Archive - January 2011

After the Arizona shooting–and you may have heard this on NPR News last night–a friend said to Mark Shields (the friend’s name, I think, was Ginsberg) that in Tucson a Republican Catholic judge went to see his friend, a Jewish Democratic congresswoman, and when the shooting started, a young Mexican-American was first to help the Congresswoman, and later her life was saved by a Korean/American doctor, and all of the events were reflected and commented on by an African-American President.

People are still asking that question as we approach the half century of the agency. Back in May of 1966, Joseph Colman, who was then the Acting Associate Director of the Peace Corps for Planning, Evaluation, and Research, published a paper in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences. I tracked down a copy of Colman’s paper that reports on several studies of motivation for joining the agency. One was done in 1962 of 2,612 applications’ replies to a motivational question on the application form; another in a 1963 interview study of why people who apply later decline a specific invitation to enter training; and the third was a 1964 interview study of college seniors and their interest in the Peace Corps. Colman’s paper concludes [not surprisingly] that Volunteers can be successful in the Peace Corps with a variety of motivations for joining.   In 1960, before . . .

Thomas Tighe (Thailand 1986-88; PC/HQ 1995-2000) is now CEO of Direct Relief International, biggest medical supplier to Haiti (directrelief.org): As quoted in Politico Playbook this morning: “One year ago tomorrow [Jan. 12] in Haiti — a country the size of Maryland — more people died in a matter of minutes from the earthquake than have been killed by all the natural disasters in the history of the United States. The scale of human tragedy caused by Haiti’s earthquake defies comprehension: 230,000 people killed, 1.3 million people displaced, and 194,000 injured. Those who survive now carry the hope and challenge of rebuilding a country. Of course help is still needed to get through and get better. The health challenges alone are steep and threatening, from the systemic level all the way down to very basic access to things like a health professional, medicines, IV solutions, and even soap. Long after the headlines . . .

A New York Times op-ed column this morning (Tuesday, January 11, 2011) by David Brooks entitled “The Politicized Mind” focuses on Jared Loughner and the shooting rampage in Tucson and quotes from a book by  Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, a research psychiatrist, who wrote (among other books) The Insanity Offense. Torrey was a Peace Corps doctor (Ethiopia 1964-66) and is married to an RPCV, Barbara Boyle (Tanzania 1963-65). The Brooks column is generating a lot of ‘heat’ for statements such as “..the political opportunism occasioned by this tragedy has ranged from the completely irrelevant to the shame irresponsible” and slamming such noted liberals as Gary Hart, Keith Olbermann, Daily Kos, and the Huffington Post. Torry’s book is the calm center of today’s op-ed piece. Quoting from it, Brooks uses Torry’s research to show that about 1 percent of the seriously mentally ill (or about 40,000 individuals) are violent. They account for about half the . . .

The new Peace Corps PSA has just come out. Allison Price, press office for the  Peace Corps, gets something right. Thank you, Allison. It is ( the PSA) on the mark. The right tone and message. Wow.  I’m stunned. Peace Corps Releases New TV Public Service Announcement WASHINGTON, D.C., January 6, 2011 – The Peace Corps has released a new television public service announcement (PSA) designed to increase awareness of service opportunities overseas.  The 2011 TV spot coincides with the agency’s 50th anniversary and portrays, with humor and poignancy, the life of a recently returned Peace Corps volunteer (RPCV) who spent two years living and working with a community overseas.  Click HERE to view the television PSA. There are two versions of the PSA.  The original is a 60-second spot, while there is also an edited 30-second version.  Both feature a string of short conversations that unfold throughout a volunteer’s daily interactions as . . .

IN EARLY 1960, Maurice (Maury) L. Albertson, director of the Colorado State University Research Foundation, received a Point-4 (precursor to USAID) contract to prepare a Congressional Feasibility Study of the Point-4 Youth Corps called for in the Reuss-Neuberger Bill, an amendment to the Mutual Security Act. The Youth Corps was “to be made up of young Americans willing to serve their country in public and private technical assistance missions in far-off countries, and at a soldier’s pay.” Then in late 1961, Public Affairs Press in Washington, D.C. published, New Frontiers for American Youth: Perspective on the Peace Corps written by Maury Albertson, and co-authored with Andrew E. Rice and Pauline E. Birky. The book was based on their Point-4 study. According to the authors, “The roots of the Peace Corps idea . . . stretch wide and deep, . . . .” They were referring to a number of volunteer programs that were early instances . . .

The recent reports how the FBI had subpoenaed information on the social media website Twitter about Julian Assange and several other prominent people connected to WikiLeaks, includind an Icelandic lawmaker brought to mind when the FBI was investigating RPCVs. This was all during the Vietnam era. The Committee of Returned Volunteers (CRV)–the first national organization of RPCVs organized in 1965 actively opposed the Vietnam war. Their copious writings–newsletters, information kits, analytical papers–portrayed the goals of U.S. foreign policy as exploitative. The true function of the Peace Corps, they believed, was to mask this imperialism by putting a warm and friendly face on America’s presence overseas. CRV members were among the marches showered with tear gas at the 1968 Democratic convention, and in 1970 they occupied the Peace Corps building in Washington for 36 hours to protests the student killings by National Guardsmen at Kent State and Jackson State Universities, as well as . . .