a reflection of our government today ... or is it?"

Last week, Bayh announced he is retiring from the Senate after serving for more than a decade. Why? According to the article:

It is this lack of social interaction, the refusal to socialize or be friends with members of the opposite party, that Bayh says is the core of the problem. But it didn’t always used to be this way, he explains:

Something has got to change, no doubt. 

But in the midst of enormous challenges comes hope. This morning the Senate voted 70-28 to pass a $15 billion jobs package, giving Senate Democrats their first legislative victory of the year. And guess what? Thirteen Republicans got behind the bill too. According the The Hill, "Final passage of the bill was made possible by the support of Sen. Scott Brown (Mass.) and four other Republicans who voted Monday to cut off a GOP filibuster."

Wow.

The bill’s four major components include "a $13 billion tax credit for employers who hire new workers; greater flexibility of businesses to write off capital expenditures; $2 billion in Build America Bonds to lower municipal borrowing costs; and a $20 billion transfer in highway funding, which did not require a spending offset and counts toward the overall cost of the legislation."

Perhaps the Senate did indeed hear Senator Bayh’s words of wisdom. Maybe we already hit rock bottom...could we be on the road to the right path? As an eternal optimist, I would dare to say yes.

On February 11, Latino leaders gathered at the Texas State Capitol to promote the 2010 Census and encourage an accurate count. According to News 8 Austin:

Rep. Peña, later blogged  "The message I send to the citizens of Texas is that together we can have a successful 2010 Census and ensure that our voice is heard and that our people our counted."

MALDEF, in collaboration with grassroots leaders and organizations inluding MATT, has formed the Texas Latino Complete Count Committee in order to reach the hardest to count communities. MATT is proud to be a part of this important initiative.

MALDEF has launched an extensive campaign

to encourage Latinos to participate in the Census, called ¡Cuéntate…Porque Tú Vales! “Because You Count, Get Counted!” They also issued a press release

asking Texas Governor Rick Perry to step up and form a statewide complete count committee:

The MALDEF release explained the rational behind the campaign as follows:

MATT is further participating in the census effort by devoting our fifth MATT Maestro en Casa book to the topic, the lesson of which will air on March 9, 2010.  It’s one of the ways we are reaching out to the immigrant community to inform them about the Census and encourage them to participate.

As I’ve mentioned before,the Census is going all out to encourage maximum participation this year. They recently debuted a spot during the Super Bowl:

I think it was very bold of the Census to shell out $2.5 million to make sure their message was heard during America’s most-watched TV event, but I am afraid the subtlety of the ad may have been lost on many-- I had to watch it a couple of times to "get it", but maybe that’s just me. Perhaps my biggest gripe with the ad is that I never got the vibe that it was asking people to participate or giving them any indication of why this matters so much, which I thought was the whole point of the campaign. In all honestly I think a more direct approach may have been a better investment. What do you think?

Moving on...

With escalating drug wars, Mexico’s gotten a lot of bad press over the past couple years. And while I don’t want to underplay the severity of violent crimes, it’s worth pointing out that the homicide rate has actually dropped in the past decade.

According to an article in the Washington Post, Mexico City’s homicide rate is about the same as Los Angeles, and our nation’s capitol is actually three times more deadly!

So why the bad rap? The Post points out that "Mexico, Colombia and Haiti are the only countries in the hemisphere subject to a U.S. government advisory warning travelers about violence, even though homicide rates in many Latin American countries are far higher." As a result, " ’What we hear is, ’Oh the drug war! The dead people on the streets, and the policeman losing his head,’" said Tobias Schluter, 34, a civil engineer from Berlin having a beer at a cafe behind Mexico City’s 16th-century cathedral. "But we don’t see it. We haven’t heard a gunshot or anything.’ "

So if drug violence has heated up since President Felipe Calderón began cracking down on cartels, why is Mexico becoming less deadly as a whole?

The article says the downward trend can be attributed to a "general improvement in Mexico’s quality of life. More Mexicans have joined the ranks of the middle class in the past two decades, while education levels and life expectancy have also risen." And "experts say while drug violence is up, land disputes have eased. Many farmers have migrated to the cities or abroad and the government has pushed to resolve the land disputes, some centuries old."

The drug war has admittedly given Mexico an unfair reputation as an exceedingly violent country, as Jose Luis Pineyro, a sociologist at Mexico’s Autonomous Metropolitan University, points out. "It’s a bad international image that affects foreign tourism and foreign investment."

It’s heartbreaking to know that so many Americans fear Mexico. The reality is that by avoiding dangerous spots like Cuidad Juarez-- the epicenter of drug war violence-- Americans can enjoy traveling to Mexico without worrying that they are putting themselves at great risk.

As the Post concludes, "in many parts of Mexico, villages are more tranquil than ever - a fact that retired nurse Marilyn Wells struggles to drive home with her American friends back home in LeMars, Iowa."

