Thursday, May 21, 2015

Did Rioters Target Asian-American Businesses? --Where's the DOJ?

The Other Racial Divide

Source:  Conservative Headlines
By Dennis P. Halpin, May 25, 2015, The Weekly Standard

When guests at a North Korea Freedom Week dinner in Northern Virginia learned the Korean-American pastor at our table led a Maryland church, they immediately asked about the situation in Baltimore. It was May 1, and National Guard troops had been deployed to the city three days earlier to help quell the unrest sparked by the death of a man in police custody. The pastor let out a deep sigh before responding. A few members of his congregation had lost everything. After working diligently for years building small businesses in a new country, they watched their efforts literally go up in flames as looters trashed their shops and carted off their merchandise.

The crisis reminded many in America’s growing community of two million Korean immigrants and their descend-ants of another city’s devastation two decades earlier. Baltimore’s riots began two days before the anniversary of the outbreak of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, in which Koreatown, the heart of the Korean diaspora in America, was subjected to pogrom-like attacks by irate mobs. Though Asian Americans had nothing to do with either Rodney King’s or Freddie Gray’s injuries, they appear to have been the targets of some of the animosity unleashed by rioters.

The depth of feeling about the L.A. riots—which left some Korean-American business owners who lacked insurance permanently impoverished—reached even the ancestral homeland, as I well remember. A delegation of dissidents, including pastors, labor leaders, academics, and students, called at the U.S. consulate at which I was stationed in Busan, South Korea’s second-largest city, in the spring of 1992 to demand that President George H. W. Bush “do something to protect our compatriots from rioters.” They considered inadequate the official U.S. government response that protection of life and property in civil disturbances in the United States was a local issue, primarily for Los Angeles mayor Tom Bradley, and that deploying the National Guard was the prerogative of California’s governor, then Pete Wilson. That evening, an enraged student demonstrator tossed a Molotov cocktail at the U.S. consul’s car—my car—as it departed through the consulate’s gates. Fortunately, the official car was armor-plated, a surplus U.S. government vehicle left over from the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympic Games, so the gasoline-filled, lit bottle bounced off it without igniting.


Read the full story:  www.m.weeklystandard.com

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comment Policy:

The author of this blog will attempt to engage in conversation via the comments section whenever possible and recognize the 24/7 nature of the internet. Moderating and posting of comments will occur during regular operational hours Monday through Friday. Comments submitted after hours or on weekends will be read and posted as early as possible, however admins and/or the author is unable to commit to replying to every comment posted.

This is a moderated blog. That means all comments will be reviewed before posting. In addition, it is expected that participants will treat each other, as well as the author and admin, with respect. Comments that contain vulgar or abusive language; personal attacks of any kind will not be posted. Comments that are spam or that promote services or products will not be posted. It is requested that all comments remain on topic.

The Elder Statement blog does not guarantee or warrant that any information posted by individuals on this blog is correct, and disclaims any liability for any loss or damage resulting from reliance on any such information. The Elder Statement blog may not be able to verify, does not warrant or guarantee, and assumes no liability for anything posted on this website by any other person. The Elder Statement blog does not endorse, support or otherwise promote any private or commercial entity or the information, products or services contained on those Web sites that may be reached through links on our Web site.

To protect individual privacy and the privacy of others, please do not include phone numbers, addresses or email details in the body of a comment. Such information will result in removal of a comment.

Thank you for your attention.

The Elder Statement