It's All About Race
Now Jimmy Carter is joining the "Joe Wilson's Outburst Was About Race" chorus. While using the "race card" to stifle criticism of the president is a concern, perhaps there's a silver lining? Perhaps there is a growing realization that, when it comes to pretty much everything, it's all about race?
Obama himself is all about race - he's nothing without his race - he'd be just another boring guy of above-average intelligence whom no one's ever heard of. Crime is all about race. Education is all about race. Government spending and taxation are all about race. The securitized-mortgage calamity was all about race. Income inequality is all about race. Is health care all about race? It's largely an issue of who pays for it vs. who benefits from it, and so like all such conundrums it too boils down to race. Foreign policy? Oddly, though very few foreign policy decisions are influenced by what we consider minorities, it seems a vast amount of foreign policy resources are driven by the fortunes of a couple million people in the Middle East who share an ethno-religious identity with a couple million people who happen to be doing rather well here in the U.S.A. And, obviously, there's immigration.
Non-Asian minorities have lower average achievement levels economically (lower median income), in education (test scores, graduation rates). They have higher rates of street crime, of poor health effects (obesity, hypertension) and illegitimacy. These differences are statistically significant and, more important, noticeable to pretty much everyone on each side, particularly to people like Obama who are much higher achievers than average. The question is how do you respond to these differences - resentfully or practically? Immigration greatly exacerbates these divides because it results in very large increases in the numbers of one underachieving group (Mexican-Americans). And when it comes to contentious issues like universal health care, it's a problem that places like Canada - or Vermont - don't have to wrestle with. So, yes, Joe Wilson's outburst ultimately finds its genesis in race - but so does pretty much every other controversy that pops up in this racially divided nation.
Obama himself is all about race - he's nothing without his race - he'd be just another boring guy of above-average intelligence whom no one's ever heard of. Crime is all about race. Education is all about race. Government spending and taxation are all about race. The securitized-mortgage calamity was all about race. Income inequality is all about race. Is health care all about race? It's largely an issue of who pays for it vs. who benefits from it, and so like all such conundrums it too boils down to race. Foreign policy? Oddly, though very few foreign policy decisions are influenced by what we consider minorities, it seems a vast amount of foreign policy resources are driven by the fortunes of a couple million people in the Middle East who share an ethno-religious identity with a couple million people who happen to be doing rather well here in the U.S.A. And, obviously, there's immigration.
Non-Asian minorities have lower average achievement levels economically (lower median income), in education (test scores, graduation rates). They have higher rates of street crime, of poor health effects (obesity, hypertension) and illegitimacy. These differences are statistically significant and, more important, noticeable to pretty much everyone on each side, particularly to people like Obama who are much higher achievers than average. The question is how do you respond to these differences - resentfully or practically? Immigration greatly exacerbates these divides because it results in very large increases in the numbers of one underachieving group (Mexican-Americans). And when it comes to contentious issues like universal health care, it's a problem that places like Canada - or Vermont - don't have to wrestle with. So, yes, Joe Wilson's outburst ultimately finds its genesis in race - but so does pretty much every other controversy that pops up in this racially divided nation.
posted by ziel | 9/16/2009 07:26:00 AM
3 Comments:
You point out one side of the coin. It is all about race... if we make it so.
It has nothing to do with race if that's our focus. It's a choice.
Many liberals are making the choice to see the issues through the prism of race. Some out of ideological blinders and others as a calculated political stratagem.
Geoffrey - sure, we can choose to ignore race. But as you point out liberals are inclined to inject the race issue into everything - but when one side uses race as a bludgeon in an argument and the other ignores it - well, you get a one-sided argument.
It's also awfully hard to ignore - the observable patterns are just too visible, and so it comes down to one's priors as to how these patterns are interpreted.
We'll be generous and say that Jimmy is just trying to express an opinion. Unwarranted and without any factual foundation but that is not unusual for former President Carter. What a tremendous, productive administration he had.
If anyone reviews his presidency, they would recognize that his opinion reserves no attention.
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