「census」的搜尋結果
Census Crunch Time
President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to quickly nominate a commerce secretary after his first choice, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, withdrew this week. Frankly, the far more pressing task at the Commerce Department is to name a new director of the Census Bureau.
The Board Blog
Additional commentary, background information and other items by Times editorial writers.
With only a year to go before the nationwide count in 2010, Mr. Obama needs to nominate a strong new director who can move swiftly to counteract years of political meddling and neglect that have left the bureau ill prepared to conduct the next census.
This page has issued many warnings about the bureau’s state of unreadiness, as have members of Congress and advocates for groups that tend to be undercounted in a less-than-robust census, especially racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, the poor and the disabled. In November, Congressional investigators named the 2010 census as one of 13 issues requiring Mr. Obama’s immediate attention.
Any further delay increases the chances, which are already too high, of a botched census in 2010. That would be a very expensive failure of a constitutionally mandated duty on Mr. Obama’s watch. The damage would be compounded in 2012, when the new census data will be used by state governments to redraw electoral districts. If the census is not accurate, the electoral map also would not be — for years to come.
If Mr. Obama and his team need any more reasons to act now to rescue the census, they should note that the party most likely to benefit from a faulty count is certainly not their own. That’s because an inaccurate census generally overcounts people who tend to fit the Republican profile — white, English-speaking and suburban — and to undercount diverse, mobile urban populations.
The census also is used to allocate federal aid to states — an increasingly important issue in the midst of the country’s deep economic troubles.
More than a month ago, this page noted that the director of the acclaimed 2000 census, Kenneth Prewitt, would be the obvious choice to pull the 2010 census out of the hat. If the Obama team has a better candidate, it’s past time to put his or her name forward.
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國會參議員葛雷格(Judd Gregg，共和黨，新罕布夏州)本月12日退出商務部長提名，不僅使歐巴馬總統邀請共和黨人士入閣的努力破局，舊金山紀事報23日指出，此事還凸顯一年後將進行的2010年人口普查，已成為兩黨政爭的焦點。 人口普查本身即具有高度的政治性，事關選區視人口增減重新公平規劃，影響國會議員席位分配；聯邦政府也將根據人口普查數據，決定撥給地方政府的公路、學校、警察經費，因此備受政界重視。 葛雷格退出提名時公然表示，他與歐巴馬就2010年人口普查，有「無法化解的歧見」。問題在於，歐巴馬決定把原屬商務部主管的人口普查，讓白宮扮演更重要角色。早先的報導指出，歐巴馬政府擬把人口普查局的預算追加70億至80億元，也令葛雷格不滿。 舊金山紀事報指出，歐巴馬的行動旨在安撫非洲裔和拉丁美洲裔，他們抗議任命葛雷格出任商務部長，因為他一向主張限制人口普查局經費。 他們擔心，葛雷格上任後，將使人口普查少算非洲裔和拉丁美洲裔人口問題，更加嚴重。 歐巴馬加強白宮對人口普查的監督權，激怒了共和黨人士，指控他放任民主黨「奪權」。歐巴馬強調，他沒有剝奪商務部主管人口普查的權力，但無論如何，葛雷格退出提名。 紀事報指出，華府這場戲劇化政爭的背後，有一個長期問題：窮人、移民和年輕人，很難清點，因為他們流動性太高，而且不大理會人口普查的清點員。 都市的少數族裔被人口普查漏列，是政爭的焦點。他們通常投票支持民主黨，所以民主黨對人口普查非常認真。相對的，少算這類人口，對共和黨比較有利。 |
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