In the obit for former Senator Jesse Helms on NBC Nightly News, they mentioned (or at least hinted at) his racist background, as they should have, but I was stunned by the conclusion.
Martin Savidge reporting (at about 2:58 of the NBC video segment):
But there is one point on which both critics and supporters do agree: Helms led the rise of the modern conservative movement.
This was followed by the disreputable Pat Buchanan saying, “He was the most principled conservative in the United States Senate.”
I don’t see what’s “modern” or “principled” about Jesse Helms, who came to fame in North Carolina through his overt racism.
And – most of all — I don’t see how NBC has the nerve to say that both critics and supporters agree that “Helms led the rise of the modern conservative movement.” Until Martin Savidge said so, I had never heard anyone say anything even remotely like that. I’ve heard many people or groups credited with leading the modern conservative movement: Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, William Buckley, and Rush Limbaugh, and in a more indirect manner, the Weekly Standard, the Olin Foundation, the Federalist Society, and the Heritage Foundation. I have never heard anyone, until I heard Martin Savidge tonight, say anything like this: “Helms led the rise of the modern conservative movement.”
UPDATE: JPS in the comments helpfully points out that many conservative organizations are making claims similar to NBC's:
All I can say is that, while I am not myself in the conservative movement, I know some people who were -- and are -- major players, and they never said anything about Helms that was even approximately similar to these sentiments. But then the people I talk to are academic in their profession or their approach to the world.The folks at the American Conservative Union disagree. David Keene's quotes in the NYT obit don't use those words exactly, but are pretty close. Former ED David Josi referred to him as, among other platitudes "quite possibly the most important U.S. senator ever to have served."
Then there's ConservativeHQ today saying in a press release today "It was the New Right that energized and led the conservative movement in the 1970s and 1980s and our beloved leader was Senator Helms." ConservativeHQ.com
Jesse Helms Center's webpage in his bio: "A founding figure of the modern conservative movement"
The folks at the American Conservative Union disagree. David Keene's quotes in the NYT obit dont use those words exactly, but are pretty close. Former ED David Josi referred to him as, among other platitudes "quite possibly the most important U.S. senator ever to have served."
Then there's ConservativeHQ today saying in a press release today "It was the New Right that energized and led the conservative movement in the 1970s and 1980s and our beloved leader was Senator Helms." ConservativeHQ.com
So bottom line, it's not NBC that has the nerve. Don't blame this one on the "liberal media"
Thanks very much for the info. I updated my post accordingly.
Jim Lindgren
Righteous Warrior
Jesse Helms and the Rise of Modern Conservatism
William A. Link
St. Martin's Press
656 pages
Size: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
Plus one 8-page b&w photo insert
$39.95
Hardcover
Pub Date: 02/2008
ISBN: 0-312-35600-5
In the light of a cold sober dawn in a few months, most of Helms' conservative eulogists will regret their hosannas to a man who, while an important senator, built his career on race-baiting.
There was no 'Southern Strategy'.
Reagan chose the location of his speeches by accident, not for any deeper reason, and "States' Rights" was about federalism. Just federalism.
Welfare moms and Willie Horton? Government entitlements and crimes. Move along, no subtext.
Republicans are the party of Lincoln, while the "Democrat Party" is the bastion of Sen. Byrd (did you know he was in the KKK?).
Finally, Sen. Helms is a father of the conservative movement- remember how he stood up to the UN? All those appointments he blocked? That racist thing? Eh.... he's not really a leader of the modern conservative movement (other quotes notwithstanding).
Remember- the way to stop discrimination is to stop discriminating. Umm... where is that from? Plessy ("If the two races are to meet upon terms of social equality, it must be the result of natural affinities, a mutual appreciation of each other's merits, and a voluntary consent of individuals."). Somewhere.
Anyway, I hope some people understand this syllogism:
1. The Republican party appeals to racists.
2. This is a small, but significant portion of their vote.
3. It is always amusing to watch "conservatives" tie themselves into knots trying to disavow this obvious fact. It's like watching liberals attempt to argue that the Democratic party is not overly beholden to teachers' unions.
On racism, the data say otherwise.
Until 2000, Democrats were consistently the more racist party -- and had been for at least 70 years, despite incorrect academic claims to the contrary. Since 2000, the Republicans have become roughly equal to Democrats in their racism.
As the 2008 Democratic primaries revealed, there is still a strong racist strain among mainstream Democrats.
But the claim was about Helms' role in the modern conservative _movement_, which is, and has always been, fundamentally racist, and has always derived its base of support from racists.
Doesn't seem to be working this year, thus all the fainting spells among the "liberal media".
You are sadly mistaken that the "modern Conservative Movement" is fundamentally racist.
After all, it was the Modern Conservatives who pushed through the Civil Rights Act over Democrat objections.
You should be more careful whom you libel.
Helms also has another legacy--he either started or greatly increased the modern practice of blocking judicial nominations for political reasons.
Setting characterizations of the national parties aside, it cannot be reasonably disputed that Helms himself was an unreconstructed racist. Throughout the 60's he was a commentator on the local news known for spewing the standard racist lines of the day. Mysteriously every single one of the tapes of his commentaries has been lost. Imagine that.
