August 3, 2019

"The Reverend Bill Owens Stands Behind Trump."

Isaac Chotiner interviews Bill Owens (in The New Yorker).

Owens said that Trump has talked with him and other "inner city pastors" about "ways the President could help the African-American community with their challenges and their problems." Trump was, according to Owens "very receptive" and had (to use Chotiner's words) "a pretty deep understanding of the problems affecting the black community."

Owens justified Trump's criticism of Elijah Cummings on the ground that Cummings attacked Trump and Trump "felt he should respond."

Chotiner prodded Owens to say that Trump's recent attacks on "the four Democratic congresswomen" had "a racial basis," and Owens said:
I don’t see that. This country is based on race now. Everybody tries to make a race issue out of everything, because they are trying to say the President doesn’t like black people. I don’t see that. They are using that because it is popular to do it now, and it polarizes black people against the President. I think it is very unfortunate.
Owens said that black pastors are often "reluctant to be interviewed by the press":
They ask, “Where is the trap? What are you trying to get me to say that I don’t want to say?” That happens every day to me. But I am bold enough to take my shot and try to be as honest as I can, regardless to where it takes me.
Chotiner asks about same-sex marriage, which Owens has opposed. He still opposes it:
It’s terrible! It has terrified children! Look at what they have done. Look at the men playing women in kindergarten. I forget what they call it, where they call it a civil right. These big men pretending they are women, playing with little children. And it sends the wrong message to little children. They think it is O.K., and it is not O.K.
Well, then, how does Owens feel about Trump's "romances and sleeping with porn stars," Chotiner asks. Owens answers like a preacher: "If you are a sinner, and repent your sins, your sins are forgiven."

Asked about the separating of families at the border, Owens prioritizes "the black children in America who have lost their parents":
For years, they put the black father out of the home. The federal government hired a hundred thousand social workers to put the black father out of the home and put the mother on welfare. What did that do to children? It was done by our government on purpose.... Can we just take children from all over the world and do better with them than we have with our citizens? Black people died for this country. We fought for this country for hundreds of years. And we are still being neglected, and no one is talking about it.

109 comments:

Big Mike said...

For years, they put the black father out of the home. The federal government hired a hundred thousand social workers to put the black father out of the home and put the mother on welfare. What did that do to children? It was done by our government on purpose.

He's correct, of course, but it took serious guts to say that.

rhhardin said...

Black people aren't being neglected. They're being infantilized.

Ann Althouse said...

Bad link fixed. Thanks for the heads-up.

Paul said...

The Rev. Bill Owens won't "stay on the plantation" and say what liberals think is what blacks should say.

And that is an unforgivable sin among liberals.

mccullough said...

Blacks deserve reparations for The Great Society programs

Michael K said...

Once again, no evidence that Trump did anything with the blackmailer except a photo at a golf tournament.

I suspect that Democrats are panicking about the black vote.

Anonymous said...

I am convinced that one objective of Trump's attack on Baltimore is to underscore: 1. that he is aware of the condition of blacks in many cities; 2. that he intends to do something about it if blacks will give him some backing. He is going to take the "racist" tactic away from the Dems.

Bay Area Guy said...

Anyone with a brain understands how it works in the ghetto.

1. Mostly black, Dem politicians get on tv to Complain about the poverty and crime,
2. Get Federal dollars for various programs to FIGHT the poverty and crime
3. Mostly black Dem politicians and their cronies line their pockets with the Federal dollars
4. Black voters buy this nonsense and give their votes to mostly black, Dem politicians.
5. Poverty and crime never get better.

It's good that Pastor Bill Owens doesn't buy the Con job.

wendybar said...

AMEN!!! I'm so happy that it has become so apparent that the left is using RACISM to defeat Trump, and it is causing a backlash against them. The RACE CARD has been overused and overplayed since the Obama administration, and I for one a, thrilled that it will mean nothing. I feel bad for the REAL victims of REAL racism, but they can Thank the Democratic Party and their loyal propaganda media for that.

Leland said...

That's a long list of things that pastor was made to answer for. Now lets ask Kamala Harris about her family history of owning slaves? Her own history of prosecuting blacks for drug crimes, her use of tainted evidence, and her refusal to provide defense evidence that could exonerate the defendant? Mention these things and watch Democrats toss out the old "Southern Strategy" myth, while ignoring that the described strategy sounds a lot like what Kamala Harris did as a DA.

Wince said...

For years, they put the black father out of the home. The federal government hired a hundred thousand social workers to put the black father out of the home and put the mother on welfare. What did that do to children? It was done by our government on purpose.

