Those Ungrateful Bla... Afric... Obamas

Recently, Peggy Noonan wrote,

The Democrats have it exactly wrong. Hillary is the easier candidate, Mr. Obama the tougher. Hillary brings negative; it's fair to hit her back with negative. Mr. Obama brings hope, and speaks of a better way. He's not Bambi, he's bulletproof.

The biggest problem for the Republicans will be that no matter what they say that is not issue oriented--"He's too young, he's never run anything, he's not fully baked"--the mainstream media will tag them as dealing in racial overtones, or undertones. You can bet on this. Go to the bank on it.

You would think, as somebody who recognizes the racial subtext in attacks on the Obamas, that Noonan might be careful. Or perhaps she has decided that, whatever the risks, she needs to remind her readers, "The Obamas are black - and they're ungrateful." Speaking of Michelle Obama, Noonan writes,

I wonder if she knows that some people look at her and think "Man, she got it all." Intelligent, strong, tall, beautiful, Princeton, Harvard, black at a time when America was trying to make up for its sins and be helpful, and from a working-class family with two functioning parents who made sure she got to school

Noonan's choice of words is not accidental. She first attempts to invoke "Black English", and next suggests that Michelle Obama is not sufficiently grateful for having benefited from affirmative action. She goes on to admit that she doesn't actually care about the facts of Michelle Obama's background - "That's the great divide in modern America, whether or not you had a functioning family, and she apparently came from the privileged part of that divide". It would take her how many seconds to find a biography of Michelle Obama, or to contact somebody within the Obama campaign who could fill her in? No, the point here is to remind everybody that the Obama's are African American, probably only got where they are through affirmative action, and are committing the capital sin of being ungrateful. And in case you missed it,

A lot of white working-class Americans didn't come up with those things. Some of them were raised by a TV and a microwave and love our country anyway, every day.

(Does Noonan truly believe that "pride" and "love" are synonyms?)

After this column, it seems apparent that Noonan's concern is not that the media will wrongly infer racial overtones from Republican attacks on the Obamas. It's that when people like her attempt to inject racial overtones into the debate, they risk having somebody call them out.

Segregation As "Sad" But Inevitable?

David Brooks penned a column, The End of Integration which opens with the lament, ("Nothing is sadder than the waning dream of integration"), but (suprise, surprise) he's shedding crocodile tears. And, as is his wont, he relies on a child-like presentation of social anthropology to justify his actual position:

But it could be the dream of integration itself is the problem. It could be that it was like the dream of early communism — a nice dream, but not fit for the way people really are.

For hundreds of thousands of years our ancestors lived in small bands. Surviving meant being able to distinguish between us — the people who will protect you — and them — the people who will kill you. Even today, people have a powerful drive to distinguish between us and them.

As dozens of social-science experiments have made clear, if you separate people into different groups — no matter how arbitrary the basis of the distinction — they will quickly begin discriminating against others they deem unlike themselves. People say they want to live in diverse integrated communities, but what they really want to do is live in homogenous ones, filled with people like themselves.

So integration is analogous communism? (Did I miss his "Nothing is sadder than the fall of the Iron Curtain" column?)

When Brooks describes people who say they want to live in integrated communities but actually seek out segregation, I suspect he's speaking of himself. This supports any number of "shorter David Brooks" synopses of his column:

• I live in a neighborhood that's primarily white, went to white majority schools, and I've never had a black friend, and I turned out okay.
• Why are people carping about this racism stuff, when they should be addressing real problems like make-believe anti-Semitism?
• I have a black neighbor - every Tuesday - and I would be saddened if he moved away.

I will concede in fairness that David Brooks contends that his comments about anti-semitism were a "joke", although (as with the factual errors that he reinvents as jokes) his delivery of the punch line was a bit off the mark.

The obvious point Brooks somehow overlooks is that whatever divisions may naturally flow between "us" and "them", race does not have to be a principle point of division, or even a significant point of division.

Maybe the health of a society is not measured by how integrated each institution within it is, but by how freely people can move between institutions. In a sick society, people are bound by one totalistic identity. In a healthy society, a person can live in a black neighborhood, send her kids to Catholic school, go to work in a lawyer’s office and meet every Wednesday with a feminist book club. Multiply your homogenous communities and be fulfilled.