I think one must distinguish between the modern conservative movement, which Helms came to late, and modern conservatism as a governing coalition, in which Helms' helping Reagan win the 1976 NC primary was crucial.
I wasn't aware that women now are considered to be a race of their own...
It is possible to look at Lyndon Johnson as a great president (civil rights) and a terrible president (Vietnam).
It is possible to look at Jesse Helms as a great Senator (read his speech to the U.N. available online), and a terrible Senator (racism).
I've heard TV commentators say Helms was against civil rights and foreign aid, as if they are morally equal. But many people are against foreign aid for pragmatic reasons, because it's a waste of money and does more harm than good. Helms had the courage to say that. Good for him.
And for those pointing out that Helms laid the foundation for Reagan in '76 to be the heir apparent in '80, that alone puts Helms in the pantheon of great men. I think many in Eastern Europe would agree.
Oh, I get it. The liberals started it. I just went back for a speech honoring his 100th birthday (why no recognition of THAT at the Volokh Conspiracy? It was July 2, 1908 he was born) and looked at the cases that Thurgood Marshall argued (or helped orchestrate) for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in the Supreme Court in the period that Robert H. Jackson was on the court from 1941-1954 BEFORE Brown.
Let's see:
1) Elections. Election segregation (altering of voters votes to get them disqualified - US v/ Classic (1941); white only primaries in Texas - Smith v. Allwright (1944); Jaybird self-governing club in Texas as a Democratic party for the white primaries (Terry v/ Adams (1953),
2) Education. Graduate education where blacks were sent out of state as opposed to being able to go to the local top university (State of Missouri et rel, Gaines v/ Canada et al (1938 key case just before); Sipuel v/ Board of Regents of University of Oklahoma (1948); Sweatt v. Painter (1950); McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education (1950)
3. Criminal law. All white juries in selection of grand jury and petit jury Patton v. Mississippi (1948); selection of white men only for the jury Cassell v/ State of Texas (1950); all white jury Shephed v/ State of Florida (1951). This last one is particularly interesting as there is a concurrence from Justice Jackson saying "Under these circumstances, for the Court to reverse these convictions upon the sole ground that the method of jury selection discriminated against the Negro race, is to stress the trivial and ignore the important. While this record discloses discrimination which under normal circumstances might be prejudicial, this trial took place under conditions and was accompanied by events which would deny defendants a fair trial before any kind of jury." The two defendants were lynched shortly afterward.
4. Interstate travel. - segregation on interstate motor transporation Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia (1946)
5. Housing - Racially restrictive covenants (Shelley v/ Kramer (1948); Hurd v/ Hodge (1948); Barrows v/ Jackson (1953). The history of these racially restrictive covenants is particularly instructive. As blacks moved north from the racist southern oppression in the 1920's there was fear in white neighborhoods in the north of blacks coming in in numbers. Attempts at passing segregationist laws in the north met difficulty in the courts. So through the magic of contracts, racially restrictive covenants were put in place by which people could not sell their homes to blacks (and other groups as time went on). These were not considered state action for the longest time (about 25 years) so the courts would enforce them as private agreements (sanctity of contract) until in 1948 the court refused to enforce them. If you look at some titles for real property and leases at least into the 1970's and maybe even today you will find these little gems in them.
Five areas in which the power was reserved by whites (particularly white men) in elections, in education, in transportation, in criminal law, and in housing. Sure looks to me that the racial spoils was clearly a "white thing" to the benefit of whites. And unless my math has gotten wrong that would make from 1607 to 1948 about 341 years of oppression morphing from slavery through segregation and notwithstanding a civil war in the midst of it all.
From 1948 on it has been a long and difficult process of dismantling the legacy of that white spoils system to move toward integration and hopefully equality.
Jesse Helms was no help in that process and I believe there is a special place in hell reserved for him for all the pain he has inflicted on the least of these through his apologia to racism.
Best,
Ben
That is absurd. If I replaced conservative with progressive and racist with socialist, many on the left would have a hissy. Moreover, have you ever noticed which side of the political spectrum always seems to bring up race? Maybe we could just replace conservative with progressive in your statement...
care to provide some?
i know the general consensus on these boards is that liberals/democrats are evil and responsible for all the bad in this world, but that hardly constitutes data.
I'd be interested in knowing how you settled on that date.
More important, this is meaningless -- you, Professor, are intelligent enough to know that most of the Southern racists of the Democratic Party left it to become Republicans (where they were welcomed with open arms).
Are you suggesting that Helms left the Democrats because they were too racist?
No, this sort of argument is an insult to your readers.
so merely discussing race issues is racist? acknowledging that there are disparities between the races, trying to figure out why and searching for solutions is racist?
Yes, it is racist, because it is fundamentally focused on race. Why is saying "we need to ensure whites do better" any more racist than saying "we need to ensure that blacks do better"?
The point being . . . what? Oh I get it, the damned liberal MSM, blah, blah, blah.
Aside from the fact that you are almost certain to be wrong about that, what does Byrd's racism have to do with Helms'? You can't swing a dead cat in the South without hitting some 80-100 year-old politician with serious racial skeletons in his closet.
