View Full Version : Race goals are easier, not better
"Should affirmative action be based on wealth and class rather than race and ethnicity?"
Worth reading and considering.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Race goals are easier, not better
Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune, 24 Apr 2009
Here's a quick history quiz for you. Which nationally prominent leader said this:
"Edicts of nondiscrimination are not enough. Justice demands that every citizen consciously adopts a personal commitment to affirmative action, which will make equal opportunity a reality."
Was it the Rev. Jesse Jackson? The Rev. Al Sharpton? Sister Souljah?
No, it was Gov. Ronald Reagan of California in his 1971 executive order. He sounded more liberal, at least on this issue, than the racial-quota fighter who became president nine years later.
Times have changed, but on race not all that much, as far as Julian Bond is concerned. The civil-rights-era hero, now chairman of the NAACP, whipped out that old quote like an ace up his sleeve during a debate at the Library of Congress this month to argue that what was good for Reagan two generations ago is good enough for America now.
I'm not as certain of that as he is. Sitting in the audience at the debate, I was struck by how much America's persistent problems with race have changed, while so many of our leading affirmative action proponents have not.
Yet I was also struck by how replacing race-based affirmative action with the class-based kind is easier to say than to do, especially at elite colleges and universities.
That's one reason why Bond opposed the evening's proposition: "Should affirmative action be based on wealth and class rather than race and ethnicity?"
President Barack Obama thinks it should, he has said in writing and out loud. "We have to think about affirmative action," he said in at last summer's convention of black, Hispanic, Asian and Native American journalists in Chicago, "and craft it in such a way where some of our children who are advantaged aren't getting more favorable treatment than a poor white kid who has struggled more." It is safe to say that, in the fashion of President Richard Nixon opening doors to China, Obama's position later helped him with white voters and didn't hurt him very much with blacks.
Defending Obama's position in the debate was Dalton Conley, a sociology professor at New York University and an expert on wage and wealth gaps. Past discrimination in jobs and lending has left such a wide wealth gap between the races, he argued, that diversity-minded colleges would end up with a healthier mix by race, ethnicity and class if they focused on household wealth as Obama suggests, instead of race.
Bond's teammate Lee Bollinger, president of Columbia University, disagreed. Bollinger was president of the University of Michigan during the 2003 Supreme Court cases that upheld and clarified affirmative action at that school. Then and now, he said, "we want both racial diversity and ethnic diversity" plus "diversity based upon income and class." And the most effective way to do that, he said, is to take race into account, as well as class.
Otherwise, "and this has been studied by many people," he said, "if you use only income, you will increase the proportion of white students and decrease the proportion of African-American and Hispanic students."
You can see or read the hourlong debate at the Web site of its sponsor, the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia, http://millercenter.org.
Yet that's also why the debate's other participant, John McWhorter, a best-selling author and Manhattan Institute senior fellow, was right to point out a more important hidden danger: When diversity policies lower achievement bars, they can hurt as much as they help.
When he taught at the University of California at Berkeley, he recalled, it was only after the affirmative action ban "that efforts were actually made to teach black and Latino students throughout the state to actually qualify for what the admission procedures were." It hadn't happened before that, McWhorter said, and it wasn't going to happen as long as state universities could rely on racial "preferences," a word that proponents hate despite its accuracy.
With that, he exposed an eternal truth: If we did the tough job of providing quality educational opportunity to every American kid from preschool on, we would not need special programs to build diverse students bodies. They'd be diverse already.
Even so, I do agree with Bond and Bollinger that too much is made of the argument that affirmative action admissions leave a stigma on black and Hispanic students. People get into selective colleges for all sorts of reasons – including legacy preferences, athletic scholarships and geographic diversity – without feeling stigmatized. In the end, it's not how you got into college that counts; it's how you leave.
http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/forums/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=93
IMHO, what the discussion most needs are clearer definitions of charged concepts including 'tolerance,' 'diversity,' 'equality,' 'opportunity,' and 'social justice.'
This isn't to suggest that everyone will have the same notion of these terms, or that they should. Rather, if we could find ways to identify the fundamental differences and key similarities in what is meant by various stakeholders when they use these concepts, we might do a better job of talking to each other than at each other.
For example, it is my observation that elements of the political left view 'opportunity' in America as a finite resource. This means that for someone to have a seat at the dinner table means that someone else now has to wait outside.
Well, what if 'opportunity' is an abundant resource that simply requires figuring a way of getting that extra table in the spare bedroom and those chairs out of the living room into the dining room so we all can sit down together?
Well, what if 'opportunity' is an abundant resource that simply requires figuring a way of getting that extra table in the spare bedroom and those chairs out of the living room into the dining room so we all can sit down together?
Who says we have to stay inside if it's too small? :confused:
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Who says we have to stay inside if it's too small? :confused:
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Richard, you present an even better use of my metaphor and an illustration of the benefits of talking about basic definitions and assumptions.:D
Hey - I love picnics. Bring everyone...and everyone bring a dish to share. It's the American way. ;)
Richard's $.02 :munchin
IMHO, what the discussion most needs are clearer definitions of charged concepts including 'tolerance,' 'diversity,' 'equality,' 'opportunity,' and 'social justice.'
Well said, Sigaba, well said.
I was just reading a paper...here's an excerpt:
There is evidence suggesting that homogeneous groups result in higher levels of cohesiveness and satisfaction (Perrone & Sedlacek, 2000). However, there seems to be overwhelming consensus that heterogeneous groups provide more opportunities for learning because students are exposed to a variety of new perspectives that allow them to engage in more stimulating thinking (Cohen, 1994). Heterogeneous learning groups tend to have the largest positive impact on low-ability students but also facilitate the achievement of medium and high-ability students (Webb, Nemer, Chizhik , & Sugrue, 1998; Johnson & Johnson, 1989). However, Hackman & Walton ( 1986) indicated that group membership must be appropriate for the assigned task.
From: Graham, C. R. (2002). Factors for effective learning groups in face-to-face and virtual environments. The Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 3(3), 307-319.
So...even when we limit the question, literature appears to give an ambiguous answer about benefits of diversity. Is it always good? No. Is it always bad? No again. And how on Earth do we tailor groups to the "assigned task"?
