Bernie Sanders: The straightest path to racial equality is through the one percent

[Uncle Joe]

Americans owe many of our freedoms to those who put their lives on the line for racial equality: people like Fannie Lou Hamer, Medgar Evers and Daisy Bates. But a racial wealth gap of 10 to 1 exists between white and black Americans, and that gap, along with the effects of racism, fuels disparities in areas ranging from health care to housing and from college debt to criminal sentencing.

Many black Americans are disillusioned about politicians who champion the organizing power of black women when it’s time to turn out the vote but neglect their needs between election cycles. They are tired of politicians offering meaningful yet inadequate reforms — kicking the can of progress down the road instead of using their political capital to fight for reforms that current generations desperately need.

(snip)

Structural problems require structural solutions, and promises of mere “access” have never guaranteed black Americans equality in this country. Sixty-five years after Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, education has remained separate and unequal. “Access” to health care is an empty promise when you can’t afford high premiums, co-pays or deductibles. And an “opportunity” for an equal education is an opportunity in name only when you can’t afford to live in a good school district or to pay college tuition.

Jobs, health care, criminal justice and education are linked, and progress will not be made unless we address the economic systems that oppress Americans at their root. As Princeton’s Keeanga Yamahtta-Taylor recently argued, “There is no race without class in this country.” Yet most politicians won’t acknowledge the role that our economic system plays in maintaining racial inequality.

(snip)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bernie-sanders-the-straightest-path-to-racial-equality-is-through-the-one-percent/2019/07/10/730a7206-9f6b-11e9-b27f-ed2942f73d70_story.html?utm_term=.86e0c2add055

[guillaumeb]

1. Recommended.

A recognition that racism is foundational to US capitalism.

[Honeycombe8]

2. So what's his solution? nt

[Control-Z]

5. This.

I don't know that I've ever heard a solution come from Sanders.

[riverine]

8. Revolution!

You know.

Whatever that means.

[George II]

11. There is none.

[TomCADem]

15. Its a RW Ideal - Trickle Down Social Justice

How is what Bernie is preaching different from the right wing, which has also argued that economic growth will magically erase racism and sexism? Ronald Reagan used to push this idea of trick down social justice. The only difference is in how Bernie versus Reagan push for economic growth. Bernie may push for expanded spending while Republicans pimp tax cuts, but the underlying premise is that economic growth will somehow eliminate racism.

https://www.thenation.com/article/two-terrible-ideas-on-their-way-to-historys-dustbin/

We are all too familiar with the pitfalls of trickle-down economics, the theory that cutting taxes and regulations at the top will create prosperity for all. As we argue in Rewriting the Rules of the American Economy, more than 30 years of experimentation have shown that imperfect information and institutional distortions reward the powerful, who then write rules to perpetuate this cycle. Thus we end up with an increasing share of limited growth going to the top, with stagnant incomes for most and a hollowing out of the middle class.

But the orthodox belief in trickle-down economics, which has held sway since the 1980s, is no longer dominant in either major party. Donald Trump pays lip service to a kind of anti–trickle down populism, even if in reality he continues to push the Republican line on tax cuts for the rich. On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has joined figures like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders in calling trickle-down a “failed economic theory.” The emerging progressive economic agenda, which calls for rebalancing power at the top, strengthening our labor market by creating strong floors of standards and greater access for the most vulnerable workers at the bottom, and investing in public goods and economic security through a more robust role for the state, is the antidote to neoliberal tax-cutting.

What’s less widely recognized is that the same market orthodoxy has driven “race-neutral” and “color-blind” policy making. This is the idea that, in order to improve outcomes for people of all races and especially people of color, we must focus on high common standards and accountability and move away from policies that name, discuss, or demarcate people according to racial groupings. But this “trickle-down racial equity” approach does not account for the very unequal life chances and increasingly limited social mobility faced by people of color, which sees black Americans at every level of education earning less than their white peers.

As with trickle-down economics, after more than 30 years of trickle-down racial equity, our schools and neighborhoods and workplaces are no more racially integrated or equal; in fact, the little progress made in the late 1960s and 1970s has stalled and even reversed in some areas.

[Honeycombe8]

16. "Voo doo economics." Reagan's trickle down economics.

But Sanders doesn't even have an economic plan. It's just an idea of going after the uber-rich. No real plan for growth of jobs, particularly for unrepresented minorities in the work force. No real plan for growth of home ownership. Etc.

