Archive - 2014

The March 10, 2014, issue of The New Yorker carries a long “Letter From Cairo” piece by Peter Hessler (China 1996-98) from Egypt entitled, Revolution On Trial: The strange world of the Muslin Brotherhood court cases. Peter and his wife, Leslie, and their two babies live in Cairo. His most recent book is Strange Stones: Dispatches from East and West.

Dear Peace Corps Colleagues, I wanted to make folks across the agency aware that, in the coming week, we expect The New York Times to publish an extensive multi-media story about the Peace Corps both in print and online. The Office of Communications has been working with the paper extensively on this story, which  will include commentary from Acting Director Hessler-Radelet, along with both supporters and critics of the agency. The Times has solicited a wide variety of stories from current Volunteers and RPCVs, and we expect the piece will include both positive and negative sides to it.  Finally, it is our strong hope that agency reforms to enhance support for Volunteers and enhance their experience in the years ahead will be highlighted throughout. Because of the depth of this story, I fully expect that it will go viral quickly in the Peace Corps community and beyond.  To help Peace Corps . . .

Novelist, rancher, and country music singer, Kinky Friedman, got one step closer Tuesday to adding another line to his résumé: agriculture commissioner of Texas. Kinky made the  Democratic primary runoff for the position. He’ll compete against cattle farmer Jim Hogan in that May 27 contest. A Republican is favored to win the general election. Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/03/richard-kinky-friedman-texas-agriculture-commissioner-runoff-104270.html#ixzz2v5cIHl5B

Reported by Jonathan Pearson (Micronesia 1987-89) Advocacy Director for the National Peace Corps Association (NPCA) on Tuesday, March 4, 2014 President Obama submitted a Fiscal Year 2015 budget to Congress which requests virtually the same level of overall funding for the State Department and other international affairs programs, including the Peace Corps. The President is requesting $42.6 billion for the State Department and other International Affairs programs, about a 0.2% decrease from spending in the current fiscal year. The Peace Corps fared only marginally better, as the President is requesting $380 million for the fiscal year that begins next October. That’s a one million dollar increase from current funding, which is about 0.3% above current funding. Pearson reports that RPCV Congressman Sam Farr  is expected to begin circulating his annual “Dear Colleague” letter, urging support for increased funding for the Peace Corps.

VOTE TODAY FOR KINKY FRIEDMAN (BORNEO 1967-69) Willie Nelson’s bud Kinky Friedman wants to become Texas’ next Agriculture Commissioner. So it should come as no surprise that he’s made the upcoming election “a referendum on lifting the prohibition on pot and hemp.” “Prohibition simply doesn’t work,” Friedman writes on his campaign website. “Lifting the prohibition is not about long-haired hippies smoking dope; it’s about the economy, the environment, water conservation, education, the border, health care, criminal justice (and injustice!). It’s about the future of this great state.” On the homepage of the site, it reads in big letters: “Kinky Says Legalize Now!” Musician, author, humorist and political hopeful, Friedman is best known as the leader of his band, the Texas Jewboys. These days he’s set his sights on making a difference working at the highest level of state government. Friedman has lost several previous races but is trying again to win the upcoming . . .

Erik Lang (Guatemala 1987-90) is an attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. He works in the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration Related Unfair Employment Practices.  Erik is also a Screener for AFI Docs, a documentary film festival in Washington DC that is held every year in June. His blog is  Worthy Mouse Clicks. Erik was nice enough to send me a heads up on this link to the Amrican University Peace Corps collection. He wrote me: I made the video above about the Peace Corps Archive at a recent history event organized by Jesse Bailey who is the Historian of the Returned Peace Corps Volunteers of Washington (RPCV/W).  He moderated a panel discussion about the history of RPCV/W.  The participants were all former board members of RPCV/W.  There were even many audience members who were very steeped in the history of the Peace . . .

[Kitty Thuermer (Mali 1977-79) attended the Peace Corps Acting Director’s talk at the National Press Club last week and was kind enough to send me her impressions of Carrie Hessler-Radelet and the presentation by the Peace Corps.] • How fitting that Carrie Hessler-Radelet, Acting Peace Corps Director, spoke in the Edward R. Murrow room at the National Press Club in Washington D.C. on February 27th. Imagine CBS News broadcaster Edward R. Murrow, tall, lanky and cranky — the man whose voice signaled hope to a generation of World War II fighters — imagine him as a Peace Corps Volunteer. Sporting a bush jacket, head wreathed in a cloud of cigarette smoke, he would be just the guy to help launch a community radio program in rural South America. Murrow would also be the first to embrace new technology and wrestle it into service in the field.  Which is exactly what . . .

From The Peace Corps Press Office Remarks of Carrie Hessler-Radelet Acting Director, Peace Corps “Honoring Peace Corps Week in the 21st Century” National Press Club, Washington, D.C. AS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY February 27, 2014 I’m honored to join you all today in celebrating Peace Corps Week, which commemorates the anniversary of our founding. Each year, during this week, the Peace Corps community comes together across the nation, and around the world, to renew our commitment to service. It’s great to be here at the National Press Club. Let me tell you what the press had to say about Peace Corps in our early days. In 1961, TIME magazine described the first groups of Volunteers in this way: “Peace Corps Volunteers are patriotic and adventuresome….with the patience of Job, the perseverance of a Saint, and the digestive system of an Ostrich.” Personally, I’m not quite sure what it means to have . . .

A Writer Writes My Philomena by Tony Gambino (Zaire 1979-82) [Tony Gambino taught  TEFL for one year in a rural high school and then spent two years teaching at the branch of the Zairian National University in Kisangani. In 2001 he returned to the Congo as the Mission Director for USAID. He is sure that he is one of a very small number of RPCVs who returned to serve as USAID Mission Director in their country of service. (Many RPCVs have become USAID Mission Directors, but didn’t do so in their country of service.) Today he is a consultant working on international issues and lives in the Washington, D.C., area. This essay by Tony appeared on February 25, 2014 on the website Slate. It is republished by Tony’s permission. It is the story of one son’s search for his biological mother.] Tony and his biological mother, Dorothy The story of Philomena Lee and . . .