And tolerance? That's got some funny attributes too. As it turns out, I have a fairly wide spectrum of people I know. Some live in really nice places - and they perceive strong prejudice in the community against them because of their economic status. Of course, those less fortunate harbor similar views. If one's neighborhood is a source of distrust, I think we have a long way to go.
The challenge, I think, lies within the development of our national picnic. As long as there's plenty for everyone, life is good and we will all be good friends. But when the desserts start getting sparse....:eek:
Hmm...and IMO the infirmity of the reasoning shown in those remarks yet again proves Mr Adams' point that:
Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so. - Douglas Adams
Richard's $.02 :munchin
greenberetTFS
04-27-2009, 14:34
I know I'm not a racist, all the way down to my very bones...... :rolleyes:
But I never could accept "Affirmative Action"...........:mad: I been screwed more than once by it. Have anyone else have had this come up in their situation, or I alone in my belief? :confused:
GB TFS :munchin
What is weak about the arguments?
They sound like a rehash of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion - with a new set of protagonists.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Defender968
04-27-2009, 15:28
I know I'm not a racist, all the way down to my very bones...... :rolleyes:
But I never could accept "Affirmative Action"...........:mad: I been screwed more than once by it. Have anyone else have had this come up in their situation, or I alone in my belief? :confused:
GB TFS :munchin
GB TFS you are not alone, I've been turned down by a Federal LEO Agency (Very recently) who said I didn't fit their needs after I made it through the entire hiring process including the medical. Even though I have 2-5 years experience in EVERY mission they perform, I also hold a masters, current sec clearance, antiterrorism exp and military experience etc, meanwhile a guy I know personally from my old dept was hired by them, good guy but has only local LEO experience (which I also have) and 2 years minor investigations experience and that's it. No advanced degree, no military, no experience in any of the agencies stated missions, but he can check a block other than white and his last name is Hispanic. The agency I applied for has hired lots of females (hired 2 from my old department for the same class alone) and minorities regardless of qualification, but has displayed that white males need not apply, don't know about other agencies, but I have heard rumors.
Just my experience to date, but I can tell you it is still happening.
What is weak about the arguments? :confused:
With respect, I don't have much confidence in your arguments for many reasons, not the least is that they display teleological thinking.
In one fell swoop, your post collapses the histories of race relations, the American city, urban planning, politics (at the federal, state, and municipal levels), civil rights, and mass popular culture to a simple equation that reads:
Urban blight is the result of blacks voting for Leftist candidates because they are ignorant and racist.
To me, this logic makes as much sense as the DHS's profile of returning veterans as being likely suspects for extremist activities.
And incidentally, I would point out that according to the 2000 Census, 85.4 million Americans lived in metropolitan areas defined as "Central Cities." Of that total:
60% were white
21.6% were black
57.1% of families with children 6 or under had both parents working
47.5% of all residents never went to college
63.4% of all households made less than $50,000 a year
I don't agree that the cause of the problem is as obvious as you suggest.
However, it's what Milton Friedman said, one cannot "enforce equality" per se, because trying to create an equal outcome one way to work against discrimination means you have to actively discriminate against someone else.
This statement, if it is what Friedman actually said, centers around Friedman's definition of 'affirmative action.' Does the statement hold true for all forms of affirmative action? What about various forms of volunteer mentoring programs? Or, as discussed in the links provided here (http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/forums/showpost.php?p=261303&postcount=59), just making sure that standardized tests are as unbiased as possible?
But I never could accept "Affirmative Action"...I've been screwed more than once by it. Has anyone else had this come up in their situation, or am I alone in my beliefs?
Yeah - I used to hate it because Art was black and about 5'5" and got to stand in the back row of the payday formations on Alamo Parade Field and whisper jokes with George and Weasel and the other short guys while I was always the Right Guide having to stand quietly in the front rank because I was 6'5". Then we got Sibio in the company - black and also 6'5" - so SGM Ahumada applied some SF affirmative action and we got to take turns having to stand payday formations as the Right Guide - he'd do it one month and I'd do it the next - on the months we didn't have to stand formation, the SGM left us in the orderly room to answer the phones and guard the B Team's coffee pot. :D
Oh...isn't that what y'all meant. :rolleyes: ;)
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Not saying blacks in particular, or that said blacks are racist at all, I mean more people themselves, of all ethnicities, in certain areas.
And IMO racial issues, at least for the black community, will always be a problem as long as the black community continues to fall for Leftism. Blacks are only backwards as a people in comparison to whites because political Leftism dominates so much among the inner-city areas, leading to high crime, poverty, violence, ignorance, hatred, etc...as long as this Leftism dominates, the blacks as a population are going to be less educated and successful than the whites and this will thus always cause problems regarding "equality," "race," "social justice," quotas, etc...I hope someday the black community can become learned and turn itself around, then the Democrats would lose a lot of votes as well.
But when you have stupid crap like BET (Black Entertainment Television) taking those kids who beat up that white kid and putting them on television, like it was something good they did, problems will only continue (and animosity will only continue to exist between the "races").
But if there is any group of people that has been severely hampered by Leftist policies, it is the blacks. For years, our cities (and states) have been social engineering laboratories, and cities like New York (which was driven to bankruptcy in the 1970s), Los Angelos, Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago, etc...are prime examples of what the welfare state and Leftist policies do to a people.
I just mean as long as this remains the case, and people such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are still stuck in the 1960s, the blacks are going to remain "behind" groups such as the whites overall.
Until the blacks as a whole can move out of this mindset, they are always going to have far higher levels of crime, poverty, lower levels of academic achievement, etc...which will thus keep cries for affirmative action, quotas, "equality," "social justice," etc...being pushed.
If you need work - the Speaker of the House could use someone with your speedy counter-propulsive cycling skills. ;)
Sigaba is absolutely correct in his analysis.
Richard's$.02 :munchin
This statement, if it is what Friedman actually said, centers around Friedman's definition of 'affirmative action.' Does the statement hold true for all forms of affirmative action? What about various forms of volunteer mentoring programs? Or, as discussed in the links provided here, just making sure that standardized tests are as unbiased as possible?
For that matter - what, precisely, is affirmative action? What, exactly, are the goals of affirmative action?
The Department of Labor indicates: The equal opportunity clause requires that the contractor will take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, color, religion, sex or national origin.
