Will Race Be Factor in Clinton vs. Obama?
Do you think the Democratic Party should nominate Obama to demonstrate racial justice and support of affirmative action?
Politico- By: Wynton C. Hall -The current field of Democratic presidential hopefuls stands united in their support of affirmative action, demands for racial justice and self-proclaimed commitment to African-American uplift and flourishing. But if liberals are sincere in their commitment to the Democratic Holy Grail of “diversity” (and I believe they are), they have but one option come 2008: ditch Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, N.Y., and elevate Sen. Barack Obama, Ill., as the Democratic presidential nominee.
It’s often said that presidential elections are one big job interview, where candidates are hopeful employees and we, the electorate, a collective hiring committee. Candidates’ Web sites, ads, and speeches showcase their “resumes.” Debates serve as “interviews.” And ballots determine who’s hired and fired.
On the Democratic side, the resumes of the two leading job applicants stack up nicely. Clinton earned her law degree at Yale, Obama at Harvard. Obama’s books stay bolted to The New York Times bestseller list, as did Clinton’s.
Where these applicants differ, of course, is on race and gender, the twin pillars of “identity politics,” an enterprise fostered and fueled by the Democratic Party’s core constituencies, including feminists, liberal activists and academics.
By these measures, the differences are stark. Obama is black. Clinton is white. Obama, as every news profile reminds us, was born to a Kenyan father and a white Kansan mother and grew up in a broken home. Clinton’s upbringing in suburban Chicago was more traditional, with a small businessman father and a homemaker mother. Each married attorneys. Clinton’s spouse, however, just so happens to have been the 42nd president of the United States. It doesn’t get more “privileged” than that.
So why the need for a Democratic primary? Doesn’t the liberal logic of affirmative action dictate that Obama, equally qualified but outgunned in power and privilege, be granted affirmative access to the White House? “Affirmative action has knocked down the barriers of the past,” Clinton reminded us in 2003. “When our public places are as diverse as our great nation, then our country grows stronger and we move closer to the America we dream about.”What’s changed, of course, is that Obama is the first politically viable African-American presidential contender. One could argue that Clinton is the first viable female contender. But there’s the rub: There’s no easy metric to calculate one’s “disenfranchisement.” How many points should Obama get for being black? Clinton for being a woman? What about someone such as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice? Would she be eligible for double points?
The 2008 campaign will bolster or belie liberals’ rhetoric on race. Democrats must ask themselves: If race should be a factor in hiring and college admissions, then why not the presidency? What’s more, if Democrats hire Clinton under the guise of being “better qualified,” will they expose as folly a central tenet of the liberal orthodoxy?
May the best candidate get the job.
It’s so refreshing to hear a wing-nuts give advice and ultimatums to Democrats. He clearly has the best interests of the Democrats at heart.
Do you think the Democratic Party should nominate Obama to demonstrate racial justice and support of affirmative action?
How much more racist can you get to pick somebody, qualified or not, solely because they’re black?
Chris
Is that not affirmative action?
It is exactly. It says that blacks are so inferior that they can’t do it on their own. It also says whites actually think that blacks are inferior, and allows progressive whites to feel good about themselves by reaching down to the black’s level and extending a helping hand. Those engrained with the progressive affirmative action gene automatically rush to the aid of blacks whenever they see them, because they think blacks automatically need their help. I know, because I practiced it myself for nearly two decades in a conscientious attempt to NOT be racist, before being informed just how oppressive my “helpful” attitudes really were.
LeftHook, your post #1
Did you know a threaded fastener can have left-handed threads? Are you referring to left-wing nuts? There are a ton of them out there!
Chris, re your post #4.
Interesting journey you’ve had, but not all that uncommon. When Jesse Jackson ran for President years ago, I actually considered voting for him. I listened to him and I was young – I had no worldly experiences at that point. Sort of proves the old adage, if your not a Liberal when you’re young, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative as you mature, you have no mind.
