The Politics of Racism

Has Democrat identity politics so saturated our culture that we must all think our race the primary determinant of who we are? It sure seems that way when listening to what passes for political discourse these days.

It’s been a long time — so long I cannot remember the last time it bothered me when someone called me a racist. It did sting the first few times and it put me on the defensive. I felt compelled to refute the charge, but I don’t anymore. The accusations are most often in anonymous comments on my web site, but also in signed letters to the editor in newspapers carrying my column.

When on my “Left & Right” TV show, one leftist opponent habitually calls Republican policies or individuals racist, I ask for specific evidence. His answers indicate he doesn’t know what racism actually is. Dictionary.com defines it as:

a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human racial groups determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to dominate others or that a particular racial group is inferior to the others.

Early charges of racism against me came after I wrote columns arguing against Affirmation Action policies enforced by the federal government. According to HG.org Legal Resources:

The purpose of affirmative action is to promote social equality through the preferential treatment of socioeconomically disadvantaged people.

My point was that in order to grant preferential treatment to historically disadvantaged groups like blacks and women in hiring, college admissions, and granting of government contracts, other groups like white men must necessarily be passed over. That, of course, requires bona fide racial and sexual discrimination.

There can be no argument that so-called “affirmation action” discriminates against white men. College admission policies discriminate against Asian men and women as well as whites as evidenced in recent lawsuits against Harvard University by Asian students who have been denied admission on the basis of race. Evidence indicates other Ivy League colleges do the same.

A 2015 LA Times article reported on a Princeton study using SAT scores to measure advantages and disadvantages of applicants according to their race. It was summed up by a college admission specialist named Ann Lee who said: 

African Americans received a “bonus” of 230 [SAT] points. Hispanics received a bonus of 185 points. Asian Americans, Lee says, are penalized by 50 points — in other words, they had to do that much better to win admission.

It’s the ultimate irony that Asians and whites who argue against such racially discriminatory policies are the ones accused of racism. Who is making these racist accusations? New York Times columnist David Brooks last week claimed that for the past twenty years: “

…white educated Democrats have moved left is true, but it’s not the essential truth. The bigger truth is that this segment is now more likely to see politics through a racial lens. Racial equity has become the prism through which many in this group see a range of other issues.

While I find myself agreeing with Brooks less and less lately, I’m with him on much of what he says in this column. Charges of “racism” hurled against me for more than twenty-five years have nearly always come from educated white liberals. Though many are still impressed by them, I’ve learned that college degrees do not prove intelligence, and I believe educated liberals yell “racism” when they run out of logical arguments. Another driving force behind accusations of racism is “white guilt,” especially as described by Shelby Steele in his 2006 book by that name. Educated white liberals are terrified that anyone may think them racist, so they bend over backward to forestall any such possibility.

As Brooks put it last week: 

“…if you’re a rich white child of privilege you have to go to extraordinary lengths to prove you’re one of the good children of privilege and not one of the bad ones. In this take, white progressives don noble clothing to make themselves feel good…

Are educated white liberals signaling their virtue when calling the rest of us racist? It was less than three years ago that candidate Hillary Clinton labeled half of Trump supporters racist. Compared to today’s far-left Democrat candidates she was a moderate. It’s Tuesday as I write this and I expect charges of racism against the president and his supporters to dominate tonight’s Democrat debate in Detroit.

Our Supreme Court recently forbade the 2020 US Census to ask people if they’re citizens of the United States but has no problem with questions about race — for which there are over a dozen possible categories. If even the United States government is now officially more concerned about people’s race than their citizenship, what kind of country have we become?

Politically Correct Discrimination

At exclusive colleges and universities in 2016, conservative students held satirical “Affirmative Action Bake Sales” to spotlight discrimination against whites applying for admission. Cookies were sold to Native Americans for 25¢ whereas blacks were charged 75¢, Latinos $1.00, Asians $1.50, and whites $2.00. Women of any race got 25¢ off. SAT scores required for admission to those elite schools also varied according to race and pretty much correlated to the prices of cookies. Asians needed higher SATs. So did whites. Lower scores were accepted for minorities and women.

Protesters at UT bake sale

Young Americans for Freedom hoped to initiate civil discussion of Affirmative Action policies at the University of Texas and there was some, but things went downhill and the event ended in violence according to campusreform.org. Opponents shouted epithets like Nazi! You deserve to be punched! Others yelled “Get the f*** out!” Still others tried to steal the cookies and overturned the table on which the cookies were displayed.

