New-Old Hypocrisy and a New-Old Spin

Friday, February 8, 2008

Typical northern college student, recent grad: "I'm voting for a Black guy because that would make me different from my parents. Doesn't Hillary remind you of Mom? I hate you Mom! I'm going to call her to send me money, so I can send it to Obama NOW!" (Pictured right, Barack and Hillary in a campaign fund raising tussle.)

There is something rotten about promoting an 'acceptably' Black or biracial president when your classroom, neighborhood, chosen associations, and cultural and modern awareness places Blacks at the very periphery of your consciousness. 'The educated Black person at the office is acceptable' but the black person with the ethnic clothes and accents is looked at as likely a threat. That is creating a sort of racial paradigm that actually is more restrictive to Black people than being fully ostracized.

Americans are not particularly concerned that we have the highest rate of incarceration in the history of the world and that 72% comes from Blacks and Hispanics who make up just 22% of the American population.  We ignore that Black family income is just 60% of White income, and 43% of all Black children live beneath the poverty line- a figure almost identical to that which existed on the day Martin Luther King was assassinated, and 4 times the average for Western European countries. Americans are not concerned that more Blacks are in jail than college. That Whites have 10 to 13 times the net worth of Blacks and Hispanics respectively has not been something that Americans feel is very important to address. Perhaps it isn't.

But to see Obama as 'hope' because he personally is 'change' means that some Americans are schizo. This can be the only way that Obama represents 'hope' while a third of Black men of college age are under court supervision (with no voting rights), and while Blacks are incarcerated at a much higher rate for the similar crimes, and as Blacks are mostly incarcerated for crimes of drug use and sales despite having lower levels of drug use but are arrested 10 times (not 10%), and when 50% of Black men in New York City are unemployed, and single Black women in their prime wage earning years have an average net worth of $5.00 (not a typo).   On average, college educated African-American women annually earn $19,054 less than college educated white men.

Whites will meanwhile look to affirmative action, seldom understanding that affirmative action means to make an effort at leveling the playing field among those of similar merit rather than proportional hiring, admissions, etc. More importantly, affirmative action has led to a decrease in traditional minority representation in contracts, hiring and admissions.  Where set asides have happened traditionally underrepresented minorities have lost instead of gained. Who have the real winners been?  White women and Asians have been the fastest growing portion of Minority Business Enterprise programs while African Americans and Latinos are still extremely underrepresented.  Government contracts, even more so under Obama go to White businesses, being the most effective American racial transference of wealth. In 2010-2011 only $6 billion (or 0.01%) of $500 billion in federal contracts went to Black business, despite  the fact that 16% of businesses certified with federal government being Black owned. Affirmative action if anything creates a mythology that promotes further discrimination or serves as a red herring.

Don't worry though, the expert talking heads will say it is the death of race, again, just before going to their millionaire, White Upper East Side, Foggy Bottom, Dupont Circle, Chappaqua, Rye, Scarsdale, etc. neighborhoods. They'll be sure to cash the checks they receive for saying such foolishness that Nathan, the news director came up with as the "theme" just before writing out their ad libs. That isn't to say that race, region, religion and sex are the only thing that matters in elections- far from it.

One of the things that makes Obama Barack such an attractive candidate for special interests is that he comes from no base (including a Black political organizations) and he is left utterly to bidder. He is a poof of 'hope and change', and by hope and change, we mean meaningless words that talking heads have been programmed to breathlessly repeat as of late. He is as susceptible in his fall as he is in his rise by the hands that control big media and spin.