And that's exactly why it should be called the "Welfare State to Prison Pipeline" rather than the "School to Prison Pipeline".

The welfare statists want to you to believe it's the imposition of disciplinary standards in the structured setting of school that is the cause that needs to be ameliorated when, in fact, the path to dysfunction is paved by the welfare state well before children even reach school.

traditionalguy said...

What we have here is a success at communicating truth. The legacy of DJT will be his example instilling in others the courage to stand up for righteousness and tell the truth. That is now what makes one a winner. For the past 30 years that only made one into a trashed, slandered, excluded from society and forgotten loser.

And we all know where that evil came from. The EDU Mafia.

Tank said...

That's some bravery there. Both Trump and Owens.

Ice Nine said...

Trump needs to start - and should have been already - holding MAGA rallies in Baltimore, Detroit, North St. Louis, etc. They would of course have lower attendance but think of the profound impression they would make on Blacks. Try to think of a better way to get the true message about him and what he wants for them out into the hood, via those very attendees. And best of all, think of how the Democrats would howl!

Bay Area Guy said...

In a normal world, 2/3 blacks should be voting Dem and 1/3 GOP.

But the Democrat poverty pimps distort this and keep it at 95/5, which hurts blacks, maintains the poverty, but helps elect Dems.

Trump is hammering this, which is great. Thank you, Mr. Owens.

Yancey Ward said...

It's obvious, isn't it, that Bill Owens is a racist. (/sarc)

Fernandinande said...

For years, they put the black father out of the home. The federal government hired a hundred thousand social workers to put the black father out of the home and put the mother on welfare.

Is he claiming that blacks have less "agency" than people of every other race? That they're just some sort of pawns or robots?

It was done by our government on purpose.

To what end?

But it was done by blacks on purpose, unless you agree with the Rev. that blacks have insufficient agency to live in a modern welfare state.

And we are still being neglected, and no one is talking about it.

Actually blacks are not being neglected and people talk about their problems, issues and interests all the time.

But almost all that talk consists of lies and false statements like those of Owens.

whitney said...

Don Lemon doesn't like him off the plantation either

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/cnns-don-lemon-ambushes-black-pastor-over-his-meeting-with-president-trump

Ray - SoCal said...

Trump is doing a lot of actions aimed at the Black Vote.

A$AP Rocky was another one, that got a lot of publicity.

The rise in Trump popularity in the Black Community is huge.

There is a lot of low hanging fruit for Trump to harvest. All the Democrats have is playing the race card, enriching their Black Cronies, and promises of more money.

Trump is addressing Prison Reform, Jobs, Black Political Corruption, Immigration (competition for Black Jobs).

Three more opportunities for Trump are:

1. School choice.

2. Title IX False Rape Accusations, that affect Black Males disproportionately.

3. Job Licensing / Education Requirements, that affect the Black Community disproportionately.

Yancey Ward said...

There is one, underlying cause of black poverty- single motherhood. All government policies subsidize single mothers and penalize marriage outright. Women in general cannot raise boys to adulthood, and they do a poor job raising the girls going it alone.

At this point, I think there is no fix for this that isn't draconian in nature- more money is definitely not going to help. The building of a productive culture is a centuries long process, and is mostly the result of chance.

roesch/voltaire said...

Well yes that is what presidents are suppose to do after all last time he blamed President Obama for Baltimore. Maybe he should stop passing the buck and govern for all of us? And while he is at it maybe he can do something about the stretches of poverty and drug use in Republican controlled states.

Yancey Ward said...

A prescription for disaster is this- males between the ages of 13-50 with nothing to care about but themselves.

Michael K said...

maybe he can do something about the stretches of poverty and drug use in Republican controlled states.

I see you got the memo. This same theme is appearing in all the left wing places this weekend.

Maybe you should get out of your academic bubble and read something like this.

I moved to a small town at just the right time in national politics. It feels like the conservative/liberal divide has grown to absurd proportions, and in part it's become a geographic divide as well as a social one.

I'm a coastal liberal who now lives around rural conservatives, and living here has forced me to see things from another perspective.

My town was settled mostly by Latter-day Saints who worked in ranching and farming. There's still cattle and farmland interspersed between the burgeoning neighborhoods. Many of the county elders and large landowners are still Mormon farmers and ranchers, and religion is such a big part of life that leaving the church can mean for some people losing social and family ties.

I've come to understand the fear some small-town residents have of technology and new ways of working. In cities, people embrace new industries powered by tech and don't think twice about the demise of agricultural jobs. But when you were raised to be a cowboy, it can be frustrating to discover the only way you can make enough money to buy a house involves computers. I've seen this frustration unfortunately get aimed at newcomers to my town, many of whom are college-educated coastal liberals who ride bikes and skis instead of horses.


