Given that this is an election year politicians across the country are looking for simple talking points that voters can latch onto without doing any of the requisite thinking typically required for crafting public policy. In Michigan US Representative Kerry Bentivolio has offered up an excellent example of how politicians pander to low information voters.
In an editorial piece in the Detroit News Representative Bentivolio advocates for the repeal of the 16th amendment which provides congress with the ability to levy taxes. According to the representative the 16th amendment has "outlived its usefulness, and, as the investigation into the targeting of conservative groups has shown, the IRS has become an intrusive bureaucracy that too many of our fellow citizens fear."
The logic here is embarrassingly simplistic and ignorant. Perhaps there are valid reasons to replace the 16th amendment but the representative’s opinion on an amendment's usefulness is not one of them. Nor is the representative’s perceived fear level of the US citizenry. If that is all it takes to repeal an amendment to the constitution it would be considerably easier to argue that the second amendment generates far more fear among US citizens as well as outliving its usefulness. After all what gun toting militia stands a chance against the most powerful military in the history of the world?
Beyond that in the 225 year history of the constitution there has been a total of one successful repeal. Making this repeal a key component of his legislative goals shows just how serious Representative Bentivolio really is about the job he was elected to do. He would be better off promising to get the moon base, that Newt Gingrich made part of his presidential campaign, built and operational than he will of getting this amendment repealed.
Of course if Representative Bentivolio is just looking to appease US citizens and assuage fears he could offer to hold banks and their decision makers accountable for plunging the economy into a devastating recession, that affected far more people than the few political action committees that were forced to prove they weren't breaking the law.
Perhaps more concerning than the insincerity the representative exposes with his trite rationale is the complete lack of ideas the legislation he supports represents. What would H. J. Res. 104 do to make the "tax code fairer and easier to understand"? Nothing.
Instead Representative Bentivolio says "This repeal will eliminate the personal and corporate income tax, the estate and gift taxes, and taxes on investment earnings at the federal level. After ratification, Congress and the states will have two years to decide on an alternative plan to raise revenue for the federal government. If no agreement can be reached within the two-year time frame, the current system would continue as if nothing had changed."
One imagines that the voters of Michigan's 11th district had hoped their representative would go to Washington and solve any number of available problems. Instead Representative Bentivolio seems content to let others do the heavy lifting while he sits and the sidelines hurling insults like the grumpy old white guys in the balcony of a Muppets show.
In the end that fact that Representative Bentivolio believes a full frontal assault on the 16th amendment exemplifies a valuable use of tax payer’s time and money suggests perhaps his time in the House is what has truly outlived its usefulness.
Friday, May 23, 2014
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Abusive government practices and deceptive minimum wage rhetoric won't help working poor
Over the past year there have been a lot of discussions surrounding the minimum wage. Fast food workers went on strike in an attempt shine a light on this issue and increase their pay. The president has also made it a key element of his fight against income inequality.
In Michigan a group called Raise Michigan started a petition drive to put the question of increasing the minimum wage before voters. Concern over this ballot measure forced the Republican controlled legislature to provide a work around that cuts voters out of the democratic process similar to their work that dissolved the voters will on Michigan's emergency manager law, their efforts to remove local control over schools, and their continued use of minor budgetary considerations that prevent residents from voting on referendum to controversial or unpopular legislation.
Not surprisingly, for some conservatives, this government overreach went too far. To them if the government was going to screw the people of Michigan out of the democratic process the least they could do was stick to true Republican ideology.
For the Detroit News editorial board the concern is that raising the minimum wage will hurt teens and business stating "With teen unemployment at near historic highs, this proposal will dim their prospects even further" and "by artificially increasing the annual cost of labor, without corresponding raises in productivity or prices, the impact of this legislation could crush small- and mid-sized businesses"
It should be noted that the teen employment rate has fallen precipitously since 2001. It should also be noted that changes in the minimum wage occurred in 1997 and 2007. It is a massive leap to insinuate that a full four years after being enacted an increased minimum wage resulting in a sudden drop of teen jobs. It took less than six months for Republicans to saddle the president with the economic woes created by his predecessor yet minimum wage has a four year gestation? This conclusion appears to be completely disingenuous conjecture on the part of the editorial board given that they provide no supporting evidence and that history shows no such definitive correlation. If they were being honest they would point out that the biggest change to occur in 2001 was the party in charge of the White House. Perhaps the real culprit for the considerable loss of teen jobs was Republican policies.
