Keep On Thumping

The election underscores the need in a democratic enterprise for an efficient system of checks and balances, something Republicans in Congress failed abysmally to provide, which exacted a heavy price. We hope Democrats will bring some semblance of oversight on the executive branch, whose incompetence during the past six years has been exceeded only by its arrogance. Tragically, America and the world have paid mightily and some of the wounds inflicted on long established American traditions of civil rights and individual liberties may tragically never heel.

Indian Americans need to begin engaging themselves in the national public discourse on the pressing issues of the times. We also need to be astute about the community agenda and strategize on how it is best pursued in the new political realignment. Although the repudiation of Republicans is widely attributed to voter anger over the execution of the Iraq War, a Little India online poll found that the war registered barely a blip in the minds of most Indian Americans. Fewer than 5 percent of Indians in the Little India poll identified the Iraq War as an important political issue. Immigration was by far their most significant concern (45%) followed by relations with India (25%).

Indian American policy concerns fall into three broad categories: immigration law, relations with India and catch-all Indian American interests, which are frequently aligned with other minorities. These concerns often play at the margins of the mainstream public discourse and so have to be navigated through the fault lines of the two major political parties.

The biggest current issue in India relations revolves around the nuclear agreement with the United States, which could still be torpedoed in Congress as different versions passed by the House and the Senate are reconciled. The agreement negotiated by the Bush administration has stronger Republican than Democratic support on the Hill. Indeed, some of the opposition to the treaty comes from prominent Democrats, and several of them, including Hillary Rodham Clinton D-N.Y., Frank Lautenberg D-N.J., Robert Menendez D-N.J., Barbara Boxer D-Calif., and Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., supported several stifling amendments, which were ultimately defeated. On the other hand, Democrats tend to be far more sympathetic to immigrants and to minority social concerns. However, even on some aspects of immigration policy, H1 visas for instance, the core Republican constituency of business provides valuable advocacy and support.

The point is that Indians have to be smart about pushing the community agenda, which frequently involves cobbling together bipartisan majorities on what for the mainstream frequently are fringe issues.

We have to be vigilant in prodding senators and congressmen in our respective constituencies, Republicans and Democrats alike, who frequently take our support and money for granted. Politicians need frequent and regular thumpings to keep them on the straight and narrow. Let’s do our part to nudge them ever so often.