Of his examples...

• You can live in a "black neighborhood" or move out of a "black neighborhood" without regard to your race;
• You can attend a Catholic school without regard for your race;
• You can work for a lawyer, or even be a lawyer, without regard for your race (if we assume the lawyer doesn't discriminate when hiring you);
• You can be a feminist without regard for your race; and
• You can join or quit book clubs without regard for your race;

But you can't change your race. Hatred and division predicated on race is qualitatively different, because race is a status and not a choice.

There is no question that society can change its views on race and ethnicity. Many groups which were once subjected to active discrimination are now integrated into our society. Many people who are overtly racist nonetheless display extreme partisanship in favor of a local sports team which is largely black. The color of somebody's skin may present an easy basis for distinction between groups, but the fact that it is easy does not mean that it is desirable or even tolerable within a modern society.

Am I wrong in believing that Brooks would not shrug off another person's dismissal of the segregation of Jews with, "This isn’t the integrated world many of us hoped for. But maybe it’s the only one available"? I suspect he would most likely accuse the speaker of being actively anti-Semitic, or at least of holding anti-Semitic sympathies. I suspect he would be correct. And yet that's his response to racial segregation.

Thinking Like A Lawyer?

Law professors sometimes contend that they teach their students to "think like lawyers". If this guy is an example of what law professors mean by "thinking like a lawyer", let's hope that they fail in their mission. His argument, on analogies between South Africa and the situation in the occupied territories commences,

For reasons that should be obvious to any objective observer, I find the South Africa analogy to be both absurd and obscene. However, let's assume for the sake of argument that Israel's occupation of the lands it captured in 1967 is indeed morally analogous to South African apartheid.

Okay, so far so good. It's not at all unreasonable to point to the many differences between the two situations. Lawyers frequently advance positions they don't accept "for the sake of argument". So let's see where he runs with this. What happened after Apartheid ended?

Instead, the black population of South Africa voted in a new government composed of black supremacists, who expressed openly and vigorously their hatred and contempt of white people, and swore that they would never negotiate any accommodation with the South African government, short of turning all of South Africa into a black supremacist state, with whites being forced to return to their "homelands". The new black government used its new territorial sovereignty to establish terrorist bases, smuggle weapons, and establish new military and political ties to other organizations that had genocidal views toward South African whites. White South African towns faced a constant missile barrage from this territory.

Even knowing the hatred leveled at South Africa during apartheid years, I find it hard to believe that under these circumstances anyone with a modicum of respectability would have been calling for boycotts of the South African government.

So the analogy he would have us accept between South Africa and Israel's occupation of the West Bank is that the subjects of Apartheid and the occupation are similarly nasty, awful people, undeserving of freedom and self-determination. Nobody with a "modicum of respectability" would disagree, once they accept that "fact". If you support a boycott in favor of the freedom of these awful, nasty, undeserving people, you are "morally bankrupt" and support terrorism.

Nice.

You don't have to agree with a boycott to grasp the depravity of that position.

The Latest from Jim "Foxworthy" Lindgren

The curent subject is a little bit different than last time, but the punch line is the same.... If you disagree with Mr. Lindgren's politics... you might be a racist.

Giving the Benefit of the Doubt to George Allen

Most people already know the story. Even those who seem inclined to believe that Allen intentionally used a racial slur question why he would do so. I think it's a reasonable inference that parts of his story are true - he did pick up the term from his staff, and he didn't realize that it was a racial slur. The sticking point is, he does not want to admit that his staff includes racists who know "white supremacist" code word ethnic slurs, and he has no good response to the question of why he engaged in what amounts to racial taunting even if he did not know he was using an ethnic slur.

Prohibiting Bilingual Ballots

George Will's latest column, A Vote For English, advocates against bilingual ballots for U.S. elections. He sneers at Alberto Gonzales, who has the temerity to disagree with him on this issue:

The federal government's chief law enforcement official may need a refresher course on federal law pertaining to legal immigrants.