Last weekend, SkyNews reported on an event in Detroit along the same lines, but it wasn’t satirical like the event at the University of Texas. It was serious: “The organisers of the AfroFuture Fest, set for 3-4 August, are charging lower rates for tickets bought by ‘people of colour’ than for ‘non-people of colour.” Early bird tickets for ‘POC were $10 and $20 for ‘Non-POC.’”

In the FAQ section of their web site, they explained: "Why do we have POC (people of colour) and Non-POC (white people) tickets? I'm glad you asked! Equality means treating everyone the same. Equity is insuring (sic) everyone has what they need to be successful. Our ticket structure was built to insure (sic) that the most marginalised communities (people of colour) are provided with an equitable chance at enjoying events in their own community (black Detroit).”

Tiny Jag

In response, one entertainer has withdrawn from AfroFuture Fest: “Tiny Jag, a biracial rapper based in Detroit, has quit the event and insisted AfroFuture Fest removed her name from all promotional material… ‘I was immediately enraged just because I am biracial… It seems almost like it has spite, and unfortunately with spite comes hate…’ [she said.]”

Good for her, but it would have been better if she’d quit on principle alone and not because she’s “biracial.” Most of us are multiracial — or multiethnic at least — as more and more people learn when they get results their DNA analysis after paying $50-$100. It’s way past time to put all race-based quotas in our rear-view mirror and affirm that there’s really only one race — the human race.

The word “discriminate” used to be neutral, meaning “distinguish”; “discern”; or “differentiate.” It described an ability to detect finer differences between similar things. It had at least one positive connotation when used to describe someone with nuanced taste in art, in food, or in human character. Then in the 1950s and 60s it developed a strongly negative connotation when describing racist attitudes — referring primarily to some white people averse to other races. In that context it was often employed as part of the phrase: “discriminate against.”

Forced, race-based, school busing is back in the news after some 2020 Democrats put their fingers up into the political winds. California Senator Kamala Harris scored points against front-runner and former Vice President Joe Biden in their first debate when she criticized Biden’s sponsorship of an anti-busing bill while he was a US Senator from Delaware back in the 1970s. There actually were conservative Democrats in those days, and not a few of them either. They opposed racial segregation in schools when black students were denied admission, but could not support forced busing when imposed by a federal judge and left-wing Democrats because some schools were majority black.

In the 1960s, former Democrat Congresswoman Louise Day Hicks opposed any plan to bus Boston first graders across town and pointed out that schools in Boston’s Chinatown were majority Chinese, in the North End they were majority Italian, and in South Boston or Charlestown (where my family comes from) they were majority Irish. These were neighborhood schools and people wanted their kids to attend school in their own neighborhood. It wasn’t about race until the US government under Federal Judge Arthur Garrity made it so by forcing six-year-olds to be bused past the school on their block and sent across town because of their skin color.

The federal government’s forced busing plan was based on racial discrimination pure and simple. Then-Senator Joe Biden was right to oppose it, but he’s backtracking now and that’s no surprise. Biden has demonstrated over forty years that he goes where the wind blows. California Senator Kamala Harris resurrected that highly-charged busing issue because she would do anything to peel away support from the front-running Biden.

Biden is an old, white guy and she’s a younger black woman. In today’s Democrat Party, racial and sexual identity politics come right after abortion on its list of most important issues.

Left & Right June 20, 2018

We discuss "family separation" on the southern border which dominates media lately. We agree on most points, but Gino suggests that Guatemala, Honduras, etc. are suffering because of too many MS-13 members deported back there from the US.

I contend Democrats want open borders but won't say it outright. The "asylum" scam is widening and accelerating. Awesome display of media/Democrat, pro-illegal-immigration propaganda.

What is in Trump's core? Gino says he lacks one, that he's completely opportunistic.

I describe anti-white-men bias at Harvard Medical School, and in undergraduate university admission procedures. Lawsuit by Asians who have been discriminated against is proceeding.

Tariffs past and present -- good or bad? Trade war? I say Calvin Coolidge hands-off policies more effective than Hoover's or Roosevelt's federal control policies.

Gino compares the Great Depression to the financial collapse in 2008.  I contend the feds should have done nothing in both cases and let businesses collapse. Let other private firms pick up pieces after bankruptcies. That's what Coolidge did and it worked very well. Government intervention prolongs recessions/the depression with central control.

