Semi-Daily Journal

Thank you!

This is hearsay, but I was told of an email received by someone from Sullivan to the effect of:

I don't care if any drugs are able to be distributed to Africa. I'm not a socialist.

...so this is no surprise.

And what will black Americans be doing, meanwhile, to shoulder their own share of the "collective responsibility"? They presumably want to be considered men too.

" I would suggest... that insofar as a collection of people wishes to claim existence as a society or a nation, it must thereby accept existence as a community through time, hence must acknowledge that acts committed by earlier agents still bind or burden the contemporary community.... [W]hatever reparation is still possible must be attemped.... Nor does this responsibility have a time limit. Responsibility for a burdened past can justifiably become less preoccupying as other experiences are added to the national legacy."

Thank you, Brad. You know I really want to be a MAN too!

I'm verey concerned that my comunity - European Americans - has done uncountable damage to the whole rest of the world through our colonial past. And since I identify with my French, German, English, Irish, Scottish ancestors and my wife's Russian, Polish, Portuguese and Italian ancestors I think that before we educate our children that we are duty bound to educate the offsspring of our former colonial subjects and victims as well as provide for their clean water, wholesome food, healthcare and entertainment.

I really don't think you can claim to be a REAL MAN while most of the rest of the world is suffering because of our greedy ancestors. American blacks are only a few tens of millions. Why do they deserve more restitution than the many billions who've suffered far worse, such as those Africans fortunate enough not to have been made American slaves.

Why don't you support dividing the total world's financial production by the number of humans on the planet and taking away the amount that people have above that average from those who have it and distributing it to those who have less than the average.

THEN WE'LL ALL BE REAL MEN, won't we?

Adrian

>>This is hearsay, but I was told of an email received by someone from Sullivan to the effect of: "I don't care if any drugs are able to be distributed to Africa. I'm not a socialist."<<

I strongly believe that's fake: to nurse the sick is one of the principal Works of Mercy, and Andrew Sullivan is very, very Catholic (in his one strange cafeteria way).

Thanks for the inclusion of the article by Charlie Maier. The idea of a "half life" of societal responsiblity for wrong deeds perpetrated on a class is interesting. I am a self defined "bleeding heart liberal" and proud of it. However, I do worry about the generation of a long term victum class with claim to special treatment. We tend to have quite a few of these now: the rich needing lower taxes, large corps needing special access to the power of government and farmers needing periodic bailouts. Make your own list. Sunseting some of the special considerations would make me happier but I don't see how our system could make them work. Maybe only constant and vigiorius debate on the issues is the ans.
Maybe Andrew throws a fish in our face to help generate that debate. I hope his comments are not his real beliefs.

Adrian wrote:

>>we are duty bound to educate the offsspring of our former colonial subjects and victims as well as provide for their clean water, wholesome food, healthcare and entertainment.<<

Well, yes. :-) America has a heavy, special responsibility for the successful economic and social development of the Philippines, the Pacific islands, much of Central America, Vietnam, et cetera.

But I would think repairing the effects of slavery and Jim Crow counts as an even higher and more urgent duty...

Brad

Very well put Brad. That is why even as a conservative/libertarian I support Affirmative Action.

One thing that has started to bother me about Affirmative Action though is that the argument for it has largely strayed from the argument you make to the vaguer promotion of diversity. And where diversity programs start and end and who gets covered or not is a slippery slope that concerns me as the ethnic groups and combinations in America explode.

All white campuses fall way short of giving the students a well rounded education. If college were only book learning, students could open a few books and be done with it. A major part of the college experience is introducing students to diversity. So many students are raised in all white enclaves and have little contact with people of color or from other countries religiouns, etc.

The biggest push for diversity in colleges comes from the potential employees. The business community is solidly behind affirmative action in colleges. Why? Because business is increaseingly global and needs employees that can relate to people that are different from themselves. If students do not learn about people different from themselves in colleges, they will have to learn on the job. Some very expensive mistakes can be made on the job.

A few years back, AT&T hired a public relations firm to promote their system and diversity. They were paid over $1 million and created a poster that insulted Africans and African Americans. AT&T got a black eye, spent millions for services that were counter to their goals. Needless to say the PR firm that created the poster was fired and lost business because of thier huge mistake.

Companies know that hiring people that lack sensitivity to issues of race and religion and culture can cost them big bucks. Since creating a K-12 system that provides equivalent resources to all school systems is politically impossible, we are going to require affirmative action long into the future.

I would change the word "man" in the last sentence to "citizen" so that you don't exclude the "better" half (like my wife).

Otherwise a very good post. Many right-wing bloggers accuse liberals of desiring equality of outcome. This post, i believe, clarifies that many on the left desire a true, fair equality of opportunity.

So long as our affirmative actions programs are run by people, there will be mistakes. but the very fact that so many people argue that affirmative action programs enhance racism is, to me, proof enough that racism is alive and well, and the programs are still needed. (Jesse Helms, anyone?)

FDl

"One thing that has started to bother me about Affirmative Action though is that the argument for it has largely strayed from the argument you make to the vaguer promotion of diversity. And where diversity programs start and end and who gets covered or not is a slippery slope that concerns me as the ethnic groups and combinations in America explode.

Posted by Joe Blog"

Joe, but diversity of what? What if you get a bunch of people who look very different but think the same? You've increased one dimension of diversity while reducing another arguably more important dimension of diversity.

I agree that diversity is very important just as portfolio diversification is important in financial affairs just as genetic diversity is important to the strength and survival of a species in biology.

I'm talking about Diversity with a capital "D" that rhymes with free and applies to many different dimensions and variables.

I challenge you to show me how mandating diversity in one variable of a system doesn't actually reduce overall diversity of that system.

It should be obvious to even the most casual observer that the real route to overall diversity is through freedom and liberty even if choices are made by individuals that you might not approve of. The system will be healthier, that is to say more resistant to the many dangers that face that system.

Adrian

Joe Blog:
You are correct that the argument has strayed but that is because Justice Powell specifically outlawed any other arguments in the Bakke decision. Proponents of AA must fit into the box he constructed. Yesterdays opinions just shrink the size of the box and in my opinion leave the discussion to: You can do it, but you must do it in a way in which there is no accountability, no scorecard, no record of why you did it. So much for the new accountability in government (again).

Corporations (or really big corporate CEOs) say various things for various reasons most of which should be taken with a grain of salt. If AT&T wants to hire people so that they have an exact ethnic representation of America in their work force, I guess that's up to them. Can't work much worse than their other recent business strategies. But I take their opinion on college admission policies no more seriously than their opinion on option expensing on financial statements.

Do you think Hispanics are as deserving of AA as blacks?

I find Brad's post entirely too glib. Why do Americans of 2003 have a responsibility for slavery that ended in 1865 or even for state-supported racial discrimination that ended in 1964? Is there such a thing as collective responsibility?

In any case, isn't one of the anti-affirmative-action arguments that the best way to end the stigma of slavery is to treat African-Americans exactly the same as everyone else?

This isn't a comment about affirmative action but intellectual support for the program can't rest on the historical experience of slavery. If affirmative action is to be based on historical harm and not some future goal, then the harm needs to be much more immediate.

Adrian:
I think you missed my point. I do not like the diversity rationale much at all.

JCW:
You seem to know the history much better than me. I didn't know that was the roots of the diversity argument. I belong to a more recent immigrant group that qualifies for some preference programs. I know people who are budding political activists who promote a "we deserve our share" mentality. I think we deserve an opportunity, not some fixed or semi fixed share. And I don't think an opportunity has to mean your school receives every last dollar of funding that Beverly Hills 90210 does.

Where do I collect the present value of my ancestors' work on the Pyramids? I'm certain today's Egyptians want to be real men.

On a parallel track, do, say, the Boat People who came here after the fall of Saigon get a pass on this? If no, why not? If yes, is it a race or a timing thing?

Every spring we read:

In every generation one must look upon himself as if he personally has come out of Egypt...