And continues:
The AAP identifies those areas, if any, in the contractor’s workforce that reflect utilization of women and minorities. The regulations at 41 CFR 60-2.11 (b) define under-utilization as having fewer minorities or women in a particular job group than would reasonably be expected by their availability. When determining availability of women and minorities, contractors consider, among other factors, the presence of minorities and women having requisite skills in an area in which the contractor can reasonable recruit.
And then we come to this:
Successes
OFCCP efforts benefit real people through systemic contractor investigations and through partnerships with private industry and state and local agencies.
In general, OFCCP programs helped many Fortune 1,000 companies and other major corporations break the glass ceiling for women and minorities. In 1970, women accounted for 10.2 percent of the officials and managers reported on the Employer Information Report (EEO-1) form submitted by federal contractors. In 1993, women were 29.9 percent of all officials and managers, according to the EEO-1 data.
LINK (http://www.dol.gov/esa/ofccp/regs/compliance/aa.htm)
So we start out saying everyone is to be treated equally. But we end up with a metric that mandates unequal treatment of individuals in order to demonstrate successful pursuit of the policy. This appears to create an internal contradiction.
In essence, an allocation system based on several variables is instituted.
Whether such a system is helpful is another subject - and, given the scope of the policy, deserves careful research. Do we know, based on empirical data and solid research methodology (I refer now to a true experimental design with randomized groups and careful controls) that affirmative action helps - or, for that matter, hurts? Moreover, do we know who it helps (or hurts), in what manner and to what degree it helps (or hurts)? I suspect we do not. I suspect the policy is based purely on someone's notion that affirmative action is a "nice idea" that "oughta work somehow".
Let us suppose we take coffee pot duty away from the tall, and assign it on occasion to the height-challenged. What is the gain? Do we even know?
And then we come to standardized tests. As unbiased as possible? I'm not sure how that can be accomplished. For that matter - I'm not even sure it should be accomplished. Are we sure that we want the heterogeneity (or, if you prefer, diversity) that might imply? Should we put those with poor language skills who lack acculturation into higher education? And if we do, what are the consequences?
I propose a reflective experiment. Why should we, as a society, impose rules that specify the outcomes implied by affirmative action? Answers such as "fairness" or "equality" do not suffice, since we are simply arguing that some aggregation of inherently unfair actions will result in a fair outcome. Further, we suggest that by requiring unequal treatment, we will come to a state of near-perfect equality. I question whether such a self-contradictory system is not fatally flawed.
Defender968
04-27-2009, 18:12
:confused: Not trying to say there's any conspiracy or anything, if that's what you mean. But if there is any group of people that has been severely hampered by Leftist policies, it is the blacks. For years, our cities (and states) have been social engineering laboratories, and cities like New York (which was driven to bankruptcy in the 1970s), Los Angelos, Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago, etc...are prime examples of what the welfare state and Leftist policies do to a people.
I just mean as long as this remains the case, and people such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are still stuck in the 1960s, the blacks are going to remain "behind" groups such as the whites overall.
During the campaign, for example, you heard complaints of how Barack Obama was "too white."
In Thomas Sowell's book, Black Rednecks, White Liberals, he talks about how much of what is thought of as "authentic black culture" is actually the left-over remnants of a southern redneck white culture which itself came from Scotland.
To this day, variants of that culture exist in the ghettos, because of Leftist policies.
Until the blacks as a whole can move out of this mindset, they are always going to have far higher levels of crime, poverty, lower levels of academic achievement, etc...which will thus keep cries for affirmative action, quotas, "equality," "social justice," etc...being pushed.
I'm going to have to disagree with you on the facts here. You ascertain that the left is keeping blacks down. From my own personal experience working as an LEO in a several predominantly low income black areas what I saw and believe was hindering them is the disintegration of the family unit in their subsection of society, (though it's happening all over society it happens with greater frequency in theirs, at least from my experience) which turn leads to a lack of education and more teen pregnancy which starts the cycle all over again.
When a child is born with no father in the house (as was the case most often when in a single parent home in my AO) the mother was usually young, and only able to focus on providing for the basic needs of the child. Also the mother was usually not mature enough to really do any adequate parenting, which means the children grew up knowing no boundaries, with no real perception of right or wrong except what they learned from friends or maybe at school. These children then grow up and do what ever feels good, which is most often times sex, drugs and alcohol and at young ages, and low and behold they get pregnant and or arrested at the age of 14 or 15 and the cycle starts again. How they vote and what they believe in has very little to do with their situation. Simple economics are much more dramatic in effect, i.e. have a kid at 15 and without a strong family unit you pretty much will have to drop out of HS. HS drop outs don't make much money, and also don't get much education, and thus are stuck in their current situation, which in turn is why they vote left, so someone will give them a break. Why, not because they’re black, but because due to nearly zero proper upbringing they don't have a work ethic so they take the path of least resistance, and let's face it, it's much easier to be given something than it is to work for it. That in my opinion is why they vote left.
Defender968
04-27-2009, 18:42
Disintegration of the family unit I absolutely agree with, but wouldn't this be tied in with the results of leftist policies and also certain cultural aspects?
When I was talking about "leftism," I also meant (though perhaps I should have been more specific) as well the breakdown of the family unit.
But I would think it is leftist policies that contribute to this, for example giving teenage girls an incentive to have a child because the state will pay for her apartment and so forth.
I don't think the politics have much to do with it, you have to understand many of these folks have never gone more than 8 blocks in any direction, and I'm talking about 18-22 year old people, not further than 8 blocks, EVER. They don't watch the news, they don't have a particular belief structure or set of skewed principals, for the most part they've been in survival mode nearly their entire lives. Nor do I think they have kids to get an appartment, they have kids young because they want to have sex, and have no reason not to because it feels good now and haven't been taught to think about consequences. I've not seen a young girl who got pregnant to live in an appt, that's just not how it works at least in my AO. (Now that is not an excuse for illegal or irresponsible behavior, simply the root cause, I'm still a firm believer that you make your bed you have to lie in it and I don't except any of the above as an excuse for a hand out, quite the opposite)
So no I wouldn't say the left contributes to that substantially, though they don't help it either, I believe it's a cycle that people get themselves into and it is very difficult to break but I would argue it's not influenced by politics or liberal beliefs much at all. It's simple lack of decent upbringing and discipline, the fact that they vote left is simply like I said the path of least resistance. Self reliance and self sufficiency are concepts they cannot understand, not of their own fault necessarily, but because they've often never seen it by example in their own lives.
