Discount up to 22% on Prescription Drugs

According to the San Jose Mercury News -

" Santa Clara County has joined a nationwide program sponsored by the National Association of Counties to buy drugs in bulk. The main idea is to help sick people buy drugs they need but can't afford and to bring more business to pharmacies. Residents of any age, with or without health coverage, can get a free card without having to register or fill out cumbersome paperwork. Locally, 200 pharmacies will participate. The cards can also be used outside the county at about 59,000 pharmacies recruited by the association.

Kicking off the program at Government Hall, Supervisor Liz Kniss said the program won't cost county taxpayers a dime. Pharmacies expect to profit by selling more prescription drugs to patients who can't afford them now."


http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_14004655


While new to this county, the program has operated for several years in dozens of states throughout the country.  There is no budget or end date for the program, and residents can use the discount cards as often as they purchase prescription medications.

To get a list of participating pharmacies and counties throughout the US, go to caremark.com/naco or call 1-877-321-2652.

Residents need only to print out a "prescription discount card" online from a county Web site in order to take advantage of the discount.  The cards are also available at county libraries, Social Service Agency headquarters, and the county administration building.

To get a free prescription drug discount card, link to the website:

http://www.rxprintacard.biz/naco/web-cards/naco.aspx?pid=90DD0259-B133-475C-B240-848794DE5DF8

Hell in An Loc: The 1972 Easter Invasion and the Battle That Saved South Viet Nam

http://www.amazon.com/Hell-Loc-Easter-Invasion-Battle/dp/1574412760/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259348429&sr=8-1

In 1972 a North Vietnamese offensive of more than 30,000 men and one hundred tanks smashed into South Vietnam and raced to capture Saigon.  All that stood in their way was a small band of 6,800 South Vietnamese (ARVN) soldiers and militiamen, and a handful of American advisors with U.S. air support, guarding An Loc, a town 60 miles north of Saigon and on the main highway to it.

This depleted army, outnumbered and outgunned, stood its ground and fought to the end and succeed.  Against all expectations, the ARVN beat back furious assaults from 3 North Vietnamese divisions, supported by artillery and armored regiments, during the three months of savage fighting.

About the Author

Lam Quang Thi was a general in the ARVN.  He is the auther of "The Twenty-five Year Century: A South Vietnamese General Remembers the Indochina War to the Fall of Saigon (UNT Press).  He lives in Fremont, California.  Andrew West (foreword) is the author of  "Vietnam's Forgotten Army:  Heroism and Betrayal in the ARVN."

Vietnamese American Community of Northern Cal vs. City of San Jose

The Brown Act lawsuit is grinding through the wheel of justice with the City of San Jose trying to ask for a dismissal.  Recently, the City appealed to the Court of Appeals but lost its appeal on related matter.  The date for the trial will be in early March 2010.  The community recently had a fund raising event to support the trial.  Another event will be on December 13, 2009


According the community's website:

http://vacnorcal.webs.com/

"This lawsuit is not about the naming of an area, it’s about holding public officials accountable for violating a law that protects democracy, and to discourage them from doing it again. Our voting rights are protected in a democracy, whether we vote by ballot or by voice. For ballots there are laws and procedures to protect them from being destroyed before they’re counted.

For legitimate concerns expressed by a significant segment of the public at council meetings (where proposals not suited for citywide elections are deliberated) there are laws to protect the people’s voice from being ignored. The Ralph M. Brown Act prohibits a majority of councilmembers of a California city from secretly discussing a matter prior to a Council meeting regarding that matter -- so that political deliberation and decision-making are in the open, and so that the public’s participation at the Council meeting would be seriously taken into account.

Evidently, a majority of San Jose Councilmembers secretly discussed and decided to vote against the name “Little Saigon” prior to the Council meeting on November 20, 2007 where more than 1,000 “Little Saigon” supporters came to participate in democracy and to vote with their voices. These councilmembers totally ignored the people’s voice due to prior behind-closed-doors dealings, led by Councilmember Madison Nguyen, that are specifically prohibited by the Brown Act.