Goldwater voted against the Civil Rights Act; which "Modern Conservatives" voted for it or pushed it through? Certainly the southern wing of the Democratic party voted against the bill; the problem with your argument is that most of them subsequently became Republicans.
I know many "conservatives" prefer to make up their own facts, but the idea that the Democratic party's base of support is among socialists in the same way that the Republican party's has been among racists has the small defect of being untrue & just plain silly. Which Democratic/progressive politicians favor social ownership of the means of production (nationalizing industry)?
As far as "bringing up race", perhaps you do not see the irony of accusing Democrats of "bringing up race" while defending the memory of Jesse Helms?
For that matter, I don't know which base is more racist. I haven't seen the data. There are certainly racially obsessed people on both sides of the political spectrum who want goodies to be distributed on the basis of race.
My point being that the big 3 networks have a different standard for Democrats than they do for Republicans. People who are liberal or Democrat don't care because they benefit for the bias.
As for Senator Byrd, it is well known that he was a KKK member and said "white nigger" in a Fox News interview.
if you are going to use fairly unusual definitions of a word, you really should say so.
why isn't not talking about race issues in the face of disparity also considered racism?
Why is saying "we need to ensure whites do better" any more racist than saying "we need to ensure that blacks do better"?
better in relation to who? i know of very few liberals who want blacks to do better than whites. i know of a great many who want both races to given the same opportunities.
The tired bit about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn't help the conservative cause. Sure, a lot of conservative southern Dems opposed it -- because conservatives generally opposed it, and liberals generally supported it. As has been mentioned, and as LBJ predicted, this meant that the Dems would increasingly lose the south going forward.
Helms was an important part of the U.S. conservative movement, and that fact should be an embarrassment to modern-day Republicans and conservatives.
Considering 80% of Republicans in the House and Senate voted for it, there might have been a couple.
Are you kidding? See recent congressional hearing with congresswoman Maxine Waters...
You literally, by definition, cannot have affirmative action without passing over a more qualified white male.
You can argue about it. You can obfuscate it. You can talk about Emmett Till. But you can't honestly make the point that AA means not passing over more qualified white males.
(And Asians)
You say you "haven't seen the data" on racism as a basis for Republican/conservative electoral victories?
As you are evidently very young & thus don't have personal memories of any presidential election from 1964 onwards to draw on here, Rick Perlstein's Nixonland: The rise of a President & the fracturing of America would be an excellent start; a quick perusal of the Wikipedia article on the Southern Strategy won't even require you to get up from your computer.
Of course, since our original topic is the sainted memory of conservative icon Jesse Helms, this WSJ eulogy might be worth noting:
The three fond remembrances on the National Review's home page also indicate the importance of Helms to the modern conservative movement.
Waters is generally considered a bit of an embarrassment within the party (she pushed the idea that the CIA was responsible for the crack epidemic) & is hardly an example of an influential or respected Democrat.
One isolated outlier does not really make a case.
The greatest economic intervention by government in my lifetime was Nixon's wage-price freeze: would that indicate that the Republican party is basically socialist?
What kind of obit will you write for him ?
Will you focus on his history as a Grand Kleagle of the KKK ????? Will that be your concern ?
Face it - your (hitherto unknown to me ) extreme left-wing bias has clouded your judgement, and your commentary.
Sir, you are diminished by what you have written here.
Hilarious.
Have you read what Buckley and other conservatives were writing about civil rights at the time?
The liberals started a racial spoils system in American politics.
Oh really? What would you call the political (and economic) system that existed in the Jim Crow South (and to a slightly lesser degree in many other areas of the country at the time?) Do you seriously believe that affirmative action was the first time race was a factor in American life? Think again, Zarkov.
I am using one of those definitions: "discriminatory especially on the basis of race or religion." Someone who is making distictions based on race is practicing a form a racism.
It depends on why they are not talking about them. If they are intentionally not talking about them to maintain some status quo disparity based on racial discrimination, then it is racist. However, if they are not discussing race issues because they are not the fundamental reason for the disparity, then it is not racism. On the flip side, people who look for every opportunity to discuss racial issues is racist.
By "better," I meant better than the race is currently doing (i.e., wages to increase by 10%, college graduation rates to increase by 20%, etc.).
The focus on racial group performance has lead to some pretty odious results. For example, the University of Michigan points system (at issue in Gratz v. Bollinger) had components gave 20 extra points to certain racial and ethnic groups to encourage greater admission of those groups. It also gave 20 extra points the socio-economic disadvantaged. However, a student could only receive the 20 extra points once.
In other words, the racial/ethnic component of the system conferred no benefit to poor people of those racial and ethnic groups. However, it did allow the middle and upper classes from those ethnic groups to maintian their pre-existing socio-economic advantages over poor whites and Asians.
Not arguing the truth of those statements. I am saying that you are almost surely wrong that the media won't mention those facts when he dies.