You might learn something.

dreams said...

Blacks were making great strides in moving up and becoming middle class until the sixties, until liberals, liberals destroy. Also, integration of schools hurt blacks, there was a time before integration when black teachers demanded the best from their students.

Browndog said...

Yancey Ward said...

A prescription for disaster is this- males between the ages of 13-50 with nothing to care about but themselves.


Who raised them?

Fernandinande said...

And that's exactly why it should be called the "Welfare State to Prison Pipeline" rather than the "School to Prison Pipeline".

There's actually a negative correlation between black murder rates and being raised in "the welfare state".

++
"The phenomenon of extremely high homicide rates in the nonwhite population is not new. Since 1914, when national mortality data were tabulated for the first time by cause of death and race, death rates from homicide among nonwhite males have exceeded those for white males by factors as great as 13 to 1. (**)

However, this ratio steadily diminished in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s; and the ratio held fairly steady in the 1980s as the homicide death rates from each race-sex group declined after sharp increases in the 1960s and 1970s (see table 2).

** B/W ratio murder rates:
1950: 13.1
1960: 11.5
1970: 09.0
1980: 06.7
1987: 06.2

++

That paper was written in 1991; see Homicide Trends 1980 to 2008 to see that the black murder rate was reduced by almost half from 1980 to 2008.

As a reference point, the Johnson's "Great Society" started around 1964.

TJM said...

Dems screech: You can't steal our slaves, err voters!

narciso said...

It's a complex phenomenon its welfare deinduatrialization, the influence of drugs in certain cohorts the politicization of faith

joshbraid said...

"I'll have those n*ggers voting Democratic for 200 years." LBJ?
http://www.intellectualtakeout.org/blog/did-lbj-say-ill-have-those-nggers-voting-democratic-200-years

Sebastian said...

This is going to be tricky for progs: how are they going to smear the reverend as racist? Better ignore him.

Sam L. said...

Dems have kept blacks under their thumbs for far too many years.

Yancey Ward said...

"This is going to be tricky for progs: how are they going to smear the reverend as racist?"

Guarantee you they are trawling everywhere for a rape victim.

Beasts of England said...

'But I am bold enough to take my shot and try to be as honest as I can, regardless to where it takes me.'

Mere politics can't compete with a fearless Reverend...

YoungHegelian said...

Once again, it's not about Trump. Trump is simply the man in the right place at the right time.

The Democrats have embraced with a vengeance a secular morality that on many subjects stands in direct opposition to the tenets of Christianity. Earlier Democrats worked hard to make sure that believing Christians could somehow fit themselves into the party, but the modern Party leadership seems to flaunt its hostility to faith.

Who are the two most religious ethnic groups in the US? Blacks & Latinos. So, yeah, there are going to be some major defections in the future.

I can't imagine that the above referenced CNN interview between Don Lemon & Pastor Bill Owens went over very well in the black community. I'll spare everyone the cruder language no doubt used to describe it among blacks, but the sight of a gay black man married to a white man berating a "man of God" on national TV for opposition to gay marriage was an early Christmas gift to the RNC.

CWJ said...

If Althouse's sampling of the interview is representative of the whole, then I have to give The New Yorker credit for publishing it rather than sitting on it.

Birkel said...

roesch/voltaire won't support a reset of trade deals, of course.
He won't acknowledge that those trade deals exported manufacturing jobs from middle America.

So he blames Trump for not addressing the problems Wall Street Republicans (Baptists) and Leftist Collectivist Democratics (Bootleggers) created.

You're just not willing to let go your cognitive dissonance and nobody here is going to help you.

Francisco D said...

Maybe he should stop passing the buck and govern for all of us?

I thought that the common refrain on the Left was "He is not my President."

Seeing Red said...

Via Insty from Rasmussen...Only 41 percent of black voters, who are overwhelmingly Democrat believe that Trump voters are racist, which is less than Democrats as a whole. Democrats as a whole are the only group that has a plurality of likely voters who agree with the statement that Trump supporters are racist. Every other group, male and female, age group, and race have a plurality or majority who do not believe Trump supporters are racist. This speaks volumes about white Democrats and racial politics....

Birkel said...

Seeing Red:

It's called projection.
White Leftist Collectivist Democratics are the racists, still.

Free markets.
Free people.

Big Mike said...

It was done by our government on purpose.

To what end?


@Fernandistein, as I commented in the thread about structural racism, the end goal is to turn black people into a permanent underclass that feels it’s only way forward is to vote for Democrats and live off the crumbs that are left after people like Cummings take their cut.

Seeing Red said...