"Do you think Hispanics are as deserving of AA as blacks?

Posted by tc'

GOOD QUESTION TC. Why aren't Brazilians protected? how about Southern Italians who earn much less than Northern Italians? What about Walloons (French speaking Belgians) who earn much less than Flemings (Dutch speaking Belgians).

You know I consider myself a citizen of the world, not just America. Who the hell are you to pick who should be protected and who shouldn't. As a member of an opressed class - Acadian French Canadians - who earn much less than Anglophone Canadians or Quebec French Canadians I want my piece! You guys have to expand your Americo-centric world view and pay attention to a whole planet-full of victims.

All your highly evolved concerns for your lessers is pure BS if you don't comfort all our brothers and sisters who don't live in the USA.

Opressed peoples of the world arise, you have nothing to lose but your hunger and you have American tax revenues to gain!

Adrian

"I think that the politest possible response is that this demonstrates, more than anything else, that Andrew Sullivan is simply and totally clueless about what America is."

Are you sure about that, Brad? We're talking about Andrew Sullivan — you've got so many other examples to work with ...

I've never seen diversity as a major good, only perhaps a minor good, and therefore I, too, am unhappy with this restatement (or justification) of affirimative action on that basis. In some sense, I agree with Sullivan if he's trying to criticize the idea that something like racial diversity should be so highly valued over other forms of diversity.

Brad, however, is not justifying AA on the basis of diversity, but rather on correcting a social injustice. Sullivan and DeLong are arguing about different things. I agree with both, though with many caveats.

My tiny, elite 30K-a-year-tuition liberal arts college eschews any sort of formal AA and supposedly evaluates all applicants strictly on merit (widely defined and evaluated very subjectively--so, who knows?). And though, overall, I think I preferred (and prefer) it that way, the result is an almost lilly-white student body. My freshman class of 128 students had one black person (a woman) and a very small number of other minorities. *That* I didn't like, and I always felt that the College could correct that problem by very aggressively recruiting from minority communities. In a discussion with a fellow alum, however, I got this response: "But those people don't want to go to school at SJC." I'll only mention in passing that this infuriated as badly as anything anyone has said to me in the last six years; but what was interesting is that this gentleman is nominally quite liberal, the child of, believe it or not, a civil rights attorney. On the other hand, he grew up in New Orleans. Anyway, I suppose that's a digression.

If it sounds like I'm contradicting myself, I should say that my principle reason for wanting greater minority representation in the student body is not that the diversity of the student body is enormously valuable. (It's valuable, but it wasn't my main concern.) Rather, my concern was the other way around: that it would be good for society and the underprivileged minorities to be more greatly represented in the student body.

"I think that the politest possible response is that this demonstrates, more than anything else, that Andrew Sullivan is simply and totally clueless about what America is."

Are you sure about that, Brad? We're talking about Andrew Sullivan — you have so many other examples to work with ...

Sorry for the multiples -- sloooooow server.

"I think that the politest possible response is that this demonstrates, more than anything else, that Andrew Sullivan is simply and totally clueless about what America is."

Are you sure about that, Brad? We're talking about Andrew Sullivan — you have so many other examples to work with ...

The righting-of-past-wrongs defense works for Americans of African descent, but what about Latinos (Hispanics?) who similarly underperform in school? America has no collective responsibility to them -- or, at least, not in the direct manner of restitution for slavery and Jim Crow laws. But it is just as important to include them on college campuses in the interests of diversity, if diversity is what we are after. And if we are interested in present equality of opportunity, then historical treatment has very little bearing on the debate. By even including restitution in the rationale for affirmative action (as, I believe, the Supreme Court does not), it seems that one forces oneself to agree that blacks should be favored over Latinos of similar income and status. Which you may or may not agree with. Just something to consider -- I'm very conflicted about this issue.

I have a good friend who is *literally* an African-American...he's an immigrant from the Ivory Coast.

Does he pay into/surrender a slot to an American black descended from slaves? Or does he get a "free lunch" because of his skin?

Where do I collect the present value of my ancestors' work on the Pyramids? I'm certain today's Egyptians want to be real men.

do you think the effects of Jewish slavery on Egypt on your life today is comparable to the effects of American slavery, Jim Crow and continuing discrimination on African-Americans?

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So, let me get this straight, elmination of Affirmative Action+no blacks in universities? Ok. I assume no Hispanics as well. Well. Glad to know you think that highly of my kind Brad.

Also, I'm surprised at the amount of proponents of AA that completely avoid the injustices among minorities, such as underrepresented Philipinos for example, created by AA policies. No equality of oppornunity for them then.

"I have a good friend who is *literally* an African-American...he's an immigrant from the Ivory Coast.

Does he pay into/surrender a slot to an American black descended from slaves? Or does he get a "free lunch" because of his skin?

Posted by Bucky Dent'

GOOD Question Bucky. But I think you have it backwards. It is clearly the Blacks left behind in Africa who are really the agrieved ones.

By any meaningful measure they are much worse off than the descendants of their enslaved cousins. If we are to take a truly global point-of-view then it is both us white and black Americans who should give our places to those poor suffering souls in Africa.

WE ARE ALL JUST HUMANS. We must be fair to everyone, not just Americans.

Adrian

>do you think the effects of Jewish slavery on Egypt on your life today is comparable to the effects of American slavery, Jim Crow and continuing discrimination on African-Americans?

Absolutely. Dead folks enslaved my dead ancsestors. Jews were kept out of the elite schools concurrent with the exclusion of blacks.
There are co-ops and schools in NYC TODAY that
don't let Jews in.

Why are my claims less valid than anyone else's?

Does there need to be a direct link between the people living here and now who, through no fault of their own, would be asked to make sacrifices for strangers they've never met, let alone injured?

This kind of absurd exploitation, usually proposed by folks who would themselves sacrifice nothing [like tenured govt school professors], drive folks into the arms of the Pat Buchanans of the world.

Most colleges try to attract students from a wide variety of countries and backgrounds. Bucky's friend would possibly receive special consideration as a foreign student. Elite colleges especially like to brag in their brochures about having students from X numbers of foreign countries. After all it is one of the qualities that makes them elite.

BTW- Doesn't everyone know that the dirty little secret of admission to elite schools is to excel in an important minor sport such as lacrosse? An excellent lacrosse player with C's in high school can find a slot easier than some straight A students.

Another question. What will UM do about the UPies? Will they still give this all white group 20 bonus points? Everyone knows that UM does this to maintain political support in the legislature. If UPies were shut out of UM, UM state funding might be less or get transferred to NMU or horror of horrors, MSU. Then again, I don't guess the Supreme Court said anything against bonus points for special groups of white students. It only applies to blacks.

I was going to point out that both american business and the american military came out in favor of affirmative action when these cases were going to court, because they (unlike the 'race-blind' conservatives) would rather have qualified employees that reflect their target markets rather than the rate of contraceptive failure in Darien, but then I read the rest of the comments.

Boy, you have some creepy people reading this.

My view of the best form of "affirmative action" for undergraduate schools is to give extra points to kids with decent grades and SAT's who came from "bad schools", whether that is defined by low average college attendance, or no AP offered, or low average SAT, or bad general test scores, or whatever seems best. Mark down kids who went to good schools, if they didn't take advantage - points off if your school offered AP Calculus, buy you stopped at trig, and so forth.

Minority kids - as opposed to their parents - are far more failed by their educational opportunities than they are by decade or century old discrimination or oppression. If it were otherwise, Asian immigrants - who come from cultures where virtually everyone was oppressed until very recently - would be failing as well.

"Collective responsibility" - the sins of the father visited upon the son. White Americans of today are not responsible for slavery - most of us don't even benefit from it. Eighteen year old whites aren't responsible for what happened in 1950 - they were born in Reagan's second term. To the extent that THEY benefitted from discrimination, in most cases it is far removed and long ago. Twenty five years is long enough - we don't need twenty five more.