2. It's been a few years since I've run the numbers, but I believe that if you look at the 1972-1998 General Social Survey data on party id and measures of classical racism (opposition to interracial marriage, opposition to integration, and believing that African American were born with less ability), you will find that white Democrats were consistently more racist than white Republicans. The trend was in the direction of the Democrats becoming less racist faster than the Republicans, but the idea that the Republican rank &file became more racist than Democrats in the late 1960s or early 1970s is just a myth. The party of Jim Crow didn't turn around on a dime. Traditionally, the most racist segment of the population was conservative and moderate Democrats.
3. Starting about 2000 (and through at least 2004), Republicans lost a lot of support among the well educated and less racist, so Republicans' clear advantage in education and non-racism has dissipated, leaving the parties roughly equal (though there are some differences on education: conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats tend to be highly educated).
4. As the 2008 primaries revealed, the Democratic base is made up chiefly of three groups: African Americans, white liberals (who tend to be well educated and non-racist), and relatively poorly educated and relatively racist white moderate and conservative Democrats. What joins all three groups is populism. And the latter group was large enough that Hillary Clinton got a few more Democratic primary votes than Barack Obama, when Obama carried the first two groups and Clinton carried only the latter group.
The problem arises what do we do next when given the same opportunities they still do not achieve equal results. If everyone starts out at the SAT starting line together but the 1st three winners are all white.
When that happens in sports and the three highest jumpers are black we say merit is our only judge. We don't consider fewer basketball courts in the suburbs only who jumped the highest.
and Maurice Hinchey.
way to miss the mark. do you think people dislike helms because he said things like "blacks are statistically more likely to be poor"?
It depends on why they are not talking about them. If they are intentionally not talking about them to maintain some status quo disparity based on racial discrimination, then it is racist. However, if they are not discussing race issues because they are not the fundamental reason for the disparity, then it is not racism. On the flip side, people who look for every opportunity to discuss racial issues is racist.
so merely mentioning race is guaranteed to make one a racist a no matter what?
By "better," I meant better than the race is currently doing
now explain to me how it is racist to say that some group should be doing better in the future than they are now in some measure?
The focus on racial group performance has lead to some pretty odious results.
the results were much worse before people began seeing the disparities in racial group performance as a bad thing. and no, one example of a bad implementation (one which i never supported) does not mean that the larger principle as a whole is faulty.
Responding to the overall point, why do you suppose African Americans have been an important element of the Democratic Party's base of support since they got to vote? Could it be things like the overt racism of an acknowledged leader of the modern conservative movement (aka the post-Nixon Republican Party) like Jesse Helms?
1970s: Dems 42.0%, Reps 25.4%
1980s: Dems 34.3%, Reps 28.2%
1990s: Dems 20.0%, Reps 15.8%
2000s: Dems 13.5%, Reps 11.7%
As you can see, by the 2000-2006 GSS, Republicans had essentially caught up with Democrats in their opposition to interracial marriage, with only an insignificant 1.8% difference between them.
Jim Lindgren
Writing stories such as this, and then getting people to donate a dolar, five, maybe 10; times that by a million and suddenly your party/issue is a washed by money. (From the Wall Street Journal for the quote)
The Democrats also have the their several of their own strategies to accentuate racial differences and benefit from them.
Which party benefits from playing the race card more? I don't know.
That's a pretty big and fairly absurd assumption. Which racial groups are more likely to attend SAT prep classes and similar programs? Which racial groups make up the majority of poorly performing and funded schools in areas with a significant minority population?
We don't consider fewer basketball courts in the suburbs only who jumped the highest.
I've lived in both urban areas and suburban areas. there were many more basketball courts in suburban areas. for example, in the suburbs about 2/3 of the people i knew had there own basketball net (myself included). when i lived in downtown chicago, the closest basketball court to me was 5 blocks away and they had only 4 nets.
Hinchey...ditto.
Anything either of them said contradict the Rev.Wright?
If you defend that, it would seem that you must be racist. I trust you don't.
Waters and Hinchey are embarrassments but fortunately neither has risen to the prominence in the party as Helms or approached his political influence.
What has he done to get the right all upset? I couldn't find any advocacy of government ownership of industry in his Wikipedia article or Congressional homepage.
"Oh really? What would you call the political (and economic) system that existed in the Jim Crow South ..."
That was regional apartheid. Apartheid differs from a spoils system, although they have some features in common. The modern racial spoils system we have is national in scope as opposed to regional. It essentially began with the Nixon administration and consists of handing out jobs, contracts, judgeships etc to various groups in return for their votes. It launched political careers. For example Ron Dellums started out as a poverty pimp using federal grants which he handed out to gain political influence.
The racial spoils system does not depend on apartheid, or denying people the vote. Like apartheid it uses gerrymandering.
The question of how to undue the legacy of slavery is a difficult one, but the problem began with slavery.
Even today there is an article in the NY Times about segregation in cemetaries in Texas. The question is whether the black funeral parlor can get to bury a white person who did not have any family, etc.
Just think of the advantages that people have from the connections that they and their family members have. Would George Bush be president if his father was not a president and his grandfather a Senator? McCain certainly benefited from a family history in the Navy (although he did show great courage in rejecting the opportunity to be freed earlier from captivity because of his connections).
Many people get help going into all kinds of careers (from family businesses to being police officers and firefighters and actors and even academics) from their family members. Helping people who have no connections to make it into middle class life is going to be even more difficult today with so many good paying jobs evaporating.