Having said that, these numbers have been falling for over a decade. If conservatives were really so concerned about the teen employment rate why did they stand ideally by while the number of teens finding jobs reached 30 year lows on their watch. Wasn't six years of controlling the executive and legislative branches of government enough time to offer even one solution to what we are now supposed to believe is the catastrophic result of an increase in minimum wage?
Of course it is also true that for years we have had a different set of rules for teen employees than other employees including a lower minimum wage. If the biggest concern with an increase in minimum wage was the number of job opportunities for teens, shouldn't Republicans just extend the reduced minimum wage rate for teens that is already on the books?
The reality is the pseudo outrage over teen employment shows just how tenuous the Republican opposition to minimum wage really is.
As far as businesses are concerned, it is certainly possible that some people may lose their job with an increase in the minimum wage however there would also be a considerably larger number of people who benefit from the increased wages. With that said, the idea that the minimum wage is some artificial increase implies that companies have no ability to artificially restrict wages. Let's say that we did as the editorial board suggests and we had tied higher wages to increased productivity. If that were the case, then American workers would have already seen an increase in pay much larger than the proposed $10.10 since data shows that while productivity has risen steadily since the mid 1970's the real hourly compensation for employees has not. Essentially for nearly 40 years now businesses have artificially kept wages low.
It is also curious that many conservatives believe an increase in the minimum wage will crush businesses however they hardly bat and eye at the millions upon millions that many CEO's make. If employee wages affect product pricing, then that is true at all levels of a company not just those at the bottom rung of the corporate ladder. Instead of firing employees how about these companies just cut top management wages by a few million dollars.
While the Detroit News editorial board had their thoughts on the topic there are other Republicans, like my colleague Dan Calabrese, who believe we should just let the free market take care of itself. This has been the thought process in many European countries where there is no minimum wage. The reason these countries can operate without a minimum wage is because they have some of the highest rates of union membership in the world. Instead of the government providing a baseline for wages, workers organize and work with companies to establish wages that allow everyone to prosper. This system also lowers the income inequality that has become an ever increasing issue in the US.
The Republican position on unions represents one of the greatest hypocrisies for their free market argument. Supporters of a truly free market wouldn't simultaneously argue against government intervention in the case of minimum wage but for government intervention to restrict workers rights. Like it or not, free market principles apply to corporations and individuals equally. Anything less is an example of government picking the winners and losers.
In the end the fact that the best talking points Republicans have to offer are so dubious says an awful lot about their motives. They want to use the power of government to protect the profits of corporations while Democrats hope to use the power of government to force companies to provide employees with a greater share of the spoils. Either way some people win and some people lose. Perhaps rather than manipulating the democratic process and using various groups as pawns in a rhetorical battle it would be best to just let the people decide for themselves.
In Michigan a group called Raise Michigan started a petition drive to put the question of increasing the minimum wage before voters. Concern over this ballot measure forced the Republican controlled legislature to provide a work around that cuts voters out of the democratic process similar to their work that dissolved the voters will on Michigan's emergency manager law, their efforts to remove local control over schools, and their continued use of minor budgetary considerations that prevent residents from voting on referendum to controversial or unpopular legislation.
Not surprisingly, for some conservatives, this government overreach went too far. To them if the government was going to screw the people of Michigan out of the democratic process the least they could do was stick to true Republican ideology.
For the Detroit News editorial board the concern is that raising the minimum wage will hurt teens and business stating "With teen unemployment at near historic highs, this proposal will dim their prospects even further" and "by artificially increasing the annual cost of labor, without corresponding raises in productivity or prices, the impact of this legislation could crush small- and mid-sized businesses"
It should be noted that the teen employment rate has fallen precipitously since 2001. It should also be noted that changes in the minimum wage occurred in 1997 and 2007. It is a massive leap to insinuate that a full four years after being enacted an increased minimum wage resulting in a sudden drop of teen jobs. It took less than six months for Republicans to saddle the president with the economic woes created by his predecessor yet minimum wage has a four year gestation? This conclusion appears to be completely disingenuous conjecture on the part of the editorial board given that they provide no supporting evidence and that history shows no such definitive correlation. If they were being honest they would point out that the biggest change to occur in 2001 was the party in charge of the White House. Perhaps the real culprit for the considerable loss of teen jobs was Republican policies.