But Chris, here’s another very real possibility, which I believe to be true. On a group basis, the blacks have a significantly lower IQ’s than whites (testing is adjusted properly). Chris, this macro concept has ramifications as I’ve stated before. And this doesn’t refute that individuals of any group (micro basis) can be outstanding. This was accepted 40-50 years ago by the scientific community until they were beaten down by the PC Police. And that’s only the mental side of the equation. Remember what I said about tribes cleaving to their own kind. It’s true.
Hugh I’m going to agree with you on one part, but strongly disagree on another. First, I don’t believe there to be any substantial inferiority in the black race as compared to whites. As proof I offer up the multitude of accomplishments by blacks that have contributed greatly to both our society and cultures at large, and to the unique benefits of blacks and whites respectively. I don’t have the lists handy at the moment, but if you care to research it, look up the black inventor’s lists and the roster of successful black businesses and organizations (such as schools, universities, scholarship funds, etc), particularly in the south.
This leads to my point of agreement with you about how “tribes” cleave to their own kind. The accomplishments of blacks in terms of businesses and organizations are all highly reputable outfits measuring up to any standards the white race can hold them to, but were undertaken from the need to fill the void of accessible organizations offering services to blacks. You’ll notice this happened primarily in the south, because of our historically overtly racist attitudes. The blacks decided to do it for themselves, and they did, very well I might add.
So I agree with you that “sticking to your own kind” is a natural tendency of all humans, and has its advantages, not the least of which would be to help preserve the positive aspects of each culture. But the shear volume of successes that can be chalked up to black’s ingenuity, initiative and motivation disputes any claims that they’re somehow inferior to whites by nature.
I won’t dispute however that inferiority can be bred into cultures through long-term collective messaging such as institutional actions undertaken in the name of affirmative action.
I would even go so far as to generalize that black republicans are former democrats who left the Democrat’s maternal nest to go out and achieve success on their own, on their own terms and by their own standards. And who suffers most when that happens? Democrats have an interest in keeping blacks dependent on them so that they’ll keep voting for them. So you’ll see Democrats whipping up racist alerts all over creation trying to scare blacks back into their folds to retain their position as protectors over the poor poor blacks who would get devoured by racists everywhere out in the real world on their own.
But just to be fair and balanced, the GOP does the same thing whipping up terror alerts all over creation to try to keep their sheep in line.
Chris, that’s why I wanted to ensure I noted that there are both “macro” and “micro” aspects to the point I make. I won’t discount your point at all about numerous cases of success with black folks. Not at all. But Chris, if you take the test scores, on a macro basis, across the races, you see the bell curve patterns. And the results do not coincide. There are significant differences, and those differences cause problems!
And we do agree how the parties play to everyone’s fears!
Chris
I agree with your post 4.
That is why I am not for AA.
BTW I never had a problem finding talented black people to work for me.
Chris, some folks don’t understand Affirmative Action. For example, it’s accepted science (”real” science, not PC Science) that the white IQ is approximately one standard deviation above the black, and that’s significant. Now what is corporate America doing? They are hiring based on the overall % of a given race in the society. Thus if we have 12 to 13 % blacks in American society, corporate America wants to give them that same % of the jobs, without regard to the actual IQ of the blacks. My kids might thus lose out on a job to someone less qualified. And on top of that, the job might be that of a doctor. Thus lives are in jeopardy if the “standards” are bent, and that does happen. And it hurts the qualified blacks who always have folks looking at them wondering if they were affirmative action hires. Chris, sorry for the rambling. I’m sure you knew all this – it’s for the benefit of others who haven’t thought it through yet.
So you’ll see Democrats whipping up racist alerts all over creation trying to scare blacks back into their folds to retain their position as protectors over the poor poor blacks who would get devoured by racists everywhere out in the real world on their own.
Yeah, but don’t you think that Republicans stance against affirmation action is really about letting unqualified white people get jobs because they “know” all the right people. Look no further than the Bush administration to see this in action.