It's a mixed bag, but in a binary, politically pragmatic cast it's bound to be no other way at times. The great and telling irony is that the "nuanced" Left, Left/Dems and other partisans as well want us to believe it's not merely a binary/pragmatic political cast but is a manichean script wherein they represent the right, the true and the good.
Puhleez.
So your solution to that problem is not education but to take the group that scores more poorly and arbitrarily accept them and reject the higher scoring applicant. And you wonder why there is a backlash.
You have made the totally unproven assumption that if the second group had SAT prep classes and more funding they would score exactly the same as the higher groups.
The equivalent experiment, was when I grew up in Chicago, if you had given me thousands of hours of training I would have ended up a teammate of Michael Jordan. Big assumption. Not in my DNA.
"1. Racism is usually measured among whites, with African Americans excluded, because most researchers don't equate black racial solidarity with racism."
So why is black racial solidarity not racism while white racial solidarity is? Don't you think that blacks hold invidious racial stereotypes about Hispanics, Asians, Indians etc. If you don't you need to get out more. Some light-skinned blacks even hold invidious stereotypes about darker-skinned blacks. A black friend of mine told me she refused to answer the door because the person ringing the bell was "too dark."
Odd, then, that blacks have for decades supported the Dems so disproportionately. Is it your position, I ask again, that blacks are (in such great numbers) simply confused as to which party is more biased against them? Also odd that there have been so very, very few black Republican elected officials compared to black Democratic elected officials in the past couple of decades, given what you claim was the more benign view towards blacks among Republicans. And that whole Southern Strategy thing by the Republicans? Again, odd for the supposedly more enlightened party.
Again, of course, this is about the conservative movement, and in some ways we can't take party affiliation as a proxy for liberal and conservative. The point is that Helms WAS a product, exemplar, and spokesman for a certain type of conservatism, and there is no escaping that.
You literally, by definition, cannot have affirmative action without passing over a more qualified white male.
About 10 years ago I managed an engineering group for IBM. I was told my group was under-represented in minorities. I replied that we always tried to hire the most qualified individual. The response back was that the company supported that goal. What they wanted our department to do was to spend additional effort finding and recruiting minorities. We followed that advice but still always hired the most qualified person, in our view. The result: we ended up with a higher proportion of very highly qualified minorities.
And incidentally, never once was I asked to pass over a more highly qualified individual in order to higher a less qualified candidate.
I think your reading of these numbers is simplistic, as are the arguments about Democratic opposition to Civil Rights laws. The shift you describe was not one of party ideology. The racists moved into the Republican Party, as they found a welcoming home there, Helms and Thurmond, of course, being outstanding examples.
As for Civil Rights legislation, it's true that it was strongly, though not unanimously, supported by Republicans in the 60's. But it was also supported virtually unanimously by northern Democrats. The opposition came from southern Democrats and some northern Republicans. This group cold fairly be described as the conservatives of the time, like it or not.
The blunt fact is that the conservative movement, which was far from identical to the Republican Party at the time, opposed Civil Rights laws. If you doubt that go back and read the political commentary of the time. Bluster about Robert Byrd won't change that.
In addition, you are being overly dismissive of the fundamental problem that the University of Michigan point system represented. Here, an group of educated people at an elite university put together a system that can honestly be described as a travesty. However, when they were called on it, they fought for it all the way up to the Supreme Court. Moreover, Democrats rushed to the defense of the system while critics of the system were decried as racist.
Apparently Fox thinks Helms was "a Capitol Hill icon who devoted 30 years in the Senate to championing conservative causes"; guess they're confused too.
The National Review is full of tributes like Death of a Conservative Great, which compares Helms to the sainted William F. Buckley.
I think you're going to have to acknowledge that the right generally is proud to acknowledge the profoundly racist Helms as a hero & leader of the modern conservative movement.
When did I say that was my solution? you seem to be pretty big on making stuff up but it is not a good rhetorical tactic.
You have made the totally unproven assumption that if the second group had SAT prep classes and more funding they would score exactly the same as the higher groups.
exactly the same? no. statistically similar? maybe. a smaller disparity? most definitely. i have seen no evidence to date that, after accounting for all possible confounding factors, blacks are just plain stupider than whites. i take it from you line of arguments that you don't think this is a fair assumption.
The equivalent experiment, was when I grew up in Chicago, if you had given me thousands of hours of training I would have ended up a teammate of Michael Jordan. Big assumption. Not in my DNA.
wow. what a strawman.
The real question should be: is the variation between the groups statistically significant when compared to the variation within each group. This tells you how much predictive power knowledge of the group membership gives over the result.
you're right, with the sole addition of the word solely in "...should always be viewed solely as a racial issue...". but this is a far cry from you original statements on this board. refusing to talk about and ignoring racial issues when they are one of several contributing factors is also racist.
Moreover, Democrats rushed to the defense of the system while critics of the system were decried as racist.
your view of this is overly simplistic. much of the democratic defense was a result of republicans using the one example to bash the entire concept of affirmative action. i suspect much of the same with the conservative's support of the boy scouts right to be anti-gay bigots on the taxpayer's dime.
and i'll note, before you get in too much of a tizzy from being called racist, you and many other conservatives on this board have done the exact same thing and rushed to call liberals/democrats/progressives racist.