Having said that, these numbers have been falling for over a decade. If conservatives were really so concerned about the teen employment rate why did they stand ideally by while the number of teens finding jobs reached 30 year lows on their watch. Wasn't six years of controlling the executive and legislative branches of government enough time to offer even one solution to what we are now supposed to believe is the catastrophic result of an increase in minimum wage?
Of course it is also true that for years we have had a different set of rules for teen employees than other employees including a lower minimum wage. If the biggest concern with an increase in minimum wage was the number of job opportunities for teens, shouldn't Republicans just extend the reduced minimum wage rate for teens that is already on the books?
The reality is the pseudo outrage over teen employment shows just how tenuous the Republican opposition to minimum wage really is.
As far as businesses are concerned, it is certainly possible that some people may lose their job with an increase in the minimum wage however there would also be a considerably larger number of people who benefit from the increased wages. With that said, the idea that the minimum wage is some artificial increase implies that companies have no ability to artificially restrict wages. Let's say that we did as the editorial board suggests and we had tied higher wages to increased productivity. If that were the case, then American workers would have already seen an increase in pay much larger than the proposed $10.10 since data shows that while productivity has risen steadily since the mid 1970's the real hourly compensation for employees has not. Essentially for nearly 40 years now businesses have artificially kept wages low.
It is also curious that many conservatives believe an increase in the minimum wage will crush businesses however they hardly bat and eye at the millions upon millions that many CEO's make. If employee wages affect product pricing, then that is true at all levels of a company not just those at the bottom rung of the corporate ladder. Instead of firing employees how about these companies just cut top management wages by a few million dollars.
While the Detroit News editorial board had their thoughts on the topic there are other Republicans, like my colleague Dan Calabrese, who believe we should just let the free market take care of itself. This has been the thought process in many European countries where there is no minimum wage. The reason these countries can operate without a minimum wage is because they have some of the highest rates of union membership in the world. Instead of the government providing a baseline for wages, workers organize and work with companies to establish wages that allow everyone to prosper. This system also lowers the income inequality that has become an ever increasing issue in the US.
The Republican position on unions represents one of the greatest hypocrisies for their free market argument. Supporters of a truly free market wouldn't simultaneously argue against government intervention in the case of minimum wage but for government intervention to restrict workers rights. Like it or not, free market principles apply to corporations and individuals equally. Anything less is an example of government picking the winners and losers.
In the end the fact that the best talking points Republicans have to offer are so dubious says an awful lot about their motives. They want to use the power of government to protect the profits of corporations while Democrats hope to use the power of government to force companies to provide employees with a greater share of the spoils. Either way some people win and some people lose. Perhaps rather than manipulating the democratic process and using various groups as pawns in a rhetorical battle it would be best to just let the people decide for themselves.
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Conservatives odd obsession with commencement speakers
Over the past few years the conservative media has focused a lot of attention on the political affiliation of commencement speakers at various higher learning institutions across the country. The reason for this attention stems from protests by students who don't want the culmination of years of hard work to be attenuated by orators whose ideology they find offensive.
In a recent piece my colleague Maria Servold puts voice to the conservative argument in this debate, stating rightfully so that "American universities are where ideas of all kinds are encouraged and explored". It should be noted that typically these speakers choose not to speak instead of being told that they can no longer speak. These students are simply expressing their displeasure with the ideas that the speaker represents. They have no power to prevent the speaker from attending unless there is such universal outrage that the school is left no other choice.
The reality is that these protests represent the exact exchange of ideas that should be encouraged.
Maria then ends her piece with the following line: "A truly open-minded person can listen to a speech by someone they disagree with, without throwing a fit first." While "throwing a fit" is probably a poor designation for a group of students organizing to advocate for a position it is certainly true that open minded people should be able to listen to those they disagree with.
Of course it is also true that these students made a choice to attend a specific collage because they felt it represented them so if these same students find the words of a student organization, a professor, or an administrator to be offensive and in clear opposition to their ideology they are well within their rights to protest.
As a proud graduate of Hillsdale College one imagines that years ago Maria made a similar choice and selected a school that represented her conservative ideology. Otherwise she might have picked a liberal leaning school where she could have experienced a greater breadth and depth of ideas that she obviously values for her more liberal brethren.