Hmm...I must be missing something somewhere. So you guys mean it is wrong to just attribute the problems of the black community to leftist policies and leftist beliefs amongst people in such areas that allow such politicians to keep gaining power, that it is more complex?
Yes. Those things that seem simplest seldom are...except to the simple.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Thomas Sowell on affirmative action:
The Grand Fraud: Affirmative Action for Blacks
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=2637
Affirmative Action and Gay Marriage
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/11/05/affirmative_action_and_gay_marriage?page=1
Essay adapted from Affirmative Action around the World, by Thomas Sowell
Thomas Sowell recently concluded a study of affirmative action programs around the world, from India and Malaysia to Nigeria and the United States. His findings? Such programs have at best a negligible impact on the groups they are intended to assist.
http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/3010426.html
An interesting observation from the essay by Thomas Sowell, 'Affirmative Action Around the World:'
The history of blacks in the United States has been virtually stood on its head by those advocating affirmative action. The empirical evidence is clear that most blacks got themselves out of poverty in the decades preceding the civil rights revolution of the 1960s and the beginning of affirmative action in the 1970s. Yet the political misrepresentation of what happened—by leaders and friends of blacks—has been so pervasive that this achievement has been completely submerged in the public consciousness. Instead of gaining the respect that other groups have gained by lifting themselves out of poverty, blacks are widely seen, by friends and critics alike, as owing their advancement to government beneficence.
Which takes us back to the original thesis:
With that, he exposed an eternal truth: If we did the tough job of providing quality educational opportunity to every American kid from preschool on, we would not need special programs to build diverse student bodies. They'd be diverse already.
And that's not a simple problem to be solved by anyone. ;)
Richard's $.02 :munchin
The Reaper
04-27-2009, 20:23
IMHO, the education process is multi-faceted.
The student, parent, teacher, curriculum, and material resources are all major parts of the equation.
It is possible to succeed with a deficiency in one of the above, particularly when there is merely a material deficiency.
If the student, parent, or teacher are not motivated, it is almost impossible to succeed. With two or all three marking time, the students are doomed to failure.
I have seen too many students who don't care, or are betting their future on non-academic skills, parents (usually singular) who are using the school to warehouse their children, and teachers who are tenured and who do not have a strong desire to do what it takes to help the students succeed. I believe that the NEA has a big share of the problems with teachers.
I think serious mistakes have been made and innocents wronged with affirmative action. Baseball would not be what it is today, if the first black players in the majors had not been superb players. Mandating that every team take three or four players of a certain race or ethnicity does nothing to forward the cause of equality. Seeing that those who are selected are sufficiently talented able to be successful sets the stage for future progress. You cannot make people accept something different without them seeing the greater value in it. IMHO, many minority professionals today suffer from the general suspicion that they may not have been admitted to their schools because of their skills, but instead, were the recipients of affirmative action or other special treatment. I would want the first people of any race or ethnicity trying to break a color barrier to be the very best possible, and demand high performance. If you were selecting a lawyer, a doctor, or an architect, would you want the one who was at the top of his profession, or the one who slipped in through the cracks. Right, wrong, or indifferent, I believe that this affects minorities adversely much more than current admission or hiring practices do.
The truth of the matter is, this is very much a zero-sum game. When someone is admitted or promoted for reasons other than relevant competency, someone else is not admitted or promoted. And what is the mindset of the person passed over toward the person or group that were selected over them? The standards have been lowered, and as SF soldiers, we should be very sensitive to that. Wronging another group, or several groups, to favor one, is still wrong.
Just my .02, YMMV.
TR
Stiffed, by Susan Faludi
She's a liberal, she hates men, she's critical of all we've ever done, but her research is SOLID, and surprisingly "Subjective". At the end of the day, she admits that our problem in this (USA) culture is the result of young men being raised by single mothers. (Now take that in correlation to all ethic groups; white, black, asian, hispanic, etc.). Some are more ellligable to identify their fathers, have uncles, mother/father in the same house, ages not spanning more that 18-24 months between siblings, etc., and you will have very different results.
"The problem with men is that we have asked them not to be men, but different images of us. We created our own problems."
An Ovation for Bill Cosby
by L. Brent Bozell III
May 28, 2004
On the fiftieth anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision on Brown vs. Board of Education, which began the end of racial segregation being defended as "separate but equal," an anniversary party was thrown at Washington’s historic Constitution Hall. The biggest name on the program was TV star Bill Cosby, and he packed the biggest – and most unexpected – wallop.
Cosby did not come boasting of progress, basking in satisfaction, or marking a half-century of racial uplift. Instead, he slapped the audience with the rhetorical equivalent of a cold fish. In Cosby’s big picture, too many black Americans today aren’t raising their children correctly.
He lamented the upbringing of lower-income black children in particular. "They're standing on the corner and they can't speak English," he exclaimed. "I can't even talk the way these people talk: 'Why you ain't,' 'Where you is'....And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. And then I heard the father talk.....Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads....You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth!"
It was no doubt additionally controversial when he proclaimed that many young black men in prison today are not "political criminals," but guilty of real crimes. "These are people going around stealing Coca-Cola. People getting shot in the back of the head over a piece of pound cake and then we run out and we are outraged, [saying] 'The cops shouldn't have shot him.' What the hell was he doing with the pound cake in his hand?"
Parents who lament their children in prison jumpsuits were challenged: "Where were you when he was 2? Where were you when he was 12? Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn’t know he had a pistol? Where is the father?"
Cosby’s remarks drew some laughter, and some unease. Ted Shaw of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund was angry, and immediately followed up at the podium by suggesting that systematic racial discrimination was still to blame. Others protested. Black academic Michael Eric Dyson complained in the papers that Cosby’s comments "betray classist, elitist viewpoints that are rooted in generational warfare."
Some younger people dismissed Cosby as sounding like somebody’s cranky grandpa, an old codger lecturing to sit up straight, respect your elders, and use nouns and verbs in their proper order. But this wasn’t just old Cosby. It was the creed of the young Cosby, too.