1. As predicted, several commenters have noted that Sen. Byrd was a member of the KKK. Wow! Really? I guess that solves everything, right? Because, you know, everytime the dog whistle of the Republican Southern Strategy gets trotted out, we get to here about him.
2. Shorter Michael B.- some of Senator Helm's best
friendsum, house assistants were black, so he couldn't be that bad. You know, if he allowed black people to work for him, he couldn't be a racist, right? You know... he had a press secretary that was black! Just ignore everything he ever said or wrote about race.3. I wonder how many of the people here have lived in certain parts of the South. I once attended a rather nice meal for a legal function where I kept hearing the word 'Democrat' bandied about... I was very confused until I realized that in that area/class it was a synonym for 'black'. YMMV in Memphis.
4. I think there has been one truly insightful comment... don't have the time to scroll back up and see it. There is a dichotomy involved between the modern conservative movement, and the modern conservative governing coalition. The first would not be possible without the second. Unfortunately, there are elements of the second (for example, the racists, or the extreme evangelicals like the IDers pushing evolution out of the schools) that the more pro-business, libertarian conservatives wish to forget about. But without their votes, you've got nothing. Nothing makes me laugh harder than the mental contortions (but look, the Civil Rights Act... the Republicans voted for it!) that people go through to avoid this essential reality.
Again-
The Republican party uses racist appeals to help win votes.
Doesn't mean all (or most) Republicans are racist.
Just like not all Democrats are in favor of raising taxes.
Now, this didn't happen overnight. In fact, it's taken nearly 40 years for the transformation to be complete. For a time, racist Dems could and did vote for Senators and Congressman whom they could trust on racial issues. The change in political culture gradually removed those candidates from the Dem side, but -- and this is key -- not from the Republican side. People like Jesse Helms could survive in the modern Republican party when they could not in the modern Democratic party.*
*Even Robert Byrd has had to try to change his public persona in a way that Helms never did. Byrd doesn't always succeed, of course.
I threw that in to try and prevent exactly what you did do, discuss SAT prep classes and economics. It was a rejoinder to what I knew would be your argument. My reply could be your SAT prep bit is a strawman until proven but I will be more polite.
2) Lindgren--you're quite right that the Democratic rank-and-file has been more racist for some time. But the Republican Party has been more racist at least since the time of Nixon, because they've been making a concerted attempt to appeal to white racism. Black voters didn't flip their allegiance from overwhelmingly Republican to overwhelmingly Democratic for nothing. They could tell who the racist party was, and it wasn't the Democrats.
3) Those trying to equate black solidarity and affirmative-action programs with white racism are committing a phenomenal moral error. Black solidarity is about members of a group that's been systematically oppressed for hundreds of years, up until maybe 30 years ago (the busing cases in the 1970's arose from findings that school districts had intentionally drawn boundaries to ensure de facto segregation) collectively sticking together to make things better for each other. That's not remotely comparable to racist white having stuck together for hundreds of years to oppress them. Likewise, trying to help members of a group that has been systematically oppressed for hundreds of years isn't morally comparable to the system where black people were systematically barred from all manner of jobs, the franchise, admission to universities, etc. Even if affirmative action is morally inappropriate, it's morally trivial compared to the system of discrimination that preceded it.
(#1 isn't mine, but I can't remember where I read it)
I lived in Raleigh during the years Helms was giving daily TV editorials. I did not know but am not surprised that the tapes have disappeared.
What I most remember about him is that he slobbered on TV.
When he decided to run for Senate, I thought, no one who drools on TV can be elected to the United States Senate.
Shows what I know.
Since you decided to smear Senator McCain by refering to his "illegitimate black child" (his daughter Bridget, who is actually from an orphanage run by Mother Theresa's organization in Bangladesh, but don't let facts get in the way), you hardly have any credibility to talk about statements made by others.
It might be good racism, or enlightened racism, or noble racism, or whatever. But affirmative action is racism.
I thought it was obvious that I was in no way smearing Senator McCain or his child. Rather, I was referring to surrogates of G.W. Bush who, during the Republican primaries, attacked McCain by accusing him of having an "illegitimate black baby." Had you not heard about that? My point was to add another example of the type of racist attacks/appeals that certain conservatives have used over the years.
Joseph Slater can speak for himself, but I think he was making a sarcastic reference to the use of that smear by Republicans in 2000 in SC.
and when did i defend UMich? on what basis did you associate me with UMich's policies?
Here you have made assumptions.
just like i told you i did.
What is your evidence?
thank you for proving the point of my last sentence. and if you expect me to provide hard data, the least you can do is provide it for your claims.
If the entire black population were to get those classes, their collective scores would rise. Of course if the entire white population were to take the courses their scores too would rise.
and what's your point? as it stands now whites are more likely to get these classes than blacks.
I threw that in to try and prevent exactly what you did do, discuss SAT prep classes and economics. It was a rejoinder to what I knew would be your argument. My reply could be your SAT prep bit is a strawman until proven but I will be more polite.