Well again Hugh I’m going to disagree, simply because of the racial makeup during my own educational experiences. My high school was about 50-50 black/white, and proud as I am of my own and the school’s overall academic achievements, credit must be given to both the black administrators and the other half of the student body besides the whites. We were about as integrated as you could get, and barring a few minor racial incidents common with any school boasting a 4,000-size student body, blacks sailed right up there at the top academically along with whites. This was in the mid-late 70s and was a far cry from my experiences in grammar school, which was all white except for a handful of black “special ed” students off in separate classrooms with their own special teachers. Comparing the two, and the futures available to everyone involved, I’d take the high school experience over the grammar school experience ANY DAY.
Granted, the public education system has changed dramatically since then (which I believe has alot to do with the problems today), as well as attitudes of parents and students, but at that time both the quality of the schools and the students’ attitudes and achievements were as perfect as you could hope for in a perfect world.
Hugh,
You’re going big time into racist theology. According to that same theology the chinese are infinitely more smarter than caucasians. White people should be put into indentured servitude to asians.
Caroline I don’t disagree that today’s world is more about who you know than what you know. But I don’t link that to racism or republicanism at all. If anything it’s more about protecting secrets that if exposed would ruin the enterprise. If you’re a player, you’re in. If you’re an honest hardworking soul with integrity and morals, expect to be left outside.
Caroline, the Chinese are smarter than Caucasians, but not “infinetly” more so. The gap between whites and blacks is much, much larger than between the Chinese and Caucasians.
Chris do you understand the basic concepts of that book, The Bell Curve to be true? And if so, do you not see the ramifications. But again, on a macro basis!, not micro!
Hugh,
The bell curve has been discredited by people who went back and checked their sources. They were found to have falsified information to make their case. Test score issues are largely socio economic. The reason test scores in the south are the lowest in the nation is because of the white people we have here.
Hugh, the attitudes I’m referring to are those of people striving for excellence. Those attitudes were still very prevalent back during my time in high school. All the students wanted to be there, wanted to excel, loved the competitions, couldn’t get enough of the good grades and praise that follows from that.
Those attitudes are very lacking today in students of all races because excellence has been pre-empted by money and spoiled rotten kids. Fast success, screw the quality, just hurry up and get rich somehow. Kids of all colors have this entitlement attitude where they think they should be coddled and given everything without having to work for it. That’s more of a cultural/societal dilemma than it is racial.
I’m sorry Hugh, I’m not seeing it to be true. My own experiences negate what you’re trying to say. You stated earlier that there differences in whites and blacks and those differences are causing problems.
I almost agreed with you on one point in regards to our education system, in that we’ve started teaching to the lowest common denominator instead of the top, causing the top to atrophy and languish in boredom and mischief. I think that’s wrong policy, and there should be some segregation among learning deficiencies (without regard to race at all). And it was Democrats who demanded integration of slower learners with those at the top, out of concerns for their self-esteem. Well I’m sorry if they get their feelings hurt by not being in the top ranks in learning. That’s no reason to degrade the top ranks to their level to make them feel better. As a result we’ve dumbed EVERYBODY down to that level and we’ll be paying for it for several generations until it’s fixed.
Chris,
Children who are mainstreamed are not “dumbing” down the rest of the student population. They have their own individualized education plan. The class doesn’t not operate to their standards. Please get more information before making statements like this. I have personal experience in this area. It’s easy to blame other children but it’s not their fault. The dumbing down comes more from things like NCLB than anything else. Kids are just taught how to take tests, not critical thinking skills. It’s like we’re all going to southern baptist bible camp all the time where perfection is being able to spout out bible verses-no need to understand what they mean or what context they came from.
I didn’t blame the students, I blamed the system.
Are you familiar with Linda Schrock Taylor? She writes about education at lewrockwell.com.
Copied below is one of her articles that helped solidify my opinions (which had developed over the last 10 years, from a distance).
Actually this one’s more appropriate to the actual line of discussion.
Yes, but you were implying that it was the kids in your prior post. You seemed to be saying that the fact that they were in with the general population and not segregated was a problem.
I was saying that to put them in with the general population and not be segregated was a problem. But it’s not they’re fault at all. It’s the systems fault for putting them there.
Actually, putting them in the general population is not a problem. If you shuttle them off to special ed like they did when I was a kid, things are much worse. The kids are not challenged as much in spec. ed as they are in the general population. The other kids are not held back because of the mainstreamed kids. You really need to get more knowledge. The problem is relying on testing for everything not mainstreaming.