As the 2010 Census draws closer (forms will be mailed out in 6 weeks),  the Census Bureau is ramping up its efforts to make sure the count is accurate, spending tens of millions in California alone. Not doing so could prove much more costly, as proved in the 2000 Census. According to PE.com:

The 2000 census missed more than 40,000 residents of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, costing the region more than $75 million in federal funds...Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Pacific Islanders, the poor and children are among those most likely to be missed...

The Census Bureau is targeting much of its $133 million outreach effort toward those and other groups that experts say are typically undercounted in the once-a-decade count of all residents. People who speak little or no English, renters, high-school dropouts, public-assistance recipients, the unemployed and those who recently moved are also among those classified by the census as particularly hard to count.

With so much at stake, the chances for a more accurate count seem promising. According to an article in the Washington post, the effort is massive and unprecedented:

The four-month 2010 Census advertising campaign will officially start across television, radio, print, outdoor and the Internet on Jan. 18., but the first television spot will debut the night before on NBC's broadcast of the Golden Globe Awards.

 With ads produced in an unprecedented 28 languages, the 2010 Census advertising campaign will reach the average person 42 times with messages around the importance of participating in the census. More than half of the budgeted advertising will be targeted to media consumed by minority and ethnic audiences.

The Census has already overcome a number of hurdles, including the defeat of a bill which would have required respondents to indicate their legal status, and a call by some Latinos to boycott the Census unless comprehensive immigration reform is passed by March.

Do you think the Census Bureau is on the right track?

Read more about the efforts of the Church and Latino leaders, who are also helping make sure the 2010 Census is accurate.

This week there are a couple interesting articles about how Latinos are influencing American politics. 

First, the Economist explores "Power in Numbers", delving into how a long-underrepresented group is quickly gaining political power:

This week, MATT introduced a series entitled "Are You a Citizen or a Spectator? Over the next few months we'll explore this question by delving into what it means to be an engaged and active citizen, rather than one who just watches things happen.

I came across this video which does a really good job of succintly explaining what citizenship means. I hope you'll watch it and let me know if you agree with Jennifer Rockwood's assesment:

Lately, I’ve taken a keen interest in the 2010 Census and how Latinos will affect the overall count. I’ve talked about the issue before here, and again when the Vitter amendment was defeated, thereby preventing the Census from asking respondents their legal status.

Today, the Herald Online published an article on the challenges of making sure all Latinos in the U.S. are accounted for:

Census officials are working harder than ever this year to build relationships with Latinos, a population that has quadrupled in York County since the last census in 2000.

But some undocumented immigrants in York County are wary of the census form because they fear it could send them and their families back to their home countries. The fear persists despite a law that bars officials of the U.S. Census Bureau from sharing personal information with any other agency.

As I’ve mentioned before, some Latino leaders have called for a boycott of the Census unless Congress and the White House pass comprehensive immigration reform. I personally cannot wrap my head around this logic, as being counted is the key to obtaining political representation. Boycotting the Census is therefore just a way of silencing your own voice.

Luckily, others are working hard to make sure Latinos participate and make their voices heard. 

Some religious groups are making concerted efforts to convince Latinos to participate so they are accurately represented in Congress. And the Census Bureau itself is launching the 2010 Census Road tour, aimed at convincing underrepresented groups, including Latino immigrants, to participate.

It was a proud moment for all Americans when Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed to the United States Supreme Court earlier this year. Recently Latina magazine named her "Woman of the Decade", profiling her incredible story in this year’s December/January issue. Some interesting tidbits about the country’s most famous "wise Latina" are revealed in this provocative piece. I was particularly intrigued by the following passage, detailing her decision to accept the nomination:

"...weeks before Obama made public his pick to replace Souter, Sotomayor called her confidante and good friend Llambelis, telling her that she wanted to pull her name from consideration.

"You have to understand that Sonia is a very private person," Llambelis explains. "She didn’t want to go through another public vetting process and a potential public dressing-down by those on the Republican right who opposed her nomination. Sonia was happy being a Federal Appeals judge, loved her life in New York and felt fulfilled. She worried about having less time to spend with her mother, family and friends, particularly given her mom’s age and potential health complications." Llambelis recalls listening to her friend, whose "I can" mantra was being drowned out by last-minute uncertainty. She told her to think beyond herself. "At this point, this is not about you," Llambelis said to her. "It’s about little girls and boys, brown and black, who live in the projects and in poor communities around our nation, who can dream bigger if you are in the Supreme Court. You cannot back down now." Sotomayor promised to think about it overnight. And in the morning, she woke up with a lighter heart and a bigger purpose."

I for one am glad Sotomayor searched within herself and decided to not only accept but embrace the nomination, grueling hearings and all. A wise Latina indeed!

The full article can be read in the print edition of the magazine, on newsstands now.