HAHAHA. you made a horrible strawman, got called on it and this is the best you can do to justify it? you've already admitted that SAT classes raise scores. the economics aspect is well documented. (oh, and you got your timeline wrong. it is nearly impossible to prevent an argument that i had already made.)
This point has been (properly) laughed off above, but taking it on directly, it is absolutely false. Though the bi-partisan coalition that pushed through the Civil Rights Act was more Republican than Democratic, it was overwhelmingly northern liberal and moderate. And the opposition was overwhelmingly southern conservative. 40 years ago it was perfectly normal to be a liberal Republican or a conservative Democrat. Today it verges on the impossible.
That's one definition of racism, and by that definition, yes, affirmative action is racism, irrespective of what motivates those who support it. But "racism" also means race-based hostility or opposition, and by that definition affirmative action isn't racism. It's a corrective, many would say morally required response to a history of racism that created an unlevel playing field.
This is from the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education See paragraph 6
In 2005 the average black score on the combined math and verbal portions of the SAT test was 864. The mean white score on the combined math and verbal SAT was 1068, 17 percent higher.
In 1988 the combined mean score for blacks on both the math and verbal portions of the SAT was 847. By 2005 the average black score had risen only 17 points, or about 1.4 percent, to 864.
Despite the small overall improvement of black SAT scores over the past 17 years, the gap between black and white scores has actually increased. In 1988 the average combined score for whites of 1036 was 189 points higher than the average score for blacks. In 2005 the gap between the average white score and the average black score had grown to 204 points.
Not only are African-American scores on the SAT far below the scores of whites and Asian Americans, but they also trail the scores of every other major ethnic group in the United States including students of Puerto Rican and Mexican backgrounds. In fact, American Indian and Alaska Native students on average score more than 104 points higher than the average score of black students. On average, Asian American students score 227 points, or 19 percent higher, higher than African Americans.
Explaining the Black-White SAT Gap
There are a number of reasons that are being advanced to explain the continuing and growing black-white SAT scoring gap. Sharp differences in family incomes are a major factor. Always there has been a direct correlation between family income and SAT scores. For both blacks and whites, as income goes up, so do test scores. In 2005, 28 percent of all black SAT test takers were from families with annual incomes below $20,000. Only 5 percent of white test takers were from families with incomes below $20,000. At the other extreme, 7 percent of all black test takers were from families with incomes of more than $100,000. The comparable figure for white test takers is 27 percent.
But there is a major flaw in the thesis that income differences explain the racial gap. Consider these three observable facts from The College Board's 2005 data on the SAT:
• Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 993. This is 129 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.
• Whites from families with incomes below $10,000 had a mean SAT test score that was 61 points higher than blacks whose families had incomes of between $80,000 and $100,000.
• Blacks from families with incomes of more than $100,000 had a mean SAT score that was 85 points below the mean score for whites from all income levels, 139 points below the mean score of whites from families at the same income level, and 10 points below the average score of white students from families whose income was less than $10,000.
...........................(crickets chirping)...........
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So why should we take the squeals of the few with the decency to be embarassed by him now?
"1. Racism is usually measured among whites, with African Americans excluded, because most researchers don't equate black racial solidarity with racism. "
One of the common inane rants of the far-left, 'only white people can be racist'. Where was it recently, U of Colorado if I recall, where that was actually codfied in a freshman orientation program, where they were made to agree 'Racist = white, white = racist' ? I guess by your lights when it's BLACKS talking trash about whites, that;s just 'racial solidarity'. Uh huh.
"But then the people I talk to are academic in their profession or their approach to the world. "
And it is painfully obvious that you left the real world a long time ago, cloistering yourself among whak-job liberals in academia. Not only do you resemble Jimmy Carter in your facial features, but in your idiotic liberal positions.
( 'proud to be a liberal' )
"Just think of the advantages that people have from the connections that they and their family members have."
Are you insane ? Are you actually suggesting that 'all white people have inherited family connections and influence, while blacks are deprived of it' ??? I'll tell you what - I'll grant you a 90 % commission, you go out and find the 'inheritted connections and influence' that were my 'entitlement as a white person'. I seem to have misplaced them somewhere. If you find them, you can keep 90 % for youself. How much time are you going to invest is proving your theorum ??? Here's a fantastic profit motive for you. Hell, you can keep 100 %, just drop me a note and let me know where they were.
The point about the Gantt ad is that it is used as if it were racist,when in fact it tells the literal truth. That qualifies as being racist.
All of the above would be true were Helms involved or not.
That is the way AA was supposed to be done. Hubert Humphrey, a leading sponsor, said that it it turned into a quota system, he'd eat a copy of the bill in the well of the Senate. Nobody was nasty enough to call him on it half a minute later when it became a quota system.
And your experience was not in line with, say, UMich, or all the municipal fire and police departments being sued for that very thing.
So...your experience is so honest you're a chump, in the AA world.
www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/read.helmsunspeech.html
He "led" the movement to the extent he was an early activist pushing religious conservatism forward.
all you've shown is that income is not the sole variable of the disparity...a claim i never made.
anyways...i'm out. it's fourth of july weekend and i have family events to attend.