This is unacceptable in a democratic society. If you value democracy, you should support the Brown Act Lawsuit against the City of San Jose, even if “Little Saigon” is not your choice or the naming issue is not of interest to you."

The lead attorney is James Chadwick, a partner with Sheppard Mullin.  He is considered to be one of the best lawyers in the America in 2008 and 2009.  The other lawyer on the legal team is Steven Dovan and the paralegal is Trina Nguyen.  More information about the trial can be read on the community's Website and www.sccaseinfo.org/civil.htm.

Established in 1994, VACNORCAL is a nonprofit organization represeting Vietnamese-Americans in Northern California.  Headquartered in San Jose, its mission is to support theVietnamese-American community in the Bay Area.  VACNORCAL is the plaintiff. 

Vietnamese American Community Services (VACS) is a nonprofit foundation founded by Dr. Phu Le.   The foundation provides social assistance to San Jose Vietnamese-American residents.  Dr. Phu Le is the treasurer of the legal fund. 

Should San Jose Chief Rob Davis Resign?

A coalition of Latino, Asian-American and African-American recently had publicly asked SJ Chief Police Rob Davis to resign.  Their request is published in the Mercury News

http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_13773188

The funny thing is due to the disagreement between the two leading organizations of the Vietnamese-American community in San Jose, Viet-AmericanVoters of Northern California and Vietnamese-American Community of Northern California, the colation decided not to include them in the group.   The coalition includes NAACP, Asian Law Alliance, La Raza Lawyers; African-American Community Services Agency; Silicon Valley De-Bug; Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network; San Jose Peace and Justice Center; National Lawyers Guild; Asian-American Center of Santa Clara County and Coalition for Justice and Accountability are united in their call for the police chief to step down.


The coalition will have a press conference in front of the city hall at noon on Tuesday November 24 to update their progress including their succesful effort to have the release of the Daniel Pham's 911 tape.   From the latest rumors, attending the press conference will be members of the Viet-American Voters of Northern Cal. but not the members of VACNORCAL.

VACNORCAL sees this as an issue of not a community being mistreated by those in power but an issue of communist vs. anti-communist.  The logic is simple to VACNORCAL.  Since the exchange student Ho Phuong comes from Vietnam, he is a communist and VACNORCAL cannot be seen as supporting a communist.  Hence, VACNORCAL decided not to join the coalition against their effort of pushing for changes as well as asking for the resign of SJPD Chief Davis

The Viet-America Voters of Norther Cal is made up of mostly younger activists and they only see this is a community issue as a whole.  In order to better the community, there has to be drastic changes.  And Phuong Ho was a victim of an abusive system that needs to be changed.

Where Was Our Humanity?

Many people see the SJPD beating of the San Jose State student because he is a Vietnamese/Asian/ member of an ethnic community without any weapon and in a position to defend himself, and not because he was from Vietnam or from San Jose. It could have been any of us. When see the videotape and hear Ho’s cry-for-mercy, it sounds like a human being just like anyone regardless of who they are and where they came from. Thus, I see that beating from the perspective of a member of the human family. One could ask whether the police's motivation was from self-defense, disrespect, anger, or hatred toward this student.


For the past 6 years since the 95-pound mother of two toddlers Cau Tran killing until the most recent mentally-ill Daniel Pham killing by the SJPD, I did not see our chief of police or the police department leadership reach out to the Vietnamese American community or the victims’ families in any meaningful way.

At least the name of the Cau Tran's shooter was released, the Daniel Pham's shooter's names were kept secret and were not made known until the no-indictment information, several months later. So, public information became more secretive. It was an open grand jury for Cau Tran's killing, and it was a closed grand jury for the Daniel Pham's killing. Transparency has become a thing of the past. SJPD police on July 13, 2003 killed Cau Tran with one bullet in the safety of her own kitchen. On May 10, 2009, they killed Daniel Pham with 12 bullets. Is it self-defense, or is it hate that these police pumped 12 bullets into this person in his own backyard?