Well yes that is what presidents are suppose to do after all last time he blamed President Obama for Baltimore. Maybe he should stop passing the buck and govern for all of us? And while he is at it maybe he can do something about the stretches of poverty and drug use in Republican controlled states.


What do you think he’s been doing while fighting the deep state/lsm?

Birkel said...

To what end:

As always with the Democratics the second-best answer is serfs.

The absolute best answer is chattel property.

Big Mike said...

Maybe he should stop passing the buck and govern for all of us?

I cannot picture any policies that Trump could pursue that would satisfy you, without betraying 80% of the American population.

Seeing Red said...

Olde World Thinking.

roesch/voltaire said...

You don't need a memo to see that Moscow Mitch's Kentucky has over 17% living in poverty and a huge problem with drug use, for example. When on vacation in northern Wisconsin, I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy --some about to give up diary farming but not sure what else to do.

Narayanan said...

@Blogger Ice Nine :

Trump is wise to woo inner city denizens from distance ... He doesn't want antifa joining with gangs and egged on by MSM.

effinayright said...

Ferdinanstein:

"Is [Owens] claiming that blacks have less "agency" than people of every other race? That they're just some sort of pawns or robots?"

and:

"But it was done by blacks on purpose, unless you agree with the Rev. that blacks have insufficient agency to live in a modern welfare state."

So....you ask a rhetorical question, then answer it AS IF Owens himself had answered it in the affirmative!

snort

Paddy O said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Seeing Red said...

You don't need a memo to see that Moscow Mitch's Kentucky has over 17% living in poverty and a huge problem with drug use, for example. When on vacation in northern Wisconsin, I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy --some about to give up diary farming but not sure what else to do.


Are you suggesting Kentucky’s problems started under Mitch?

Did they talk about the rules the USDA has put on them?

Don’t forget, that’s the same dept. that wanted to pass a rule about not making cheese on a wood board anymore.

Beasts of England said...

'I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy...'

I totally believe you, dude. Totes.

Michael K said...

You don't need a memo to see that Moscow Mitch's Kentucky has over 17% living in poverty

Compared to Baltimore, Detroit and Chicago ?

The memo has has gotten to all of you, I see. What is the poverty rate in California?

That can't be true ! It's not in the memo.

narciso said...

Cue card, they dont have the attention span to read the memo, oxycontin really fir their narrative well up to a point with Alice Fisher protecting Purdue from inside and Eric holder on the outside.

Birkel said...

More people in California are povertous than anywhere else in the country.

roesch/voltaire knows his whataboutisms.

Bay Area Guy said...

"This is going to be tricky for progs: how are they going to smear the reverend as racist? Better ignore him."

Happy medium - just call him an Uncle Tom.

Progs like to play that card after the "race" card.

daskol said...

Owens just jumped into the irredeemable deplorables basket with both feet.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

".Only 41 percent of black voters, who are overwhelmingly Democrat believe that Trump voters are racist, which is less than Democrats as a whole."

It would be insanely optimistic to think Trump will get a majority of the black vote in 2020. But if he manages to get, say, even 30 percent, the Dems will be in big trouble. That's why they are screaming RACISM 24/7 these days.

If open borders are allowed, in 10 years the black vote will not matter to the Dems. There will be enough new Hispanic voters to override any defections from the blacks. But the blacks have to remain on the plantation for at least another few years. The great fear is that they will escape before then.

traditionalguy said...

Rev Owens wants to help the children to live in Christian families with fathers. That’s all. So makes him the enemy of the plan terrible LBJ that gives welfare money to single mother households only. And he stands up and calls out Gay marriages laws for the harm they do to raising boys. He is a Chik Fil A level enemy of the brave new post Christian world.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

UP next - the Doxxing of the Reverend Bill Owens.

Will Anfita CNN Maddow Hillary hate-Schit-FBI hate-house corruption brigade have him offed?

Darkisland said...

Apparently Rev Bill Owens has been to the WhiteHouse 4 times so far this year. I did not see the Don Lemon interview but Scott Adams says that this came out in the interview.

Apparently surprised Lemon because it makes it look like this was not just a one time photo-op but an ongoing initiative in PDJT's part.

John Henry

madAsHell said...

I wonder if the slur "Oreo Cookie" will be slung during this election cycle? My money says it will.

Darkisland said...

One of the things that is cool about A$SAP Rocky is that by PDJT intervening, he got Kamala Harris to come out in favor of keeping a black man, a famous black man, in a foreign jail.

I suspect that this will go down well in the black community.

I don't think PDJT should call this out but others should: In Rocky's Tweets about how happy he is to be released, not one word of thanks to PDJT.