He was never just a television star. He was the first real television role model for black America. He didn’t make his way into America’s hearts with anger, but with humor. He didn’t win over whites by laughing about all our racial differences, but about our common humanity. The "generational warfare" isn’t coming from Cosby, but from the "thug life" theorists selling the black community nothing but hate, greed, and lust to a thumping rap beat – three serious obstacles to black progress.
Some intellectualizing types are actually suggesting Cosby failed to grasp that ungrammatical English – or ignorance to the ear of the average American – is actually precious folklore. On ABC’s "Good Morning America," Time magazine cultural critic Christopher John Farley explained that he respected standard English, "but I think it's also important to respect nonstandard English. I think it has an important role to play in the development of language and we should respect that. In terms of Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, even the music of Bob Marley, uses nonstandard English to create poetry and to bring joy to people."
Do you suppose Mr. Farley earned his job at Time magazine talking or writing that kind of "poetry"? Would his editors today respect his use of "non-standard English" if he employed it for next week’s magazine? If if isn’t acceptable for Mr. Farley in the workplace, how dare he encourage it for black children!
Bill Cosby has given millions of his own fortune back to the black community, but his words and actions might mean more than the money. His television career has done more than entertain. It has helped build a multiracial culture demanding excellence as well as racial harmony. Cosby’s critics are offering the opposite: excuses instead of excellence, rage instead of humanity. He deserves a nationwide standing ovation for speaking out.
From my understanding....
Why are you using exclusively polemical works written by an economist as the basis of your understanding of some of the most intensely studied fields of American history?
(A cautionary tale: The Soldier and the State remains one of the most influential studies of civil-military relations more that fifty years after its publication. The army, as well as the United States, have paid a huge price for the fact that it wasn't written by a historian.)
Is your skepticism of the political left and its alleged influence over academia so strong that it prevents you from considering other sources?
Might it be possible that academics who spend decades researching a topic could produce credible scholarly works that are not fatally flawed by their political bias? Might it also be possible that some of these works are so majestic that even if they are labeled as 'biased', they're still required reading because intellectuals don't just read works that agree with their views?
Two quick points before I spend some time being pissed off at Donald Rumsfeld.
First, "the time in which blacks as a whole advanced themselves the most was" was every day of the nineteenth century. The American Civil War was made possible by the resistance of blacks to slavery. Without the resistance to slavery through acts of quiet dignity, of sublime sabotage, of desperate flight, and even of bloodthirsty uprising, no fugitive slave laws, no Uncle Tom's Cabin, no growing discontent among Northerners of a 'slave power' in the South, no formation of the Republican Party, no election of Abraham Lincoln, no succession, no Civil War. No Civil War, no freedom. Yes, it was the U.S. army who visited destruction on the Confederacy but who summoned the avatar of Moses the avenger that was William Tecumseh Sherman? It sure as frack wasn't Walt Whitman.
With the Civil War came Reconstruction. (FWIW, I'm agreeing with Eric Foner that it began in 1863, while the war was still in progress.) From the high hopes for gaining their rights as freedmen, blacks sought to participate in political, economic, and civic life as Americans only to find that the light at the end of the tunnel was the weight of growing Northern indifference, resurgent Southern militancy, and Jim Crow. As the nineteenth century drew to a close, blacks found themselves on the wrong side of history as Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and Williams v. Mississippi (1898) enshrined African Americans as citizens without a country for the next fifty years, not withstanding the heroic efforts of Americans to halt the ravages of American racism before it metastasized.
My second point is historiographical in nature. The argument of the European origins of American culture is nothing new. The debate among the academics who actually specialize on the topic is still ongoing. On this point, a place to start is not with Sowell, but David Hackett Fisher's Albion's Seed (1989). But ultimately, for any discussion of the culture of Southerners (both white and black) to have genuine legs, one might benefit from the works of Eugene Genovese and Elizabeth Fox-Genovese. And before I offered an interpretation of any culture as archaic and ultimately counterproductive to the demands of every day life in America? I'd vet my assumptions while reviewing Lawrence Levine's Highbrow/Lowbrow: The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America (1990).
Defender968
04-28-2009, 07:28
The history of blacks in the United States has been virtually stood on its head by those advocating affirmative action. The empirical evidence is clear that most blacks got themselves out of poverty in the decades preceding the civil rights revolution of the 1960s and the beginning of affirmative action in the 1970s. Yet the political misrepresentation of what happened—by leaders and friends of blacks—has been so pervasive that this achievement has been completely submerged in the public consciousness.
Instead of gaining the respect that other groups have gained by lifting themselves out of poverty, blacks are widely seen, by friends and critics alike, as owing their advancement to government beneficence.
Ok this is correlation not causation. If you look deeper than the academic topics that will be covered in most college classes you'll notice that things started going downhill in the late 60's through the 70's. If you look at several of the neighborhoods I patrolled as examples their historical crime rate prior to the late 60's was near 0, lower than the white sections of town by far, you will find this throughout the US, but as drugs came into the mainstream and became more accessible the crime rates went up, drugs such as marijuana, then heroin, and finally the big one crack that IMO had the most dramatic negative impact on black neighborhoods. If you look, the crime rates started increasing in the mid to late 70's at the same time the teen pregnancies statistics started an uptick, which started the cycle we are currently in IMO. There are other factors that played a role, but the single most important thing that has hurt black society as a whole are drugs. In the 80's when Crack use reached epidemic levels the cycle which we are in was sped up significantly and it has continued today.
Thomas Sowell, in his book Black Rednecks, White Liberals, which I mentioned earlier, says that one problem is many blacks in the lower-income areas are resistant to learning to speak correctly because that is "acting white," and they want to remain "black." He says, however, that this kind of language really is just the leftover remnants of a southern redneck white culture that itself had its roots in Scotland (a rather backwards portion of Scotland). It formed the basis of much of the early South, was picked up by the slaves, and while the South itself has mostly gotten beyond it, many elements of this culture survive to this day in the ghettos and low-income areas and influence the language and the black "gangsta" culture as well.
I've seen this phenomenon personally, young black males getting into trouble because they don't THINK they have options, and the reality is they don't have very many positive black male roll models. Is it an issue, absolutely, but the only folks that can solve it are those in the community and they are perfectly capable of getting out of their situation they only have to make the choice.