I find this debate interesting, for a number of reasons:

(i) As someone who is sympathetic to the right on a lot of things, I nevertheless find myself repelled by the vehemence with which so many conservatives protest affirmative action. Of all the evils in the world, why does this one upset them so much?

As much as conservatives like to claim "racial equality" as their motivation, I frankly don't believe them. Throughout the last 39 years, ever since the Goldwater candidacy, conservatives have NEVER shown themselves to have been on the cutting edge of eliminating inequality for ANY group other than for white males; women's rights, desegregation, an end to profiling, gay rights - you name it, and conservatives have always found ways to rationalize their opposition. So why is it that on this one issue, they suddenly discover principles they have failed to display in any other arena of political life? Could it have something to do with the fact that - horrors - the beneficiaries aren't white?

Regardless of the purity of their motives (or lack thereof), conservatives must accept the fact that African Americans have a right to be suspicious of their intentions. Who in his right mind would trust a group with such a selective sense of outrage?

(ii) There is in fact a legitimate case to be made that affirmative action casts doubt on the legitimacy of minorities' achievements, but it isn't really as strong as conservatives like to make out.

Certainly, I have seen for myself just how much it twists perceptions - as an undergraduate at a certain American university, I was often challenged by white and Asian students asking "Did you get in on Affirmative Action", and this despite the fact that (1) as a foreign student I wasn't eligible for AA, and (2) I had higher SAT scores, and was taking tougher classes (graduate math classes as a freshman) than nearly all of them - and they knew it too! If people could challenge my abilities despite the empirical evidence to the contrary, how must it have been for other, less spectacular, minority students?

But then the question arises - how would African Americans be viewed WITHOUT affirmative action? Would African-American doctors, lawyers and accountents be accorded a greater level of prestige, as having "earned" their qualifications? Or would it not be more likely that the same people would now say "Dr. Brown went to an all-black or no-name school, so he can't be any good?" I think the reality is that prejudiced people are likely to think badly of blacks' qualifications, whether or not Affirmative Action exists.

(iii) There can be no justification, in my view, to extending Affirmative Action programs to immigrants of any color, even black ones. Whatever they might have suffered in their home countries, the fact is that they have CHOSEN to come to America, and as such America owes them no special debt whatsoever. For African Americans (as opposed to "real" Africans) nothing of the sort is true.

One strange thing that I noticed was that many of the beneficiaries of Affirmative Action in America's best universities were in reality African immigrants. This is a natural corollary of the fact that they tend to predominate in that small pool of black applicants with very high test scores and GPAs - if you have a black student with an SAT score above 1450 (post-recentering), it's almost a certainty said student will be an African immigrant. In so far as African immigrants do not necessarily consider themselves part of the traditional African-American community, I see no benefit in treating them as if they were, other than as an easy way to meet some unofficial quota.

Similarly, I see no reason to extend special consideration to hispanic immigrants; if they think America no better than their home countries, why move to begin with?

(iv) There is also an issue as to how long into the future AA programs can be justified. An open-ended, never-ending mandate hardly seems acceptable, even to one who isn't unfavorably disposed to such programs. But this is at heart a political issue, which leads me to:

(v) At bottom, Affirmative Action is a matter of political realities. How much inequality between groups can America tolerate, before the social compact breaks down? An idealized notion of a purely race-blind nation is fine on paper, but given that America wasn't race-blind for most of its' history, to simply say "It's time to move on" is ridiculous, if one wants to preserve the peace. Empty phrases do nothing to soothe the anger and frustration of a sizable, aggrieved minority. It is for the same reason that the "progressive" income tax system stays in place; society can tolerate only so much income inequality, ethical considerations be damned.

"America is a country built on noble ideas, one of the chief of which is equality of opportunity."

Not true. America is built on the ideal all persons*** have the same rights. (***Jefferson, in the Declaration of Independence, very regrettably used the word "men." He excluded women, and did not count male slaves as men. So he didn't state the ideal, but he did declare a point on the road to the ideal.)

So if you're thinking that the Declaration of Independence was the source of the ideal of "equality of opportunity," I don't see any evidence to support that thought.

"Affirmative Action" is actually a complete perversion of, "all persons are created equal." It attempts to designate certain people as *favored* by the government. That is NOT the "ideal" that all people have the same rights. It's the exact opposite.

"The Quest for Cosmic Justice," by Thomas Sowell, is a good book that deals with this issue. It shows the inherent injustice of the government trying to address past wrongs, by itself committing new wrongs.

One classic example I remember from the book: I think it was from a California city orchestra. Historically, the orchestra had applicants play behind a curtain (so that the judges could only judge the music).

Enter "liberal" thought: now the applicants for the orchestra were to play where the judges could see them. Pathetic. And NOT an American ideal.

Isn't the real scandal the spectacularly bad performance of many, even most inner city high schools, which fail to prepare their students for college, and occasionally graduate students who can't read? Shouldn't outrage be focused on those local school boards which fail their students so spectacularly?

I think you have the story turned around. It wasn't Blacks, but women. Female players started appearing in orchestras in much larger numbers only *after* orchestras began giving "blind" auditions.

See Claudia Goldin and Cecilia Rouse, "Orchestrating Impartiality: The Impact of 'Blind' Auditions on Female Musicians," NBER Working Paper 5903 and American Economic Review.

"i) As someone who is sympathetic to the right on a lot of things, I nevertheless find myself repelled by the vehemence with which so many conservatives protest affirmative action. Of all the evils in the world, why does this one upset them so much?"

Well...I'm a Libertarian, not a conservative, but affirmative action offends me, because it operates on the logic of "two wrongs make a right."

The government has historically discriminated *against* black people (of course, this ignores all the OTHER people who have historically been discriminated against!)...so now the government will discriminate FOR them.

Wrong. The government should not discriminate for OR against ANYONE, based on "race." (Which becomes more and more of a joke, as "races" inter-marry.)

"All people are created equal." Period. ALL people are endowed with the same rights, which the government has been instituted to defend... EQUALLY.

Perhaps the strongest reason that I can think of to support affirmative action, in addition to the moral argument that Brad presented, is because of what's known, in cognitive science, as cognitive schemata.

That is, there's a proven relationship between the society one lives in and how one thinks. If, for instance, a child growing up in a poor environment has limited options, most likely the child is going to develop cognitive schemata; the inabilility to perceive beyond those limited choices.

This concept, I think, can be extended to diversity. If you've never worked or lived with or alongside minorities, you're likely going to accept the limited ranges that you've seen or experienced them. If, however, you have worked or lived with them, you're likely to accept that there are broader possibilities or perhaps even reject stereotypes.

I hate doing this, because it's not very cool to point out people's spelling mistakes, but this one is a button of mine.

...then subjected to an only somewhat less *viscious* campaign of terror...

I don't buy the diversity argument. The objective of education is knowledge. For one reason or another, there are few black graduate students in, say, mathematics. Does a racially diverse graduate student body, by virtue of being racially diverse, help find new ways of solving stochastic differential equations? If you can show me that, I would be curious to hear it.

I don't buy the idea of the US being uniquely morally obliged to remedy past wrongs, either. The slaves were often hunted down and enslaved by other Africans or Arabs; transported by the British, French, and Portugese, and eventually exploited by the French and British in America before America started as a country. Lots of people profitted before the Americans as such got to profit from slavery. If guilt travels through time like this, then should they insist on having quotas for African Americans at the Sorbonne, University of Lisbon, Oxford, and other places? If not, why not?

Perhaps the strongest reason that I can think of to support affirmative action, in addition to the moral argument that Brad presented, is because of what's known, in cognitive science, as cognitive schemata.

That is, there's a proven relationship between the society one lives in and how one thinks. If, for instance, a child growing up in a poor environment has limited options, most likely the child is going to develop cognitive schemata; the inabilility to perceive beyond those limited choices.

This concept, I think, can be extended to diversity. If you've never worked or lived with or alongside minorities, you're likely going to accept the limited ranges that you've seen or experienced them. If, however, you have worked or lived with them, you're likely to accept that there are broader possibilities or perhaps even reject stereotypes.

