Juan Rangel is CEO of Chicago's United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) and co-chair of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's recent election campaign. He was interviewed in the Saturday, September 17, 2011 issue of the Wall Street Journal: The Masters of Hispanic Destiny by David Feith.
The UNO organization is described this way: Its premise today is that Hispanics in the U.S. are masters of their own destinies, responsible for their affairs good and bad, and duty-bound to invest in American civic life.
Some of what Mr. Rangel went on to say is very encouraging:
the central question for Hispanics to answer as they grow in number and potential political influence is: "Do we want to be the next victimized minority group in America, or do we want to be the next successful immigrant group?"
"...we're gonna play by the rules, play hard, and get ahead, and it'll be good for the country and good for our community."
Education is the key to success. Hard work is useful, but that is not enough. Every ditch digger works hard, but that does not make a ditch digger successful. Mr. Rangel promotes the importance of education.
We live in a competitive world. If we track success by ethnic group, and look at the CEO's of large American companies, it looks like the Hispanic community is being outflanked by those communities that focus on education.
Robert Canright
Note:
Reading the online version of the Wall Street Journal is tricky if you do not have a paid subscription to the online version. The trick is to reach the article through Google. Just google
masters of hispanic destiny wall street journal
and you should get a link that accesses the article.