To put it simply: mainstreaming is requiring a higher standard while segregation promotes a lower standard.
Did you even read the second article I posted?
Yes, but I have been going on what you have been saying not what others are saying. You said in #24 that students should be segregated.
I also said in #13 that I much preferred my integrated high school experience to my segregated grammar school experience. That segregation however was based on racial bias instead of any learning disabilities.
And I still maintain that I think mainstreaming as you call it, where learning difficulties are the issue, is a bad idea for general educational environments. However I’m not in the education profession and only have my experiences and what I read to go on. I think learning issues should be dealt with according to those issues, with specialized instruction in more suitable environments than the general classroom.
You’re welcome to your opinion but I have a son who is ld and putting him in special ed full time would have put him further behind and unable to compete. Mainstreamiing increases the standards for kids with learning disabilities but doesn’t lower the standard for reg education kids. IMO, only the kids who can not function in reg. ed at all are the ones who should be in special ed. Want to know insanity? NCLB requires that servely disabled kids pass the tests just like the reg ed students.
One thing you don’t seem to realize is that in the full time special ed classroom, you have kids on 17 different levels. So, using your own standards, spec. ed would be making it worse for those kids too.
No I didn’t realize the numbers of students involved in special ed situations.
Also, if what Linda Taylor describes of the classroom environment is true, I cannot begin to imagine going through school in that situation. The playful, highly intellectual and analytical banter back and forth between students and teachers was what made the high school experience so much fun (well, extracurricular stuff was fun too LOL). I just can’t imagine having any of that tempered for the sake of learning disabled students in our presence. It was literally a contest daily to be smarter than the teacher, to try to prove him or her wrong every single day. The students ruled the classroom in that way in the majority of classes, and to have the situation turned upside down in order for the teacher’s aide to bring the challenged students up to speed or into the mood would have destroyed our learning environment.
You insist it does not degrade the general ed standards at all, and I just find that impossible to believe. Based on my own memories of the classroom.
I visited my favorite math teacher about ten years ago, and caught her heartbroken and emotional as she lamented the lower standards of achievement of her HONORS students. Straight algebra only. No trig, no geometry, no pre-cal, no theorems, formulas and proofs. Just straight up algebra was the highest level they were reaching in high school. I couldn’t believe it, and I don’t remember what she attributed this decline to, but it was a very disheartening decline.
Hugh here is going to try to blame it on the inferiority of blacks, which I’ll handily reject because the black students in my classes 15 years earlier did as well if not better than me, under this black teacher’s superb direction. What would you attribute it to?
LD students have individualized education plans and many times they have aides in the classrooms to give them additional help with work. It’s very different from when you and I were in school. They set a ciriculum and go forward with it. If there are a few stragglers, they are given help but the rest of the class is not held back.
Generally speaking, special ed. does not challenge the students.
I think you are also making the mistake of thinking that any special ed. kid is mentally retarded. Well, that’s not the case. There were probably many kids who had some serious problems back when we were in school who were undiagnosed. They’ve come a long way since then.
Many of the students don’t even realize that the “aides” are aides. They usually think that the classroom is team taught with one teacher lecturing and the other teacher answering questions and assisting students.
You keep insisting that it does not degrade the experience of regular ed students. So when a teacher is teaching advanced math of some sort, and 90% of the students are keeping up fine, but the remaining 10% are struggling, how is that resolved? Does the teacher artificially inflate their test scores to be more in line with the other students, as part of the mainstreaming program? Or does the teacher give them the actual grades they earn, even if they’re consistently Ds and Fs? Or do the teachers try not to teach such advanced levels so that all the students in the class have a chance to make good grades? Explain to me how it works nowadays, because I’m having trouble accepting that lower skilled students have zero impact on the higher level students in the same classroom.
Sorry I had to drop out, but I go to work very early in the am.
Chris, I would be interested in hearing who discredited the Bell Curve. I have only heard of baseless attacks from the multiculturalists, not a meaningful rebuttal by non-PC scientists.