I don't buy the diversity argument. The objective of education is knowledge. For one reason or another, there are few black graduate students in, say, mathematics. Does a racially diverse graduate student body, by virtue of being racially diverse, help find new ways of solving stochastic differential equations? If you can show me that, I would be curious to hear it.

I don't buy the idea of the US being uniquely morally obliged to remedy past wrongs, either. The slaves were often hunted down and enslaved by other Africans or Arabs; transported by the British, French, and Portugese, and eventually exploited by the French and British in America before America started as a country. Lots of people profitted before the Americans as such got to profit from slavery. If guilt travels through time like this, then should they insist on having quotas for African Americans at the Sorbonne, University of Lisbon, Oxford, and other places? If not, why not?

"Regardless of the purity of their motives (or lack thereof), conservatives must accept the fact that African Americans have a right to be suspicious of their intentions."

This completely ignores the fact that some of the most outspoken and visible opponents of Affirmative Action have been BLACK conservatives*: Ward Connerly, Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams.

A great piece on "Affirmative Action Grading."

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/williams052803.asp

Give it a try, Dr. DeLong! ;-)

P.S. *Sowell has self-identified as a "libertarian" rather than a "conservative." I haven't seen Williams' self-identification, but I'd suspect it might be the same. I've never seen a self-identification for Connerly, but every referral anyone else has ever made is "conservative."

"I think you have the story turned around. It wasn't Blacks, but women. Female players started appearing in orchestras in much larger numbers only *after* orchestras began giving "blind" auditions."

No, I don't have the story turned around, as far as I remember.

The situation was that the orchestra was ALREADY giving auditions behind curtains. The members of the City Council (as I recall) wanted (and succeeded, as I recall) to force the orchestra to TAKE AWAY the curtain.

I don't have "The Quest for Cosmic Justice" with me. But I'd be surprised if I'm misremembering it...because that was Sowell's whole point: the curtain is GOOD. And it was being taken away, to promote "Cosmic Justice." ("Cosmic Justice" = Where "liberals" decide who gets to be in the orchestra...not by how they play, but by how they look.)

"All people are created equal." Period. ALL people are endowed with the same rights, which the government has been instituted to defend... EQUALLY."

When I am faced with a choice between dealing with empirical reality and sticking to philosophical principles, I cannot help but come to terms with the facts as they are. That is why, despite my own libertarian tendencies, I could never see myself joining the Libertarian Party. I don't do ideological purity, or buy into the notion of society as a tabula rasa.

No philosophical notion is going to convince African-Americans to adopt a policy they see as harmful to them, particularly when it is championed most loudly by those who stand to benefit from it the most, and who have done so little to advance the African-American cause in the past.

There are of course a few African-Americans who are speaking out against affirmative action, and I'm not going to besmirch their reputations by accusing them of base motivations, but what does their existence really prove, except that African-Americans aren't entirely monolithic in their political views? They are a tiny minority, and given a large enough group, you're always going to find a few voices to speak against some policy or other, however much it benefits the group as a whole.

One thing that ought to be given more prominence in this debate is the contrast between conservatives' support for racial profiling, and their opposition to affirmative action. How can one reconcile support for racially selective policies in the former case with race-blindness in the latter? If you say the end justifies the means where profiling is concerned, you leave the door open to affirmative action, but if you say racial distinctions are ALWAYS wrong, shouldn't you oppose profiling as well, however useful it may be?

I won't claim that everyone on the right supports these two positions, but it seems to be true of the great majority. What is more, it seems to confirm my suspicions as to the less than noble motivations of many opponeents of affirmative action.

Looking around on forums like Free Republic also bolsters this suspicion - the sheer level of racially motivated bile against minorities who are supposedly oppressing white males makes one nauseous, so intense is the self-pity and prejudice. You may say that Freepers don't represent the mainstream of conservative thought, but the truth is that they are a lot more representative of the GOP's grassroots than the well-coiffed individuals who appear on Fox News or write for the National Review. They represent the id of the GOP.

This has been a very interesting read.

I am wondering if the initial post by Andrew Sulivan was really saying the following.
If diversity of ideas is the ultimate aim of the universities, why does race matter?
Perhaps a better question is, "why don't universities specifically select equal merit students based on actual and known differences of ideas?"

One of the many complaints by the right is that diversity really means racial diversity and not diversity of ideas. Unfortunately, the manner in which university administrations implement diversity selection bears this out. The original Supreme Court Blakke decision declared that actual quotas are unconstitutional. It seems that schools have been working at a way around this legal barrier. Ever notice how the percentage of a specific minority students never seems to greatly fluctuate at top universities? The recent Court decision said that race may be a factor but not a mechanical factor. Again the ruling makes it illegal to create a racial quota. In this case through the use of a mechanical advantage.

Brad DeLong raises a powerful point about the accountability of the United States for its passed wrongs. Slavery being one of the darkest stains on this country. While future good deads can never provide for the cleansing of sins, they do point to a correction of conscence. In this respect, the United States sacrificed 558,052 lives in the Civil War. This is not a token sacrifice.

Government affirmative action, in the area of education, does not help. Oh, it helps the people who get a foot in the door, but it leaves even more people out in the cold. It does not do enough. For every student who benefits, there are 10, 20, 100 who do not. Students of all races. University affirmative action is being used as a weak method to overlook real problems in the US educational system.

All high school graduates should be ready for college.
All high schools should provide at least the necessary schooling so that C graduates are college ready.
Every high school graduate should have an opportunity to attend University.
University should be affordable to even the poorest of Americans.

University affirmative action is a bribe to allow Liberals to feel good about ignoring the greater educational problems and to distract Conservatives from the real educational issues.

"America is a country built on noble ideas..."

No it isn't, it is built on Platonic lies which are believed by all - there is now no group of undeceived guides (unless that too is a lie to which I have succumbed myself?). They don't even serve any useful outside purpose, only perpetuating their own support structure. The modern term is "memes".

Look at it all in a detached way, including looking at the idea that you are all corporately subscribers to a form of inherited moral debt you never incurred merely by virtue of acceding in propagating the lie. It will soon be clear that these "noble" things are merely the fine sounding phrases of some mock-Helvetius, adapted to your circumstances by your founding fathers and binding you now, not noble at all.

It makes much more sense to start with a Burkean insight than a Helvetian one.

I wrote, "All people are created equal." Period. ALL people are endowed with the same rights, which the government has been instituted to defend... EQUALLY."

You responded: "When I am faced with a choice between dealing with empirical reality and sticking to philosophical principles, I cannot help but come to terms with the facts as they are."

I don't understand...are you saying you don't care about what's right or wrong, just about what is? If so, there isn't much to talk about. Many state-supported universities think they should discriminate for some people (and therefore against others) based on skin color. That's what is. Period.

"No philosophical notion is going to convince African-Americans to adopt a policy they see as harmful to them, particularly when it is championed most loudly by those who stand to benefit from it the most,..."

Actually, Ward Connerly is probably the one person in the United States who is most intimately identified with the fight against Affirmative Action:

http://www.publicaffairsweb.com/ccri/connerly.htm

But you're right that a majority of blacks tend to support Affirmative Action because they think it will benefit them.

Just like a majority of seniors probably support a prescription drug benefit under Medicare, because it will benefit them.

And a majority of farmers probably support farm subsidies, because they think farm subsidies will benefit them.

So...is the solution for the government to continue to discriminate in favor of blacks, and to institute the Prescription Drug Benefit, and to continue the farm subsidies?

"One thing that ought to be given more prominence in this debate is the contrast between conservatives' support for racial profiling, and their opposition to affirmative action."

I don't think so.

You might not think this is directly related, but an Iranian guy on another website acknowledged that he thought that the union of religion and government in his country was a problem. But he also wanted to talk about the (alleged) union of religion and government in the U.S. Well, I don't think the discussion of the (alleged) union of religion and government in the U.S. is going to address the acknowledged problem of union of religion and government in Iran. I think it would be better to figure out how to solve *that* problem, before discussing the other (alleged) problem.

