Posted on 03/29/2008 4:00:18 PM PDT by Main Street
In his Philadelphia address on race, Sen. Obama identified as a root cause of white resentment affirmative action -- the punishing of white working- and middle-class folks for sins they did not commit:
"Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race," said Barack. "As far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything. ... So when they ... hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed ... resentment builds over time."
On this issue, Barack seemed to have nailed it.
But then he revealed the distorting lens through which he and his fellow liberals see the world. To them, black rage is grounded in real grievances, while white resentments are exaggerated and exploited.
White resentments, said Barack, "have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. ... Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism."
What Barack is saying here is that the resentment of black America is justified, but the resentment of white America is a myth manufactured and manipulated by the conservative commentariat. Barack is attempting to de-legitimize the other side of the argument.
Yet, who is he to claim the moral high ground?
Where does this child of privilege who went to two Ivy League schools, then spent 20 years in a church where racist rants were routine, come off preaching to anyone? What are Barack's moral credentials to instruct white folks on what they must do, when he failed to do what any decent father should have done: Take his wife and daughters out of a church where hate had a home in the pulpit?
Barack needs to reread the Lord's admonition in the Sermon on the Mount: "And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?"
Longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer once wrote that all great movements eventually become a business, then degenerate into a racket.
That is certainly true of the civil rights movement. Begun with just demands for an end to state-mandated discrimination based on race, it ends with unjust demands for state-mandated preferences, based on race.
Under affirmative action, white men are passed over for jobs and promotions in business and government, and denied admission to colleges and universities to which their grades and merits entitle them, because of their gender and race.
Paradoxically, America's greatest warrior for equal justice under law and an end to reverse racism is, like Barack, a man of mixed ancestry. He is Ward Connerly. And his life's mission is to drive through reverse discrimination the same stake America drove through segregation.
And when one considers that the GOP establishment has often fled Connerly's cause and campaigns, his record of achievement is remarkable.
Connerly was chief engineer of CCRI, the 1996 California Civil Rights Initiative, Proposition 209, which outlawed affirmative action based on ethnicity, race or gender in all public institutions of America's most populous state. Two years later, Connerly racked up a second victory in Washington.
In 2006, Connerly went to Michigan to overturn an affirmative action policy that kept Jennifer Gratz out of the University of Michigan, though she had superior grades and performance records than many minority students admitted. The Michigan proposition also carried and has been upheld by the courts.
One U.S. senator, however, taped an ad denouncing Connerly's Proposition 2 in Michigan and endorsed affirmative action for minorities and women. That senator was Barack Obama.
Comes now the big test. Connerly is gathering signatures to place on the ballots in Nebraska, Arizona, Oklahoma, Colorado and Missouri -- the latter two crucial swing states -- propositions to outlaw all racial, gender and ethnic preferences. Voting would be the same day as the presidential election.
"Race preferences are on the way out," declares Connerly.
Now that our national conversation is underway, Barack should be asked to explain why discrimination against whites is good public policy, while discrimination against blacks explains the rants of the Rev. Wright.
America is headed for a day, a few decades off, when there will be no racial majority, only a collection of minorities. When that day arrives, if some races and ethnic groups may be preferred because of where their ancestors came from, while others can be held back because their ancestors came from Europe, America will become the Balkans writ large.
Folks need to be able to separate the true friends of racial justice from the phonies who believe with the pigs on Orwell's Animal Farm -- that "all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
On this issue, Barack seemed to have nailed it.
Actually, he skips some steps.
Here, for example, should be inserted things like:
So when they ... hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college...
...because of institutional racial preferences, both legal and social;
...necessarily without regard for merit first;
... [feel free to add your own]
***
Obama clearly cannot relate to entrepeneurs, or doesn't care enough about them to address the business-crushing reality of minority [and women] owned business contract awarding preferences.
But who's counting. Shhhh! These are the words of Obama!
Doncha new that "paddy" as some of the geniuses here call him is totally wrong on everything, and Real Republican Conservatives believe in Affirmative Action (a Nixon program after all), Reparations, the 14th Amendment as a catch all for any "civil right" like murdering your unborn baby, and the racial and ethnic transformation of America into a Third World nightmare as compensation for our evil, racist past?
Doncha know this??!
Excellent article. Institutionalized racism, also called set-asides of scholarships and jobs for minorities at the university are alive and well. So called “hate crimes” are soon to be instituted at a higher level to offer special and unequal protection for minority victims of crime. Just as the lives, property, prestige, and families of nobility were afforded more value to their rights than the serfs, so history repeats itself today in our “more civilized and progressive” nation.
Given that Washington and Jefferson et al lived and worked in the White House, imagine now Obama bringing in all of his affirmative action buddies into the Lincoln bedroom. Sally Hemings would be laughing at all of us over this.
Sortof makes you wonder why more people, especially real/paleo conservatives, don’t listen to Pat. He’s like the old man in the corner telling anyone who’ll listen exactly what’s going to happen, but everybody blows him off until after the fact.
President John Adams in 1800 was the first to live in the White House, but we understaand your meaning.
That certainly proves true with Jesse and Al and their 'subsidiaries'.
It will be a hard battle. The race industry is dependent on the lie of continuing discrimination. Take it away, and the race industry loses it’s income stream.
“Folks need to be able to separate the true friends of racial justice from the phonies who believe with the pigs on Orwell’s Animal Farm — that ‘all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others’.”
Nails lid on coffin!
Now Condi Rice has a racial chip on her shoulder and is scolding whitey.
She’s a quota mentored by the elder Bush; she has the temerity to complain... SHE”S HE SEC. OF STATE for goodness sakes!!!!!
For the most part the blacks stuck in this racket are a sad lot, but the whites who partake in this zeitgiest of race hate are truly an evil lot. They have nothing but destruction as an agenda, instructed by Mommy Professor (cretins stuck in the 60s). Cynical snarky nihilists and they would probably pull the wings off of flies if they thought flies were worthwhile.
Please do correct me if I’m wrong, but are you saying that blacks who participate in racism are “sad” but whites who do it are “evil”??? What in the world is the difference?
Racism is racism, and it’s ALL evil and wrong - no matter what skin color or ethnicity the perpetrator of hate happens to be. We all need to stop making excuses for anyone who participates in the cycle of hate.
It's a sense of entitlement nurtured by the Reparations gang.
It's contagious too. I know a guy who was born in South America, brought to U.S. as a child. Grew up, got an engineering degree at a California state U. and ended up being a pilot in the Guard.
Which he believed was due him in part because he's hispanic!
Just remember, we're all equal. Except some piggies are more equal than others....
Could you define “racism?”
Uh you do know that it was Nixon who gave Buchanan his big break in politics.
In fact, if you can scrape through your weak memory, you'll find exactly the opposite.
Racism (simply put) is the belief that one person is inherently superior than another person simply due to their race/ethnicity.
Now, that I’ve answered your question, would you mind answering mine??? Again, are you saying that blacks who are racist are “sad” and that whites who are racist are “evil”?
Again, there is NO DIFFERENCE! Racism is racism, and all of it is evil and wrong!
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