One also imagines that she found very little to dislike in the past decade of commencement speakers for her alma mater which includes the following:
2014 - Eric Metaxas
2013 - Ted Cruz
2012 - Roger Scruton
2011 - Mark Helprin
2010 - Edwin Meese
2009 - Hadley Arkes
2008 - Louis J Freeh
2007 - Mitt Romney
2006 - Harvey Mansfield
2005 - Ken Starr
It would seem that Hillsdale College doesn't share Maria's passion for challenging graduates with opposing voices at their commencement.
In the end most liberals would probably agree with Maria's assertion that who a school chooses to talk at their graduation ceremony really isn't that important. But to imply that the conservative media or jilted speakers are within their rights to whine about who is chosen to talk while students somehow are not doesn't suggest that conservatives concerns on this topic are really about open mindedness.
Ineffective legislation hampers teacher effectiveness
Republican legislators pay a lot of lip service to cutting wasteful spending. Unfortunately their actions aren't always in line with their rhetoric.
Recent examples of this include the Florida welfare drug testing program, the US Defense budget and the support for lower capital gains tax rates which all have Republicans unnecessarily wasting tax payer money.
Of course no Republican hypocrisy is complete if it doesn't include an attack on public education. Luckily Michigan's legislature has managed to offer up such a bill. Using the fallacy that our education system is broken and that public educators are squarely to blame the legislature has passed two bills that look to make teachers accountable for their students outcomes.
If the capitalist model is the basis for these changes, it is important to recognize that, in the private sector, when an individual is judged on the performance of others that individual typically has the authority to remove any underperforming team members and chose a staff that they work well with. Educators have no such option. They must teach and improve every student that walks through the door.
It should also be noted that the education profession already has both a high turnover rate and a shortage of qualified replacements. This suggests that the provisions of these bills making it easier to get rid of teachers are very unlikely to be the magic bullet towards improving education that many believe.
The one thing these bills manager to do very well is spend tax payer dollars. According to the House Fiscal Agency the financial impact of these "teacher accountability" bills is as much as $42 million initially with ongoing costs "likely to decrease slightly".
Yes, the Michigan legislature is willing to spend up to $42 million per year to have a statewide evaluation system that meets the standards of the 148 apparent education experts currently residing in the Michigan House and Senate.
So what sort of return should Michigan residents expect on this investment? According to TeachersUnionsExposed.com it costs as much as $219,504 to remove "bad teachers". This means the state would need to identify and remove over 190 bad teachers per year just to break even. If school districts are hiring and giving tenure to that many bad teacher per year shouldn't this legislation focus more on fixing the hiring process than burdening tens of thousands of effective teachers with additional metrics?
Of course given that 52% of educators have a masters degree or higher and have been on the job for, in many cases, at least 4 years before they get tenure protections, one might expect a significant separation cost. After all most of these same people are willing to accept the nearly $30 in golden parachutes the average CEO gets regardless of how well they did their job. They also don't seem to mind the legal costs and the hundreds of thousands in severance packages many private sector employees often receive.
Unfortunately for students the benefits of these proposed changes are still very much in question. While many studies find little to no improvement, one of the few studies to show a positive correlation uses different measures than the prospective Michigan program. Ironically, these legislators seem to have done very little to evaluate the effectiveness of their own program aimed at evaluating teacher effectiveness. Perhaps the makeup of the Michigan plan will improve educator performance or perhaps it will errantly fire good teachers.
Ask anyone of these legislators to stake their jobs on the effectiveness of this legislation and watch them offer up a multitude of reasons why they shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of others even thought that is exactly what they expect teachers to happily accept.
Some day Republicans will have eliminated all of the public school boogiemen (bad teachers, tenure, Unions...) and spent billions of dollars with their McCarthy style witch hunts that completely gut the best education system in the world for nominal gains. Perhaps then they will finally admit that they are not experts in education and what we really needed to do to improve educational outcomes had way more do with problems that fall outside of a teacher’s control.
Educators are more than happy to take personal responsibility for their actions. What they aren't willing to do is take the fall for the failure of legislators and parents which is exactly what this legislation makes them do.
Recent examples of this include the Florida welfare drug testing program, the US Defense budget and the support for lower capital gains tax rates which all have Republicans unnecessarily wasting tax payer money.
