The Right erases another JFK Policy

[James DiEugenio]

This one took awhile, but Ed Blum is finally going to succeed in striking down affirmative action.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/supreme-court-affirmative-action_n_63600d1fe4b08fd5e954d2c4

This was one of the very first things JFK did to do something about the lack of people of color in his administration.  On the day he was inaugurated he called Doug Dillon and asked him why there were no black faces in the Coast Guard parade.  Dillon said, he did not know.  He told him to find out.

This really bugged him. At the second cabinet meeting, he told everyone to bring down the numbers on how many minority members were in their department and where they were located in the hierarchy.  When they were submitted to him he was shocked.  First at  the very low numbers, and second because all the people were near the bottom of the employment scale, clerical and custodial.  So in March of 1961, he signed an executive order demanding affirmative action.

But then later, he greatly expanded this order.  He now ordered that all doing business with the federal government had to prove they had affirmative action guidelines in place.  So now, for the first time in North Carolina, textile mills had to hire African Americans.  When the manager was asked about this he said, well, its either that or we close up.

But what really stuck in the throat of the right was the number of African Americans going to Ivy League colleges.  They hate upward social mobility.  

  It took them about 12 years to gut his foreign policy.  Well, it took them over fifty years to get this one.  

Edited November 1, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Michael Griffith]

11 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

This one took awhile, but Ed Blum is finally going to succeed in striking down affirmative action.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/supreme-court-affirmative-action_n_63600d1fe4b08fd5e954d2c4

This was one of the very first things JFK did to do something about the lack of people of color in his administration.  On the day he was inaugurated he called DOug DIllon and asked him why there were no black faces in the Coast Guard parade.  Dillon said, he did not know.  He told him to find out.

This really bugged him. At the second cabinet meeting, he told everyone to bring down the numbers on how many minority members were in their department and where they were located in the hierarchy.  When they were submitted to him he was shocked.  First at at the very low numbers, and second because all the people were near the bottom of the employment scale, clerical and custodial.  So in March of 1961, he signed an executive order demanding affirmative action.

But then later, he greatly expanded this order.  He now ordered that all doing business with the federal government had to prove they had affirmative action guidelines in place.  So now for the first time in North Carolina textile mills had to hire African Americans.  When the manager was asked about this he said, well, its either that or we close up.

But what really stuck in the throat of the right was the number of African Americans going to Ivy League colleges.  They hate upward social mobility.  

  It took them about 12 years to guy his foreign policy.  Well, it took them over fifty years to get this one.  

I seriously doubt that JFK would agree with you on this case. You realize that the plaintiffs in this case are Asian parents and Asian college students who have been denied entrance to a few top universities (in this case Harvard and UNC) because of how affirmative action has been applied, right? You realize that some states have already banned using race as a factor in university admission, including the deep blue states of California, Michigan, and Washington, right? 

Furthermore, education and legal scholars have noted that even if the Supreme Court rules in favor of the plaintiffs, most college admissions will not be affected.

Personally, I support most forms of affirmative action, but when AA is applied in such a way that only certain minorities benefit, then it is discriminatory and violates the core idea that promoted AA in the first place. Many people from all across the spectrum have suggested using income as a key factor in college admissions, such as requiring that a certain percentage of students be from low-income households, but the radical left insists that AA must be exclusively race-based and must only benefit certain minorities to the exclusion of other minorities. 

You keep trying to twist JFK's record to make it seem like he shared your far-left views, and in so doing you are doing a disservice to his legacy and are misrepresenting his views. 

 

 

 

Edited November 1, 2022 by Michael Griffith

[James DiEugenio]

Please Doug.

 Are you going to try and say you do not know who Ed Blum is?

The only reason he did it this time with Asians, is because he lost the first time around with only whites.  You do know that do you not?

So this is the way he played it this time around, one minority group against another.  And  his accomplices on the court understood what he was doing and asked just the right questions as you can see from that story.

No president since Lincoln did more for civil rights than Kennedy did.  In just about every way.  And this was one of the first--and most effective-- things he did.

There are nine states which have already stripped away affirmative action in education.  In each state, in the large public colleges, the percentage of African American and Latino students has declined significantly.  The reason for this is pretty obvious, and this will make those inequities pretty much permanent.

 

[Gerry Down]

I think the problem is both democrat and republican teachers don't want to teach in black schools. This means black schools struggle to get good teachers handicapping the education opportunity of black communities. Perhaps a good form of affirmative action would be for all newly qualified teachers to teach for 3 years at a black school.

[Michael Griffith]

Anyone who doesn't know that the Asian community is upset over how AA has been applied to Asian students needs to broaden their news sources or at least visit some Asian-American rights websites.