Will points out that in order to be naturalized, the law requires that you "demonstrate an understanding of the English language, including an ability to read, write, and speak words in ordinary usage in the English language." To Will, this means that any person who cannot understand a Ballot that is written in English should not have been allowed to become a citizen. And to Will it inexorably follows that ballots should only be in English, apparently such that voting privileges are reserved to those who "can comprehend the political discourse that precedes the casting of ballot".

Okay... But Will has forgotten a few things. First, not everybody who has weak English language skills is an immigrant. Will may not like this fact, but not every person born in the United States grows up in an English-speaking household. Second, not every election requires that you be a citizen to vote. Some local elections, such as Chicago school board elections, do not require citizenship for participation. Third, communities with large populations of non-English speakers may end up with bilingual ballots even in the abence of a legal mandate as, despite the possibility of Will's disapproval, voters may demand them. The effect of English-only ballots would be felt most significantly by citizens who do not have sufficient political clout to successfully lobby for ballots in their language, which would seem to have the opposite effect of bringing marginalized people into the nation's "political discourse". Fourth, ballots may be available in English, but that English isn't always easy to understand even to a native speaker. Fifth, even if a citizen has weak English language skills, if that citizen is going to vote anyway, isn't it better for everybody else in the country that the citizen understand the ballot?

Oh, but if only we could live in an ideal world, where everybody wears neatly pressed suits, speaks fluent Englsh, and writes for the Washington Post.

As I have previously noted, George Will is preternaturally unable to make even a slight criticism of a Republican without savaging a Democrat. No exception here.

It takes political bravery to propose pruning the Voting Rights Act, given the predictable charges of racism that are hurled so promiscuously nowadays. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, for example, has a liberal's reflex for discerning racism everywhere and for shouting "racist" as a substitute for argument

Demonstrating his firm grasp of the English language, Will asserts the narrowest possible construction of the term "race" and "racism":

Was his opaque idea - well, perhaps it is not opaque to liberals - of unintentional racism merely a bow to Senate rules against personal slurs? What "race" does Reid think is being victimized? Are Spanish speakers members of a single race?

A more astute follower of the nation's civic conversation might recognize that the term "racism" is frequently used in contexts where the speaker is actually referencing "bigotry". Which is not to say that Will doesn't have a point buried in his vituperation. After all, you shouldn't attribute to evil that which can be adequately explained by stupidity. Or, in the case of Congress, political opportunism.

It's In The Washington Times, So...

So what can you expect, right? Describing Liddy Dole's demand that Harry Reid apologize for suggesting that the push to make English the official language of the United States is racist,

Sen. Elizabeth Dole yesterday called on Minority Leader Harry Reid to apologize for charging this week that a proposal to make English the official language was racist.

The article later editorializes,

In the past, Mr. Reid has denied that racism has anything to do with the debate over immigration.

Sure, but we're talking about making English the national language, not immigration.

Applying "The Bell Curve"

I'm personally not sure why, but from time to time people still post seeminlgy passionate defenses of The Bell Curve and its scholarship. This example left me wondering, though, why its advocates still press the issue so hard. The blog post suggests that a British university lecturer was disciplined for defending The Bell Curve in class - but if you read the linked article, he was a bit more extreme in his beliefs:

Dr Ellis gave an interview to the university’s student newspaper in which he described himself as “an unrepentant Powellite” who favoured repatriation if it were carried out “humanely”. He said that the British National Party was “a bit too socialist” for his liking.

He voiced support for the theory set out in The Bell Curve, a book published in 1994 by Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray, that white people had higher average IQs than blacks. He said the study had “demonstrated to me beyond any reasonable doubt there is a persistent gap in average black and white average intelligence”.

Dr Ellis also told Leeds students that women did not have the same intellectual capacity as men and that feminism, along with multiculturalism, was “corroding” Britain.

Even Enoch Powell, who inadvertently gave his infamous "Rivers of Blood" speech on Hitler's birthday, was arguably a "repentant Powellite" at least insofar as that poor choice of date.

Let's assume for a moment that the criticisms of The Bell Curve are all 100% wrong - that it's the finest scholarship to ever grace the written page. What use does it have to those of us who are't "unrepentant Powellites", to the political right of the British National Party (which seeks to protect "the native British people" from immigrant populations), or in favor of booting dark-skinned minorities (save possibly Asians?) out of our nations?