Of course no Republican hypocrisy is complete if it doesn't include an attack on public education. Luckily Michigan's legislature has managed to offer up such a bill. Using the fallacy that our education system is broken and that public educators are squarely to blame the legislature has passed two bills that look to make teachers accountable for their students outcomes.
If the capitalist model is the basis for these changes, it is important to recognize that, in the private sector, when an individual is judged on the performance of others that individual typically has the authority to remove any underperforming team members and chose a staff that they work well with. Educators have no such option. They must teach and improve every student that walks through the door.
It should also be noted that the education profession already has both a high turnover rate and a shortage of qualified replacements. This suggests that the provisions of these bills making it easier to get rid of teachers are very unlikely to be the magic bullet towards improving education that many believe.
The one thing these bills manager to do very well is spend tax payer dollars. According to the House Fiscal Agency the financial impact of these "teacher accountability" bills is as much as $42 million initially with ongoing costs "likely to decrease slightly".
Yes, the Michigan legislature is willing to spend up to $42 million per year to have a statewide evaluation system that meets the standards of the 148 apparent education experts currently residing in the Michigan House and Senate.
So what sort of return should Michigan residents expect on this investment? According to TeachersUnionsExposed.com it costs as much as $219,504 to remove "bad teachers". This means the state would need to identify and remove over 190 bad teachers per year just to break even. If school districts are hiring and giving tenure to that many bad teacher per year shouldn't this legislation focus more on fixing the hiring process than burdening tens of thousands of effective teachers with additional metrics?
Of course given that 52% of educators have a masters degree or higher and have been on the job for, in many cases, at least 4 years before they get tenure protections, one might expect a significant separation cost. After all most of these same people are willing to accept the nearly $30 in golden parachutes the average CEO gets regardless of how well they did their job. They also don't seem to mind the legal costs and the hundreds of thousands in severance packages many private sector employees often receive.
Unfortunately for students the benefits of these proposed changes are still very much in question. While many studies find little to no improvement, one of the few studies to show a positive correlation uses different measures than the prospective Michigan program. Ironically, these legislators seem to have done very little to evaluate the effectiveness of their own program aimed at evaluating teacher effectiveness. Perhaps the makeup of the Michigan plan will improve educator performance or perhaps it will errantly fire good teachers.
Ask anyone of these legislators to stake their jobs on the effectiveness of this legislation and watch them offer up a multitude of reasons why they shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of others even thought that is exactly what they expect teachers to happily accept.
Some day Republicans will have eliminated all of the public school boogiemen (bad teachers, tenure, Unions...) and spent billions of dollars with their McCarthy style witch hunts that completely gut the best education system in the world for nominal gains. Perhaps then they will finally admit that they are not experts in education and what we really needed to do to improve educational outcomes had way more do with problems that fall outside of a teacher’s control.
Educators are more than happy to take personal responsibility for their actions. What they aren't willing to do is take the fall for the failure of legislators and parents which is exactly what this legislation makes them do.
Friday, May 9, 2014
Are Democratic policies racist?
Late last month the US experienced a couple of high profile racist statements - one from then NBA owner Donald Sterling and the other from conservative hero, rancher, lawbreaker and "taker" Cliven Bundy. If nothing else, these comments proved that we are not in a post racial era as many would have you believe. Obviously given the status of both of these men their comments garnered national media attention and started a number of conversations.
As you might expect these conversations revealed just how far we have to go but one of the unexpected comments I received when discussing the issue of race in America was "you bloggers and opinion writers need to let the race thing rest for a while. It's getting old and tiring."
Gee, you mean to tell me old white conservatives don't want to talk about how the statements of other old white conservatives could be seen as racist? Back when "black on black crime" was all the rage in the conservative media; talking heads like Bill O'Reilly were out in front calling on black leaders to address this issue. After all it was their community - shouldn't they do something? Now that the shoe is on the other foot conservatives no longer sees any value in a community policing their own?
Of course for a group that has attempted to repeal the ACA dozens of times, is still obsessed with Benghazi even after multiple reports have revealed no smoking gun, and continues to insist the president was born outside of the US, this call to end debate seems exceedingly hypocritical and self serving.
In actuality the conservative community has performed very poorly when it comes to reprimanding other conservatives who make inappropriate, racially charged statements. When it comes to racism what they have excelled at is clever word games.