In my state, Asian parents filed a lawsuit against a county run by woke liberals because the school board changed the admission process to an elite high school in a way that discriminated against Asian applicants. The school board scrapped a long-standing standardized test that was used to determine admission to the high school, using the justification that few blacks or Hispanics were getting good scores on the test. As a result, many Asian students who would have been admitted to the high school were rejected. How about we try that approach for medical school applicants? "Nah, don't worry that you couldn't get a high enough score on the medical qualification test. We'll just scrap the test." That's going too far.

The way to end discrimination is to stop discriminating for or against people based on their race or ethnicity. Denying Asian kids entrance to top schools in order to admit more kids from other minorities is discriminatory and unfair. AA should apply to all racial/ethnic minorities or to no racial/ethnic minorities. 

Personally, I believe that, sadly, we still need AA because, sadly, there is still too much racism in our society. But AA cannot be used to single out one or two minorities for favorable treatment and to disadvantage other minorities in the process. 

 

[James DiEugenio]

2 hours ago, Gerry Down said:

I think the problem is both democrat and republican teachers don't want to teach in black schools. This means black schools struggle to get good teachers handicapping the education opportunity of black communities. Perhaps a good form of affirmative action would be for all newly qualified teachers to teach for 3 years at a black school.

This is a good observation Gerry.  

Kennedy was planning on making this a campaign issue in 1964.  I once wrote about it and how different LBJ's approach was to the problem.  And how he discarded the expert Bobby Kennedy had found on the issue, Dave Hackett.  I really think that  with Hackett that program had a chance at succeeding.  Johnson just tried to throw money at it, and it did not work.  Then those riots broke out and LBJ would not even go to the ceremony to accept the Kerner Commission report which was probably the best analysis ever made of the race problem by a congressional committee.

This was the concluding part of that four part series.  It addressed this issue.

https://www.kennedysandking.com/reviews/the-kennedys-and-civil-rights-how-the-msm-continues-to-distort-history-part-4

Edited November 1, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Michael Griffith]

5 hours ago, Gerry Down said:

I think the problem is both democrat and republican teachers don't want to teach in black schools. This means black schools struggle to get good teachers handicapping the education opportunity of black communities. Perhaps a good form of affirmative action would be for all newly qualified teachers to teach for 3 years at a black school.

Yes, this is a problem. There are several programs, state and federal, that offer teachers bonuses if they will teach in schools in black communities. The two programs I have any knowledge of don't offer large enough bonuses, in my opinion. Part of the problem in attracting teachers to such schools is that there are often security issues at those schools and teachers don't feel safe. 

But this is not just a money-teacher problem. It is also an attitude/cultural problem. Barack Obama caught a lot of flak in 2008 for saying that too many blacks viewed education as a waste of time, that too many blacks thought it was uncool to do well in school. I'm paraphrasing, but that's pretty close to what he said. On a hot mic, Jesse Jackson was caught saying that he was so upset at Obama for saying this that he wanted to cut off his genitals. I admired Obama for saying it, because it is true in too many cases. Peer pressure can be a powerful thing, and when so many of your peers think it's dumb to waste time on school, that can be a hard thing to deal with. 

Perhaps one solution would be to offer black and Hispanic students in historically poor-performing schools a full-ride two-year scholarship to a community college if they could graduate with a C and pass a very basic aptitude test in math, English, and reading comprehension. Something like that. 

Another problem is that we need to figure out a way to enable more blacks and Hispanics to live in good school districts. Poor counties tend to have substandard schools, but many minorities cannot afford to live anywhere else. Busing is certainly not the answer, since that violates two basic rights. But I would be open to federal home loan guarantee program for minorities who could meet basic credit qualification criteria so they could buy homes in better counties. 

If nothing else, states and the federal government simply need to spend more money on schools in low-income areas, including the provision of greatly enhanced security at the schools to enforce discipline and protect teachers. 

 

Edited November 1, 2022 by Michael Griffith

[Matt Allison]

6 hours ago, Gerry Down said:

I think the problem is both democrat and republican teachers don't want to teach in black schools. This means black schools struggle to get good teachers handicapping the education opportunity of black communities.

Agree. I've seen this issue personally in Chicago, and it is brutally sad to watch. 

The disadvantages that Black folks have to deal with in this country are still myriad and we are nowhere near as far along on the path to equality as we should be.

Eliminating AA will have the same deleterious effect on Black people that overturning the Voting Rights Act did. Disgraceful.

[Paul Brancato]

Is it true that the ‘left’ doesn’t want to try affirmative action based on income levels? What does the ‘right’ think about this? 

[James DiEugenio]

That is a good question Paul.  I don't know the answer to it.

[Matthew Koch]

Tucker had a really good segment on this tonight, the part about Justice Sotomayor.. oof 

 

 

This was 7 years ago at Yale, times have changed. I think JFK was for equal opportunity and that he believe that Black people given the opportunity could do the same job. I don't think that he believed in filling quotas without merit. 

