July 31, 2019

"It’s $500 billion dollars — $200 to $500 billion dollars — payment of a debt that is owed. That is what reparations is."

"We need some deep truth-telling when it comes. We don’t need another commission to look at evidence, I appreciate what Congressman O’Rourke has said. It is time for us to simply realize that this country will not heal. All that a country is is a collection of people. People heal when there is some deep truth-telling. We need to recognize when it comes to the economic gap between blacks and whites in America. It does come from a great injustice that has never been dealt with. That great injustice has had to deal with the fact that there were 250 years of slavery followed by another 100 years of domestic terrorism. What makes me qualified to say $200 to $500 billion dollars? I’ll tell you what makes me qualified. If you did the math of the 40 acres and a mule given that there were four to five million slaves at the end of the Civil War and they were all promised 40 acres and a mule for every family of four. If you did the math today it would be trillions of dollars. And I believe anything less than $100 billion dollars is an insult and I believe that $200 to $500 billion is politically feasible today because so many Americans realize there is an injustice that continues to form a toxicity underneath the surface and an emotional turbulence that only reparations will heal."

Said Marianne Williamson at last night Democratic Party candidates' debate, quoted by Eugene Scott at "Marianne Williamson makes the case for reparations in her breakout debate moment" (WaPo)(Scott writes "million" for billion in this piece that went up 6 hours ago, and no one at the Washington Post has noticed yet).



Scott writes:
Reparations has not polled particularly well with the American public, but the topic has seen renewed focus this year as many presidential candidates have been asked to address it and the House held a hearing on it earlier this summer.
From the comments over there: "Reparations is the dumbest idea democrats have ever had. If you want to motivate republicans try this bs." I guess that means it's a "dumb" idea because it's politically dangerous for Democrats. It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning. It has some practical and legal problems. And it might be a smart idea politically if your goal is to impede the progress of excessively left-wing candidates.

Anyway, I give Williamson high marks for rhetoric and delivery. She's on fire.

344 comments:

1 – 200 of 344   Newer›   Newest»
Mike Sylwester said...

$500 billion would buy a lot of cocaine and sneakers.

rhhardin said...

The wealth gap comes from blacks having a lower average IQ than whites, hugely augmented by discouraging good character in blacks in every public proclamation.

Mike Sylwester said...

That is what reparations is.

$500 billion would buy a lot of grammar lessons.

Dan from Madison said...

It's funny how they all like to talk about reparations, but nobody has a specific plan on who pays what to whom, and how.

rhhardin said...

If you had invested a single penny when Christ was born, it would be worth trillions today. Compound interest. Leaves you wondering what happened to those pennies.

rehajm said...

Scott writes "million" for billion in this piece that went up 6 hours ago, and no one at the Washington Post has noticed yet

Million, Billion, Trillion- the left sees no distinction here.

David Begley said...

Williamson is hypnotic. Here is my some of my take from Sioux City,

“I asked her about paying money to the heirs of the 350,000 Union soldiers who died. She gave a long answer (nine minutes!). She started with a history lesson on slavery in America. After the Civil War, the Ku Klux Klan seized power in the South. The former Confederate States enacted Black Codes that stripped rights from the newly freed slaves. Sherman’s failure to execute fully on his field order of forty acres and a mule to the newly freed slaves – under Williamson’s theory – is the proximate cause of all the racial misery and strife that has followed since 1865.”

Ann Althouse said...

What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

Mike Sylwester said...

This is a good issue for the Democrats to win back the Rust Belt states.

rehajm said...

There's some poll their campaigns all paid for what says this is a great talking point to engage black voters. They are really really white but are gonna really really need black voters.

rhhardin said...

Reparation proposal. Each black gets all the grains of wheat on a chessboard after one grain is deposited in the first square, two on the second, three on the third, four on the fourth, and so on, until all the squares are filled.

Mike Sylwester said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Shouting Thomas said...

What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

Several trillion have already been spent on Baltimore for that purpose.

Elijah Cummings and his black gang allies pocketed the money and lived the high life.

It's going to be different this time?

The black ethos of gangsterism and racketeering will change?

rhhardin said...

She wanted truth.

Bill, Republic of Texas said...

I'm not falling for this again. One of the big reasons I voted for Obama was my naive belief that electing a black president would go a long way to healing racial issues in this country.

Wow was I wrong. Obama and his party hugely increased racial tensions in the country.

Lesson learned. Con men are going to con.

Paco Wové said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning."

It's not even an idea, it's just a word and some vague sentiments, with a whole host of intractable details attending.

Mike Sylwester said...

What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

If a Black person dies in police custody, all the improvements will be burned down within two weeks.

Unknown said...

Our betters have bravely offered to gift someone else's money to fix some broken people.

Mark said...

Well, if it provokes lots of comments like rhhardin from Trump supporters it might be a winning issue.

Currently it does not seem like a winner, but as we have seen Trump repeatly do - if you get your opponents to overspeak and overreact you do not have to even convince people to join your side - they flee to your position.

This might provoke the right to democrat levels of stupid commentary.

Paco Wové said...

D. Begley – so did you ever get your answer about the heirs of those 350,000 Union soldiers along with your history lesson?

rhhardin said...

Trump goes as hard as he can to encourage good character in blacks. That's the only way to improve things.

Unknown said...

> What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

Housing Projects

When given something nice, whatever given will end up in the same state as things are now.

Heck, with Demoncrats, we should be paying reparations to Mexico since they turned out a corrupt and poor (loser) nation - must be our fault somehow.

Shouting Thomas said...

Althouse, I gotta ask...

After decades of watching black racism hucksters and racketeers abscond with the relief money, you really harbor some hope that the same thing won't happen again?

Unknown said...

This $500 G would only be a downpayment - not the last of it.

When the black jelly beans keep falling to the bottom of the jar (Texaco lost that suit)

Time to pay up again...

All that was accomplished to tell people someone owes them

David Begley said...

Paco: No.

rhhardin said...

You have to make lower-IQ work valuable somehow. Good and dependable work habits are absolutely necessary for that.

Low-IQ whites do okay. They just fit in where they fit in, show up for work, do their job. It would work for any skin color.

rhhardin said...

You can't say blacks have a lower IQ than whites on the average. Not being able to say that is what prevents any solution from being applied.

The goal is to make everybody an American.

Tregonsee said...

I agree with most that reparations are a terrible idea. I could, very reluctantly, support such an idea so long as it is constituted as a Constitutional Amendment, to be known as the "Paid in Full Amendment." Meaning that upon ratification is shall be unconstitutional to use race for any purpose in employment, apportionment, school admission, promotion, etc. In other words, that the law shall be truly colorblind, and let the results be what they are.

Temujin said...

There is a way to make reparations to Black Americans. But it's not by dumping cash over to everyone in a one-time payment. Beside, where is that money going to come from? Me? You? Joe Biden? This is simply another government waste program in the waiting.

Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat forever.

There is a way to change the lives of Black Americans. And it starts with changing how we treat our cities and most especially- the schools. And it would require a Manhattan-level project to make it happen. A moon-shot level focus by the entire nation. Something the entire nation worked to get done. Something even the politicians would be dragged into taking part in.

We've all heard lip service for too long. There is action that can be taken.

I have a plan.

rhhardin said...

Teach the advantages of good character and you're taking people seriously as moral beings.

You could define racism as not taking people seriously as moral beings. That makes dems the racists, and Trump the enemy of racism.

Michael The Magnificent said...

"It is time for us to simply realize that this country will not heal."

Not as long as people keep picking at the scabs, for money and/or power.

Kevin said...

Every Dem idea comes down to this: what we really need is to tax group x and give the money to group y.

With appropriate oversight, regulation, and administration being taken off the top, of course.

Shouting Thomas said...

I don't have a plan to fix the gang racketeering and violence culture of inner city blacks.

They have to get fed up with it and change it, and I see no movement there.

Kevin said...

How much does Rachel Dolezal get?

PJ said...

Williamson is proposing to pay a fraction of what she herself calculates is owed. That can work only if there’s an enforceable promise by the debtees to cancel the remainder of the acknowledged debt and foreswear any claim to it. In this situation, there is nobody to make such a promise and no way to stop renewed claims. Go big or go home.

rhhardin said...

They have to get fed up with it and change it, and I see no movement there.

There's no movement because the media keep the incentives for bad behavior up.

The more you riot the more gets given to you. It's the only way to get stuff, as they see it.

rhhardin said...

If you see that your labor isn't worth anything to anybody, you don't have a lot of options. Unless somebody points out good work habits as the way out. The opposite of the direction you've been trying.

rhhardin said...

You can boil it all down to ratings. Riots are good for the bottom line, so riots you'll have.

Let's stir up the blacks again. They'll fall for it.

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

Main talking point prior to reparations:
"Reparations are the only way to right these wrongs!"

Main talking point the day after reparation checks are mailed:
"Don't get the crazy idea that paying reparations has fixed anything!"

rhhardin said...

You've got to identify who your friends are.

Hagar said...

Self reliance and individual enterprise cannot be inculcated by a government project.

rhhardin said...

A plan to pass out lottery tickets is the obvious dem public compromise.

rhhardin said...

Self reliance and individual enterprise cannot be inculcated by a government project.

The MSM discourages it. No ratings. Get people to spot the enemy (the MSM, ultimately soap opera women editing the news) and self reliance will again have a positive growth rate, instead of being overwhelmed with resentment every day.

Kevin said...

MLK did not march for reparations, but he did march to cash a check.

He was smart enough to know the debt that was owed wasn’t money.

wendybar said...

Bill, Republic of Texas said...
I'm not falling for this again. One of the big reasons I voted for Obama was my naive belief that electing a black president would go a long way to healing racial issues in this country.

Wow was I wrong. Obama and his party hugely increased racial tensions in the country.

Lesson learned. Con men are going to con.
7/31/19, 6:31 AM

AGREE 100%

tim maguire said...

I'm surprised that Marianne Williamson embraced such a crass "money, and only money, can heal the soul" argument. I thought she was better than that. But then I remember, she is a Democrat.

Beasts of England said...

'Don't get the crazy idea that paying reparations has fixed anything!'

Correct. And, of course, when no structural change results from the first round, we'll hear that it obviously wasn't enough - and off we go again.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

$500B is $12,500 per African American person in America, and only costs the rest of us $1700 per person.

rhhardin said...

I'm surprised that Marianne Williamson embraced such a crass "money, and only money, can heal the soul" argument. I thought she was better than that. But then I remember, she is a Democrat.

She's after the black vote. Both cynical and dysfunctional.

tim maguire said...

Ann Althouse said...
What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?


There'd be 500 really rich Democratic poobahs in Baltimore. The city itself would still be a cesspool.

Amadeus 48 said...

Let's not get too excited here. Everyone likes a handout. I think every living person who was subject to chattel slavery should get reparations. Raise your hand...anyone?

As in every case with leftie big thoughts, it all comes down to who, whom.

Those latino/hispanic/whatever folks didn't have anything to do with either American slavery or Jim Crow. Marianne Williamson, time to tell some truth. Your family name wasn't Williamson; it was Vishnevetsky. I don't think you had anything to do with chattel slavery, either. Like a lot of Americans, neither did I nor my ancestors. So, I'll opt out of the reparations gambit. You can make voluntary payments without dragging the rest of us into it.

Then, we need to subtract the payments already made--the cost of the Civil War to the states in the Union (including compound interest), plus the trillions sunk into the Great Society programs aimed at helping black people, plus the heuristic cost of affirmative action on white people and Asians.

I think if we work at the math, we can get black people owing the rest of us.

Over to you, Don Lemon and Jussie Smollett. Ta-Nahisi Coates holding on line 1.

tim maguire said...

Do we get credit for the money already spent on the welfare state?

If you do the math, you'll see the black community owes us about 500 billion.

AllenS said...

$12,500 per African American person in America

After that money has been spent, then what?

Left Bank of the Charles said...

Older African Americans should get a bigger check than younger ones. The payments could be administered through social security. It wouldn’t have to be a lump sum.

gilbar said...

It is time for us to simply realize that this country will not heal. We need to recognize

Good point!
The 'victims' in this country WILL NOT HEAL
giving each $1,000 will just Piss them off
giving each $10,000 will just Piss them off MORE
giving each $100,000 will make them SHOOT you for not giving them each $1,000,000

NO AMOUNT OF MONEY will EVER heal this country.
What we need to do, is bring in tens of millions of MS-13 members to rob and kill ALL Americans, until the few surviving Americans realize that we are All in this together!

Bill, Republic of Texas said...

Non-blacks have a claim on part of the reparations checks. Non-blacks need to get a refund for all the disproportionate misery and money wasted by blacks.

Refund the amount of the great society trillions that went disproportionately to blacks. Subtract the costs the disproportionate black prison population. Restitution caused by the disproportionate black violent crime.

I would guess the blacks would end up owning non-blacks reparations.

Rusty said...

AllenS said...
"$12,500 per African American person in America

After that money has been spent, then what?"

No longer my problem.

Sally327 said...

Someone who thinks all that a country is is a collection of people, if she genuinely believes that, which I guess she does or she wouldn't have said it, is definitely anti-Trump, it's kind of the embodiment of the anti-Trump philosophy, that concept. And actually post-American I think I'd call it. She could be really dangerous were she ever to actually get into power.

campy said...

rhhardin: what will African Americans do with their 2080 grains of wheat?

tim maguire said...

