A failing grade? Shocking.
Although the head of the Republican National Committee and President George W. Bush have pledged to make a more concentrated effort to win over Black voters, 98 percent of Republicans in the House and Senate earned an F on the latest NAACP Civil Rights Report Card, compared to only 2 percent of Democrats receiving failing grades.
“[Republican Party Chairman Ken] Mehlman has been out beating the bushes and saying that the Republican Party was appealing for the Black vote, but this is the most powerful evidence and continuing evidence that the Republicans have not realigned their public policy approaches to attract the Black vote,” says University of Maryland Political Scientist Ronald Walters.
…
“What is the basis of any party’s appeal to any voter? It is the extent to which they believe in that party’s vote,” he explains. “And there is a very simple answer to the question that we get all the time, ‘When will Blacks vote Republican?’ It is when they have a reason to.”
If anyone would like to know what reasonable, rational black Republicans are actually like, instead of the spooks inside Willis’ head, you should know where to find us. The Conservative Brotherhood. http://www.conservativebrotherhood.org
Chances are you’ll find the antidote.
Sorry for the repeat, my mistake.
It’s pretty clear to see what the NAACP was scoring. The days of legislation based on fair access to voting rights or housing or employment are over and done with; those goals have been accomplished.
What the NAACP seeks now are the goals of socialism and income redistribution. On those things, yup, sure ’nuff, the Republicans received failing grades, for which I can only say, thank God.
What the NAACP has failed to realized is that they already won, years ago, as far as the legal barriers to minorities were concerned. We moved from a society in which whites had to “grant” blacks their equal rights, to a society in which everybody was equal under the law.
The problem then shifted: it ceased being what whites needed to do to cease oppressing blacks, to one in which blacks had to help themselves. White people can’t do anything about blacks dropping out of school, white people can’t do anything about black women having children out of wedlock at prodigious rates, white people can’t do anything about blacks commiting crimes at double the rates of whites. Those are all things that the black community has to do for itself.
The NAACP seems to think this is something that can be accomplished by legislators in Congress, but it isn’t. The problems in the black community today are susceptible only at the community, personal level.
Cellulose attempts to turn my argument on its head, and fails, because the fact is, as he would have noted had he been more careful in his language, the problems of white children dropping out of school (at rates lower than among blacks, but still too high) really are the problems of the people among whom the dropouts occur. It is true that “black people can t do anything about white women having children out of wedlock at prodigious rates,” which really is the case, though not as badly as within the black community.
The fact is that all of these problems are within the community; they may have wider consequences, but they are problems that can be solved only locally. These aren’t problems that Congress can solve, but problems resulting from poor decision-taking by individuals.
Whites don’t get to scapegoat past discrimination for the problems that they have, but, other than that, the problems are the same and have the same solution: personal responsibility reinforced by community morés.
“What the NAACP seeks now are the goals of socialism and income redistribution.”
What do the Hate Crimes Protection Amendment, anti-police brutality and anti-profiling legislation have to do with goals of socialism and income redistribution?
Black people can t do anything about whites dropping out of school, black people can t do anything about white women having children out of wedlock at prodigious rates, black people can t do anything about whites commiting white collar crimes at far greater than double the rates of blacks. Those are all things that the white community has to do for itself.
That white community really needs to get its act together.
Y’know…Dana’s little racist rant looks like it could have been ripped from David Duke’s website.
In it, we see the same little nuggets of racism prevalent in the writings of Duke and his fellow white supremacists:
NAACP a socialist organization? From David Duke: During the next couple of days I avoided even thinking about the issue, and I stayed away from the Citizens Council office. Finally I picked up and read the two copies of Common Sense I had taken home. One copy maintained that the NAACP was a Communist front organization dedicated to the eventual overthrow of our way of life. It purported that 12 Jews and one Black had founded the NAACP, and all the founders were dedicated Marxists with decades of documented Communist affiliations.
Racism has been eradicated? Well, David Duke doesn’t really agree–he argues racism exists against ‘European Americans.’
