Obama’s Response to Ricci
Like most liberal politicians, President Barack Obama supports race-based preferential treatment, although he calls it affirmative action, which it is not. We’ve explained on the blog several times what affirmative action is: widening the recruitment net to include qualified minorities historically left out of the process for whatever reason. Racial preferences are not affirmative action. Preferences purport to include qualified minorities, but most often involve lowering standards to increase “diversity.”
Last week the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in favor of white firefighters and against the city of New Haven in Ricci v DeStefano. The city had thrown out the results of a promotions test because no blacks scored high enough to qualify for promotions. The city claimed that had it certified the test results, it could have been sued by black firefighters under the disparate impact theory.
“Keep in mind the Supreme Court didn’t close the door to affirmative action,” Obama told the Associated Press. “I’ve always believed that affirmative action was less of an issue or should be less of an issue than it has been made out to be in news reports. It hasn’t been as potent a force for racial progress as advocates will claim and it hasn’t been as bad on white students seeking admissions or seeking a job as its critics say.”
Obama is delusional to think racial bean-counting “hasn’t been as bad” on whites applying to schools or for jobs. Racial discrimination is just as demoralizing and unfair to whites as it is to blacks, regardless of what Obama says. The government has no businesses judging one individual as more deserving than another based on the color of his/her skin. Private employers shouldn’t do it, either, but the government is constitutionally required to treat citizens as individuals and not as members of a racial group. By preferring one person over another based on race, the government is doing exactly that.
While the president tries to appease both sides of the debate with smooth rhetoric, to reasonable people, it rings false. The size and extent of the negative effects of racial discrimination aren’t the point. Racial discrimination needs to be abolished in whole, not in part.
