[CatoRenasci]

It's really a pity, because 'affirmative action' could have been structured to be a merit-oriented way to help the disadvantaged.

I was involved in the early debates over affirmative action and its shape at the University of California.

I was part of a faction that proposed an affirmative action program that would concentrate on identification of talented students through testing and interviews, and extensive remediation efforts at the junior college level to bring otherwise unprepared disadvantaged students up to the standards required for regular admission to the University. Those admitted on this approach would have been expected to take a traditional academic major, not something in ethnic studies or the like.

Our idea was that once the student was at the University, he or she would be treated exactly as any other student without preference, although with perhaps access to supportive services to help with adjustment to university life.

This approach would have ensured that there would be no question as to the qualification of the student to be at Cal or any question that the student had done the same work for a degree. Unfortunately, we lost.

[dead]

I'm sorry you lost.

It became a skin-color-based entitlement, that ignored scholastic merit.

The same sort of racial spoils system that was dismantled in South Africa is still being pushed in this country by our faux-compassionate liberals.

[lepton]

That's one of two parts of affirmative action I can deal with. The other was the original "foot in the door" part, the need for which is long gone. Once the foot is in the door, the reverse monopoly is broken, and people who act on their racism pay a price.