PDJT not only pressured Sweden to release him, he even, personally, offered to put up bail money. I suspect that this will have been noticed in the black community.

In Kamala's defense, she does make some good points about PDJT should not have gotten involved.

1) He was not released on bail because Sweden does not have any provision for bail in its legal system

2) The Prime Minister has no authority over the courts so asking him to intervene is improper. How would we feel if the situation were reversed?

3) ANY intervention in ANY court case in progress in any country is probably improper. An exception might be if our citizen was being singled out, treated unduly harshly or something like that. Sweden has their justice system, different from our but apparently relatively fair, let them sort it out.

4) If it had been John Smith, a black schoolteacher in Sweden on holiday that this had happened to, would the president have gotten involved? Would we even know about it?

I don't know all the details of what is going on, the Swedish justice system and so on. Perhaps I am wrong. But, based on the little I do know, I think it may have been improper for PDJT to intervene.

OTOH, I am ROTFL because he forced Harris to come out in favor of keeping a black man in jail.

So that's not nothing.

John Henry

Darkisland said...

I agree with whoever it was upthread that the Dems are panicking. They keep calling PDJT a "racist" and, in recent months all of us who support him racist.

And, as they do, more and more blacks start coming out, like Bill Owens, Charles Barkly, Kanye West and others in favor of PDJT and/or his policies. Still just a trickle but seems like more and more.

I've asked several times here for examples of how PDJT is racist and never get any examples of things he has done. Oh, some weak tries about banning some (but very few) Muslims. Or saying bad, but truthful things about some Mexicans. Or trying to control our borders.

But when it comes down to it, crickets on how PDJT is racist. What he has done, what he has said.

We deplorable scum should start asking people, whenever anyone says says PDJT is racist, to give examples. Specifically about how he is racist toward American blacks.

When they can't give us any, and they never can, we need to tell them to STFU and FOAD!.

John Henry

daskol said...

Mario Lopez suspended from his tv show for suggesting a danger in letting 3 year olds choose their gender. Ellen Pompeio called racist for criticizing Kampala Harris. The Montagnards are purging the Girondists this primary season. Dangerous times for Democrats. An ever growing group of people look with envy of the self-proclaimed deplorable irredeemables over whom “Racist!” cries hold no sway any longer.

wildswan said...

Hang in there, Reverend Owens.

Many black males do not have a high school degree which makes maintaining a family very difficult, and Wisconsin is utterly disgraceful in this area. Wisconsin has the largest gap in the nation between graduation rates for while and black students and the gap is increasing.* This disgrace is the responsibility of the present Governor, Tony Evers. He was Deputy Superintendent of Public Education 2001-2009, then Superintendent of Public Education 2009-2018, and he then became Governor. Wisconsin did not have the largest graduation-rate gap back in the Nineties before the manufacturing sector, which is very important in Wisconsin, sold itself to China. Led by Evers for the last ten years, the educational establishment has totally failed to grapple with the problem of the impact of economic collapse and the unemployed fathers on the educational attainment of their children. There are other kinds of rats besides those in Baltimore. Some you can vote for and the Democrats like Evers have been among the rats (Democrat Educrats, I mean, of course) on ballots And, strangely, the black voters of Milwaukee have continued to vote for the Educrat rats who fail their children. The monolithic pattern of voting in Milwaukee has made it certain that the educrats who failed to educate the black children of Milwaukee will also fail to educate their grandchildren. But I do believe that one day the black pastors and the black working class will turn on the Dems and vote them out. It could happen in 2020. No one saw the Trump vote form in the white working class and Our Betters, the blind kittens we saw at the debates, have not become prophets or even good pollsters.


* https://www.wpr.org/wisconsin-again-posts-nations-largest-black-white-high-school-graduation-rates-gap

Darkisland said...

I thought someone here cited the LBJ quote about keeping the XXX voting democrat for 200 years but can't find it.

I think a better LBJ quote is:

"These Negroes, they’re getting pretty uppity these days and that’s a problem for us since they’ve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppityness. Now we’ve got to do something about this, we’ve got to give them a little something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference."

I think this explains the Democrat Party strategy of the last 60 years. Give them Obama. He looks black, and sort of is, but not really. No history or communication with the US black community. Raised white, largely raised outside the US. Son of a foreign black and a white mother, never did anything to make him seem "uppity".

Now we have Kamala Harris she looks black, and sort of is, but not really. No history or communication with the US black community. Raised white, largely raised outside the US. Daughter of a foreign black and a white mother, never did anything to make him seem "uppity".

