NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

I first traveled to the United Nations to testify in 2007. I testified along with two other Marie Auyong and Rima Miles before the Fourth Committee on the situation in Guam. We came in the wake of a larger delegation the year before which featured Victoria Leon Guerrero, Julian Aguon, Sabina Perez, Fanai Castro, Tiffany Lacsado and Kerri Ann Borja. That trip represented a big moment in sort of post-nation Chamoru/Angel Santos activism in Guam and the diaspora. The trip first came from a conference in San Diego that I along with a few others had organized in April 2006 about decolonization and Chamoru issues. It was, as far as any of us could tell, the first of its kind in the diaspora. The gathering of so many critical and conscious Chamorus in one place led to a great number of things, one of which was a period of new engagement around the United Nations.

Chamorus had been traveling on and off to the UN since 1982. There were high points, usually when the Government of Guam wanted t…

Each March, UOG organizes an Annual Research Conference or ARC. This year is the 39th year there has been a conference such as this. I presented at this conference as an undergraduate student, a graduate student and now I present at it regularly as a professor. For this year's ARC, I am participating in a couple different panels and presentations, most of which are connected to Guam's decolonization or its current political status.

Here are the abstracts for two of the sessions to which I am most looking forward:

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A Decolonial Analysis of Guam’s Media Landscape
The role of media in a society is not simply to report stories and investigate events, but to promote values and norms, usually on behalf of dominant classes or institutions. In a colonial context, such as that of Guam, these roles gain a colonial dimension, as both institutions and individuals will often be compelled to defend and naturalize the colonial status quo. As such, rather than condu…

While watching the health care drama unfold for Republicans over the past few weeks and months, I kept thinking, who does this remind me of? Today it finally hit me, the Republican party, with their years of whining about Obamacare and promises to repeal and replace as soon as they were put in power, are like some of my worst students. For years they promised this, they knew that eventually it would happen and they would face a real test. But instead of studying, instead of preparing, they just kept procrastinating and accomplishing nothing helpful. Now, even their best efforts are laughable in the face of the fact that they had so much time to work something out, and can only resort of the dirtiest tricks now to try to get something, anything passed.

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How Republicans Got Stuck on Repeal
by Jennifer Haberkorn
Politico
7/31/17

Republicans openly speculated in November whether they could fast-track an Obamacare repeal bill to Donald Trump's desk by Inauguration D…

Comedian Samantha Bee bid a fond "adios" to the campaign of Ted Cruz on her show Full Frontal last week.

I said "fond" not because of her affecting for Cruz as a politician or what he stood for, but rather because Cruz had been such an incredible mine for political humor.

As evidence of this, even in his departure, she was able to tweet at him and mock him in one of the most incisive ways I've ever seen in less than 144 characters. See the tweet below.

Ai gof tahdong na tinekcha' enao. Ha botleleha i baba na hinengge-ña yan i gef annok na ti maguaiya gui' gi patidå-ña achagigu.

As she said adios on her show, she rattled off a list of the gof na'chalek nicknames that she had given Cruz, which still make me laugh even after hearing them several times.

Here is the list, with the video below:

"Born Again Tyler Durden"

"Princeton's Unwanted Fetus"

"Fist-Faced Horse-Shit Salesman"

"The World's Only Unlikable Cana…

Chelsea Clinton: Why Guam Should Choose My Mom
Letter to the Editor
Pacific Daily News
May 4, 2016

I’ve spent the last few months on the road doing everything I can to make sure that my mom, Hillary Clinton, is elected our next president because I believe this is the most important presidential election of my lifetime. I feel that way for two fundamental and interconnected reasons that I think many in Guam share.

First is a deeply personal one. This is the first presidential election I voted in as a mom — on April 19 in New York. I didn’t know I could care any more about the issues that I already cared about until I became a mother. As many parents I’ve talked to this campaign cycle have shared with me and I’ve shared in turn, everything feels much more personal once we have children in the world. Whomever we elect our next president will play a fundamental role in shaping the country, the world and the future that all our children will grow up in.

The second reason is bec…

Rolling Stone has done a couple of stories on the white militia occupation in Oregon. Here are two of them.

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WTF Just Happened to the Oregon Militia, Explained
by Tim Dickinson
Rolling Stone
1/27/16

The FBI has cut off the head of the snake of the militia occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge outside Burns, Oregon.

The FBI announced Tuesday night that it had arrested eight militia members and that the leader of the standoff, Ammon Bundy, is in custody. One militant is dead, another wounded. Here's what you need to know.

Did federal officials finally raid the wildlife refuge?

No. The militants got cocky and went on a road trip. The FBI intercepted a group of six occupiers traveling on the state highway to John Day, an east Oregon city 70 miles north of Burns, where militants had been scheduled to appear at an anti-government rally Tuesday evening.

Who did the FBI capture?

The FBI arrested Ammon Bundy and his brother Ryan; the Bundy brothers' bodygu…