Affirmative action doesn't help IMO, there are no barriers keeping black males down other than those they apply to themselves. Case in point is our president he had the deck stacked against him, he is black, and yet he chose to pull himself up and succeed. (but he also had a supportive extended family) I'm all for scholarships for deserving people who can't afford it regardless of color, but anytime you put quotas on things or say we will hire unqualified people who happen to be of a certain demographic you hurt everyone involved including those who are hired and not qualified, as they get something they don't deserve and didn't work for and that rarely works out. If you don't believe me think back to high school, how many kids wrecked the really nice cars their rich parents bought for them, they didn't value the possession because they didn't earn it and thus treated it like crap and destroyed it, conversely how many kids did you know who worked for their cars and because of that sweat equity took very good care of them.
Life is no different, when people are given things they didn't earn be it welfare, affirmative action, or citizenship for illegal’s they don't appreciate it and will abuse it whatever it may be.
Surf n Turf
04-28-2009, 13:43
Sigaba,
Thank you for bringing Albion's Seed (David Hackett Fisher) into the discussion. I was just pulling quotes from the book to use in this thread. Mr. Fisher was correct in his construct of English / Scots settlement as a basis for regional behavior during the several hundred years of American history.
Broadsword2004,
If you have not read the book, I would second Sigaba’s suggestion that you do so. It may prove insightful to you, especially the sections on the Border English / Scots and their history, customs, manners, and politics.
SnT
greenberetTFS
04-28-2009, 15:30
An Ovation for Bill Cosby
by L. Brent Bozell III
May 28, 2004
On the fiftieth anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision on Brown vs. Board of Education, which began the end of racial segregation being defended as "separate but equal," an anniversary party was thrown at Washington’s historic Constitution Hall. The biggest name on the program was TV star Bill Cosby, and he packed the biggest – and most unexpected – wallop.
Cosby did not come boasting of progress, basking in satisfaction, or marking a half-century of racial uplift. Instead, he slapped the audience with the rhetorical equivalent of a cold fish. In Cosby’s big picture, too many black Americans today aren’t raising their children correctly.
He lamented the upbringing of lower-income black children in particular. "They're standing on the corner and they can't speak English," he exclaimed. "I can't even talk the way these people talk: 'Why you ain't,' 'Where you is'....And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. And then I heard the father talk.....Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads....You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth!"
It was no doubt additionally controversial when he proclaimed that many young black men in prison today are not "political criminals," but guilty of real crimes. "These are people going around stealing Coca-Cola. People getting shot in the back of the head over a piece of pound cake and then we run out and we are outraged, [saying] 'The cops shouldn't have shot him.' What the hell was he doing with the pound cake in his hand?"
Parents who lament their children in prison jumpsuits were challenged: "Where were you when he was 2? Where were you when he was 12? Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn’t know he had a pistol? Where is the father?"
Cosby’s remarks drew some laughter, and some unease. Ted Shaw of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund was angry, and immediately followed up at the podium by suggesting that systematic racial discrimination was still to blame. Others protested. Black academic Michael Eric Dyson complained in the papers that Cosby’s comments "betray classist, elitist viewpoints that are rooted in generational warfare."
Some younger people dismissed Cosby as sounding like somebody’s cranky grandpa, an old codger lecturing to sit up straight, respect your elders, and use nouns and verbs in their proper order. But this wasn’t just old Cosby. It was the creed of the young Cosby, too.
He was never just a television star. He was the first real television role model for black America. He didn’t make his way into America’s hearts with anger, but with humor. He didn’t win over whites by laughing about all our racial differences, but about our common humanity. The "generational warfare" isn’t coming from Cosby, but from the "thug life" theorists selling the black community nothing but hate, greed, and lust to a thumping rap beat – three serious obstacles to black progress.
Some intellectualizing types are actually suggesting Cosby failed to grasp that ungrammatical English – or ignorance to the ear of the average American – is actually precious folklore. On ABC’s "Good Morning America," Time magazine cultural critic Christopher John Farley explained that he respected standard English, "but I think it's also important to respect nonstandard English. I think it has an important role to play in the development of language and we should respect that. In terms of Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, even the music of Bob Marley, uses nonstandard English to create poetry and to bring joy to people."
Do you suppose Mr. Farley earned his job at Time magazine talking or writing that kind of "poetry"? Would his editors today respect his use of "non-standard English" if he employed it for next week’s magazine? If if isn’t acceptable for Mr. Farley in the workplace, how dare he encourage it for black children!
Bill Cosby has given millions of his own fortune back to the black community, but his words and actions might mean more than the money. His television career has done more than entertain. It has helped build a multiracial culture demanding excellence as well as racial harmony. Cosby’s critics are offering the opposite: excuses instead of excellence, rage instead of humanity. He deserves a nationwide standing ovation for speaking out.
wet dog,
Well said, I concur whole heartily with you and Mr. Cosby..............:D
GB TFS :munchin
The possibility of getting killed transcends "all" racial lines...
"I think I'll stick around for awhile out here, where we all are ONE."
Its hot, we're tired, sweaty balls, ass-crack, etc. We don't give a F**K if you're green as long as pull your weight and then some!:lifter
Stay safe.
Peregrino
04-28-2009, 22:14
The possibility of getting killed transcends "all" racial lines...
"I think I'll stick around for awhile out here, where we all are ONE."
Its hot, we're tired, sweaty balls, ass-crack, etc. We don't give a F**K if you're green as long as pull your weight and then some!:lifter
Stay safe.
The most important lesson the Army and SF taught me! Merit is the only legitimate criterion for any preferential treatment. Stereotypes are conveniences. Not being able to look beyond them is self limiting/destructive (flat out lazy if you ask me). Everyone deserves the opportunity to be judged on their individual merits. Especially when survival is ultimately a cooperative venture.
alright4u
04-28-2009, 23:23
I never cared what race a man was if he was good in combat.
The End.
However I'm not sure what you are getting at here, I never said anything written by the political Left on the history of blacks should be ignored.
What I'm getting at is the possibility that maybe, just maybe, one's intellectual drive can transcend one's political views. While you've offered no specific comment on scholarly works by the "political Left", you have shown what strikes me as a dismissive attitude towards a significant trajectory of Western political philosophy. For example, you wrote:
Modern "Liberalism:" The political ideology of those who live in a world filled with sunshine, lollipops, and rainbows.