Kamala is just the latest iteration of "just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference"

Would it be racist to bring up this about Kamala? Probably but WTF. A week or two back I was looking for info about Harris' (rich, white) husband and I found this

One longtime donor, noting the country’s expectations around the First Family, told me, “When she married Doug, I knew she was running for President.”

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/22/kamala-harris-makes-her-case

Point being that since leaving Willie's willy, she has had no relationships but realized that she could not win the presidency without a husband. Or at least the appearance of a husband.
John Henry

Derek Kite said...

The best thing for the black voters is if there are two parties competing for their support. I hope Trump breaks the stranglehold the Democrats have on this voting block.

I had a hunch Trump would make a move in this direction, I didn't know how and where he would do it. Baltimore is an obvious Democrat failure of unimaginable proportions. Republicans did nothing about Detroit, to their shame. Finally a Republican who has the balls to go up against the predictable accusations of racism to expose a travesty.

MountainMan said...

"Now lets ask Kamala Harris about her family history of owning slaves?"

Why? She is not responsible for what her ancestors did. She needs to be asked about what SHE has done. I wish we would get over all this stupidity around trying to hold people accountable for things that happened long in the past for which they are not responsible.

Derek Kite said...

If you want to see the nastiest and ugliest racism, watch what would happen if Trump won 55% or more of the black vote. Pelosi herself would be calling them ni**ers.

narciso said...

I forgot this was murray chotiner's tendentious nephew doing the interview, who last tried to paint victor davis hanson as a racist, among other work,

daskol said...

Owens steps into the circle of hate, while Dems target their leadership in internecine power struggles cloaked in racial grievance. This Dem organization purged its leaders after a historically successful run of fund-raising.. The ugly side of identity politics is getting rubbed in everyone’s faces all of the time now.

daskol said...

Nassim Taleb called the Quillette editor a purveyor of nazi race-superiority pseudoscience. Something is in the air.

narciso said...

he better switch to decaf, he's usually pretty sane,

n.n said...

The ugly side of identity politics is getting rubbed in everyone’s faces all of the time now.

Diversity (i.e. color judgment) breeds adversity, always, and forever.

effinayright said...

MountainMan said...
"Now lets ask Kamala Harris about her family history of owning slaves?"

Why? She is not responsible for what her ancestors did. She needs to be asked about what SHE has done. I wish we would get over all this stupidity around trying to hold people accountable for things that happened long in the past for which they are not responsible.

*************

Yeah...taking the high road has always worked for conservatives, hasn't it.....oh wait.

Myself, I think the phrase "turnabout is fair play" is operative here.

madAsHell said...

I see that Trump does not have an out-reach program to GloZell Green.

Known Unknown said...

"'I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy...'"

Check out Dian Fossey over here.

h said...

This is I realize totally meaningless (but on the other hand we're all talking polls and those are equally meaningless): I listen to some local (right leaning) talk radio in the DC area, and to CSPAN which has call in segments from time to time. I've noticed an increase (big enough so I noticed) of black callers who are supporting Trump. This latest set of exchanges about Baltimore have perhaps inspired some of these calls, and the pro-Trump callers say things along the line of "I live in Baltimore and Trump is right." I also sense a growth in sympathy to the "Democratic plantation" view: "They only come to us at election time and we give them 90% support, and how have they improved our lives." Anyway, this is a strain of politics I will watch over the next year+ (along with reaction to over use of "racism" charge) and if Trump wins, I expect these issues will loom large in the election post mortem.

Known Unknown said...

Barack Obama
Kamala Harris

Not a President DeAndre Witherspoon to be found!

rcocean said...

What does it matter if Kamala Harris' family owned slaves? What does it matter if she's 1/4 black?

It matters a lot. If she wasn't a black woman, she wouldn't be running. Hell, she wouldn't be a US Senator. Look at her academic record or performance as a Bay Area DA.

She's just like Obama. She got on the Express Elevator to the Top, because its reserved for smart, black, Democrats.

rcocean said...

THe R's do the same thing. Colin Powell was a perfectly adequate Chief of Staff, and later secretary of state, but he got both positions because he was black. But that's OK, he was probably better than some flunky Bush would've appointed otherwise.

But you had idiots like Jerry Ford suggesting Quayle be dumped and Powell be given the VP slot in '92. Later Ford supported a Powell for President movement in '96 and 2000. The only reason? He's black.

Drago said...

R/V: "'I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy...'"

Dear Diary......

rcocean said...

THe R's do the same thing. Colin Powell was a perfectly adequate Chief of Staff, and later secretary of state, but he got both positions because he was black. But that's OK, he was probably better than some flunky Bush would've appointed otherwise.