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said..."Don't get the crazy idea that paying reparations has fixed anything!"

Reparations are white privilege.

Big Mike said...

What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

You finish up by Labor Day, and it’s a rat-infested shithole again not later than September 15th.

Also, what Bushman wrote at 6:55.

AllenS said...

Money? What problems will it solve? What achievement gap between black and white children in school has it solved by the use of money? None, and there isn't any amount of free money that
would help at all for any of the problems that blacks are facing. The only people that free money will help are people like Cummings and Sharpton.

Amadeus 48 said...

"What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?"

I have it on the best authority that Baltimore has no current need of improvement. The ministrations of the D'Alessandro family during their years in the mayor's office set Charm City on the path to greatness. Look on their works, ye Mighty, and despair.

David Begley said...

This idea is cheaper than free college.

Bay Area Guy said...

"Anyway, I give Williamson high marks for rhetoric and delivery. She's on fire."

And she is taking that gnostic spirit of love to the ghettos of America, Baby!

daskol said...

Advocating for reparations is no mere cynical ploy to capture black votes, or whatever it is in Williamson's case (an attempt to stand out?). Even if you believe in the moral justice of reparations, the political reality is that will hasten the process of white people viewing themselves as an interest group, with collective interests that need protection from the government (and other groups favored by the government). It's next level identity politics, taken to its most extreme form: take money from one group based on skin color, and distribute it to another group of a different color. Not only is that how you get more Trump, it's how you get the "white awakening" you keep ascribing to Trump.

Is it an accent or a relatively mild speech impediment? Sounds almost like a New Yorker when she drops her Rs, but I can't place her vowel sounds, and bio says she's from Texas. Unusual sound. I wish her the best and I love to see the politicians disrupted because they're to a man and woman unworthy of our attention let alone the presidency, but this issue is going to tear the country apart.

MikeR said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning." It is. This is not how we do damages, and for very good reason. You don't want the world's Jews going through Europe and claiming reparations for every time their ancestors were chased from their homes. They would literally take everything Europe has. You don't want everyone from the North claiming reparations because their great-great-great was killed fighting the South, and hence the South and by extension the whole US owes them for a human life. Etc.
I feel zero guilt for black slavery in the US. I wasn't a slave owner. My ancestors were not slave owners. And if they had been, I still should not feel any guilt.
I do feel responsibility for helping their descendants.
Glenn Loury has made this point many times. Reparations does not heal wounds. It reopens them. The way to do this is the way people who care about each other behave, not the way enemies behave. "We know that black people are disadvantaged in this country, along with many others. Some of that is because of what people in this country did to them. In any case, it's unacceptable. We are going to work together today, using our mutual resources, to make sure that everyone has a fair chance to better their situation. We aren't going to leave people in bad situations, because we love them."

Mike Sylwester said...

Part of the solution is to import hundreds of thousands of peasants from Central America.

Paco Wové said...

"$12,500 per African American person in America"

Which is going to accomplish... what? On an individual level, that's peanuts.

Bay Area Guy said...

Reparations
Free college
College Debt forgiveness
Medicare for All
Minimum Wage Hike to $25/hour
Andrew Yang $1,000/Month

All this free money and stuff! I'm gonna be rich!

Maybe Cory Booker can offer a program of free hookers to high school boys - it might improve their grades.

MikeR said...

"What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?" Two of the last three mayors in Baltimore were convicted of corruption. Quite a number of the current city council are known to have done worse than the mayor. All that would happen is that the next mayor would write a new children's book and pretend to sell 50 billion copies.
These problems need fixing, but that is what happens.

gilbar said...

David Begley said... This idea is cheaper than free college.

it's WAY Cheaper than free college!
Remember that rich guy,
that payed off ALL the student loans for students graduating from ONE small college, for ONE YEAR?

as soon as he did that, people (people of Colored!) started bitching and moaning:
What about NEXT YEAR? What about OTHER Schools

If (IF!) this year, we give EVERY person that claims black descent $12,500....
What about the babies that were gestating, but hadn't popped out yet? WHERE'S THEIR MONEY?
What about the babies that hadn't been conceived yet? WHERE'S THEIR MONEY?

Ironclad said...

As long as we are passing out Reparations, I wonder if we might also obey the law and respect the Takings Clause in the Constitution too and repay the owners of the property they had seized without compensation. That was the point of the 13th Amendment really too - to step around that little issue that was at the crux of the Slavery debate - the value of the slaves far exceeded the ability of the Federal Government to buy them up and set them free (like the UK did in their manumiting order).

Of course we could go back to the source of those slaves in Africa too and demand that the descendants of those that captured, enslaved, transported to ports, and sold the 15 million and change of their neighbors to the Atlantic and Arab Slave trades pony up their gains. But alas, I think all that wealth was hidden in Wakanda or something.

David Begley said...

Williamson looks normal because the whole field is unhinged.

AllenS said...

What good would free college do for blacks who graduate from high school with a 3rd grade reading ability?

gilbar said...

Paco Wové said...
"$12,500 per African American person in America"
Which is going to accomplish... what? On an individual level, that's peanuts.


Like i said, it will just piss people off!
MY ANCESTORS LIVED IN CHAINS! And you Think $12,500 makes us even???
That's not enough for one semester of college !!!
That's BARELY Enough to buy a used car!!!!

try upping it X10
MY ANCESTORS LIVED IN CHAINS! And you Think $125,000 makes us even???
That's not enough for a shitty little 3 bedroom house!!
That's BARELY Enough to buy a Tesla X model!!!

h said...

Is there something wrong with my math? $500 billion paid to 330 million people in the US who are descended from Africans means a one time payment of about $1500 per person. So we supporters of reparations wouldn't get very much from WIlliamson/O'rourke proposal, and we'd lose all the fun of haranguing people on the subject. I'd say hold out for a program 20-50 times bigger.

MayBee said...

Mike Sylwester's comment reminds me we have spent days hearing outrage about Baltimore from people who use the term "Rust Belt" as if it isn't denigrating.

M Jordan said...

Williamson is the most interesting Dem because she truly think outside the box, the box being lawyerliness. We have come to the end of lawyers ruling politics. We need a vast array of voices. Law-nerds are one of those in the choir but just one.

Jersey Fled said...

Several years ago I overheard two black co-workers discussing some federal program that would dump millions of dollars into the black community in Philadelphia.

One said to the other:

"In two weeks the Asians will have all of it"

Kind of an indictment of their own people. At that time Philadelphia had a black mayor and a predominantly black city council.

These were two educated black men. In fact, they were both college professors.

Kay said...

I didn’t pay attention to the debates because I didn’t think anyone would say anything that would grab my attention, but this did.

Beasts of England said...

Interesting that almost every commenter here is evaluating reparations as means to a long term benefit and not merely as a handout.

MountainMan said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning."

