An extemporaneous example: If I were to open the front door of my house and someone who I had never seen before were standing there, there’s a number of things I would immediately discern (generally in this order): Race, gender, physical size, age, dress, facial and body posture (smiling/welcoming, or frowning/threatening), and perceived intent. And you probably would make the same judgements in approximately the same order. Then we, as preprogrammed human beings, would apply our own prejudices which are based (in general) on our past experiences. If it was a fat, smiling, short white woman carrying a bible and wearing a dress, I would definately not feel very threatened. If, however, it was a young, big black guy wearing his pants sagging way down off his butt with a black baseball cap on sideways, teardrop tattoos under an eye, smelling like marijuana, I would be much more on my guard. Wouldn’t you?

regards

My bone I’m picking is with stupidity. The writer in question touts her nomination for a Pushcart Prize. I quoted the nomination process from the website; that’s not slander. That’s like saying I was a candidate for President because I wrote my own name in the ballot. I could nominate my own website for a pushcart prize tomorrow–its a meaningless thing to put on your resume, and something this one did certainly because she has a paucity of skill or accomplishments to get people to take her seriously. I don’t think googling someone is stalking, nor is verifying their claims crossing the line. I’m very disinterested in anything about Grabar, except the writing she posts and the claims she makes. Her exaggerated resume is an indication that her work is going to be crap, and she doesn’t disappoint.

In any case, its a free country. I choose not to publish here under my own name, Grabar does. Grabar wants the acceptance of this community–and with her limited intellect and abilities, its not a hard sell to this bunch. But I don’t care what you think of me, and would rather not have some of the crazy bigots who post here stalking me. If its so important for you to have everyone post under their own name, then I suggest you get the PJ folks to change their policies–whining about it to me isn’t going to do anything.

Moco – I love the way you tout your own skills and criticize both the author and bloggers here and yet you deem to grace us with your brilliant wit and insightful observations. We are so blessed to be worthy of your precious time and talents. Oooops, time to go!

“Vivo replies to any article about Democrat/statist racism with the “everyone is racist” line. Perhaps what he means is, everyone he hangs out with is racist.”

What part of “everyone is racist” you don’t understand? If you were honest to yourself . . . Ask 6 billion people.

Sorry, I’m not going to play the game of pretending that the private sector was always welcoming. I once worked at a company that was know as one of the more Black-friendly places, because we had quite a few black old-timers there. That was great in the ’90s, but you start talking to some of the old-timers of all races, and you get a less pretty picture of the “good old days”, where these guys were hired to do the jobs that the whites wouldn’t do. Rebuilding cells in rooms full of airborne asbestos. Packing solid lye, and getting “mosquito bites” – welts all over the skin from the lye dust in the air. Etc.

Those days are gone (and so is that plant), but their legacy lingers. People tend to go to the types of places and do the sorts of things that they’re comfortable with. And this is the reality that we all inherit.

In time, there will probably be a slow diffusion into the private sector, but it’s going to be a slow process.

“It’s a whole lot more complicated than that.”

That, in a nutshell, is precisely my point. Maybe I should have simply posted that!

There aren’t that many government employees. I’m guessing that one of the reasons that middle class and above blacks vote consistently left is that many of them look at the lower class of blacks and say, “There but for the grace of affirmative action go I.” That’s not the case, but the constant hammering and yammering about what a racist society America is will certainly have an impact.

Interestingly enough, working poor blacks that I have talked to are about the most vigorously hostile to the welfare state crowd that I have ever met.

I’m countering that its primarily due to economics.

I’m not sure if I buy that. It’s not obvious that the white poor of comparable income, education, and family status have similar voting patterns. It’s a whole lot more complicated than that.

One thing that I think is beyond dispute is that neither party has produced any serious tangible benefit since the civil rights movement. The donkeys can’t do anything other than what they’ve been doing for the past 50 years. They’re bound by dogma. The elephants, can, but won’t. School choice, for example. Great stuff for papers from think tanks, but Bush had 8 years to make this a top priority, and what did we get instead? NCLB.

The ball really is in the elephant’s court, but he’s got to be less a creature of habit than the donkey. For God’s sake, give people some tangible reason to believe that things are going to be better, don’t just feed them a bunch of hope and change head cheese.