Off to work I go.
Chris,
You are completely clueless on this issue. Kids are only mainstreamed into appropropriate classes. They don’t put someone who can’t function in “advanced algebra” in there. As far as the struggling students, they have individual education plans done in cooperation with the special ed. teacher and regular ed. teacher. They are given the same tests and have to take those tests. Lots of times they don’t make the best grades in the class. But it is still better for them than being in a class with kids who are doing Kindergarten math. How are these kids going to ever learn if they are shuttled off into spec. ed. where they teach to the kids level rather than trying to raise them up? A lot of people don’t understand it just like you.
There’s also different kinds of mainstreaming. My neighbor had an autistic kid who was mainstreamed. He was only socially mainstreamed i.e. specials like Music, PE, lunch and the like. The article to copied doesn’t tell the whole story. It’s more just like one woman’s rant against the system. My sister is a special ed. teacher and she does agree that NCLB is now declaring them “unqualified” unless they have a degree in the subject they are teaching and spec. ed.
As far as your former teacher, that kind of thing can be the principal at his school.
You’re right caroline, I am clueless. Which is why I asked. I remember reading how teachers are held responsible for the poor grades of students, even when 90% of the class is making As and Bs, the teacher is evaluated on the 10% who are making Ds and Fs. What do teachers do? They can’t separate out the wheat from the chaff so they start teaching down to those 10% in order to get their grades up to an acceptable level that makes the teacher look good, leaving the remaining 90% left sorely underchallenged. Am I wrong? Is this not how teachers addressed the issue of failing students in their classrooms, before the concept of mainstreaming even entered the picture?
No they don’t start teaching down. You are confusing two issues. The teachers are evaluated on test scores like ITBS not the grades of their students. When I was in school, they didn’t teach down to the bad students, the bad students just failed. I had people who were terrible students in some of my classes. It didn’t effect my learning because the teacher kept going. You sound like you are confusing mainstreaming and testing.
Was everybody in your classes a perfect student? Did they always turn in their homework on a timely basis? I sure didn’t have that in my classes but this affected that student not me.
One thing to think about here in GA: you want to put your child in spec. ed only as a last resort. If you put them in special ed. they will never come out and they will fall further and further behind-never being academically challenged at all.
Schools ARE mainstreaming special education children into classes for which they are not prepared; classes which they cannot possibly handle. I hear from hundreds; thousands of parents and teachers, and I have taught in districts where this is happening. One parent called to say that her Downs Syndrom son, a “9th grader by age” was being placed in ALGEBRA! He had never been mainstreamed at all.
At one school, I was the only sp ed teacher “qualified” to teach subjects. Now that I am no longer there, the students—attend ‘regular’ classes with a ‘qualified teacher’ who has neither time nor training to teach special children; then attend DUPLICATE classes in the special ed room so the trained specialist can teach what the children missed in the regular class. All over America, school boards—ignoring IDEA and the IEPs of individual children— are making broad, board decisions to convert their special ed departments to “FULL INCLUSION”. Federal laws require a continuum of service and “Least Restrictive Environment”. (A deaf child, forced to leave a teacher of the deaf with whom the child can communicate fluently as the child builds a vital language base, has been placed in a “more restrictive environment”. An interpreter is not the answer, any more than a hearing aid is.) The Civil Rights people want full inclusion; IDEA and the IEP process wants sensible placement decisions based on “Individual Education Plans”. This all is coming soon to a school near you.
It is not only in GA that parents should think sensibly and avoid sp ed labels if possible. It is all over!! http://www.lewrockwell.com/taylor/taylor2.html
Sp ed teachers are rarely ever trained in how to teach more rapidly and effectively with the goal of getting the children caught up and out of sp ed. Sp Ed becomes a life sentence of worksheets. I rarely describe myself as someone who “teachs spec ed.” I REMEDIATE!! Any sp ed teacher who does nothing towards getting a child out from under the label, should be removed. Of course, we can’t change labels like deaf, blind, MR, …but we certainly can teach them more and better skills to prepare them for inclusion in school and in life.