They use terms like "playing the race card" to dismiss and belittle legitimate concerns. They claim "reverse racism" is a bigger problem than good old white racism. They use code words like "inner city" and "thugs" when referencing the perceived problems of the African American community. They talk about things like reducing food stamps and stopping "Welfare Queens" and "Welfare dependency".
But one of their favorite sleight of hand tricks is to latch on to the few black Americans that agree with them and pretend that this somehow justifies their stance. Ironically, this tactic is only a one way street for them. When noted rich guy Warren Buffet came out and advocated for raising taxes on rich guys, conservatives weren't swayed by this insider. To conservatives the opinions about racial inequality from African Americans like Barack Obama, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton who despite having the deck stack against them created a better life for themselves mean very little however if Thomas Sowell, Allen West or Dr. Ben Carson say Democratic policies hurt black people, suddenly those voices are worth listening to.
Conservatives then use these opinions to pretend the discriminatory policies they support are an altruistic olive branch to the African American community while the assistance programs Democrat's support enslave people. The book 'The Help' offers an excellent example of this mindset when a maid asks to borrow money to send her children to college her employer responds with "a true Christian don't give in charity to those who is well and able. Say it's kinder to let them learn to work things out themselves". Because while giving out billions in subsides to companies removes some unfair burden on American companies doing the same for citizens is nothing short of slavery.
This meme has been offered up by conservatives for years. Unfortunately the bulk of the data used to support such a claim is often anecdotal. Thomas Sowell for example thinks the income gap under Reagan compared to the gap under Obama proves that liberal policies hurt African Americans. Sowell provides no additional data because he knows conjecture is evidence enough for his audience. One could just as easily speculate that the mortgage crisis under George W. Bush caused the increase in the income gap since African Americans suffered greater losses than whites.
Additionally if we are to accept that such a casual correlation somehow represents proof then it should be noted that 8 of the 10 biggest "taker" states are Red states while the 10 biggest "maker" states are all Blue states. Using Thomas Sowell's own logic this proves that Republican policies must be hurting blacks.
Allen West takes a similar convoluted path to blaming liberal policies for the inequality in school punishment. West suggests that black students act out more and are subsequently punished at a higher rate because of the number of black children born out of wedlock - a statistic he says is a "problem (liberals) created". What liberal policies? West never says. Perhaps the "decimation of the black family" is more closely tied to the rise in private prisons and the corresponding increase in the number of black inmates. If that were the case it would again be Republican policies that are to blame.
Of course my personal favorite comes from Townhall.com writer John Hawkins who, in discussing the reasons black Americans should give up on Democrats, suggests that African Americans "vote monolithically for the Democratic Party" even though "The only thing any Democrat has to do is claim that his opponent is a racist and he's got 90 percent of the black vote locked up". The ego and ignorance it takes to make this claim is awesome. Hawkins is so infatuated with his own talking point that he can't fathom that African Americans choose Democratic candidates because they believe Democratic policies help not hurt their community. He seems to believe blacks are "monolithically" stupid and incapable of having independent thought. For him only those who see the world through his narrow prism demonstrate the intellect required to choose Republican policies.
In the end this meme that liberal policies hurt African Americans is just another poll tested myth that allows conservatives to support racist voter ID laws, drug laws, zero tolerance laws, stand your ground laws, and stop and frisk laws with a clear conscience. Because they certainly never come out and suggest these policies will fix any of the systemic inequality they claim Democratic policies are creating.
The reality is so much goes into defining ones station in life that it is impossible and ignorant to boil it down to one policy or set of policies. Perhaps some Democratic policies keep poor people poor or perhaps some Republican policies make it more difficult to rise up from the bottom. There is one thing we do know for certain, anyone who tells you definitively that one side or the other is to blame, has absolutely no clue how to or interest in fixing institutional inequality.
As you might expect these conversations revealed just how far we have to go but one of the unexpected comments I received when discussing the issue of race in America was "you bloggers and opinion writers need to let the race thing rest for a while. It's getting old and tiring."
Gee, you mean to tell me old white conservatives don't want to talk about how the statements of other old white conservatives could be seen as racist? Back when "black on black crime" was all the rage in the conservative media; talking heads like Bill O'Reilly were out in front calling on black leaders to address this issue. After all it was their community - shouldn't they do something? Now that the shoe is on the other foot conservatives no longer sees any value in a community policing their own?