 

 

[James DiEugenio]

Donald Gibson once said, the idea the USA is a meritocracy is pretty much an illusion.

Just look at who got into Harvard and Yale.  They were owned by the Eastern Establishment.

Before affirmative action, see what the numbers were on people of color who were there. How many African Americans did Bundy graduate with?

When Dillon investigated the case of the Coast Guard academy, as JFK asked, he could not find one African American student who had ever been admitted there. Now that is the Coast Guard, can you imagine Yale?  

Once the Supremes are done with this case, you will see the numbers there cut in half.  

Edited November 2, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Michael Griffith]

13 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Is it true that the ‘left’ doesn’t want to try affirmative action based on income levels? What does the ‘right’ think about this? 

Conservatives have many times proposed over the years that instead of race-based affirmative action, we try income-based affirmative action, and most liberals--not all, but most--have rejected the idea. This has been debated in Congress and on many talk shows. If you've watched some of the recent debates on TV about the upcoming Supreme Court case, you've seen some conservatives argue for an income-based approach.

I think an income-based approach would be the fairest approach because it would be race-neutral and would help those who truly need help. However, I have no problem with most forms of race-based affirmative action. I think AA has done a great deal of good, and that we still need laws that will ensure that minorities have a fair, equitable opportunity to get a good education. I think income-based AA would accomplish that goal just as well as race-based AA. But, again, I support most forms of AA is it now exists.

 

[Matthew Koch]

15 hours ago, Matt Allison said:

Agree. I've seen this issue personally in Chicago, and it is brutally sad to watch. 

The disadvantages that Black folks have to deal with in this country are still myriad and we are nowhere near as far along on the path to equality as we should be.

If anyone was interested in why where Matt lives is the way it is. Watch the links you will see it is the "Culture" of area the that is holding people back and it's not HuYt people doing it. Until laws are passed that make glamorizing people's murder's something you can sue for royalties over. This drill scene that lower Chicago invented is only going to get worse and worse. 

I highly recommend people who don't know the story watch the videos and you will see that a movie or a book could be made about how out of control it has gotten in South Chicago.. 

 

 

Edited November 2, 2022 by Matthew Koch

[Pat Speer]

22 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

Anyone who doesn't know that the Asian community is upset over how AA has been applied to Asian students needs to broaden their news sources or at least visit some Asian-American rights websites.

In my state, Asian parents filed a lawsuit against a county run by woke liberals because the school board changed the admission process to an elite high school in a way that discriminated against Asian applicants. The school board scrapped a long-standing standardized test that was used to determine admission to the high school, using the justification that few blacks or Hispanics were getting good scores on the test. As a result, many Asian students who would have been admitted to the high school were rejected. How about we try that approach for medical school applicants? "Nah, don't worry that you couldn't get a high enough score on the medical qualification test. We'll just scrap the test." That's going too far.

The way to end discrimination is to stop discriminating for or against people based on their race or ethnicity. Denying Asian kids entrance to top schools in order to admit more kids from other minorities is discriminatory and unfair. AA should apply to all racial/ethnic minorities or to no racial/ethnic minorities. 

Personally, I believe that, sadly, we still need AA because, sadly, there is still too much racism in our society. But AA cannot be used to single out one or two minorities for favorable treatment and to disadvantage other minorities in the process. 

 

The facts are... When it comes to education in America, kids of Asian ancestry dominate. They are not de facto minorities, no far from it. Say there's a step provided so short kids can reach a doorbell. Then a tall kid with short arms comes along and says I'd like to use that step as well, and it's not fair that only short kids can use that step. So he petitions the providers of the step to take away the step. 

Net result: short kids no longer have a step to help them reach the doorbell.  

Now, I would like to see programs designed to help short kids that don't discriminate purely on height. I think that's been the trend for some time. But this idea that Asians as a whole have been wronged by Affirmative Action is just bs. If you go to any major University in the country you'll see that people of Asian ancestry are over-represented compared to their numbers in the general population, by a ratio of 5-1, 10-1, or more. Heck, the last time I visited Berkeley more than half the kids walking down Durant looking for hot Dogs, pizza, and yogurt, were Asian. 

I spent a lot of time in the hospital last year, in an area that's mostly white and hispanic, and less than 5% Asian. And yet roughly half my nurses and doctors were Asian. Remembering the status of nursing a few decades ago, when a large percentage of nurses were brought in from the Philippines, I assumed many of these nurses were not born here or raised here. But in talking to the fifty or so Asian nurses I had in my stay, I found that virtually all of them were born here or raised here. One nurse seemed particularly bright. I said I bet you got straight A's in school. She laughed and said "Well, yeah, but that doesn't mean I'm smart. It means I'm Asian in America." Exactly. It's a cultural thing. Much like Jews becoming accountants, dentists and lawyers is a cultural thing.