” CNN Town Hall with Secretary, Julian Castro – An Engaging Interaction ” – April 11, 2019.

          Tonight’s CNN Town Hall featured Former Secretary, HUD, Julian Castro, contributing factfully and reasonably to the people problems.

Don Lemon of CNN, the Moderator.

          Don Lemon of CNN moderated the event.

Julian Castro, former HUD secretary.

          Extent of topics covered in this event is as broad as those in the earlier Town Halls this season – Immigration, Infrastructure, Healthcare, Education, Gun Control, Climate Change ..  ..

          1.  First to Julian Castro’s exploits :  Figure below is a representation of his exploits –

          Julian Castro became the first Hispanic to deliver the Keynote address at the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, NC, catapulting him to national attention.

          Time magazine placed Julian Castro on its ” 40  under  40 ”  list of rising stars in 2010.

          WEF in 2010 listed Julian Castro among Young Global Leaders.

          Will these give him a leg up in the contest –  Nobody can be sure.

          2.   Second to Julian Castro’s Job Performance  :  Figure below is a representation of Julian Castro’s Job Performance  –

          Julian Castro helped rebuild the disaster affected communities through a $ 1 billion National Disaster Resilience Competition in 2016. It helped stabilise the housing market too.

          Julian Castro promoted a community wide visioning effect through  ‘SA2020’  based on collective People Vision/Goals in San Antonio in 2010. Aim was to turn vision into a reality.

          Julian Castro, as Mayor, helped expand Pre-K  education through special funding from businessmen to the tune of $ 30 million in 2012.

          Job Performance may seem ok but he has not been a senator, governor, or such other powerful person as we now see in the Democratic crowd of aspiring individuals.

          3.   Third to Julian Castro’s Priorities. :  Figure below is a representation of Julian Castro’s Priorities –

          Julian Castro’s Priorities as gleaned from the discussions in the session are three-fold :  

          Julian Castro is a strong advocate of  ‘Medicare for All’  as the key program that all Democrats in general strive to support and strengthen.

          Julian Castro is a strong supporter of Pre-K program to 4 year olds with funding from higher local taxes. He accomplished this to a great degree and delivered on this while serving as mayor of San Antonio.

          Julian Castro is a strong supporter of a decent pathway to citizenship for the undocumented residents of U.S.A. ;  a strong advocate of reconstitution of ICE ;  and a strong opponent of border wall in South.

          Common to all Democrats, needs a distinguishing feature to add.

          4.  Fourth to Julian Castro’s Leadership style  :  Figure below is a representation of Julian Castro’s Leadership style –

          The quality of humanness is what is central to his style of Leadership and Governance.

          (a)  Human Concern and Compassion : The general thinking that we have to choose between border safety and compassion is not right according to him. We can have both and do more with both concern and compassion – be it justice to DACA or to the undocumented immigrants. Human Concern and Compassion is the best way to lead and make decisions on any thorny issue, he believes.

          (b)  Integrity  :  Integrity of administration is one strong quality that he avers learning from Barack Obama. And today, more than ever before, we are in great need for restoring the integrity of White House. Today, more than ever before, we need to be  ‘bold’  in our thinking and actions : be it Climate Change;  be it Judicial appointments;  be it Housing;  be it Taxes;  be it Healthcare;  be it Education  …  …  Integrity is the essence of boldness, he emphasised.

           (c)   Truthfulness  :   Whatever are our facts and real knowledge ;  whatever are our agreements and reality ;  whatever are our faiths and beliefs –  all add value to our actions and they should essentially form the basis for the entire gamut of our activities and decisions.

          A student of Human Relations, he fulfils a basic requirement of a Politician.

          Some observations from Commonsense perspective :

          1.  Julian Castro was able to maintain the enthusiasm and interest of the audience to the substance of his answers. I sincerely feel that the audience will remember the convincing answers afforded by Julian Castro in this Town Hall. To some it would serve to enhance the basics in knowledge of the issues discussed.

          2.   Julian Castro has been successful in enhancing the emotional appeal that he was able to fill the minds of the audience through his focused approach and some repetitions (specially the immigration part, his own personal experience)  during the event.

          3.   Julian Castro chose to make the topic of immigration critical and relevant, reinforcing quite a few times in the session, why the audience here and the American citizens in general have to view this as currently more important and worth caring for. It also helped to motivate the audience to respond with cheers while paying key attention to the details as in the case of DACA and undocumented immigrants.

          Conclusion :  Julian Castro succeeded in being persuasive without being controversial ;  argumentative without being confrontational ;  informative without being rhetorical – getting the audience to pay attention to what he said. Quite an engaging interaction.

   “Dieu avec nous”

   Friday, April 12, 2019 – 10.09 a.m. (IST)

   Tidbit : ” Forging and repairing alliances, and not damaging and disrespecting alliances will be the crux of Foreign Policy ” – Julian Castro in this session.