The question being discussed here is Affirmative Action. Brad DeLong supports it, to address previous wrongs. The Supreme Court supports it, apparently because they like universities to "look like America." (I haven't bothered to read their latest babblings.)

I think Affirmative Action is wrong...because I think it goes directly against a key ideal of the U.S.: that all people are treated equally by the law (the government).

I'd rather discuss that issue, than get into racial profiling.

"Looking around on forums like Free Republic also bolsters this suspicion - the sheer level of racially motivated bile against minorities who are supposedly oppressing white males makes one nauseous, so intense is the self-pity and prejudice."

I agree. Nothing worse than whinin' white boys.

Oops. Past dinnertime. G'night!

So, to be American is to accept a controversial and, in my view, bizarre notion of collective responsibility.

But at least you're not challening anyone's patriotism--just his conception of himself as citizen!

Of course, I must take that with a grain of salt. Brad's conception of the citizen is male, after all, so perhaps he's wrong about other things.

OMG, Sullivan really said that?

He ought to try living where I live: the rural South. Racism is right up there with Family Values and Jesus, usually in the same sentence. When I worked for the local convenience store chain, Kwik King a few years ago, they allowed the distribution of a KKK related newsletter in one of it's Ocala, Florida stores called The Hipopotamus. It was there every Thursday. It might still be there today.

Collective guilt/responsibility is a non-starter as far as I'm concerned. Real, hurtful racism that is going on *today* is reason enough to continue affirmative action.

"I find myself repelled by the vehemence with which so many conservatives protest affirmative action. Of all the evils in the world, why does this one upset them so much?"

Because it's institutionalized racism, which puts its supporters on the same moral plane as supporters of South African apartheid, who also had high ideals.

Ideally governments are supposed to treat everyone equally, but that is a fantasy world. The fact is, race-based measures and segregation was official government policy in numerous countries and the harm they inflicted on people was very real and some of it persists to this day.

Here in Canada, we are still grappling with the consequences of the sorry history of the First Nations. Past government policy did severely impact their lives - to point of almost destroying their society. Today, the socio-economic status of many (not all) Aboriginal Canadians is barely above that of people in LDCs. While the current government policy towards Aboriginal persons is fraught with numerous maddening complications, it is seeking to address difficult circumstances by tilting the playing field. I, for one, support the concept for two reasons:

1) Moral. How is it a government can institute a racist policy, rescind it and then dust of its hands claiming all persons are equal before the law? How does one undo literally hundreds of years of systematic damage? Environmental impacts are enormous, and the statistics are telling. For First Nations in Canada education levels are terrible, crime rates are through the roof and the incidence of serious illness far, far exceed that of the general population. I’ve been to some of the communities where they live, and all I can say is “no wonder”. (And Javier, I’m afraid your indignation is somewhat misplaced. I’ll risk putting words in to Prof de Long’s mouth, but I think you missed his point. On average, the environment in which African-Americans and Latinos live and raise their families negatively impacts their long-term prospects to compete for placement in universities. Elimination of AA only worsens the odds. It’s not nature, it’s nurture.)

2) Pragmatic/Non-altruistic. Pissed off and disenfranchised people have a tendency of venting, sometimes violently. Justifiable or not, it’s a fact of life. Ultimately, governments recognize that social peace must be bought, and sometimes that means favouring a group that is seriously aggrieved and is credible threat for mucking things up. Other groups have been seriously mistreated in the past, but for some reason they thrive today (e.g. Chinese-Canadians). Simply put, the consequences of not addressing the grievances of Aboriginal Canadians vastly outweigh those of not fully compensating Chinese Canadians. I assume the same goes for African Americans and those poor Irish Americans Sullivan keeps harping on about. Yes, it treats the two groups differently – but sometimes these are the inconsistencies government policies have to reconcile in the real world.

BTW, Adrian, regarding the Acadians - you should check out some of the lit. re: Robichaud (in particular) and Hatfield's battles to protect their language and provide comparable public services in NB. Perhaps you are already familiar with it. But it was ugly - and heavy government involvement was a must. They instituted an aggressive policy of hiring francophones in the NB bureaucracy and founded L'Université de Moncton. All in all - I would argue they were justifiable measures, and in the long run, beneficial to the province as a whole. Left to their own devices, things would have been tougher for Acadians.

(Quick note: I, for once, I agree with Abiola (!). Beneath the rhetoric of “equal treatment” I hear from some right-wingers, both in Canada and the US, there’s something that’s palpably insincere. “Equal” often goes hand-in-hand with bashing minority groups.)

Good to see that the sins of the fathers are still visited on the generations after, just like the Bible commands.

"I say both are B.S. I'm not responsible for where I was born, or what the people did where I was born, BEFORE I was born. To think otherwise is irrational, IMNSHO."

I think you missed Brad's point. The political community to which you belong _is_ responsible for its past actions. We, as members of that political community, participants in its social contract, and recepients of benefits therefrom, do have responsibilities vis-a-vis its past acts. Of course, since this is a collective, political responsibility the locus for action should also be with the government.

When there are specific and identifiable harms done to particular peoples because of their status as such, then it seems to me proper to argue that there is a moral obligation to compensate, one that necessitates, by its nature, a limited abandonment of the principle of procedural blindness.

I don't understand why conservatives have such a problem with this. Wasn't it Burke who argued that, to the extent the idea of a social contract made sense, the social contract of a political community did not simply implicate the living but also prior generations; that the very existence of a political community implied some connection between the past and the present that superceded the mortality of generations? Are not conservatives often the first to remind us that people have died making our freedoms and prosperity possible, and that we have obligations (however nebulous) to them? That same principle should hold for those who have been ethnically cleansed, enslaved, or subject to an apartheidt system in the process of forming our nation.

It is, of course, no surprise what libertarians object. Uncovering the role of the past in structuring the present, particularly with respect to the distribution of property, has always raised thorny issues for libertarians. After all, the present distribution of property pretty much everywhere, let alone in the US, is closely tied to theft and more general forms of coercion. Indeed, libertarian responses frequently fall into one of two camps:

(1) this may be so, but the costs of forcibly reallocating property to take this account are too high in terms of the rights of present individuals, not to mention the practical economic and social consequences or the infinite regression into our species history of violence and robbery

(2) some variation on the old racist canard that, for example, native americans didn't hold title to their land because they did not make effective use of it (cf. John Locke).

Now, the reasoning behind (1) is persuasive. But the logical conclusion is not that we pretend that every man is an ahistorical island, but that we seek for pragmatic ways of making good on our moral obligations when specific and identifiable harms have been done against particular groups by our government.

Affirmative action raises larger, but also core, issues for libertarianism. Libertarians are very, very ready to talk about structural effects in two contexts: the self-regulating market and government interventions in that utopian concept. They are much less willing (and yes, I am generalizing in unfair ways) to contemplate other structural effects, such as those related to durable equalities. Given the huge influence of structural position on opportunity, this isn't entirely surprising. Two examples: (1) historical discrimination in the housing market and mortgage lending means african americans are less likely to start with the housing equity many whites do, which in turn makes it harder to do things like secure future loans or to move into good school districts -- which themselves tend to correlate with high property values because of inherently inequitable way we fund primary and secondary education in most of this country; (2) past and present racism shapes social networks for blacks in ways that tend to segregate them from employment opportunities. A wealth of work, building on the Mark Granovetter essay Brad mentioned here a bit ago, suggests that social and economic networks strongly influence career success independent of merit and qualification.

Again, the question of whether affirmative action is the proper policy in these instances I leave open. The idea that no such obligations exist, however, is total hogwash. As is the idea that they can be dodged by invoking a mindless cosmopolitanism in a world of republican political allegience.

Very interesting points made.