I am one of those who are concerned about the quick erosion and loss of many residents’ trust in our police or the leadership for what they say, what they do, and how sincere they are in what they do and say in relation to what they have done.

The voices of residents of all ethnic groups calling out for help at City Council meetings in the past two years have reached a conclusive level of how many residents’ lives and career opportunities have been deeply damaged due to racial profiling, wrongful arrests of public intoxication, excessive force and beatings against young people / mothers and fathers of young children, and most recently the video-taped cry-for-mercy from a San Jose State student. The call for thorough investigation was made only after pressure from the community and the Mercury’s October 25th exposure of the video-taped beating of the SJSU student that took place nearly two months ago.

How many more incidents never saw the light of day because they were not brought to the public’s attention or were "not known" by the leadership? How credible is the police investigation of themselves (or the DA's investigations regarding SJPD police shootings in the past) especially when they found that none ("ZERO") of the arrest complaints in 2008 was sustained or had any merit? For the police, is "Zero" an improvement from less than 2% sustained complaints in the 117 (2 out of 117) complaints filed in 2007? When the average should be 8%? Why 82 percent of those arrested are ethnic minorities? (Information according to the Mercury News findings, November 1, 2009).

Should we accept that ethnic minorities could expect to be more disrespected and abused by our police? We should not have to cry for mercy from those who are paid to instill a sense of safety, trust, and respect whenever they are near us.

If we want to know how the next years will be, one of the most reliable indicators is to look at how the past 5 years have been.  If you were not invited to meet and confer in the past 5 years, be thoughtful. Maybe you were not that important to a system that is in principal designed to serve and protect at the interest of the public.

Should our children or members of our community be beaten and victimized by authorities (e.g., police) after being bullied by others (Jeremy Suftin, the friend of the beaten SJSU student) may be because one is a member of the minorities, whether in school or out of school? Many of these victims of police abuse by excessive force have to defend themselves for charges such as "resisting arrest" and all kinds of additional charges. Aren't these afterall Human Rights and Human Dignity issues?

Who knows who the next victims will be? It could be anyone of us if we still think I am too good to be treated like that.

Thanks to our good cops, and many of us have friends who are cops. It's the bad cops that made many of us fearful of them all. Unfortunately, the record shows that they have been in good hands: "Zero complaints sustained in 2008!".  "$861.000 settlement!"

We hope our elected leaders can help repair the damage of community's trust (and respect). We all deserve it.

Could this be the defining moment for San Jose community, and more importantly its leadership so that we can know how to answer if one day our children ask: Where was our humanity?

The article is written by Sam Ho, a long time San Jose resident.

Victor Duong and Meet Vietnam

About 500 - 600 Vietnamese-American protesters demonstrated in front of SF City Hall last Sunday in protest of the Meet Vietnam conference.  This is a business and cultural event took placed on November 15 and 16 in San Francisco to promote Vietnam and strengthen relations with California in trade, investment, education, tourism, science and technology. The event was held in City Hall and at the InterContinental Hotel. 

There were about 350 - 400 people, mostly Vietnamese-American business people and investors, attended the event.  The banquest dinner was at SF city hall but the main investment meetings and reception headed by Deputy Prime Minister Truong Vinh Trong were held at the InterContinental.  The music show on Sunday evening was well attended with singers and performers flew in from Vietnam. Well known singers like Tran thu Ha as well as recent winner of VN Idol were big hits with the audience. 

Deputy Prime Minister Truong also met up with the Vietnamese-American Entrepeneur Association (VAEA).  The association is headed by Nguyen huu Liem, Ngo Hua and Vu Ngoc Trac.  Nguyen huu Liem, a lawyer,  is infamous in the community for his support of Madison Nguyen against the naming of Little Saigon in San Jose as well as his close tie with the communist government.