Of course for a group that has attempted to repeal the ACA dozens of times, is still obsessed with Benghazi even after multiple reports have revealed no smoking gun, and continues to insist the president was born outside of the US, this call to end debate seems exceedingly hypocritical and self serving.
In actuality the conservative community has performed very poorly when it comes to reprimanding other conservatives who make inappropriate, racially charged statements. When it comes to racism what they have excelled at is clever word games.
They use terms like "playing the race card" to dismiss and belittle legitimate concerns. They claim "reverse racism" is a bigger problem than good old white racism. They use code words like "inner city" and "thugs" when referencing the perceived problems of the African American community. They talk about things like reducing food stamps and stopping "Welfare Queens" and "Welfare dependency".
But one of their favorite sleight of hand tricks is to latch on to the few black Americans that agree with them and pretend that this somehow justifies their stance. Ironically, this tactic is only a one way street for them. When noted rich guy Warren Buffet came out and advocated for raising taxes on rich guys, conservatives weren't swayed by this insider. To conservatives the opinions about racial inequality from African Americans like Barack Obama, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton who despite having the deck stack against them created a better life for themselves mean very little however if Thomas Sowell, Allen West or Dr. Ben Carson say Democratic policies hurt black people, suddenly those voices are worth listening to.
Conservatives then use these opinions to pretend the discriminatory policies they support are an altruistic olive branch to the African American community while the assistance programs Democrat's support enslave people. The book 'The Help' offers an excellent example of this mindset when a maid asks to borrow money to send her children to college her employer responds with "a true Christian don't give in charity to those who is well and able. Say it's kinder to let them learn to work things out themselves". Because while giving out billions in subsides to companies removes some unfair burden on American companies doing the same for citizens is nothing short of slavery.
This meme has been offered up by conservatives for years. Unfortunately the bulk of the data used to support such a claim is often anecdotal. Thomas Sowell for example thinks the income gap under Reagan compared to the gap under Obama proves that liberal policies hurt African Americans. Sowell provides no additional data because he knows conjecture is evidence enough for his audience. One could just as easily speculate that the mortgage crisis under George W. Bush caused the increase in the income gap since African Americans suffered greater losses than whites.
Additionally if we are to accept that such a casual correlation somehow represents proof then it should be noted that 8 of the 10 biggest "taker" states are Red states while the 10 biggest "maker" states are all Blue states. Using Thomas Sowell's own logic this proves that Republican policies must be hurting blacks.
Allen West takes a similar convoluted path to blaming liberal policies for the inequality in school punishment. West suggests that black students act out more and are subsequently punished at a higher rate because of the number of black children born out of wedlock - a statistic he says is a "problem (liberals) created". What liberal policies? West never says. Perhaps the "decimation of the black family" is more closely tied to the rise in private prisons and the corresponding increase in the number of black inmates. If that were the case it would again be Republican policies that are to blame.
Of course my personal favorite comes from Townhall.com writer John Hawkins who, in discussing the reasons black Americans should give up on Democrats, suggests that African Americans "vote monolithically for the Democratic Party" even though "The only thing any Democrat has to do is claim that his opponent is a racist and he's got 90 percent of the black vote locked up". The ego and ignorance it takes to make this claim is awesome. Hawkins is so infatuated with his own talking point that he can't fathom that African Americans choose Democratic candidates because they believe Democratic policies help not hurt their community. He seems to believe blacks are "monolithically" stupid and incapable of having independent thought. For him only those who see the world through his narrow prism demonstrate the intellect required to choose Republican policies.
In the end this meme that liberal policies hurt African Americans is just another poll tested myth that allows conservatives to support racist voter ID laws, drug laws, zero tolerance laws, stand your ground laws, and stop and frisk laws with a clear conscience. Because they certainly never come out and suggest these policies will fix any of the systemic inequality they claim Democratic policies are creating.
The reality is so much goes into defining ones station in life that it is impossible and ignorant to boil it down to one policy or set of policies. Perhaps some Democratic policies keep poor people poor or perhaps some Republican policies make it more difficult to rise up from the bottom. There is one thing we do know for certain, anyone who tells you definitively that one side or the other is to blame, has absolutely no clue how to or interest in fixing institutional inequality.
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