But you had idiots like Jerry Ford suggesting Quayle be dumped and Powell be given the VP slot in '92. Later Ford supported a Powell for President movement in '96 and 2000. The only reason? He's black.

Michael K said...

Colin Powell was a perfectly adequate Chief of Staff, and later secretary of state, but he got both positions because he was black.

I think that is a bit much. Obama was a cipher but Powell had a record going back to Vietnam.

There is a sort of reverse racism in which anyone who is black, like Thomas as a good example, is considered incompetent because of his color. I'm not that happy with Condi Rice as Sec State but there is no denying her accomplishments.

narciso said...

exactly, she is a polymath in several languages, now being a protégé of brent Scowcroft wasn't helpful, powell seems to have benefited from the patronage of prince bandar, a character like the latter is a major character in silva's latest, which has a number of twists, you wouldn't expect from an associate of elsa walsh, among others,

Heartless Aztec said...

He is the concience of our country.

Lewis Wetzel said...

And to counter Bill Owens, we have David French in NRO today.
A sample of French's argument against Trump supporters: " I happen to agree that too many progressives have been indiscriminate — sometimes even malicious — in their claims of racism against Republicans and Republican politicians. But it’s one thing to condemn excessive use of the racism label. It’s another thing entirely to rationalize or excuse conduct you’d condemn in any other circumstance."
That doesn't even make sense. Who would condemn a person for noting that Cummings' district is a cesspool of poverty, crime, and corruption? The racist attacks on America by Tlaib, Omar, Ocasio-Cortez, and Pressley should be answered in the same spirit they are given. Who is going to do that? Mitch McConnell?

h said...

replying to rocean: the "smart black Democrats" (and Republican) you mention are notable in that none of them are "black" in the sense of descendants of US slaves. Decades ago I read some report or study on whether and why Blacks from the east indies (Kamala Harris, Colin Powell) excelled compared to US- African Americans. And I've seen since discussions about whether Americans who are first or second generation African immigrants have not excelled. Certainly in the last 20 years I've noticed African (Nigerian?) names in the lists of honors students at my local (selective Math/Sci) public highschool. This is another aspect of race relations I'm watching to see if begins to create tensions in the "black" community. I kind of expect a fuller explication of how reparations would work might expose these tensions. For example: Barack Obama does not qualify, Michelle Obama does qualify, their children qualify or qualify for half shares? The problem is that since anthropologists know all of us are descended from Africa, there has to be some kind of specific cutoff about how much African descent is "enough" to qualify for reparations. I actually believe the whole reparations will fail on this issue.

Lydia said...

Welfare to families with no father in the house, and the increase in that, started before the 1960s -- in Moynihan's 1965 report, The Negro Family: The Case for National Action:

The AFDC program, deriving from the long established Mothers' Aid programs, was established in 1935 principally to care for widows and orphans, although the legislation covered all children in homes deprived of parental support because one or both of their parents are absent or incapacitated.

In the beginning, the number of AFDC families in which the father was absent because of desertion was less than a third of the total. Today it is two thirds. HEW estimates "that between two thirds and three fourths of the 50 percent increase from 1948 to 1955 in the number of absent father families receiving ADC may be explained by an increase in broken homes in the population."


https://www.dol.gov/general/aboutdol/history/webid-moynihan/moynchapter2

h said...

Lydia: Thanks. the report is 1965. I think we are all justified in asking why 55 years hasn't made things better.

Michael K said...

Certainly in the last 20 years I've noticed African (Nigerian?) names in the lists of honors students at my local (selective Math/Sci) public highschool.

Ask if they are Ibos, or Igbos as they are now known.

African black immigrants are very different from American blacks, and they will tell you.

narciso said...

Early in the thread:


https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/08/what-ails-the-us-press.php

Merny11 said...

RV I have a seasonal home in “up North” WI and spend a lot of time with the locals. I’d say your take is full of it. And Wildswan is right on re Evers.

narciso said...



More of fake news:

https://mobile.twitter.com/MZHemingway/status/1157729202013134848

narciso said...

And more of that news out of the headlines


https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/08/03/xr-unglued-cache-of-documents-exposes-green-menace-of-the-extinction-rebellion-xrgate/?fbclid=IwAR3bq5wBanqThTwSM6pX92HeiRwmpdcBTqFQQN5izKReqFAYa2VSy89cKw8

Fen said...

"Now lets ask Kamala Harris about her family history of owning slaves?"

Why? She is not responsible for what her ancestors did. She needs to be asked about what SHE has done. I wish we would get over all this stupidity around trying to hold people accountable for things that happened long in the past for which they are not responsible.|

How about first we ask Kamala Harris if she believes in holding people accountable for things that happened long in the past for the which they are not responsible?