At the reception, in reference to the protesters, Victor Duong commented with laughter: " The extremists missed the boat and demonstrated at the wrong place".  Victor Duong along with his brother David Duong are owners of California Waste Solution.  They are a big donors to State Assemblyman Van Tran and Madison Nguyen.  Recently, both brothers gave Van Tran $9,600 for his congressional bid in 2010 against Quang Pham, an ex-marine pilot.  Both brothers own real estate and recycling business in VN worth about $65 million.

A Fine Line

On 11/07, a group of about 60 college students from San Jose State University (mostly Vietnamese-Americans), demonstrated in front of San Jose City Hall to show support for Phuong Ho.


Phuong Ho is the student who was physically assaulted by 4 SJPD officers while handcuffed. The cell phone video captured the beating by his roommate is everywhere on the Web.

Meanwhile, the week before, Chief Rob Davis, personally paid a visit to the Vietnamese-American Community of Northern Cal (VACNORCAL). His visit came after a rather determined meeting at the Asian Law Alliance’s headquarters where Raj Jayadev (Silicon Valley De-bug) vocally suggested that there should be some concerted legal effort at the federal level against SJPD and the removal of Chief Davis. The meeting was attended by ACLU, NAACP, and other prominent civil rights groups.

The message from the meeting was quickly channeled back to the SJPD.

After being pressure by the Mercury News along with other community activists, Chuck Reed and the city council had decided that they will release the 911 tape of Daniel Pham shooting under certain conditions. It was a pyrrhic victory for the community for a closed door grand jury proceeding already determined not to charge the officers in the shooting death.

Dolores Carr on the other hand is looking hard over her shoulder for she knows that she cannot longer count on the community to deliver her the votes for 2010 election. She tried her best three months ago attending the Community Day event along with her husband asking for their votes. In front of about 2,000 people she asked for their votes while ignoring the fact that she had turned down their request to have an open grand jury proceeding on Daniel Pham as well as the release of the 911 tape.

Meanwhile behind the scene, Madison Nguyen is going after her political enemy with vengeance.


She pulled her hammer after Community Day event in August.  The event was held the parking lot in front of VACNORCAL’s rented building on 10th street. This is the same building that Bill Clinton held his fund raising effort for his wife last year for her presidential run. The parking lot was filled with about 2,000 people. The event was put together by VACNORCAL, the same group that supported the name Little Saigon against Madison Nguyen and is now suing Nguyen for violation of the Brown Act.

At this event, the community elected new officers for VACNORCAL, Viet Voters Foundation along with multiple Vietnamese-American organizations showed unification and joined hands with many dignitaries. Five members of the San Jose City Council attended along with District Attorney Dolores Carr, her husband, State Assembly member Alberto Terrico and Pete McHugh.

VACNORCAL was served the following week with a Compliance Order to cease and desist all activities by City of San Jose Code Enforcement Division. The rationale? Their facility was not zoned for community center and assembly of more than 49 people. Penalties range from civil contempt to fine of $2,500 per day from the time the Compliance order was served. This is the same VACNORCAL that subsists on a $3,000 monthly budget and yet manages to have food kitchen, free health clinics, and provide facility use for all the cultural, religious and community activities. For the last 2 months, the community has to cancel all upcoming events.

Adding insult to injury, City Code Enforcement has set a team of Code Enforcement inspectors to “monitor” the activity of the community center every weekday and weekend since August. They would come during planned small events and meetings and “remind” that VACNORCAL will be shut down and pay stiff fines if their camera captures more than 49 people at the same time. Last week, a police car was seen at the parking lot with a police officer observing and taking notes of people coming and out of the community center.

With the city in budget crisis, the city is definitely going the extra mile spending money to “serve” a nonprofit foundation that happens to disagree with the policy of a city council member.

A city council’s main objective is to serve its community’s interest and to provide support for a community to grow. In a twisted world of Madison Nguyen, this is a second time that she has used zoning law to shut down a nonprofit foundation that did not support her. Remember the GI Forum anyone?