The ladies who led the temperance movement in the late 19th and early 20th century had good moral reasoning for the abolishment of alcohol. They were able to see the country on the 18th Amendment. How did that work out?

Mike Sylwester said...

Speaking time (in minutes) for each debater

Warren: 18:33

Sanders: 17:45

Buttigieg: 14:07

Bullock: 10:59

O’Rourke: 10:58

Klobuchar: 10:49

Delaney: 10:31

Ryan: 9:47

Williamson: 8:52

Hickenlooper: 8:49

rhhardin said...

The ladies who led the temperance movement

It's called the bishops and bootleggers effect in economics. Supposed enemies have a common interest. In this case they both need prohibition.

hawkeyedjb said...

A profoundly immoral idea. This is how you wreck any vestige of racial comity in America. More something-for-nothing will benefit neither the recipient nor the unwilling donor. It will generate resentment in one ("it's not enough") and hatred in the other. This is a path to utter degeneracy.

rhhardin said...

Baptists and bootleggers.

Hagar said...

Reparations also is based on the idea that money is real, but it isn't - it is only as real as people imagine it to be at the moment.

Look at Venezuela - the country is as richly endowed as ever, but their money? The Venezuelan Indians would be welcome to a reparation payment of 500 billion Bolivars - colorful money that makes nice wallpaper.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Do Dems ever push ideas where every damn person is treated the same? They seem to be big fans of pick & choose policies where the people in power do the picking & choosing.

Amadeus 48 said...

We can never see Marianne Williamson and Ihlan Omar on the same stage. The calm assurance, the beautiful faces, the pure nonsense, the hypnotic magnetism of these two nitwits will cause a warp in the space/time continuum, and America will disappear into a Brigadoon-like swoon, only to reappear for a day every 100 years.

Keep Omar and Williamson apart. It's for the children!

gilbar said...

I'm Full of Soup said...
Do Dems ever push ideas where every damn person is treated the same?
They seem to be big fans of pick & choose policies where the people in power do the picking & choosing

True in 1860, True in 1919
True in 1960, True in 2019

Some things never change

Birkel said...

It worked so well for South Africa!
/sarc

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

No matter how much Blacks would get from this plan, they'll never stop bitching as long as they are still black.

Brian said...

Williamson is the most "Trump" of the Democratic candidates. The question is whether the DNC still has control of their nomination process after the minimization of superdelegates after the Bernie hijacking in 2016.

Based on speaking times (thanks Mike!) allowed it looks like the media is trying to keep her in her box.

She's definitely going to get a bump out of this. She's the only one that looked to be running to "do" something, and not to just add "President" to their resume.

MountainMan said...

"D. Begley – so did you ever get your answer about the heirs of those 350,000 Union soldiers along with your history lesson?"

The veterans, their widows, and orphans long ago received their due from the government. Union veterans in the late 19th and early 20th century received millions in pensions for their service in the war. The system began initially for disabled veterans but expanded over time to include more and more veterans until it included them all. It was also color-blind; US Colored Troops also received the same pensions for their service, there was nothing in the pension application or process that discriminated on the basis of race.

The last widow to receive a federal Civil War pension died in 2008 and the last dependents have died since then, maybe around 2012 or 2013. Pensions were paid for by very high tariffs on imported goods. The government even built a big, beautiful building in Washington, DC, for the administration of the pension program. Today it has been restored and is the National Building Museum. It is considered one of the most beautiful buildings the city.

walter said...

Sowell:
If we wanted to be serious about evidence, we might compare where blacks stood a hundred years after the end of slavery with where they stood after 30 years of the liberal welfare state. In other words, we could compare hard evidence on “the legacy of slavery” with hard evidence on the legacy of liberals.

Despite the grand myth that black economic progress began or accelerated with the passage of the civil rights laws and “war on poverty” programs of the 1960s, the cold fact is that the poverty rate among blacks fell from 87 percent in 1940 to 47 percent by 1960. This was before any of those programs began.

Over the next 20 years, the poverty rate among blacks fell another 18 percentage points, compared to the 40-point drop in the previous 20 years. This was the continuation of a previous economic trend, at a slower rate of progress, not the economic grand deliverance proclaimed by liberals and self-serving black “leaders.”
--
Ding, ding, ding.
We have some candidates for who should pay.

Birkel said...

It's an idea so fucking stupid in its assumptions that average people reject it out of hand. People who didn't do a thing must pay for those who are dead and may have done a thing? Group and not individual blame? Great! Let's start a war or three. Maybe just some internecine blood letting?

It's theft at the barrel of a gun. It's government making immoral action legitimate through force. It's anti-freedom. It subjugates present day Americans based on melanin.

But wait! There's more...

LA_Bob said...

"Anyway, I give Williamson high marks for rhetoric and delivery. She's on fire."

I'm sure Kirsten agrees.

Lincolntf said...

Reparations are a backward, insidious notion. They imply the existence of historical collective guilt. That notion has been used to justify discrimination, slavery, and genocide throughout history.

Beasts of England said...

Williamson had the most consequential debate of the group. I think her candidacy moved from 'novelty' to 'longevity' in about three hours. As Brian noted above, her campaign will enjoy a bounce.

gspencer said...

You first, Marianne. By next week, lets see that you've divested yourself of every asset you've acquired, including the rights to future earnings. Then we might listen.

The line - "buying things we don't want or need with money we don't have [debt] to impress people we don't like" - has been attributed to many. Regardless, it expresses a truth. Reparations is a variant - "forking over money we don't have (meaning incurring debt) to pay the debt of passed-on persons to persons who suffered who likewise have passed on."

All of this is just plain nuts.

Kevin said...

I don’t know if we can get everyone 40 acres, but we should certainly be able to ramp up mule production.

Unfortunately mule flatulence will be outlawed by the Green New Deal.

I Callahan said...

It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning.

Actually, it's more than dumb. It's preposterously stupid. Who gets reparations? There are no slaves today. There are no slave OWNERS today. Payment for being born of a certain color or of a certain lineage is about as ridiculous an idea as anyone could possibly come up with.

How can anyone morally be for paying someone for something they never suffered, and pull that money from people who had nothing to do with anyone's suffering?

I Callahan said...

But in fairness, we all really know what reparations are about. Black voters. Dems will stoop to the lowest level possible to make sure that black voters stay on the Dem plantation. Morality has absolutely nothing to do with any of this.

Gahrie said...

I thought Affirmative Action was supposed to be reparation.

Mr. Forward said...

Intelligence is not the marker for wealth. Are the top 10 from your class the most successful? Focus, discipline, and a few other virtues turn out to be better indicators. Intelligence may be genetic, virtues may be installable. There a lot of successful tribes that aren’t particularly intelligent. Germany is only one example.

“Fixing Baltimore” Of course. This eliminates the insurmountable problem of who was here when and owes what, etc.