Firstly, the person who wondered, if he'd been born in Germany in 1950, whether he'd be held responsible for the Nazis, is right on the money. Germany was paying reparations to the Jews and Israel for decades.

Secondly, affirmative action is not a special privilege for a favoured race. It's reparations for a publicly disadvantaged group. The solution to the problem is to stop them from being disadvantaged. So far as I can see, black American society is drastically under-educated, crime-ridden, underpaid, underemployed and overincarcerated. Clearly something's wrong there. Sort out those problems and, in twenty or thirty years, affirmative action should become unnecessary.

Thirdly, affirmative action is very liable to be abused. We in South Africa have a version of affirmative action called "black economic empowerment", in terms of which buddies of the government get to act as front-people and gofers for white business deals and corporate mergers. It's a huge scam, for the most part, justified because black people are benefiting (a few hundred black people at most, but as Thabo Mbeki would say, black is black). This is all bad. But on the other hand, there's been a truly massive expansion of blacks holding responsible positions in government, civil service and armed forces, which has probably transformed society quite radically (if not always for the better, since not everybody is perfectly qualified, but in the long run it should all be an improvement).

And conservative whites here whine about it too. But they're more obviously racist than the ones in the US.

Abiola Lapite writes:

"There can be no justification, in my view, to extending Affirmative Action programs to immigrants of any color, even black ones."

I agree that that the case for extending affirmative action to immigrants on remedial grounds is all but nonexistent. (There is an argument that there are some diversity-related benefits to affirmative action -- i.e., it's good for white students to interact with black students of whatever ancestry -- but that doesn't carry a lot of weight.)

The true rationale for applying affirmative action to immigrants, children of immigrants, biracial children, etc. is that you simply couldn't operate an affirmative action program on the model of the Daughters of the American Revolution, requiring genealogies and proofs of service and what not. Operating a program in that fashion would not only be an administrative nightmare but it would aggravate by orders of magnitude the divisive effects of affirmative action that critics of such programs point to with some justification. Accordingly, if we are going to have to have affirmative action programs, we just have to accept the fact that among the beneficiaries will be the occasional child of Jamaican parents and the like.

The world we live in is at best one in which rough justice applies. Affirmative action is an effort toward that end. We shouldn't expect it to be perfect, because nothing else is.

dhn: >...mindless cosmopolitanism...

The OED includes this definition of cosmopolitanism:
In 1948, ‘cosmopolitanism’ was named the chief heresy of the communist world with the Jews its chief prophets.

Since I assume that is NOT what you meant, what on earth DID you mean?

UM gives extra points to applicants (99% white) who reside in the UP. Why do people complain about blacks getting points but don't complain about UPers getting points? I believe it is due to racism. The people who are opposed to affirmative action (like Chief Justice Rehnquist who got his start in Arizona politics by challenging legitimate black voters) are acting on deep seated racism that is ingrained in the American psyche. America is a deeply racist country. If you cannot admit that, then you fail to acknowledge the problem that needs to be corrected.

A question that is lost in this discussion is "who is the best qualified?" There are many different ways that college applicants can be judged. There is one criteria for basketball scholarships and another for art students and another for students in the sciences. Someone wrote that Universities only address diversity in terms of color. This is blatantly false. Universities look for diversity in many ways, but affirmative action for blacks and minorities is the one that gets all the attention. Why does AA for blacks draw the most attention? Racism.

Also overlooked is the effect of the social multiplier on student performance. Very poor schools do not have the same environment as very good schools. Since segregation is widespread in K-12 education there is a built in bias against individuals from the poor schools that partly has its basis in color. There is a barrier to the locations that have the better school systems. As long as that barrier exists there will be a need for AA if we want a society that does offers equal opportunity.

Finally, one of the effects of Affirmative Action has been a diminished effect of the old boy network. It used to be not so long ago that many positions went unadvertised, filled at the whim of the manager and often went to nephew Bob or cousin Jane or someone who may have had little or no qualifications but mega connections. Affirmative Action has leveled the playing field by forcing the employers to widely advertise positions. This benefits everyone, including white males that don't have an inside connection. The benefits of more open job advertisement under AA to white women and other previously excluded groups such as Asians and Jews has been enormous.

Bakho,

You are wrong. I was not born in this country, so I should be presumed innocent of the "deep seated racism that is ingrained in the American psyche". Yet I am against affirmative action. And unless you imagine some deep-seated conspiracy, I don't see the right animated by racism. Your mention of the UP points can serve a test. I was not aware of that, but if it's true, I think it's just as scandalous as traditionally understood AA. And I will bet you 99 out of 100 conservatives would agree with me.

Very interesting discussion.

Bakho: maybe it makes things simpler for you to accuse opponents of affirmative action of simple racism but a more thoughtful response requires you to actually understand principled opposition to the policy. I'm not sure how I feel about AA but I do know that it is a complex issue and both sides have valid points.

DeLong counters the upshot of Sullivan's view rather nicely. But he overlooks a singular point which should be obvious in light of other goings on in Michigan this past week. African Americans themselves through ways and means that are not racial, will collectively and individually fight back against whatever ails them. They will do it whether or not it is principled, constitional, logical or reasonable. That is because they are human beings, and human beings can be counted on to survive. America comes to its senses in principled ways on occasion, but this is not the prime mover. The prime mover is somebody screaming ouch and shoving back when somebody else steps on their toe.

Affirmative Action is a political concession of the first order. It keeps the peace. Its moderation and legal framework are critical but its existence is an absolute necessity. When diversity training is no longer necessary, ie whites grow up understanding their neighbors as well as themselves; when inclusion is no longer necessary, ie non-whites needn't leave their places of origin to fulfill their potential, then Affirmative Action will no longer be necessary. Who's doing that work?

> non-whites needn't leave their places of origin to fulfill their potential

America is famously one of the most mobile societies in the world. Why is re-locating to find work a race thing?

If two college applicants are equal except for their race, should a black applicant get preference over the white applicant? I'd say yes. I believe that a white applicant has access to more opportunities for college than a black applicant, and is more likely to find a spot at a different college.

That's entirely a feeling I have, but let me point to a similar situation where there's empirical data: two people are applying for a job with equal qualifications. Should the black person get preference? Yes, because the white person is more likely to get opportunities at other businesses, since someone with a white-sounding name is more likely to get called in for an interview. Read the story here:

http://stacks.msnbc.com/news/859373.asp?cp1=1

Note to MB: Saying "Period" after your statements doesn't make them more persuasive.

Bakho - just as an aside, most job vacancies are still not advertised, and are still filled through networking, as anyone who has tried to get a job by merely responding to newspaper and internet ads can probably attest. It is an unfortunate fact of life that people would rather hire the most familiar rather than the most qualified.

I am not very troubled by AA for upper peninsula because it isn't local to me. I would prefer that they just give extra points for individual circumstances - poverty, bad schools, broken home, whatever, on the theory that it takes more native ability to achieve a certain level of achievement despite these handicaps than it does to achieve that same level without them. I don't count race amongst these factors because TODAY racism isn't a major cause of handicap for kids, except in how it is reflected in socioeconomic status, school quality, etc., that I already prefer to use. Of course, I am a meritocrat on school admissions - I could care less about diversity, but it would be hard.

Getting A's and good SAT's from a poverty -stricken broken home in a bad area is an accomplishment, no matter what race the unfortunate kid is. I happen to think that the best way to remediate the bad schools is a widespread, competitive schooling marketplace, probably facilitated by vouchers, but in the meantime circumstance-based, rather than race-based, AA is called for.

As to the constitutionality of AA by race - the 14th amendment has been interpreted as establishing racial preferences in one direction as illegal. If it has, then it has established racial preferences in all directions as illegal - that is the meaning of "equal protection of the laws." To say it bans racial preference for whites, but not racial preference for blacks, is a violation of that language on its face. Either both are legal, or both are not, because both whites and blacks are entitled to "equal protection of the laws".