It is well within your prerogative to dislike whom you wish. I respectfully suggest that the drawbacks of letting that dislike become contempt include the potential for underestimating a political opponent and missing opportunities to have the types of conversations in which views are reconsidered.
No doubt the blacks advanced through the 19th century, but they really began advancing from poverty and into the middle-class after World War II up to the 1960s, at which they stopped.....
Any culture, white, black, blue, whatever, that emphasizes sloth, laziness, entitlement, ignorance, violence, etc...is going to be counterproductive to the demands of modern-day America. There are no superior ethnicities or races. There are superior and inferior cultures.
And much of the modern "black culture" (not all of it) is counter-productive and keeps the blacks stuck in a permanent state of poverty. This culture, from what I understand, is a product of both past culture and what naturally happens to a people when they get exposed to massive social programs, entitlements, drugs, etc...which leads to the family unit breaking down, crime and violence going up, and so forth.
Bluntly but respectfully, I shall point out that you're argument has changed several times in this thread. Each time a fellow member of this BB has offered a different interpretation, you have attempted to fold that interpretation seamlessly into yours. You have wavered among politics, political philosophy, education, poverty, social mobility, crime, family structure, gender relations, gender identity, geography, psycho-social development, and, now, culture.
To me, this constant shifting you've displayed suggests that you are not as conversant on this topic as one should be given the finality with which you present your views.
The only consistent components in each iteration of your argument is the reliance on a teleological interpretation of history, mono-causality, and a reliance on an us / them schema that I find dispiriting.
A quick point about poverty. According to the 2000 census, 24.9% of African Americans lived in poverty the previous year. While this rate was matched only by native Americans, 25% hardly supports your repeated contention that blacks live in poverty. Some blacks live in poverty. Most do not.
A small point about the problems of the American city and the alleged culpability of blacks and the political left. The driving forces shaping the development and re-development of a city are those sections of the municipal code and the conditional use permits and variances that a city's government may grant to a developer. At the heart of a project getting approved or rejected are mundane considerations such as parking. When one drives through a run down part of town and wonders about the blight, and wonders if the lots are empty because this group or that group has this dysfunction or that dysfunction? Or are the lots vacant because a developer cannot afford to build a commercial land use economically because of the mundane considerations, such as the parking requirements?
Urban planners, hardly a group to be confused as conservatives, and developers, hardly a group to be confused as socialists are of growing agreement that it is the latter.
Lastly, an observation on the political affiliation of African Americans. You have repeatedly contended that, due to their ignorance and poor education, and, now, cultural dysfunction AND their maladaptive psychological development, blacks support blindly leftist politicians. This generalization is ill considered for at least two reasons. First, it overlooks the fact that here in California African Americans had the temerity to defy the leftist politicians by supporting Proposition 8, the ban on homosexual marriage. 80% of black voters supported this ban.
Second, there is an argument why blacks might serve better their interests were they Republicans. But to take seriously the insinuation that they're foolish for not leaving the Democratic party requires one to read history with closed eyes.
In many threads on this BB, the topic of the Muslim world's sense of history has been pondered with great intensity. I would posit that the historical memory of a Muslim is surpassed by African Americans. In its current form, the GOP makes states' rights and a limited federal government points of emphasis in the party's national platform.
The efficacy of this platform collides with the historical memory of the African American community: the doctrine of states' rights was the political basis for the entrenchment of slavery, the disenfranchisement of freedmen, and the rise of Jim Crow. In contrast, it was the power of the federal government through the agency of the army and the Supreme Court as well as (eventually) the White House, and Congress that ended these practices. From this perspective, is it unreasonable that black voters would be wary of a party that emphasizes a political doctrine that activates horrific memories?
The Reaper
04-29-2009, 07:25
In many threads on this BB, the topic of the Muslim world's sense of history has been pondered with great intensity. I would posit that the historical memory of a Muslim is surpassed by African Americans. In its current form, the GOP makes states' rights and a limited federal government points of emphasis in the party's national platform.
The efficacy of this platform collides with the historical memory of the African American community: the doctrine of states' rights was the political basis for the entrenchment of slavery, the disenfranchisement of freedmen, and the rise of Jim Crow. In contrast, it was the power of the federal government through the agency of the army and the Supreme Court as well as (eventually) the White House, and Congress that ended these practices. From this perspective, is it unreasonable that black voters would be wary of a party that emphasizes a political doctrine that activates horrific memories?
Sigaba:
Just trying to understand your point here.
Are you saying that the events and causation of the American Civil War (the Republicans were the party of Lincoln then), which I doubt that most high school graduates could articulate beyond the single word response of "slavery", outweigh the modern memories of the Democratic Party of Bull Connor, George Wallace, James Earl Ray, and the Klan during the civil rights era through the 80s? Need we point out that the only Klansman presently serving in Congress is a Democrat, and Martin Luther King was not a Democrat, nor were most of the civil rights leaders of that era?
I agree that we cannot treat blacks as a monolitic group, as there are always outliers and exceptions, but it would seem that when 80% plus of a group can be relied upon to vote for a single party over 40 years or more, it does cause one to wonder if there are any policy changes which could cause them to change allegiances. Frankly, as you noted with Prop 8, the Republicans represent the core issues of blacks better on a number of issues, to include religious freedom, marriage, etc. Can people in the black community, particularly upwardly mobile middle and upper classes, be persuaded to change party affiliations and vote Republican? Or is the Republican Party better off pragmatically writing them off as a bridge too far and spending their resources reaching out to the Hispanics instead?
Is the Republican Party, correctly or incorrectly, tainted to a degree that it will never be able to be competitive among black voters?
TR
I'm thinking your arguments - as good as they are - may be going too deep here and that, in general, I'm not too sure the collective memory of the MSM fed and less academically inclined [of whatever race] of this nation doesn't go back any further than a gilt [guilt] chain of selective links which goes AL, FDR, JFK, LBJ, WJC and - now - the promises of BHO. :confused:
Richard's $.02 :munchin
I think you are mis-understanding me a bit. One thing I have learned is it is very good to have debates with people of the opposite political persuasion. It forces me to understand my own arguments better and also to refine them and also you learn new things.
As for the quote, well for hardcore liberalism I think that is a fine description. I'm sure you've heard the quote: "When one is dumb and ignorant, if they are not a hardcore Leftist, usually they don't have a heart. However, once a person grows more learned, if they are not either a centrist or a rightie, they don't have a brain."