Dana’s litany about problems in the black community? David Duke: Thousands of taxpayers in New Orleans, Louisiana, and the rest of the USA shoulder the burden of Shasta and her offspring. Elaine is 32. She and her husband Ron both work hard and pay a great deal in taxes. They are trying to buy a home and start a family, but they just can t afford it because Elaine would need to quit work for a while. They are hoping, in a couple of years, to be able to afford one child, but they know that it will be extremely expensive sending their child to a private school.
They feel it wouldn t be right to send their child to the 85% Black, crime-filled, drug-laden school in their district in New Orleans. With the sales tax at 9% and their state and federal income taxes at close to 30%, they feel resentful that, not being able to afford children of their own, they must support welfare illegitimates.
Dana is a KKKer.
How come when black people do something, it’s an issue of race, and when white people do something, it’s an individual choice? How come when white people do something at a rate less than black people, “they” are absolved of community responsibility, merely because the rate is lower?
Drop-out rates are a problem.
Out-of-wedlock children are a problem.
Crime is a problem.
Dana makes it sound as though when black Americans have problems, “they” need to figure out a solution, as whitey walks by and proudly shrugs his shoulders. These are American issues.
“How come when black people do something, it s an issue of race, and when white people do something, it s an individual choice?”
Where did Dana even come close to saying that? What she did say is that people are ultimately responsible for their own decisions and actions. Dropping out of school, giving birth out of wedlock and failing to gain marketable job skills will vastly increase the likelihood of a life of poverty. That goes for whites as well as blacks. Unless of course, it is your racist contention that blacks are incapable of making good decisions.
Of course, as a liberal, you are obviously incapable of holding any racist sentiments.
Sam:
The problem with Dana’s racist screed is that it confuses symptoms with the underlying causes. To Dana, crime and pregnancy rates (an issue, BTW, that is grossly misrepresented by white supremacist-types) aren’t symptoms of another cause such as economic standing and lack of access to schools or jobs but is caused by being black.
That is a classic racist view. As is Dana’s assertion that racism has disappeared simply by removing legal barriers to minorities.
And how is your solution to be accomplished?
Why all we have to do is cut off government support for these layabouts and ne’er do wells and they’ll get some personal responsibility in a hurry, right?
And if they don’t, we’ll just “enforce our mores” (sorry, too lazy to figure out the little accent mark) by labelling the offenders as bad, bad people and walking away from the problem.
They don’t call it “compassionate” conservatism for nothing.
Or maybe they do.
“What she did say is that people are ultimately responsible for their own decisions and actions.”
Fine. Good. Then let’s leave it at that.
Does that mean we can stop talking about what the “black community” needs to do?
Oh yes, and welcome, Cobb. I like the site.
Who insists on the existence of a “black community”? When whites do, they are called racists; when blacks do, they are called “leaders”
The answer to cellulose’s comment about the “white community” is that no one calls white people the “white community.” There “people of color,” “hyphenated – Americans”, immigrants, but there’s no “white community.”
Why is there a “black community”? I don’t know. It wasn’t my idea. Ask Jesse Jackson, or Al Sharpton. Ask Harold Ford, Jr. (D)(TN) — he got a D
>>Whites don t get to scapegoat past discrimination for the problems that they have
INDIVIDUALS, regardless of race, “scapegoat” every day, you nitwit. If you’re not too old, you’re too young, or the wrong gender. Maybe you were once the white guy who complained about the black guy who just got the promotion?
Or, maybe you were the medical school student who had to settle for Dartmouth Medical School, God forbid, because Yale saw fit to let in a black woman who was qualified, but scored 30 points lower on her MCATS. She wasn’t the head of her sorority, but she did happen to serve in the Peace Corps in Africa, or Asia, and touched countless lives. But it’s all about those pesky test scores for conservatives…because if you happen to remember that clever analogy, or tricky algebra problem at 9:30AM, you’re going to be a better doctor.
Conservatives complain EVERY SINGLE DAY that they are victims of liberal policies *BECAUSE* they’re white. You’re probably one of them, no doubt.
I won’t call you a racist however. I’ll just call you an idiot.
Carry on being an idiot. It’s your life.
JK
[...] Jeffords of Vermont, an Independent, got a C. The report card is available in full here. Thanks to Oliver Willis whose post alerted me to this. –K [...]
Damn, JK, you just made a hell of an assumption about someone you don’t even know…