Those calls in South Carolina did not originate from the Bush campaign or any other Bush "surrogates," so why continue peddling that particular smear, you being against smears and all? (Wiki is one place where some info can be found, Byron York another, other sources still are available.)
"Shorter Michael B.- some of Senator Helm's best friends um, house assistants were black, so he couldn't be that bad. You know, if he allowed black people to work for him, he couldn't be a racist, right? You know... he had a press secretary that was black! Just ignore everything he ever said or wrote about race." loki13
Shorter loki13 - I can't forward a cogent thought that is in any way relevant to what was said, but I can fantasize and spew and spit and snarl - and smear.
After citing this review of Helms' political influence and life and providing an excerpt from that commentary, here's what I actually said:
"It's a mixed bag, but in a binary, politically pragmatic cast it's bound to be no other way at times. The great and telling irony is that the "nuanced" Left, Left/Dems and other partisans as well want us to believe it's not merely a binary/pragmatic political cast but is a manichean script wherein they represent the right, the true and the good."
Yep, good to see upright, honorable types take a principled stand against smears! Harrumph, harrumph, harrumph ...
Presumably the respondents included Democrats and Republicans of all races, which means African-Americans (who are overwhelmingly Democrats) would have made up a significant portion of the Democratic respondents and an insignificant portion of the Republicans. Without knowing how the responses broke down by the ethnicity of the respondent, they tell us nothing about the views of white Democrats versus white Republicans, black Democrats versus black Republicans, etc.
There are several reasons such a distinction might be relevant. For example, there are African Americans who have ambivalence about interracial marriage, not because they're hostile to whites, but as a defensive reaction to the perception among some African American men that a white partner implies higher status than a black one. (There's no significant counterpart of whites who see a black partner as bringing them higher status).
The ultimate meaning of such a distinction, and others, is certainly arguable. Moreover, I'm not suggesting the results you listed would be any different if broken down by race. I have no way of knowing, which is just the point. Like the distinction explained above by Mark Field between party registration and actual voting tendency, the results you provided paint such a vague, impressionistic picture that we're left to guess at much of its real meaning.
Unless you believe that IQ can be significantly changed, then the the black-white gap will remain along with all that implies in terms of differential performance. No amount of wishful thinking or government expenditures is going to change this basic fact of nature.
The South became more Republican after the civil rights era, but it wasn't because racists were switching to the GOP. These are left-wing urban legends. The more racist someone was, the less likely to switch. It was newcomers to the South most likely to be Republican.
Do you really doubt that the smears against McCain came from surrogates/supporters of Bush, McCain's main opponent? If not them, whom? The Wiki entry I found on the issue does not say they didn't come from the Bush side.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whisper_campaign)
The broader point, of course, is that these types of racist appeals have been part and parcel of a certain type of Republican politics since the southern strategy was implemented. And there are multiple examples of that above.
The great and telling irony is that the
"nuanced" Left, Left/Demsideologues and other partisansas wellof every stripe want us to believe it's not merely a binary/pragmatic political cast but is a manichean script wherein they represent the right, the true and the good.CJColucci hit the nail on the head. There were no conservative critics of Helms while he was active in politics. And not many now.
Oh goody. Another thread for Zarkov to "entertain" us with his bete noire (term used very advisedly).
LM responded:
My response:
No, I gave you the data on white Dems v. white Reps, just as I claimed.
Jim Lindgren
1. The White-Black IQ difference (W-B) has remained about 1 SD over several decades on IQ tests (e.g., WAIS and Stanford Binet Full-Scale IQs). [Note: SAT scores are strongly related to IQ (r > .80) and to the general factor (also known as g; see below).]
2. As Zarkov notes, this W-B difference (favoring whites) increases as SES increases: Extrapolating from Jensen’s graph (The g factor, p. 358), the W-B difference for the least affluent SES category is no more than two IQ points, whereas the W-B difference for the most affluent SES category is about 16 IQ points.
3. W-B differences are most pronounced on tests that have the highest loading (correlation) with the general factor (g). G measures variance that mental ability tests have in common. It is highly heritable. It is also strongly related to brain structure (e.g., brain size and white matter volume) and brain physiology (e.g., BOLD MRI responses in the DLPFC while solving problems on the Raven, a highly g loaded test).
4. The W-B difference cannot be explained by IQ item bias: Item characteristic curves (ICCs), which report the percentage of individuals in a sample who pass an item, are functionally equivalent for blacks and whites. Thus, if an item is harder for blacks (relative to other items on the test), it’s also harder for whites.
5. The W-B difference cannot be explained by predictive bias: The predictive validity of IQ scores for important outcomes (school grades or job performance) is nearly identical for blacks and whites. Indeed, when predictive bias is present, IQ scores almost always slightly *overestimate* how well blacks will do in school or on the job. Thus, from a psychometric standpoint, IQ scores are biased in favor of blacks.
6. W-B differences (of around 1 SD) have been obtained in countries other than the US that have had no history of institutionalized discrimination against blacks.
Re: my prior comment, I see you did specify that the summarized survey results were for white respondents only. The questions I had in that regard are obviously n/a. Sorry for the confusion.
It is what it is.