DEAR SEN. RICARDO LARA, BILL MONNING, and KEVIN De LÉON:
The Senate Democrats had shaken the Senate floor on Thursday morning, February 23, 2017. You
did that because California Republican Senator Janet Nguyen, a refugee
from Vietnam, had her speech cut off and was forcibly removed from the
State Senate floor as she spoke out in memory of fallen Vietnamese
refugees who fled persecution and oppression by Viet Cong. Did you
really have the right to silence and humiliate your colleague in such a
disreputable and despicable way? My American friends and media did not
agree with your actions. Here are some of their suggestions and views.
* Bill Laurie, Viet Nam veteran: “The
actions taken by Senators Monning, Lara, and de Leon are all the more
disgusting and vile. Senator Janet Nguyen deserves her right to free
speech but also the profound and sincere gratitude of Viet
Namese-Americans, U.S.-born American veterans, and anyone else concerned
with the cause of justice and honesty in Viet Nam, Laos, Cambodia.”
* Maureen Blackmun, President, Garden Grove Neighborhood Association: “Which
is exactly what happened to Senator Janet Nguyen on February 23 when
she spoke out about the late Senator Tom Hayden. Vietnamese refugee
Senator Janet Nguyen respectfully waited two days after until Hayden's
family was not present, when she read a prepared speech about her
disapproval of the actions of Tom Hayden when he worked with and
supported the North Vietnamese government… I applaud Senator Nguyen for
taking a stand and speaking up for the millions who died fighting the
communist regime and speaking up against what many of us felt were
‘traitors’. I thank her as well. Many wanted to thank her as well.”
* ALEXEI KOSEFF - akoseff@sacbee.com: “Republican
colleagues say Sen. Janet Nguyen, R-Garden Grove, was silenced by the
Democratic majority when the Senate sergeant-at-arms escorted her from
the chamber as Nguyen tried to criticize the late Democratic lawmaker Tom Hayden for
his stance against the Vietnam War. Hayden, who traveled to North
Vietnam with then-wife Jane Fonda in 1974, Nguyen said she wanted to
offer “another historical perspective.”
Presiding
Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, interrupted Nguyen and gave the
floor to Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel, who said Nguyen was out of order
because she did not raise her objections during the Hayden tribute
ceremony two days before.”
* Sen. Jean Fuller, R-Bakersfield: “One
Democrat, Sen. Tony Mendoza of Artesia, defended Nguyen’s right to ‘say
what she needed to say and express her feelings and thoughts about what
she feels strongly about, especially as it relates to her district and
community.’ He said someone should have given her direction on the
appropriate time to speak, “but to forcibly remove her, I think that’s
too extreme.”
* Julien Nguyen, Portland, Oregon, 2/24/2017: “Senator
Nguyen did nothing wrong, she just told the truth. She just spoke the
truth. She did not “defame” him, but was recounting and describing what
Hayden had done against her people.”
* ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER EDITORIAL BOARD: “She
had risen to offer remarks critical of the late former Sen. Tom Hayden
for his opposition to American involvement in Vietnam, which included
friendly visits to communist North Vietnam and Cambodia during the war…
Sen. Nguyen should have been allowed to speak… Crushing dissenting
speech is a grave problem, regardless of which party wields the gavel…
If Senate Democrats can praise Hayden’s legacy on Tuesday, Nguyen can
speak for herself, her family and millions of Vietnamese Americans that
lived through the war about the effects of his legacy on them on
Thursday… This
is the kind of behavior we expect from our elected leaders, not
forcibly removing someone because they do not share the same views.”
By the way, I want to remind you about Tom Hayden’ activities in the past.
* Bill Laurie, Viet Nam veteran, wrote:
“Tom Hayden, because of his immoral duplicity and mendacity, si guilty
of the deaths fo hundreds of thousands of Viet Namese... and Laotians...
and Cambodians,... and American and other allied service men killed in
SE Asia. He is a repugnant liar. The putrid actions to censor Senator
Janet Nguyen are met with disgust by both Viet Namese-Americans, among
our best citizens, as well as U.S. born veterans who loathe and despise
the late Tom Hayden, and with ample reason for doing so.”
* Maureen Blackmun, President, Garden Grove Neighborhood Association, wrote: “For
many of us, the Vietnam War defined our lives. Whether you were for it,
against it, fought in it, drafted to it, draft-dodged it, filed
conscientious objector, or had friends and family that did some of all
of the above. Even with doubt about our presence in the war, I never
understood Tom Hayden and Jane Fonda actively working with the North
Vietnamese; and I never forgave them.”
* ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER EDITORIAL BOARD wrote: “But
the war has not truly ended for many of us, as became apparent once
more. When he was first elected in 1982, denouncing him as a traitor.
For Hayden, it was part of the deal. In his final book, ‘Hell No: The
Forgotten Power of the Vietnam Peace Movement,’ he wrote about the need
to remember the awful reality of the war and the power of the anti-war
movement that helped end it.”
* According to Wikipedia, Tom Hayden was a leftist: “In 1965, Hayden, along with Communist Party USA member Herbert Aptheker and Quaker peace activist Staughton Lynd undertook
a controversial visit to North Vietnam and Hanoi. The result of this
tour of North Vietnam, at a high point in the war, was a book titled The Other Side.
Staughton Lynd later wrote that the New Left disavowed ‘the
Anti-Communism of the previous generation’ and that Lynd and Hayden had
written, in Studies on the Left, ‘We refuse to be anti-Communist, We insist the term has lost all the specific content it once had’."
“Hayden made several subsequent well-publicized visits to North Vietnamas well as Cambodia during America's involvement in the 'Vietnam War' which had expanded under President Richard M. Nixon to include the adjoining nations of Laos and Cambodia, although he did not accompany his future wife, actress Jane Fonda, on her especially controversial trip to Hanoi in the spring of 1972. The next year he married Fonda and they had one child, Troy Garity, born on 7 July 1973. In 1974, while the Vietnam War was still ongoing, the documentary film Introduction to the Enemy was released, a collaboration by Fonda, Hayden, Haskell Wexler and others. It depicts their travels through North and South Vietnam in the spring of 1974.”
Remember that Senator
Nguyen, who escaped Vietnam on a wooden boat and immigrated to the
United States as a young child after her family members were arrested
and murdered by the North Vietnamese Communist regime. She sought to put
some historical perspective on a resolution honoring Former Senator Tom
Hayden, an anti-war activist who openly supported North Vietnam during
the Vietnam War. Senator Nguyen was right in her speech against Tom
Hayden. You owe her an apology.
Ms.
Julien Nguyen asked you: “May I call your action an unpardonable
temerity, a nascent despotism, a flagrant abuse of power?” Make your
insightful decision, Senators. It’s up to you.
(Avondale, AZ, Feb. 26, 2017)
VĨNH LIÊM
A political refugee, poet, writer
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