Left and Right Show December 13, 2017

Gino and I discuss the Alabama senatorial election, DOJ investigation of racial discrimination by Harvard in its admissions, civil lawsuits by Asian-Americans against Ivy League colleges about same, what racism is and isn't. Trump will move US Embassy to Jerusalem. DOJ will investigate Planned Parenthood for selling aborted baby parts. David Dalieden wins civil lawsuit against biotech firms in California which which purchased baby parts from Planned Parenthood for resale. Tom describes abortion on demand. Plus, Tom and Gino select Good news/bad news as well as winners and losers from the past two weeks.

Democrats' Diminishing Brand

Donald Trump has record disapproval ratings for a president early in his first term. Congressional Democrats and mainstream media tell us so repeatedly, reporting little else but alleged collusion with Russians. Yet his congressional candidates keep winning special elections despite being vastly outspent.

They cannot understand it. Trump is their antithesis. He enrages both, fears neither, but voters like that. Do Congress and mainstream media not realize they have approval ratings lower than Trump’s?

Trump can be crude, egotistical. He bragged about grabbing women. He stretches truth to look good, yet voters accept him warts and all. They know a lot of guys just like him. Every corner bar has them. They can be tiresome but they’re harmless, and deep down most are nice guys. Tell them they’re full of sh** and they laugh, because they know they often are. They don’t take themselves too seriously, unlike hysterical Democrats and solemn talking heads who claim leaving the Paris climate change treaty will destroy the world and repealing Obamacare will kill thousands of Americans.

Voters detest Congress and loathe mainstream media. It’s the pomposity, the political correctness, the condescension to anyone who doesn’t think as they do. Voters don’t believe a man is a woman just because he says he is. They don’t want to call him “her” or her “him” as media do, and they don’t want to be forced to by government either. New York City has a civil statute requiring it. Last week, Canada passed a law making it a “hate crime” to refuse. And they don’t like their kids learning about transgenders in kindergarten.

Voters like borders around their country and they want them enforced. They don’t like being called bigots because they want American citizenship to mean something. They want people to work for a living if they’re able and they resent supporting deadbeats. Despite Democrat media denials, they know they’re paying for lots of them because some are neighbors and relatives. They know many illegal immigrants are on welfare and working under the table too. They know this pushes their wages down and their taxes up no matter what Democrats media claim.

When the majority of the FBI’s most wanted terrorist are Muslim, they know there’s a connection with Islam. They don’t like Democrat media calling them racist for saying it. They don’t understand why, but they detect some kind of solicitous interdependence between radical Islam and Democrat media. When someone shouts “Allahu Akbar!” while killing people here or in Europe, voters know immediately it’s a Muslim terrorist — even though media claim for days or weeks — or even years to be puzzled about motive.

They know it can be a sacrifice to raise children but it’s wrong to kill them in the womb. They know that’s what abortion does no matter what Democrat media claim. They don’t like being accused of a “war on women” for saying it either. They know Planned Parenthood is all about abortion (330,000 per year) and doing pap tests (380,000 a year) helps mask that. They don’t believe Democrat media insistence their tax money isn’t spent on abortions.

They know being called “non-college-educated-white-men” is a put down. They believe Hillary spoke for most Democrats and media when she called them “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic — you name it.” They believe media think them deplorable, bitterly clinging to guns and religion as Barack Obama claimed. They’re not fooled when racism is called Affirmative Action. When blacks, Hispanics, and women are given preference, they know it’s white men who are sent to the back of the bus. It’s especially galling when after nearly three generations of “Affirmative Action,” they’re called “privileged” and told to “renounce” it.

They know women vastly outnumber men in colleges and universities, which are almost all controlled by the leftists who support Democrats and media. They know professors teach that dead white men are responsible for bad things in history. They see white men habitually depicted as dumb, oafish, nasty, or cruel by television and Hollywood. It’s almost a hate crime when any other group is thus portrayed, but not when it’s white men — the universal scapegoats of our age.

When Democrats and media hit Trump he hits back — and voters love that. Some Democrats like Ohio Representative Tim Ryan are starting to get it: “I think, in part, we try to slice the electorate up. And we try to say, ‘You’re black, you’re brown, you’re gay, you’re straight, you’re a woman, you’re a man.’ The reality of it is there’s no juice in that kind of campaign,” he said.

Will Democrat leaders listen? Will their media partners? Maybe they will if they keep losing.