Before we unilaterally disarm ourselves.

Lewis Wetzel said...

"How about first we ask Kamala Harris if she believes in holding people accountable for things that happened long in the past for the which they are not responsible?"
"Institutional racsim" has a meaning. "Systemic racism" has no meaning. You cannot identify the thoughts, words, or actions that result in "systemic racism." Systemic racism, instead, is supposed to cause racist thoughts, words, and actions.
Any person with half a brain in their head should know that if there were such a thing as "systemic racism," the people least likely to be able to able to defeat it would be intellectuals and politicians.

Nichevo said...

Beasts of England said...
'I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy...'

I totally believe you, dude. Totes.

8/3/19, 12:35 PM

I should hope not. What is the man, a shikker?

Nichevo said...

Michael K said...
Colin Powell was a perfectly adequate Chief of Staff, and later secretary of state, but he got both positions because he was black.

I think that is a bit much. Obama was a cipher but Powell had a record going back to Vietnam.

Yes, we know he faked body count in Vietnam. We know this because he said so. I knew a man who went to ROTC with Powell at Syracuse, if I recall correctly. He was not impressed.

Nichevo said...

And Jimmy Breslin of Newsday explained how Powell's family rose out of poverty: they hit the number.

That means they played the local policy racket game and won. You can read about this in the autobiography of Malcolm X. Basically they won a small illegal lottery which I suppose gave them a grubstake to improve their lives, move to a better neighborhood.

Certainly they deserve credit for not throwing the money away. But it's not as if Powell's parents invented electricity.

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Fen said...

" think that is a bit much. Obama was a cipher but Powell had a record going back to Vietnam."

I think those claims can be simultaneous true. At Powell's officer level you are basically comparing 1st string quarterbacks. You don't make Col if you are incompetent.

1) Powell was a good officer
2) who also benefited from Afirmative Action.

AllenS said...

roesch/voltaire said...
When on vacation in northern Wisconsin, I drank at a few local bars and met Trump voters were disillusioned about the economy --some about to give up diary farming but not sure what else to do.

Where were you in northern Wisconsin? I don't believe you.

Michael K said...

Yes, we know he faked body count in Vietnam. We know this because he said so. I knew a man who went to ROTC with Powell at Syracuse, if I recall correctly. He was not impressed.

As I recall, MacNamara wanted body counts and the Army gave them to him. I was not claiming that "Powell's family invented electricity." The allegation was that he got where he was "because he was black." I said that was "a bit much" and it was. He was a competent officer and rose in the ranks of an Army that was being killed off by incompetent political leadership. Read "Dereliction of Duty"

My second point, which you ignored, was that competent black Americans are all assumed incompetent because of Affirmative Action. I also think it is no coincidence that Powell is from a Jamaican family.

Craig Howard said...

African black immigrants are very different from American blacks, and they will tell you.

Immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean will tend to be the elite. They have the ambition, the intelligence, and the wherewithal to make the move and succeed here. They are different.

Rusty said...

The economic problems of N. Wisc. and N. Mich predate Trump by a long margin. If you want to place blame put it on the regulations that killed the mining and timber industries. farming in that region has always been iffy. Especially growing crops for anything other than feed. Dairy farming used to be prevalent but young people don't want to get into something so time and labor extensive.
I have been in towns in the UP where the youngest residents were in their fifties.

Michael K said...

Immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean will tend to be the elite.

Compared to what ? I remember a kid from Uganda who was joining the Army,. He had his whole life planned. He would go to college on GI Bill after he finished his term. Then he wanted to go to medical school.

Howard, you don't know enough real people.

My medical student from Eritrea could not afford her instruments for her physical diagnosis course. I loaned her mine.

Get out more, Howard.



Medical students, at least at USC, do not use microscopes anymore,. They use laptops. She could not afford one. She graduated,.

Nichevo said...

Michael K said...

My second point, which you ignored, was that competent black Americans are all assumed incompetent because of Affirmative Action. I also think it is no coincidence that Powell is from a Jamaican family.

8/4/19, 8:43 AM

Mike, I wasn't necessarily disagreeing with you and I certainly wasn't setting out to fisk you point-by-point. As you sometimes do, I was sharing a slice of personally acquired information that may be somewhat tangential to your own point.

He may not have gotten where he was because he was black, but I daresay he didn't get where he was in spite of being black. At that point I would imagine that senior personnel were very glad to find a competent black person around.

I just don't think Colin Powell is the second coming, that's all.

madAsHell said...

It seems we had a hero in El Paso. I’ll guess Glen Oakley is going for dinner in the White House.

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