If one believes blindly in "fairness," "social justice," "equality," "peace," housing, food, and healthcare are "rights," well such a person is living in a fantasyworld and likely is ignorant of such topics (not stupid, but ignorant).
For brevity's sake here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cc_KKRO7B5Q&feature=related
MOO.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Sigaba:
Just trying to understand your point here.
Are you saying that the events and causation of the American Civil War (the Republicans were the party of Lincoln then), which I doubt that most high school graduates could articulate beyond the single word response of "slavery", outweigh the modern memories of the Democratic Party of Bull Connor, George Wallace, James Earl Ray, and the Klan during the civil rights era through the 80s? Need we point out that the only Klansman presently serving in Congress is a Democrat, and Martin Luther King was not a Democrat, nor were most of the civil rights leaders of that era?
<<SNIP>>
Can people in the black community, particularly upwardly mobile middle and upper classes, be persuaded to change party affiliations and vote Republican? Or is the Republican Party better off pragmatically writing them off as a bridge too far and spending their resources reaching out to the Hispanics instead?
Is the Republican Party, correctly or incorrectly, tainted to a degree that it will never be able to be competitive among black voters?
TR
TR--
I think that the relationship between the GOP and the African American community redeemable. Democrats like to talk about the New Deal coalition but I think ours is vastly superior.
I don't think the GOP can or should stop competing to earn the support of black voters. The short term prospect for success is small but not competing will leave the GOP increasingly vulnerable to the mis-characterization that the party doesn't care about certain groups of Americans. We may not have at this time the resources to win this contest, but I don't think we can afford to leave it, either.
Also, in the long run, the benefits of a political re-alignment are earth-shattering. An unknowable number of African Americans are convinced that the American dream doesn't apply to them. What happens if they realize that, in fact, it does? There is a standard for excellence in the African American community. This standard is most visible in the arts and athletics. What happens when that field of vision is expanded? What happens when the next group of guys aspiring to be the "best ever" applies that standard to the study of oncology?
I think that the GOP faces two challenges when it comes to increasing its number of African American members. The first centers around the collective historical memory of the party. Was Lincoln a racist? Did the Republicans abandon blacks at the end of Reconstruction? Did Eisenhower regret appointing Warren because of the Brown decision? These are the kinds of questions that academics debate. (And these debates are so heated that they should give pause to interpretations of a monolithic Ivory Tower dominated by the political Left. Were it just about politics, the late George M. Fredrickson <<link (http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/march5/fredrickson-030508.html?view=print)>> never would have kept challenging his understanding of Lincoln's views of African Americans.)
The second challenge centers around how the GOP presents its political ideology and how that ideology is perceived by skeptical members of the African American community. IMHO, what is needed is for the GOP to re-imagine how it talks about its core concepts and its vision of how America should work. To me, this re-imagining will be especially effective if it focuses on empathy (not sympathy) and opportunity (not entitlement).
...... IMHO, what is needed is for the GOP to re-imagine how it talks about its core concepts and its vision of how America should work. To me, this re-imagining will be especially effective if it focuses on empathy (not sympathy) and opportunity (not entitlement).
A thought about the Black Middle class.
A good number of them made it into the "middle class" by being government employees. Be it trash collectors, school teachers, bus drivers, city, county, state and federal office workers.
They as well as the white workers, and all the other groups, have a vested interest in "Big Government".
I'm not going to get this out right but a lot vote for the left for "job security". Then you have the elderly voting "Social Security security".
Perdue just put out she's cutting state employees 1/2% in pay. The nut roll in NC has just started.
A thought about the Black Middle class.
A good number of them made it into the "middle class" by being government employees. Be it trash collectors, school teachers, bus drivers, city, county, state and federal office workers.
They as well as the white workers, and all the other groups, have a vested interest in "Big Government".
I'm not going to get this out right but a lot vote for the left for "job security". Then you have the elderly voting "Social Security security".
Perdue just put out she's cutting state employees 1/2% in pay. The nut roll in NC has just started.
Pete--
Your point is well made and well taken.
Here in the L.A. area, the teachers' union is gearing up to fight proposed job cuts in the LAUSD. The superintendent, Ramon C. Cortines, has politely pointed out that a lot of administrators and teachers in the district are thieves.
The outgoing L.A. City Attorney is, I'm told by someone who works for him, even dumber than he seems. (No small feat <<link (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-rutten20-2008aug20,0,5045287.column)>>.)
At the state level, well, the California State Assembly makes the U.S. Congress look like a brain trust (link (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-govt-payraise22-2009apr22,0,3407994.story)).
In the 2004 presidential campaign, when Senator Kerry spoke of Bush the Younger's failure to secure America's ports, I had to tape my ears to keep my eyes from rolling out of my head in response to that guy's transparent effort to create even more government jobs filled by union workers.
But my question is: Does one throw out the baby with the stagnant bathwater? For all the laggards, malingerers, and brain dead government employees, there are some exceptionally brilliant people. Some of these could make themselves a small fortune were they to take their skill set to the private sector. (In this group, I'm including many of the members of this BB who have dedicated their lives to the defense of the country.)
My own preference is that there would be some sort of conversation about the roles unions play in driving the pay of their members and shaping the mindset some union members bring to the workplace. I know of one social worker for L.A. County who was told to slow down his pace so as not to make his colleagues look bad.:(
..My own preference is that there would be some sort of conversation about the roles unions play in driving the pay of their members and shaping the mindset some union members bring to the workplace.......
Remember before the election "GM is too big to fail"? "Bankruptcy is not the answer"?
Now it appears GM is not too big to fail and bankruptcy is the answer. The unions will fall in line and muster the troops when the Ds call.
What was it the starving people in Russia said? "If Stalin knew........"
There are very bright people in all jobs in the US. But it appears most prefere to wade in the shallow end of life's pool and don't want to jump off the diving board into the deep end,
Then my question in regards to the current state of Republicans vs Democrats as it pertains to party identification and loyalty - who's in charge?
We know who the leader of the Democrats is - who's the identifiable leader of the Republicans? :confused:
In business, brand loyalty means a lot to a product's ability to compete and survive in the marketplace.
And an organization without an identifiable leader...:(
Richard's $.02 :munchin