Fixing the insurmountable problem of Graft and Corruption? I’m out of ideas. Although, I noticed the feds just reactivated the death penalty.

gspencer said...

Further, it's unnecessary to burden us all with so-called reparations. The number of people who traded in slaves was small, and their identities are largely known. Trace that family wealth from the open slave importing years to today, and strip them of their gains. Watch out, Brown University.

Nichevo said...

Was 40AM (Forty Acres and a Mule) binding government policy? Did Sherman have the authority to issue that kind of promise and make Lincoln enforce it? Or did it just sound good which is sometimes something that you say in wartime?

Also, if Sherman had not promised (assuming true) 40AM, would they have said no thanks, we'll keep our chains? I don't think 40AM is enforceable. I think that they got their lives and freedom back and they have to decide what that was worth to them. Looks like not much, doesn't it? But of course PEOPLE ARE DIFFERENT or have we forgotten that?

I really don't know how to solve the black dysfunction in America. It seems to me that you would have to pick up each individual black family, insofar as family units exist, and transport them to be individually isolated in all white communities sans any connection to their pasts, and there try to help them make a go of it. It seems that connections or networks of Americans blacks established in the inner cities are dysfunctional rather than functional.

And, of course, that means that they are no longer free, because you have picked them up, and placed them, they did not go themselves. Basically the problem is a wicked one, as n.n. likes to say.

MountainMan said...

Reparations are one of the worst ideas any politician could come up with. It would be hard to come up with anything so divisive other than to go back to the days of Jim Crow.

2/3 of the American population today had no ancestors here at the time of the Civil War. Of the remaining 1/3, none alive today have been slave owners and none have been enslaved. I had no idea that guilt for anything, whether a moral or criminal act, was heritable. We even have in our Constitution that for the act of treason that no law shall "work corruption of blood." Some state Constitutions has this restriction for any crime; Tennessee's does. I don't see how it is moral for the current generation of Americans to have to pay a specific segment of the population for something than ended over 150 years ago, and which has subsequently been reinforced over the last 50 years with may laws - the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act - and government programs to right the past wrongs.

Nichevo said...

Oh and didn't they just sink 200 billion dollars into New Orleans?

walter said...

When 'love" doesn't move the needle enough, there's always handouts.

Anonymous said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning."

The "moral reasoning" underlying this latest push for "reparations" is nothing but question-begging on steroids.

It's where you end up when every preceding program based on your assumptions has failed to produce the desired results, but you are so deeply invested - emotionally and intellectually - in your faith-based dogmas that your only response to the problem is to cling ever more tenaciously to your flawed assumptions, and successively double-, triple-, quadruple-, quintuple-down on ever more destructive elaborations of the same damned failed policies.

In other words, the moral reasoning of, on the one hand, self-interested hustlers and tribalists, and on the other, the woolly-minded naïfs who are susceptible to being manipulated by them.

NEO-FIDO said...

The lesson at the end of the day in this contest of 'Woker than Thou', is very likely that running on Transgendered, Pro Butt Sex, Open Borders nonsense is not polling well in the African American community.

They don't like gays. They don't like Transgendered. Running on this is polling poison.

Trump has simply and pungently reminded the Black Community that their neighborhoods are actually run by Black Democrats and have been for decades, and if they have a problem, go see Elijah!

But while this kind of blatant pandering makes Althouse's let tingle (because she is another middle aged white woman), it seems like pretty pathetic pandering. Do Black people think that they have a prayer in Hell in getting a check cut by WILLIAMSON who is barely a back bencher?

Trump can't get 5 billion for a Wall but she is promising $500 Billion? Get the fuck out of here!

Birkel said...

As a person with Native heritage, I demand Marianne Williamson get the fuck off my continent.
Anybody who argues for collective guilt for historical bad behavior by dead people must go.

Free markets.
Free people.

ga6 said...

Well, my home town of Chicago has a sightly different take on what can bridge the racial divide. The new black, female Mayor has not directly addressed the facts that there have been nine mass shootings (four or more wounded at one time) in July nor the total for this past weekend; eight dead 44 wounded. But the city has a brand new agency to solve all the racial and crime problems.

Ladies and gentlemen I present the Chicago Office of Equality and Racial Justice.

GRW3 said...

During the Obama years, we went through every 150th anniversary of the Civil War. Not a single one was commemoration on a national scale, not even the Gettysburg Address. I was disappointed but I understand why. Commemoration of preserving the Union would not fit the narrative, the one that says white America has made no sacrifice or paid any price for slavery.

etbass said...

MikeR at 7:21

"It is" Ditto, plus the many implementation and fairness issues that are obvious to anyone thinking more than 5 minutes.

Howard said...

It's easy to calculate the present value of 40+mule.

5 Million slaves * ((40acre @$2,000/ac)+(1mule* @$30,000-each))

= $550,000,000,000.

* mule = F-150 truck

stevew said...

So spending billions (possibly trillions) of dollars on reparations will finally achieve the racial healing all the advocates have been talking about for the past 50 years? Of course not. According to recent studies the state of race relations in America continue to improve. This despite the constant charges of PDT and his supporters being the worst racists ever.

More pandering BS from the Democrats, advocated most strongly by the white candidates. Nice.

Tim said...

I nor anyone alive in the US had anything to do with slavery.The blacks today in the Us have not been enslaved by anyone but the Democrats. Get your money from the blacks and arabs in Africa that still sell slaves.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Make Nike and Tom Steyer pay up.

The problem for democrats is that they don't expect their wealthy donors to pony up any money for their BS ideas. They want the middle and lower middle class to pay. The democrats want to destroy the middle class.

chuck said...

Reparations are BS because they won't work and will make things worse. They are a stupid idea and will lead to even more racial division than the Democrats have already achieved in their ghettoized cities.

Jack Klompus said...

The other day in my hometown Philadelphia six people were shot in a drive by during the making of a rap video. Cinema verité if you will. I wish the guy with the gun had gotten his reparations for slavery so he wouldn't have committed this cry for help. Meanwhile Mayor Woke is touring "safe injection" sites in Canada since the heroin problem in Philly is completely out of control.

Howard said...

The full faith and credit of the United States Welched on it's promise to former slaves. It's not unreasonable to debate this topic.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Reparations would be a big boost to the timeshare industry, vacation trip agents, get rich quick scheme sellers, luxury cars dealers, wealth advisers, real estate agents selling swampland in Florida and lastly the movie industry which would get some great movie ideas out of the ways the recipients spend their windfalls.

Howard said...

It doesn't matter if it won't do anything positive or useful, it is an outstanding debt that should be honored.

narciso said...

This is why I dont find anything about Williamson, if you wanted a recipe to destroy this country, to tear it apart you couldn't go wrong with reparations.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Jack Klompus: when I saw the headline about the shooting in my Philly paper, I figured it was those white supremacists again. But the story said it was black rappers shooting each other!

rhhardin said...