Anyone?

A Seat At The Table

Is a seat at the big table enough? David Bernstein seems to think so:

Oh, and there's an EXCELLENT reason for a black conservative, especially a political activist, to be a Republican: if you want the GOP to pay attention to the interests of African Americans, it's very helpful if there are some blacks in the party who are in the room when important decisions are made.

Eugene Robinson suggests otherwise:

You could rationalize working for someone like Helms by telling yourself that you could do more good for the African American community from the inside, next to the seat of power, than from the outside. You could tell yourself you were advancing the interests of black people, even if most black people disagreed. You could ignore racism or pretend it was something else. You could tell yourself that you were making compromises and sacrifices for the greater good.

Finally, you could arrive at the White House, with a big job and regular access to the president. But it might be a White House where all the big decisions were made by just a few people, and you weren't one of them.

Then what?

But really, how often does this actually happen in any context. Somebody who wants to be political active and be a force for change in the world, who (strategically) never joins the political parties or organizations with which he agrees, who goes under deep cover in the opposing party where he rises to a position where he has access to its leaders, and who then tries to influence the party's decision-makers to take the positions he has hidden throughout his life (and to at least some degree must continue to hide in order to protect his position)?

Even if such covert work were effective, how often would your time and energy have been better spent working for the causes in which you believe?

Both the Bernstein and Robinson positions seem to assume a compromise of ideals.

Political Ideology and Racism

Over at the Volokh conspiracy, contributor James Lindgren (who is quite adept with statistical analysis software and the data at issue) contends that white Democrats are significantly more racist than are white Republicans:

Eugene,

To your list I would add that, over the last 30 years, typical white Republicans in the general public have been significantly less traditionally racist than typical white Democrats.

For example, in the 1996-2004 General Social Surveys, 11.9% of white Democrats think that differences in black/white success are due to black inborn disability, compared to only 9.1% of white Republicans. Similarly, 14.5% of white Democrats favor laws against racial intermarriage, compared to 12.2% of white Republicans.

In the two decades before 1996, these differences tend to be much stronger. Republicans have traditionally been less traditionally racist.

So, although there is a shift in traditional racism toward members of the Republican Party, members of the Democratic Party have been still more racist over the last decade--though the Republican Party may overtake it soon. Only if one uses "modern racism" measures that conflate opposition to big government with racism do Republicans usually score as significantly more racist than Democrats.

Given the tiny percentages at issue, it is astonishing that Lindgren would try to assert significant racism or lack thereof on the basis of his recited figures. But beyond that, if the data truly supports his claims, why is he the only one making these claims? Would Karl Rove truly sit on such explosive data, as the Republicans attempt to make headway among this nation's minority populations?

Although I don't have access to the same tools as Lindgren, it is possible to perform a basic reality check on his assertion through Berkeley's SDA Archive site. Using the "Frequencies or crosstabulation" tool, looking at the General Social Surveys, 1972-2004 Cumulative File, focusing on Lindgren's hallmark of racism, the question of inborn ability [RACDIF4], limiting results to white respondants [RACE(1)], and weighing results with a non-response adjustment [WT2004NR], I see the following results:



When I look at expression of admiration for blacks [ADMIRBLK], I see the following results:



By Lindgren's measure (and let me again emphasize that I disgree with his measure), if Democrats can be said to be significantly more racist than Republicans, conservatives (and moderates) would appear to be vastly more racist than liberals.

When I look at Lindgren's argument that Democrats are more likely to favor laws against interracial marriage [RACMAR], he's right - the survey indicates that strong and moderate Democrats and strong Republicans are more likely to support such laws:



But when liberal and conservative ideology is examined, it seems that strong support for such laws comes from people who describe themselves as moderate, polically conservative and strongly conservative, while political liberals are significantly less likely to support such laws:



Perhaps the difference between the two results is explained by the fact that political moderates are more likely to self-identify as Democrats than they are as Republicans:



I don't agree with Lindgren's extrapolations from the data - I don't think his data supports his claims, and I think he knows it. I know that at least one statistics guru passes by this blog on occasion - I would love to hear an expert opinion on this, as a final word on my clumsy analysis as presented above.