What if you face the problems CWs face here

“You should clap for those young people,” Vice President Biden said. “Can you imagine the pain, the anxiety, coming home every day wondering whether or not your mother and father will still be there? Can you imagine what it must feel like?”

Joe Biden was speaking about Hispanics in the U.S. but he might as well be speaking about the CWs in the CNMI. The 50 people that have controlled politics in the CNMI since 1978 created the problems we face today and now they try to blame the U.S., the CWs themselves, and the outside influence of haoles and other rabble rousers for the problem. You people created it and now you refuse to take ownership of the problem and fix it. If you do nothing, you will still be voted out in a few years anyway just by the sheer number of U.S. citizens in the CNMI and you will be hated for the way you have conducted yourselves for the past 36 years. If you own up to the problems you created, fix them and move forward, you will be remembered as statesmen, far-sighted leaders, and revered around the barbecue table in years to come. Imagine your relatives leaving the CNMI, not with a U.S. passport, not with an FSM or Palau or Marshall Islands passport and not being able to go to the States, but having to go to Dubai or Turkey or somewhere they are treated like you treat the CWs here. Think about it. When you diminish others, you diminish yourselves.

JKPL, it’s 2014, don’t buy old technology
The Joeten-Kiyu Public Library is apparently thinking of using its $11,000 donation from the Hyatt to install old, outdated and, in my opinion, useless hardware for ConnectEd.

The ConnectED Initiative announced by President Obama on June 6, 2013 sets four clear goals to transition to digital learning across the country in five years. The two goals of the four are “Supported Teachers” and “Digital Learning Resources” but these two are the most important: Upgraded Connectivity: Ensure next-generation broadband and high-speed wireless is available to virtually all of America’s students in their classrooms and libraries. JKPL has high-speed wireless now on Saipan. If Tinian and Rota don’t have it, Docomo or IT&E can install it. Access to Learning Devices: Ensure students and teachers have access to affordable mobile devices to access digital learning resources at any time inside and outside of the classroom. Touch screen tablets is what JKPL needs and that’s all they need. Kids and adults learn to use them in 20 minutes, and they are affordable mobile devices. I urge JKPL to just buy touch screen tablets. They cost way under $100 each and are exactly what President Obama is talking about. To connect to Tinian or Rota, just push the Facetime App Icon. We don’t need a digital village at JKPL, we need a digital CNMI.

Gary DuBrall
Chaln Piao, Saipan