The full faith and credit of the United States Welched on it's promise to former slaves.

The slaves were Jewed out of their take, you could say.

etbass said...

if there was as much as 1 percent improvement in black attitudes and performance, it might be worth it. But reparations have absolutely zero chance of improving anything.

It's like dropping a bucket of water on the sun to put the fire out.

Anonymous said...

Amadeus 48: Those latino/hispanic/whatever folks didn't have anything to do with either American slavery or Jim Crow. Marianne Williamson, time to tell some truth. Your family name wasn't Williamson; it was Vishnevetsky. I don't think you had anything to do with chattel slavery, either. Like a lot of Americans, neither did I nor my ancestors.

And would it make a difference to you if either you or Williamson *were* the descendants of slave-owners? This whole "but my ancestors weren't even here!" dance drives me up the wall. Are you suggesting that extracting some kind of payment from whites whose ancestors were here before the Civil War is sane and just and a cracking sound idea in itself, just a wee bit thorny in the logistics? Surely you have a better understanding than that of what this whole anti-white tribal hustle is really about. So why are you accepting their premises and their frame?

Mountain Man: 2/3 of the American population today had no ancestors here at the time of the Civil War. Of the remaining 1/3, none alive today have been slave owners and none have been enslaved. I had no idea that guilt for anything, whether a moral or criminal act, was heritable.

Then why are you so carefully delineating the populations that should be excluded from considerations of guilt or restitution?

Lincolntf said...

What about all the Native Americans who were slave-owners and slave-traders? Since they were trading in other Native Americans, do they get a pass?

Fernandinande said...

The wealth gap comes from blacks having a lower average IQ than whites, hugely augmented by discouraging good character in blacks in every public proclamation.

We live in a society which is essentially dishonest. "Scientists have already been warned [by] The journal Nature" about doing research with racial implications.


But if people want to discuss their fantasies of spending other people's money, blacks should probably pay reparations to the general public for the costs of welfare and crimes and because they don't have to sneak into the US from Africa like Africans do.

walter said...

It doesn't matter if it won't do anything positive or useful, Howie needs salve for his white guilt.

Brian said...

As to reparations policy, I would point out that its the same as "Mexico will pay for the wall". But it get's people talking about it. And all of a sudden we are past what is moral and on to "how much will it cost". And it's a differentiator,

I would also point out that Marianne's overarching theme is "Love". That directly combats Trump's theme ("Fighting back... for America"). If you like the achievements of the Trump presidency, but don't like "how" he's achieved it Twitter statements, fighting back, tariff wars, etc., then Marianne's message will resonate with you. And the more he fights back with her, the more she can fall back on "Love".

pacwest said...

"Reparations
Free college
College Debt forgiveness
Medicare for All
Minimum Wage Hike to $25/hour
Andrew Yang $1,000/Month"

That's all fine and good, but I still haven't got the chicken in a pot I was promised last time. That's all that these crap campaign promises really are. It's just that they are promising 'some' chickens in 'some' pots now.

Income inequality is a problem, and will become larger as GNR (Genetics, Nanotechnology, Robotics) progresses. Democrats could play a leading role in addressing this if they were really interested, but this is what we get instead. Everyone wants to play Robinhood.

Howard said...

Nice try rhh. Jews pay their bills, my welsh ancestors not so much.

Anonymous said...

Mark: Currently it does not seem like a winner, but as we have seen Trump repeatly do - if you get your opponents to overspeak and overreact you do not have to even convince people to join your side - they flee to your position.

This might provoke the right to democrat levels of stupid commentary.


Perhaps you could regale us with examples of reaction that is so stupid that it's going to convince the otherwise unpersuaded that reparations is a good idea.

Assuming that you've actually seen commentary trending that way that led you to propose your hypothetical.

Lincolntf said...

And of course, the first slave owner in the Colonies to be granted the right to keep slaves (by the Virginia Colonial Court, essentially a British Court) was a black man. Anthony Johnson from Angola, sometime in the 1620s. His ancestors certainly don't deserve reparations, do they?

rhhardin said...

Nice try rhh. Jews pay their bills, my welsh ancestors not so much.

Jewish ethical dilemma question, told by a Jewish comic:

A lady comes in to buy fabric and pays for it. I notice that an extra $100 bill was stuck to the money she handed me. Now here's the ethical dilemma. Should I tell my partner?

Fernandinande said...

It's easy to calculate the present value of 40+mule.

I'm going to do it the proper way.

1 mule invested at 3.875% annual compounded interest 150 years ago is now 331.34 mules.

Which are worth about $330,000 to over $2,000,000, surprisingly enough.

40 acres at the same rate are now 13,253.47 acres; the $ value depends too much on where they're located, whereas mules are fungible.

rhhardin said...

You left out mule inflation. The interest rate has to have inflation removed, if you're not doing money.

Rick said...

only reparations will heal."

Reparations won't "heal" any more than race preferences in education resulted in healing. The outcome of payoffs is louder demands for more payoffs.

Rick said...

What if $500 billion were spent to improve Baltimore?

The next day Detroit would demand a trillion.

Dave Begley said...

MountainMan:

Still not enough! Must take into account inflation.

Anonymous said...

Brian: As to reparations policy, I would point out that its the same as "Mexico will pay for the wall". But it get's people talking about it. And all of a sudden we are past what is moral and on to "how much will it cost". And it's a differentiator,

But "we" aren't past the "what is moral". That a lot of things are "all of a sudden" being pumped out of every megaphone at ear-splitting volume doesn't mean that "we" are buying what the megaphone holders are hard-selling.

I hope the Dems keep it up. I think it's an issue that is going to get a lot of sleepy-heads "woke", but not in the way Dems will like.

Clyde said...

gilbar said...

If (IF!) this year, we give EVERY person that claims black descent $12,500....
What about the babies that were gestating, but hadn't popped out yet? WHERE'S THEIR MONEY?
What about the babies that hadn't been conceived yet? WHERE'S THEIR MONEY?


The black abortion rate would drop to zero. Mama's little meal ticket!

Michael K said...

"We know that black people are disadvantaged in this country, along with many others. Some of that is because of what Democrats in this country did to them.

FIFY

Ms Williamson learned her history from a comic book or Howard Zinn. Sherman was vilified and accused of Treason because he offered Joe Johnston the terms proposed by Lincoln in his meeting with Sherman and Grant a week before. Sherman was trying to end the war and avoid any chance of the Confederates dispersing and taking up guerrilla war. Johnston had the same purpose. The trouble was a that Lincoln had been assassinated by a Confederate sympathizer, placing the radical abolitionists in a frenzy of revenge. Stanton attacked Sherman in the newspapers and his offer was cancelled.

