San Francisco Is The Canary In The Coal Mine For Where Wokeism Is Headed

Daily Caller ^ | 12/03/2022 | Alan Dershowitz,

[SeekAndFind]

The City of San Francisco is constitutionally prohibited from disqualifying job applicants on the basis of race. That is precisely what occurred to John Arntz who has held the job of San Francisco’s director of the Department of Elections for two decades.

He has been repeatedly praised for his excellent performance at this increasingly important job - important because of so many election challenges and doubts. Just two years ago, the election commission commended him for his “incredible leadership.”

But now they are essentially firing him because he is apparently of the wrong race to satisfy their “racial equity plan”.

This is what he was told:

“Our decision wasn’t about your performance, but after twenty years we wanted to take action on the City’s racial equity plan and give people an opportunity to compete for a leadership position.”

The mayor of San Francisco, London Breed, disagreed:

“John Arntz has served San Francisco with integrity, professionalism and has stayed completely independent. He’s remained impartial and has avoided getting caught up in the web of City politics, which is what we are seeing now as a result of this unnecessary vote.”

“Over the last year John successfully ran four elections while navigating a pandemic that thwarted San Francisco into crisis response – all without a single issue. Rather than working on key issues to recover and rebuilt our City, this is a good example of unfair politicization of a key part of our government that is working well for the voters of this city.”

All of the 12 managers in his department asked that his contract be renewed. But in today’s woke world of identity politics, race trumps meritocracy. “Racial equity” plans are apparently more important than electoral integrity.

It well maybe that Arntz’s “equity” replacement will be as good as or better than him. There are, after all, highly qualified people of all races and backgrounds. But that is not the point. His contract would clearly have been renewed — he would not have been fired — if he were of an “acceptable” race.

But he is not, because he does not meet the criteria for the city’s “racial equity plan.”

To cover their legal rear ends (“CYA”) the panel has said that Arntz can “reapply” and be considered among the pool of candidates who do meet the criteria of racial equity, even though he does not! This “CYA” tactic does not even pass the giggle test.

It certainly does not pass the constitutional test, even the one that currently allows universities to place the thumb of racial diversity on the scale of admissions. That test is likely to be changed — perhaps disallowed — even in the context of private universities such as Harvard.

There is one important benefit to the San Francisco decision — at least as compared to university admissions decisions. The San Francisco panel did not try to disguise the racial criteria they are employing, whereas most universities go to great length to deny that race alone is often a dispositive factor in ranking applicants.

This will make it easier for the courts to hold San Francisco’s Arntz decision as a clear violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.

But even if this particularly outrageous decision is struck down as unconstitutional, many cities and other governmental units will continue to use race as a basis for hiring and firing employees. They will simply be less transparent about it than San Francisco was.

In the bad old days, race was often used to discriminate against black applicants. Today race is often used to discriminate in favor of black applicants. I guess that is some sort of progress. But real progress will be achieved only if and when race is no longer a factor that trumps meritocracy.

Only then will Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream of how his children and ours should be judged become a reality.

[nickcarraway]

Is it? They recalled their ultraprogressive DA earlier this year.

[DoughtyOne]

No one should forget, San Francisco sank to its lowest point
under Mayor Gavin Newsom.

In the business district the crime and destruction has been
so bad, the property owners have opted to let their property
sit vacant until some semblance of normalcy is restored.

This angered the city council so much so, that they came up
with punitive measures to try and get those building owners
to get back to business as usual.

First of all, the workers that would be involved in that
would have to run a gauntlet to work on the buildings, and
then the owners would have to get lease agreements with
businesses that didn’t mind having their goods stolen on
the very first day of opening their business.

Gavin and his fellow travelers have moved that model around
the state, so other areas can experience the same bliss.

We either expose this stuff and get it addressed or our
nation is going to fold and go full Democracy on us, total
equality, total control.

The steps that are being taken, it looks like the latter is
the most likely to happen.

[Angelino97]

San Francisco is not a "canary in a coalmine."

A "canary in a coalmine" is the most vulnerable, the most sensitive, to a particular threat. The first to fall.

San Francisco is the opposite. It's the hardcore. The most resistant to any attacks to wokeism.

If wokeism falls in San Francisco, that might signal something. But the "canary in a coalmine" metaphor is not appropriate.

[irishjuggler]

Thirty-five years ago when Dersh would turn up on Bill Buckley’s Firing Line or similar TV shows, he WAS the left. The LEFT left. He hasn’t moved, but the left has, and now he’s like a centrist decrying where the left is now. Which, if we had known that then, would have scared the hell out of our younger selves.

[Ronaldus Magnus III]

I remember a woman who was hired based on her resume and last name (hispanic). When she arrived for the job, they discovered she was not hispanic. She never claimed to be, they never outright asked, they were just checking off boxes and quotas. They tried to take back the job offer, but the lawsuit would have cost more than all the years on the job.

[asinclair]

When I applied for my first job, at a land grant university, as a computer operator, I was told point blank by the hiring official "I'd hire you in a New York minute if you were a black female."

I've never forgotten that.

[faithhopecharity]

San Fransicko a canary - yes. But the communists killed The City years ago.

Is a dead canary still a good warning alarm?