DeLong, you're such an asshole. You can't even disagree with an opponent without mischaracterizing and degrading them. I like how you imply that Andrew Sullivan can't really understand America because he's a white British immigrant. It never occurs to you that his interpretation might be different (and I would say better) than yours. You pompous fuck.

Can't you at least comprehend the idea that affirmative action in that it explicitly treats students differently is unfair for that reason? That institutions of learning should be judged on academic achievement, period? That the best way to ensure fairness is to treat people equally?

Today's college applicants suffer under neither slavery nor Jim Crow. If blacks underachieve, it is (mainly) their own fault. (the result of an unacademic culture, permissive parenting, etc.) Many blacks do achieve--they study hard, get good grades, attain high test scores

Why are you pimping for people who don't deserve it on merit?

If they existence of racism is your answer, that's bogus. Surely Chinese and Indians are victims of the same (I would argue worse) racism that blacks are. Yet they're over-represented in the most academically challenging universities and disciplines. Why?

Delong, you're a vile human being. You don't argue fairly with respect for your opponents. If being an asshole were a sport, you and Krugman would have a tough fight for the gold medal.

LC writes, "If two college applicants are equal except for their race, should a black applicant get preference over the white applicant? I'd say yes. I believe that a white applicant has access to more opportunities for college than a black applicant, and is more likely to find a spot at a different college."

"That's entirely a feeling I have, but let me point to a similar situation where there's empirical data: two people are applying for a job with equal qualifications. Should the black person get preference? Yes, because the white person is more likely to get opportunities at other businesses, since someone with a white-sounding name is more likely to get called in for an interview."

LC closes with: "Note to MB: Saying "Period" after your statements doesn't make them more persuasive."

Response to LC:

Try taking a U.S. Civics course, and learn the difference between private entities discriminating, and a public (government funded) institution discriminating.

One is regrettable, but commonplace, on a whole host of features. The other is a fundamental violation of an ideal on which these United States were founded. After you take the U.S. Civics course, I hope you'll know which is which.

(Period. ;-))

Buckley,

At least in the context of ethical obligations, cosmopolitans argue that such obligations do not stop at political borders. Our primary moral identity is as human beings, not as members of particular political communities. The reductio ad adsurdum argument (that justifying aa as compensation or restitution for past & present harms done to a group logically requires the US to engage in massive wealth redistribution internationally) made by some of the anti-aa posters here depends on radical cosmopolitanism.

But there's a contradiction here. If they really believed the underlying assumptions that facilitate their reductio ad adsurdum claim, they wouldn't agrue that there was anything wrong with our tax dollars being spent willy-nilly around the world. In other words, they actually hold some sort of republican notion of political rights and responsibilities: their own objections prove why we don't normally have the same level of specific moral responsibilities to those outside our political community as we do to those within it.

"Fight private racism with government-sponsored racism? Sorry, that's against the law."

Given that many of the still-present consequences of racism are the direct result of past governmental policies, this isn't simply a matter of fighting private racism.

Moreover, how the hell else is the government supposed to fight racism than by adopting policies reflect that categories through which individuals are discriminated against? If we assume peristent low-level racism, the effect of race-neutral policies will be to reinforce existing inequities.

Moreover, I think you need to pay more attention in civics class. Policies that rely on racial categories are not, per se, 'illegal' but are subject to the highest level of scrutiny.

Mark,

I think it's like the tax code: Once you introduce one loophole, others rush in uncontrollably. Say, you want to give points to income-disadvantaged candidates. Should someone whose family lives in Buffalo, NY on 40K be given preference to someone whose family lives in NY, NY on 50K? Doesn't make sense. You have to adjust for the cost of living. But where does Long Island fall in this scheme? And how long have they lived where they do? And so on. Would you have faith that the resulting system, riddled with exceptions and special situations, will be equitable and not subject to gaming?

"I don't count race amongst these factors because TODAY racism isn't a major cause of handicap for kids..."

This statement is ignorant and uninformed. Many white folk delude themselves into believing that racism no longer exists. This is definately NOT true. Why don't you open your eyes and look around you. Racism in America is too easy to find and see if you only look. Race is a MAJOR factor in all kinds of ways in America.

Brown vs Board of Education ended legalized segregation in education but segregation was reinstituted by white flight and is institutionalized by local control and financing of public schools, zoning ordinances, red-lining and gated communities. Separate and unequal is the rule in public school systems. White conservatives want to strengthen school segregation by instituting vouchers for the middle and upper class students and continuing to underfund public schools. You don't want to spend your money fixing inner city schools and educating black children. You want to spend it on your own children's education in gated community suburbia.

Some public suburban schools rival their private counterparts while some poor urban and rural schools are clearly substandard and avoided by people with means. Few parents would sacrifice their child/s education to prove a point. Even an avid supporter of public schools and blacks as Bill Clinton chose not to send his daughter to public school in Washington DC.

Affirmative action is a necessary evil because we do not have the will as a society and individuals to confront racism and the legacy it has left. Racisms in America is obvious if you choose not to ignore it. Of course, TV makes it convenient to ignore. Maybe it is a great place to start. Just check the TV guide and count how well minorities are represented in our public culture. Are interracial marriages depicted as mainstream or taboo? Racism in America is so ingrained and institutionalized and accepted as "normal" that some people overlook the racism that is staring them in the face.

I don't think the failure to recognize racism is a problem unique to Andrew Sullivan or foreigners that move to America or even among minorities such as gays that are victims of social discrimination but do not face the economic discrimination that American blacks do. Racism in American explodes the myths of self made man, everyone is equal, etc. That is why many choose to ignore racism or cannot bring themselves to see it. Their mythology would be shattered.

"I think it's like the tax code: Once you introduce one loophole, others rush in uncontrollably."

There may be *practical* problems with awarding points based on whether people are in poor school districts, or minority school districts, or whatever. But there isn't any moral or legal problem with doing those things. (This is especially true if the UM announces the policies that it WILL use, 12 years before it actually uses them.)

There is a fundamental moral (against an ideal of the United States) and legal (violation of the 14th amendment) problem with a *state supported* university awarding points based on skin color. Or sex. Or eye color. Or location of birth. Or any other factor determined by birth.

bakho: "Affirmative action is a necessary evil because we do not have the will as a society and individuals to confront racism and the legacy it has left."

I'm wondering if we are living in the same country. I regularly hear appeals against all sorts of racism and discrimination from the President down to the street corner. You'd be better off arguing that mild, persistent racism is a difficult thing to get rid of. True enough.

rvman --

I know a white person who received the benefit of AA under a circumstance based admission. The college apparently made the proper decision because so-so grades achieved in spite of a very difficult home-life made for a solid student at a prestigious college. But it doesn't surprise me that to save time and effort, admissions committees (as well as posters to this discussion) are willing to apply the generalization that certain races are more disadvantaged than others. Possibly after considering wealth, parents' occupations, school system attended, family integrity, height, weight, name, and eye color, it is indeed true that skin color places one at a disadvantage despite their ability. I think it is worth the extra (small) effort to come up with a formula that has the same effect of helping certain races because the race as a whole is disadvantaged but at the same time doesn't give points to help out the children of wealthy CEOs, professionals, and entertainers at the expense of disadvantaged applicants who don't happen to belong to such a race.

Lisa Clarkson-- both my grandfathers changed their first names and in one case their last name because they were eager to fit in. I don't think they found it silly, insulting, or unfair because they understood some names sounded weird to some people. Just the other day I found out someone I know made a slight change to their 3 letter name for use in this country and I agreed their original name did not sound pleasant to me. Also, I have been to a place where my one syllable first name seemed very strange and hard to pronounce because the arrangement of letters is just not encountered there.

(the name below is not my name thanks to my grandfather, and I am quite glad it is not although it is part of my heritage)

Brad:
Not gonna quibble with your view of why AA is necessary, but I would point out that the rationale you cite was not accepted by the Supreme Court in Grutter. Your rationale was accepted by the Court in Bakke, i.e., AA is an acceptable means to address past wrongs. In Grutter, O'Connor specifically rejected that rationale and instead that diversity for the good of the institution was acceptable. In other words, AA can serve the interests of some underrepresented minorities, but the real good of AA is found in how non-minorities in elite institutions will have at least some appreciation for the minority viewpoint as they go forth and run American in the future.