Sherman hated politicians in spite of his brother who was a Senator. Sherman knew too many of them. He was no country boy like Grant.

The death of Lincoln and the takeover by radicals afterwards was a proximate cause of the hatred in the South that resulted in the Ku Klux Klan.

Maillard Reactionary said...

AA: "It has some practical and legal problems."

Ya think?

Regarding whether the "moral reasoning" (ahem) behind reparations is faulty, how 'bout you go ask some Cuban-Americans, or Vietnamese-Americans, what they think about it, and get back to us then.

You're just torquing us, right?

Rick said...

I agree with most that reparations are a terrible idea. I could, very reluctantly, support such an idea so long as it is constituted as a Constitutional Amendment, to be known as the "Paid in Full Amendment." Meaning that upon ratification is shall be unconstitutional to use race for any purpose in employment, apportionment, school admission, promotion, etc. In other words, that the law shall be truly colorblind, and let the results be what they are.

It's a nice sentiment but unenforceable. Equal treatment is already required by the constitution yet our robed rulers decided the constitution includes an implicit clause "unless we think otherwise".

William said...

Give her credit. She's got high cheekbones and delivers her lines not just with conviction but with a kind of spiritual presence. The Aimee Semple McPherson of racial healing. Think how much more aggravating this dumb idea would be if it were proposed by Elizabeth Warren.

Fernandinande said...

http://marianne.com/atonement/

Prayer of Apology to
African Americans

On behalf of myself, and on behalf of my country, to you and all African Americans, from the beginning of our nation's history, in honor of your ancestors and for the sake of your children, please hear this from my heart...
I apologize,
please forgive us.

...it goes on...and on...

William said...

My Irish ancestors fought on the Union side. It was, as the saying goes, a cause they didn't love against an enemy they didn't hate. But anyway they went. They would have gone with a lighter heart, if they had realized that their children's children would be further taxed and that their service was just a down payment with endless payments to come. "As He died to make men holy, we shall die to make men whole."

Sheridan said...

Time to invest in genealogical tracking services! That's a BOOM business if the reparations shakedown moves forward. Payments will be based on all sorts of factors that only in-depth study and analysis can provide. Hey, turn Baltimore into "data central" and employ everyone in town to track family records and assign scores for purity of blood reparations calcs. What could go wrong?

Unknown said...

It’s dumb because it has no relation to any notion of fairness. Vermont had emancipation in 1777. Should Vermonters pay the same as everyone else.

If anyone should pay reparations if was those that were selling slaves at the source.

Should the descendants of those that sold themselves into slavery benefit? Or those that bought themselves out of slavery? Or the descendants of slaves that were also slave owners?

Perhaps there should be reparations for descendants of the Union Army that paid in blood to end slavery.

William said...

From the tenor of the comments here, we can see how the idea of reparations contributes to racial healing. Everyone, black and white, is so much more tolerant when they contemplate the concept of reparations.

Francisco D said...

The whole point of reparations is not money. The money would be pissed away in a few weeks.

It is about creating more racial resentment, not less.

The far Leftists want to create a civil war.

Howard said...

Blogger rhhardin said...

You left out mule inflation.


In my model, the mule is rep'd by a stripped-down F-150 Ford Truck (msrp $28K) as a functional equivalent to a mule "back in the day".

I just checked the average Georgia farm price to be $4,000/ac. Then, we'll throw on some extras to the truck making it $50,000 which would make a nice farm truck, the resultant is

$1.05 Trillion

US Farm real estate as of USDA 2017 $3,000/ac. The Corn Belt is $6,200/ac

So a 0.5 to 1.5 Trillion range is reasonable. Then you need to figure in the payment plan mortgage cost if Uncle Sam puts it on VISA.

It's important because our ancestors placed the full faith and credit of the U.S. Constitution on this issue. The Senate has to have a tectonic shift to actualize the dollar dream. It's what I would call a "The Wall" issue for the Dems.

It brings out the dog in some of you and that helps them.

traditionalguy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Rick said...

The full faith and credit of the United States Welched on it's promise to former slaves.

Those asserting this should point us to the legislation authorizing reparations. Or do you suppose their fantasies are driving their policies again?

Howard said...

The White Privilege advantage is calculated by compound interest appreciation of 40-acres and a mule from 1865 to 1964, as was I thinks rhh was implicating in his previous.

I'll let the economists to conger up that number. If the Jim Crow era also suppressed the development of normal westernized industrial IQ, then the interest seems appropriate. The problem is that is a crazy number no one wants to talk about.

Howard said...

The full faith and credit of WT Sherman then.

Rick said...

If the Jim Crow era also suppressed the development of normal westernized industrial IQ, then the interest seems appropriate. The problem is that is a crazy number no one wants to talk about.

This is a good example of how the next set of demands will be justified. Since reparations has nothing to do with debts the trigger for additional demands is largely irrelevant. It's a MacGuffin. There will always be another round of demands because people want money and giving it to them is a path to political power.

Howard said...

Sluggonomicstein says~ $500-Trillion. The value of White Privilege.

Rick said...

The full faith and credit of WT Sherman then.

I'm fine with blacks finding Sherman's descendants and demanding their 40 acres. I hope they write a paper telling us how that goes.

Howard said...

Blogger Rick said...

If the Jim Crow era also suppressed the development of normal westernized industrial IQ, then the interest seems appropriate. The problem is that is a crazy number no one wants to talk about.

This is a good example of how the next set of demands will be justified. Since reparations has nothing to do with debts the trigger for additional demands is largely irrelevant. It's a MacGuffin. There will always be another round of demands because people want money and giving it to them is a path to political power.


Why not? ...you people are bringing the subject up. Cause and effect of Jim Crow post antebellum damages deliberately and violently delivered while claiming a strong heritage to the "Cause".

You make the Kray-Kray $$$$$$ reparations case damages eloquently.

Howard said...

Did Rick just tell a Dad joke?

ConradBibby said...

I would think it worth mentioning that a plan to distribute government funds to private citizens based solely on race would be blatantly unconstitutional.

It's also interesting to note that, if a person who is living today openly, intentionally, and illegally committed acts of racial discrimination against another person who is still alive today, causing the second person enormous pecuniary harm, but such discrimination occurred say ten years ago, the second person would have no legal recourse against the person who discriminated. The statute of limitations would operate to preclude any remedy, and there would be no real outrage or controversy over the application of the s.o.l. in such an instance. Yet, this talk about reparations is about remedying conduct that took place up to 250 years ago, which was actually LEGAL at the time, by purporting to hold accountable people who did not even participate in the conduct or necessarily benefit from it -- and some people evidently think such an proposal would be consistent with our laws and system of justice.

Hyphenated American said...

“ We need to recognize when it comes to the economic gap between blacks and whites in America. It does come from a great injustice that has never been dealt with. That great injustice has had to deal with the fact that there were 250 years of slavery followed by another 100 years of domestic terrorism.”