But then, Trump didn't have a "plan" either. So voters may not care.

[frazzled]

3. Essentially, a trickle down theory

That always works.

[wysi]

4. Bullshit

Social justice never trickles down.

[StarfishSaver]

6. Hunh?

That might make sense if racial inequality were limited to the 1%.

But it isn't, so it doesn't

[George II]

10. +1,000,000

[Blue_true]

33. Bernie seems to seriously believe that solving income inequality solves

every other social ill. He seems incapable of a more nuanced view.

[Otto Lidenbrock]

7. lebron james is worth hundreds of millions

he had the n-word spray painted on his front gate

[StarfishSaver]

9. Probably by someone not in the 1 percent

[TomCADem]

12. No. We Cannot Delay Social Justice While Waiting For Economic Reform

Bernie keeps on pushing this fantasy that racism is just the result of economic disparities. Indeed, you cannot have economic equality without addressing racism and sexism, because discrimination is often used to justify and economic disparities and create scapegoats.

Look at Trump. To cover-up the economic disparities that have grown under his administration, he scapegoats trade and immigrants. In other words, he tells working class whites that it is not the 1 percent, but that it is trade and immigration that is keeping them down.

Bernie just says this in reverse. The white working class does not need to worry about racism. Just push for economic equality, and racism and sexism will disappear.

[Bradical79]

25. The 2 are coupled together

It's one of my biggest disagreements with a lot of Democratic Socialists. You're completely right. Economic inequality does not lead to racism, and a rising tide does not lift all ships in this case. I'd say that often it's the racism that exacerbates economic inequality. While addressing economic inequality is a huge issue, if you focus on that without specific solutions for the massive bigotry problem, any attempt at fixing economic inequality will fail.

[ancianita]

13. It's a brilliant encapsulation of how to strengthen democratic government regulation of

fictional personhoods, lobbying, pricing, corporate law, equal pay and living wage work.

That 78% of Democrats favorably view his politics is worth any voter's attention.



https://news.gallup.com/poll/243539/americans-maintain-positive-view-bernie-sanders.aspx

[Uncle Joe]

17. I agree ancianita

and thank you for the contribution.

[ancianita]

18. ...

You're one reason I love this place, Uncle Joe.

[Uncle Joe]

19. ...

[lapucelle]

29. Here's more recent Gallup data.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/1618/favorability-people-news.aspx

[tishaLA]

14. OMG on Maddow he just compared

the call for him to pass the torch based on all the time he'd been around Washington to the plight of African Americans and women to achieve elected office. LOL that's how seriously he takes racial and gender equality issues: it's just like me!

[aikoaiko]

21. He made an analogy of ageism to racism and sexism.

And analogies are not equivalencies in all attributes -- just some.

[tishaLA]

22. Yes, the US has always had structural barriers to older white men

being elected to the presidency.

[aikoaiko]

24. Who said that?

[lapucelle]

28. So identity politics isn't a "distraction" anymore?

[tishaLA]

32. I've never contended it was

Perhaps you're confusing me with someone who's confused

[lapucelle]

37. It was simply a badly worded ancillary to the point you made.

"The US has always had structural barriers to older white men being elected to the presidency; therefore identity politics will no longer be classified as a distraction."

[ucrdem]

20. Wait, didn't it used to be the 2%?

Now why would he change that to the 1%?

[silentEcho]

23. Sanders is being consistent. The majority of the party do not believe this is

the "straightest path to racial equality", that is all. I think we have facts on our side and Sanders belief is hollow.

[Vegas Roller]

26. For Senator BS

Every path goes through the 1%

[revmclaren]

27. Unless it's a billionaire that he liked

like Ross Perot.

Only praise for that particular 1%er.

Interesting....



ONLY!!! 2019 and beyond.

[ancianita]

30. Laugh all you want, but he's right. And a lot of us believe him.

[Beringia]

31. Bernie Sanders Gets Endorsement of Delivery Worker (twitter)

Link to tweet

[Uncle Joe]

34. ...

[Blue_Tires]

35. "no race without class in this country??"

If that was true, then wealthy black folks would be completely immune to racism, right? But we know that isn't the case...

[Uncle Joe]

36. I partially agree with you Blue Tires.

"If that was true, then wealthy black folks would be completely immune to racism, right? But we know that isn't the case..."

We both do know that wealthy black folks aren't immune to racism, on that we agree but we differ on the big picture summation.


While your argument has truth to it, this doesn't negate Bernie's message.