"There is a fundamental moral (against an ideal of the United States) and legal (violation of the 14th amendment) problem with a *state supported* university awarding points based on skin color. Or sex. Or eye color. Or location of birth. Or any other factor determined by birth."

Yeah, like being born to someone who went to the school? I haven't seen a conservative or libertarian opposed to legacy preferences yet.....

I find it interesting how nobody would ever think of objecting to some forms of "collective responsibility"--for example, the responsibility of a naturalized or native-born citizen to pay taxes to service the national debt that existed when he or she pledged allegiance or was born, or the responsibility of a corporate shareholder to see his or her share of the corporation's assets used to service debts the corporation had incurred before he or she acquired the stock.

Yet somehow some people find the idea that assuming American citizenship and pledging allegiance to the United States carries with it not just an enormous number of opportunities and advantages but also some non-financial moral burdens as well a rather strange one...

>taxes to service the national debt...

So you favor small government with no inter-generational burden transfer? Me too.

>responsibility of a corporate shareholder to see his or her share of the corporation's assets used to service debts...

This is a responsibility one voluntarily assumes.

Bakho: You left out the end of the sentence " except in how it is reflected in socioeconomic status, school quality, etc" I don't doubt that there is some residual racism out there. I happen to believe that, for example, high unemployment rates among black teens is more explained by the lack of businesses in the inner city than by lack of willingness to hire them - teens often must work close to home/school. There may be some subconscious racism in the quality of schools thing - better, higher seniority teachers choosing white schools expecting an easier and more rewarding experience, for example. God knows racism is practically a reasonable explanation for the drug incarceration rates, but those kids aren't applying to colleges anyway. Racism may even mean their parents have less desirable jobs - which is reflected in the socioeconomic variable.

I am claiming that, all things equal, a more individualized treatment of these variables is a) going to select a better quality student body, b) be fairer, and c) be more constitutional than AA based crudely on race. We also become a better society when we stop harping on race.

Of course our society has some racism - is interracial marriage taboo? Yes - though my experience (from a magnet high school in a black school in the late 80's) is that interracial dating is more taboo among blacks - especially black females - than whites. Do blacks, esp. black males, get treated differently due to race -yes. Should the government treat blacks differently to "compensate"? No. Is AA better than socioeconomic scoring to compensate for past injustice? I don't think so. Does it make sense to give a leg up to the children of black professionals, rather than to the children of poor rural whites? Not to my mind.

"I find it interesting how nobody would ever think of objecting to some forms of "collective responsibility"--for example, the responsibility of a naturalized or native-born citizen to pay taxes to service the national debt that existed when he or she pledged allegiance or was born"

What a very strange thing to argue, because race based AA divides up immigrants in exactly this manner. I'd agree that a considerable debt was owed by the slave owners to the slaves, and the advantage of one group over the other tends to persist. So now what we do is assign new immigrants from Africa to the creditor group and new European immigrants to the debtor group. That's not very collective.

A better conclusion to draw from your collective responsibility analogy is that because all sorts of old and new injustices which are difficult to measure tend to propagate from generation to generation, an increased government effort ought to be made to prepare children for participation in society when their parents cannot properly do so.

"I happen to believe that, for example, high unemployment rates among black teens is more explained by the lack of businesses in the inner city than by lack of willingness to hire them.."

Fair enough, but why are there a dearth of businesses and employment opportunities to begin with? This is part of the legacy of racism, of blacks not having past opportunity to obtain loans for business ventures, of blacks losing their home equity during white flight and blacks being excluded from jobs and opportunities in the past. It is not only a legacy of the past, but it is ongoing. And why is it that blacks are concentrated in these areas with high unemployment? Are there explanations that don't ultimately involve racism?

You also seem to believe that middle and upper class blacks have the same opportunities available to middle and upper class whites. You believe that these blacks are unaffected by racism. You are wrong. How integrated are our integrated communities? Do blacks as minorities in white schools experience the school in the same way that white students do? Don't make that assumption because it is not true.

You see things the way they are and blame the individual. As a white person in a white dominated society, you do not experience racism. Because you do not experience racism, you ignore it or deny that it even exists. Your denial does not make it go away.

Who says that future generations are going to pay off the debt out of some feeling of responsibility? If they choose to service that debt, it will be to preserve the credit rating of the United States and avoid a financial crisis, not out of a feeling of "collective responsibility". If they choose to repudiate that debt, the financial consequences to them - and the world - will be dire. Keep in mind that many of the wealthy and powerful own the T-bills that would be repudiated. Mental exercise - what is the incentive for a country with an otherwise permanently balanced budget to not repudiate its own existing debt, except for the ownership of said debt by its citizens? See several South American countries for politicians who would repudiate, if they had America's economic and military strength.

>...why are there a dearth of businesses and employment opportunities to begin with?

Ask the Korean merchants targeted during the Rodney King riots.

A

Brad DeLong writes, "Yet somehow some people find the idea that assuming American citizenship and pledging allegiance to the United States carries with it not just an enormous number of opportunities and advantages but also some non-financial moral burdens as well a rather strange one..."

Because the particular "moral burden" you're writing about is bizarre, Dr. DeLong! :-)

It's pretty obvious you didn't just "step off the boat" (no offense intended to anyone). Are you going to tell my Indian (from India) friends, that when they become U.S. citizens, they become morally burdened with U.S. slavery? That's completely absurd! (But perhaps these 30-somethings then get to "trade in" their "moral burden" for the Indian caste system?? ;-))

The sons are NEVER responsible for the sins their fathers committed before the sons were even born!

Every U.S. citizen has a moral obligation to pay taxes that are levied *in accordance with U.S. law*...and so long as such taxes don't themselves support immoral practices (such as denying sick people the use of medical marijuana).

And every U.S. citizen has a moral obligation, while they are alive, to attempt to force their government to follow both The Law, and what's morally right. That's why I'm a Libertarian. That's why I absolutely demand that the federal government stop persecuting people for medical marijuana...or any other kind of marijuana or drug. That's why I will continue to write and speak against Bill Clinton's destruction of the Al Shifa pharmaceutical plant (and for the U.S. government to provide reparations for the destruction). That's why I've already called for Congress to impeach and remove G.W. Bush from office, for waging war against Iraq without a Congressional declaration (and for 1000 other ways he's violated the Constitution).

In fact, that's why I oppose Affirmative Action, as practice by the University of Michigan.

But citizens do NOT have "moral burden" for things the U.S. government did before they were even born! It's simply not rational to think they do. How can one possibly be "morally burdened" by something that one could not possibly have acted upon?

You are essentially arguing from the same logic as religious folk who argue that people will go to H@ll, if people don't accept Jesus as the Son of G@d. (Possibly not good to swerve into religion. ;-))

I've asked some of these people, "Suppose someone is born, lives, and dies in the deepest Amazon, and they've never even heard of Jesus. In other words, these people have no way of ever even knowing Jesus existed. Are they still going to H@ll?"

And their answer usually is (long pause for thought) "Y---ess!"

My response is that, if G@d punishes people for something that they could not possibly have acted upon, She's a real b....! And I'll definitely have to lecture Her about that, on the odd chance I see Her. ;-)

I absolutely refuse to assume "moral burden" for anything that I couldn't possibly have acted upon...such as actions that occurred before I was born.

AA has never been a topic that has particularly interested me; I think good arguments can be made on both sides (although Prof. Delong's all too common mindless denigration of those he disagrees with is somewhat pathetic), and, more importantly, of all the things the state does to wrongfully harm individuals, giving an edge to those usually well-off minorities who most successfully game the system is certainly no more offensive than having wealthy people game the system in order to grab other's property, through various subsidies and transfers. Furthermore, attempts by private entities