Does it mean that all Gaia between all racial and ethnic groups in USA are due to racism and slavery?

Rick said...

Why not? ...you people are bringing the subject up.

It seems like a Dem Presidential candidate brought it up. While I see how that counts as nobody it's clearly not "you people".

rhhardin said...

“ We need to recognize when it comes to the economic gap between blacks and whites in America. It does come from a great injustice that has never been dealt with. That great injustice has had to deal with the fact that there were 250 years of slavery followed by another 100 years of domestic terrorism.”

https://brainstats.com/average-iq-by-country.html

seems like something like that might have an effect too.

stever said...

However the morality is presented, there is just no way to design and implement anything close to a reasonable system to pull this off. So you are either not smart (i.e. stupid), or just virtue signaling (i.e. pandering for votes).

Fernandinande said...

"That is what reparations is."

$500 billion would buy a lot of grammar lessons.


"That be reparations."

Howard said...

Rick: Sorry, I was Unclear. Several Althousians brought up IQ deficit of Blacks, which if true is strongly correlated with slavery and jim crow.

Of course the dims bring it up, it helps shore up their base like the wall does for republicans.

stever said...

Both a and b is probably the best answer

CWJ said...

"$500B is $12,500 per African American person in America, and only costs the rest of us $1700 per person."

IOW, a futile gesture that solves nothing, and increases resentment on all sides.

rhhardin said...

The IQ deficit of blacks is the reason to tailor public policy towards teaching good character. IQ doesn't matter much if you have good character.

The Crack Emcee said...

The first three comments are decidedly racist, and the fourth is by someone who may have read Ta-Nehisi Coates' "The Case For Reparations" but didn't understand it.

So - I'm out.

Rick said...

which if true is strongly correlated with slavery and jim crow.

Can you tell us how you determined with certainty the cause of something you don't know exists? Was it sciency science?

PM said...

It's hush money that won't shut anyone up.

Terry di Tufo said...

I don’t understand the moral reasoning, not in the slightest. I checked Prof A’s responses and only saw one, which was about spending the reparations in Baltimore. Which makes me even more confused about the moral argument.

rhhardin said...

I met a guy outside the post office refilling the newspaper machine. "You want a free paper?" he asks me. "They just fired me."

I said, "Don't burn any bridges. Tell the next employer how much you liked your old job. He's thinking that this is what you'll be saying about him when you leave."

Guy thinks about it. "Thanks," he said.

It's not hard.

rhhardin said...

The first three comments are decidedly racist,

Shows the need for a better definition of racist.

Ask whether it treats the other race as moral beings or not, not whether it thinks there are racial differences.

The Crack Emcee said...

Oh - I almost forgot:

Here's the leaders of the Right's non-racist movement being,...non-racist.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/07/ronald-reagans-racist-conversation-richard-nixon/595102/

Because, you know, hiding the truth - from yourselves - is how whites have been doing this shit for centuries.

Paul said...

$500 billion? Hah!! Johnson's 'Great Society', i.e. welfare, blew more than that on them.... and all we got was a bigger ghetto and more drugs.

Amadeus 48 said...

I got it.

"Howard" is Howard Zinn. We are getting a real-time look at the thinking behind "A People's History of the United States".

The fact that Howard Zinn died in 2010 is of little importance. I'll let Marianne Williamson explain it.

Amadeus 48 said...

Crack is back!

walter said...

Unexpectedly..

JAORE said...

What does Snopes have to say about 40 acres and a mule?

MeatPopscicle1234 said...

The reason this is being “talked” about is because black people are starting to leave the Democrat plantation in droves and this is the Democrats cynical, Hail Mary attempt to entice them to stay and keep voting the D ticket... dangle that carrot and pray enough black voters bite at it to get them over the 2020 yard line...

Jupiter said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning. It has some practical and legal problems."

Kind of like giving the country back to the Indians, right? The problem would be getting them to take Baltimore.

bagoh20 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
bagoh20 said...

"It's not a dumb idea in terms of moral reasoning."

Then you should have no problem paying my mortgage by sending checks to the every other name in the phone book. I know you didn't have anything to do with the debt, and neither did those
people in the phone book, and the loan was paid off long ago, but still, you are going to do it anyway. Yep, nothing immoral about that.

Ask yourself: what would make the "plaintiffs" whole? You know, put them in the condition they would be in if it never happened.

n.n said...

Paid in blood and treasure. However, if you are committed to progress on this path, then postmortem reparations must be paid to the slaves and Posterity, and the Americans and Posterity who stood, did not kneel, to confront involuntary exploitation, redistributive change, and diversity.

Brian said...

It brings out the dog in some of you and that helps them.

Right. And I think she knows that which is why she was one of the only ones talking about it seriously last night. Beto touched on it but in a "let's study it".

It is the Wall issue. The 40 acres and a mule is the visual hook she puts to it. Trump used the "big beautiful wall".

The facts don't matter. It's emotional. She's an older white woman talking about peace and love. But she's the only one talking about Democrats have failed the black community with their emphasis on policy positions, etc. She's playing Trump's playbook. To a T.

The DNC better re-instate Super Delegates or they will be #NeverWilliamson soon.

Michael K said...

I see reparations has brought Crack out of his secret place.

The White Privilege advantage is calculated by compound interest appreciation of 40-acres and a mule from 1865 to 1964, as was I thinks rhh was implicating in his previous.

I estimate "white Privilege" as the fact that most slaves were the losers in tribal warfare. Maybe the IQ differences between American blacks and the Ibo tribe of Nigeria, for example, could be counted as "White Privilege" effects. Whites did not go ashore in Africa to catch slaves. They were delivered by the winning tribes. In east Africa, the Arabs may have done their own catching, as they do right up to the present day.

n.n said...

Elijah Cummings and his black gang allies pocketed the money and lived the high life.

Redistributive change. In South Africa, they would lynch blacks who would question them, and abort whites who would stand against their progress.

Francisco D said...

Because, you know, hiding the truth - from yourselves - is how whites have been doing this shit for centuries.

Will giving you a few thousand dollars make it all better, Crack?

Of course not.

We cannot have a conversation about race that does not have Whites as the guilty givers and Blacks as the passive takers. Things will never get better if it is all about the collective guilt of Whites.

Ice Nine said...
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Roughcoat said...

As I've wrtten before on this blog, my born-in-Ireland great grandfather and great uncles (on both sides of my mother's Irish family) all fought for the Union in the Civil War: two were KIA, two were severally WIA and functionally disabled, and one died of diptheria. My family has paid enough.

On the other hand, my Irish great-grandfather collected great-grandfather's Union Army pension (he died comparatively young, from complications of his wounds)right up until she died in 1947 at age 98.

She received $10 per month.

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