Posted on 07/05/2019 2:51:41 AM PDT by Kaslin
Sen. Kamala Harris demonstrated rare skill during the debate -- managing to shiv Joe Biden and look nice doing it. By adopting the language of "hurt" instead of anger, she finessed the problem that usually attends launching an unprovoked attack: that it may harm the perpetrator as much as the target -- think Chris Christie and Marco Rubio in 2016. Harris' pose of wounded disappointment shielded her -- at least until her rollout of $35 T-shirts the following morning, featuring the image of herself as a child. That revealed, shall we say, a certain calculation.
Still, Harris's maneuver achieved its purpose, vaulting her into the top tier of Democratic candidates. The price will come later. Many on the left are now combing over Biden's record on busing and crime, mining it for nuggets that can make him seem if not quite racist, then insufficiently sensitive for the 21st century. Harris demanded that Biden acknowledge it was a mistake to oppose busing in the 1970s and '80s. And Cory Booker, no doubt cursing fate that he was slotted in the first debate and thus missed his chance to be the black candidate who could skewer the front-runner, has issued post-hoc fighting words: "I think Joe Biden is going to have to talk a lot about his record during this election, and I think it's only right that he talk about everything from his support of the 1994 crime bill ... all the way to his stance on busing."
Hoo, boy. To review, some or most of the 2020 Democrats now support eliminating private medical insurance, making it merely a traffic fine to cross the border, extending full health coverage to illegal aliens, paying off everyone's student debt, providing "free" college and universal pre-K, offering reparations for slavery and to same-sex couples who couldn't marry until 2015, Medicare for All and forced busing.
The pile-on over the 1994 crime bill (which, at the time, many leading black politicians supported) is just around the corner.
This is a strategic mistake and a policy mistake by the Democrats.
Strategy first. Busing to achieve racial integration was always deeply unpopular. In 1972, a Gallup poll found that only 20% of respondents favored "compulsory busing of some children both black and white so that school desegregation can be achieved." Seventy percent opposed.
Now to policy: Some resistance to busing was doubtless motivated by racism, but it's wrong to assume that racism was the whole story. In the 1950s, most white Americans favored separate schools. But since the 1960s, majorities of both black and white Americans have supported integrated schools -- and overwhelming majorities since the 1980s. A Public Opinion Quarterly study found that in 2004, 83% of parents would choose a school that was "mostly mixed," as their ideal. But when they were asked if they supported busing to achieve this, support for diverse schools plummeted.
Even among black parents, support for busing was tepid. A 1998 survey found that only 55% of African American parents favored busing to achieve racial balance in schools. Larger majorities favored redrawing district lines (69%), letting parents choose their top three schools (65%) or building more low-cost housing in middle-class neighborhoods (84%) to achieve the same goal.
Schools with majority minority students aren't bad schools because of the students (many charter schools are doing well); they're bad because parents aren't as involved as those in suburbs and because teachers unions make it difficult to offer choice. Many inner-city schools are also plagued by discipline problems and violence. Labeling suburban parents who don't want their kids bused to these schools as racist is unjust.
As always, the law of unintended consequences has the last word. Jeff Jacoby of The Boston Globe reminds us that in 1970, before Boston's disastrous experiment with busing, 62,000 white students attended public schools. By 1994, only 11,000 did. The likelihood that a minority student would have white classmates declined sharply after busing, as "white flight" increased de facto segregation.
Busing was bad policy, but oh, yeah, it was also unpopular. Way to go, Democrats.
[Schools with majority minority students aren’t bad schools because of the students ... Many inner-city schools are also plagued by discipline problems and violence.]
“In 1972, a Gallup poll found that only 20% of respondents favored “compulsory busing of some children both black and white so that school desegregation can be achieved.” Seventy percent opposed.”
We live in a “democracy” (I know it’s not, but that’s what our betters are always calling it) where the will of 70% of the people was easily pushed aside in favor of 20%.
Mona Charen is a horror show.
Why?
The needs of the few, are to oppress the many.
Joe; that is NOT the Red, White and Blue of our Nation’s flag behind you.
Yep, and that poll is nearly 50 years old, so this is nothing new. The “Silent Majority” in 1972 was busy getting a president re-elected in a landslide, only to have their will overturned by the media on grounds that seem trivial compared to what has transpired since then.
I guess it all depends on whether it actually washes, the claims of victimhood. You see that all the time on the ground, and it doesn’t always, or even often work. From where I sat, among quite a few Democrats, it worked if someone else had a use for getting rid of the alleged guilty party. Then the “victim” would be fawned all over until they were no longer useful, then they would be gotten rid of, because I guess, you really can’t run things around grievance, it’s just good for “creative destruction.” They may do things differently in California, but generally I’ve seen Kamala types before, but it is a first to actually see anyone actually get behind them to help them run the show. Joe’s number is up by conventional calculations. He has been shown the door and he didn’t take the hint. Problem is, though, hes the best the Dems have, so the leadership are fools. The question is, do they have enough power to sell their b.s. to the citizenry and not just to the workers who have to listen to them or be made an example of?
Oh no not this racist crap again,can’t democrats get an original thought out of the old playbook
Busing is great for home values in adjacent communities.
I think the reason Joe is persona non-grata is because the Dems REALLY don’t want the doings of the Obama administration to be current events. They don’t want ANYBODY to take a closer look while a Republican sits in the White House able to pull the levers of power. They want no referendums on the Obama administration. Problem is that Joe played by the rules, and that too is a tradition. You don’t screw over the people who play by the rules, so it is union people vs the Obama administration’s quest for continued power. Nice little schism if you can exploit it. Might even put the Dems back on the footing of being reasonable humans you can work with with all the rapacious ones in jail, if you’re really lucky.
I hope some reporter looks into this (probably won’t). As I understand it, princess Kamala was born into wealth. Her mother was a breast cancer scientist and her father a Stanford economics professor. The wealthy elites back then did not have to worry about their little princesses being bussed. I find it uncreditable that she was part of forced bussing into white neighborhoods. I think she was already in those upper class white neighborhoods....
Biden was sucking up to the Clintons. Then-Pres Bill Clinton's 1994 crime bill demanded:
<><> stiffer penalties for inner city criminals,
<><> mass incarcerations of minorities,
<><> It encouraged and for the first time the US had a federal three-strikes and you're out law,
<><> It funded the building of more prisons in the states.....
Then-First Lady Hillary took to the mic to burnish her ambitions, and stupidly called the black criminals "super-predators."
"We have to bring them to heel," Hillary insisted.
Black protesters showed up at her 2016 campaign events, reminding her of her choice of words to describe them.
Kamalalala should run on busing.
It’s a sure winner..../s
Not only that, but she was born an Indian national and a Jamaican national, only American by accident of geography.
She is not a natural born citizen.
Natural born citizens are NATURALLY citizens because they cannot be anything else and have only ONE nationality.
I’m willing to bet that those protestors showed up during the primary and not the general.
“Jeff Jacoby of The Boston Globe reminds us that in 1970, before Boston’s disastrous experiment with busing, 62,000 white students attended public schools. By 1994, only 11,000 did.”
The problem with liberals in a nutshell. They will mouth all kinds of nice-sounding platitudes, but when it comes to putting their money (or kids’ futures) on the line they vote with their feet. Private schools, gated communities, elite universities...
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