2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumWhat does this mean? I am not feeling this at all!
Absolutely," Sanders replied, "because what we will do is instead of give tax breaks to millionaires, we will create millions of jobs for low-income kids so they are not hanging out on street corners."
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/269362-atlanta-mayor-sanders-disrespectful-and-dismissive-to-obama-over-race#.Vr9367_NqAE.facebook
Does that say 'so they won't be hanging on street corners'?
Ummm, what does that MEAN?!
treestar
(82,383 posts)so the solution to the problem is clear - tax the billionaires.
Talk about tone deaf. He digs his hole deeper and deeper.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Depaysement
(1,835 posts)Or does it?
Not uncommon at all on the corner of my block when the weather is good and often even when it isn't. African-American teen unemployment is about 30%.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Depaysement
(1,835 posts)Racism causes black teen unemployment. This is a partial solution to that. Obviously, lowering black teen unemployment doesn't alleviate racism by itself.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Depaysement
(1,835 posts)If he meant that black teen unemployment causes racism, then I am really, really confused.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)The hanging on street cirners is throwing me off, I just dont get it
napi21
(45,806 posts)or somewhere else.
Remember your mother telling you an idle mind is the devils workshop?
Unemployment at all ages but mostly teens creates involvement in drugs & crime. If you grow up in an area where you see absolutely no hope of any job or future, and someone points out you make a pretty good buck selling drugs, he temtation is too great to say no.
Jobs that these teens used to get are now being done by their parents! The jobs the parents had are now in China, or Mexico, or Vietnam....
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)"So when you have childhood African American poverty rates of 35 percent, when you have youth unemployment at 51 percent, when you have unbelievable rates of incarceration which by the way leaves the children back at home without a dad our even a mother, clearly we are looking at institutional racism," he said. "We are looking at an economy in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And sadly in America today, in our economy, a whole lot of those people are African American."
tokenlib
(4,186 posts)If they can't find work, there are those that say they are lazy and just want free stuff...
Response to bravenak (Reply #2)
Name removed Message auto-removed
Ed Suspicious
(8,879 posts)AtomicKitten
(46,585 posts)Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)You and your tired meme?
Welcome to DU!
Agschmid
(28,749 posts)Lol.
Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)NurseJackie
(42,862 posts)... that's a popular code word among some of the worst politicians and pundits.
I don't understand. Bernie has had SO MANY OPPORTUNITIES, but he misses every one. He BLEW IT AGAIN!!
bravenak
(34,648 posts)I still feel the same. Hangin on street corners, wtf
SMC22307
(8,090 posts)lazy, Welfare Queens, gangsta, would rather hang out on the front stoop or basketball court than work, etc. That sort of nonsense.
Bernie understands that with opportunities for education, jobs, volunteering, neighborhood revitalization, and overall -- the chance to live a good life -- perceptions will change. Race relations will improve.
Bernie understands how American workers are hosed by trade agreements, Obama and Clinton do not.
It's worth a shot, because in "the greatest nation in the world," our communities should not look like this:
Duckhunter935
(16,974 posts)That they would have jobs, same with all low income people of all races.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)CentralMass
(15,265 posts)if you search.
POVERTY AND RACISM INEXTRICABLY LINKED, SAYS UN EXPERT
http://www.socialwatch.org/node/16324
Poverty, Stress, and Achievement: What Role Does Racism Play?
http://www.racismreview.com/blog/2009/04/12/poverty-stress-and-achievement-what-role-does-racism-play/
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=13941&LangID=E
cannabis_flower
(3,764 posts)parents in jail for trumped up crimes will leave kids (of all races but majority back because the police target blacks), who don't have something else to do (like jobs or homework or maybe even organized sports or other entertainment) and aren't supervised because dad and/or mom is either in jail or working outside the home, to hang out on the street corner perpetuating racial stereotypes in the minds of those who would be inclined to think like that.
thereismore
(13,326 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)It was best left unsaid. I will leave it at that.
thereismore
(13,326 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Kalidurga
(14,177 posts)I live fairly close to an urban area and I go to the city often. I don't know of kids hanging out on corners looking for trouble I haven't run into that. But, I have often run into low-income kids looking for jobs. I have on occasion tried to help them get a job, I was successful once. I think it is important to do something to help though. I think that is what he is trying to say. He isn't saying it very well. But, it's still better than saying he will bring them to heel.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Thank you for the explaination. I feel sad.
Kalidurga
(14,177 posts)In fact I said I never met any. How do you get so far off the message of the text?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)What does black kids 'hanging on street corners' have to do with racism/race relations? I do not see the connection?
Kalidurga
(14,177 posts)I wish I could help. I seriously think it's a generation thing. Bernie will probably listen if someone tells him it's really not the way he perceives it. And I don't know race relations, just relatin' to my relatives of other races and my extended family and my neighbors and people I work with and go to school with.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)mucifer
(23,521 posts)before all of the factories went overseas. There is a correlation. There were lots of high paying union jobs here. Now not so much NAFTA was a mess.
I don't know that the jobs can come back. But, it would be great if we could get some new regulations on corporations.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)femmedem
(8,199 posts)I think he was asked about race relations, but spoke about how his policies would improve the lives of black Americans.
Which is by no means a perfect answer, and I understand your confusion.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)wyldwolf
(43,867 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Response to wyldwolf (Reply #6)
Ed Suspicious This message was self-deleted by its author.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)Here is Obama in 2013
"Part of being able to move this forward is understanding the reality of guns in urban areas are very different from the realities of guns in rural areas."
https://newrepublic.com/article/112190/obama-interview-2013-sit-down-president
PonyUp
(1,680 posts)Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)Improved jobs and improved wages are a benefit to everyone, especially when the youth of a minority that is around 31% unemployed or underemployed.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/oct/13/bernie-s/debate-bernie-sanders-says-african-american-youth-/
Using the standard method for determining the jobless rate, the figure for African-American youths is 31.5 percent and for Hispanic youths its 18.6 percent.
Duckhunter935
(16,974 posts)Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)840high
(17,196 posts)AtomicKitten
(46,585 posts)Logical
(22,457 posts)mac56
(17,566 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)SoLeftIAmRight
(4,883 posts)chill pill baby - peace
bravenak
(34,648 posts)SoLeftIAmRight
(4,883 posts)...
bravenak
(34,648 posts)SoLeftIAmRight
(4,883 posts)I just wanted to help
be well
Uncle Joe
(58,328 posts)POVERTY AND RACISM INEXTRICABLY LINKED, SAYS UN EXPERT
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511221589
Thanks for the thread, bravenak.
Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Uncle Joe
(58,328 posts)sammythecat
(3,568 posts)She's not looking for truth here. Aggravation is the name of the game being played. You'll get no concessions no matter what you say or how well you demonstrate the truth of the matter.
AtomicKitten
(46,585 posts)here to pummel Bernie as punishment because his supporters made her cranky or some such shit
thereismore
(13,326 posts)Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)I guess this thread didn't go as you thought it would did it?
Cali_Democrat
(30,439 posts)I live in a big city......I don't see this.
What is he talking about?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Which has nothing to do with the subject at all.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)is a result of institutional racism.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)trying to convince me that Al Gore said he invented the internet.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Race relations, solved by jobs. And ending street corner hanging.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)do. You refuse to ask a question you don't at least THINK you know the answer to.
It's obvious and it's a hoot to watch.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)nc4bo
(17,651 posts)As during the warm months.
There really are no good jobs here unless you are military affliated, can pass the security screenings to work for contractors on Bragg, or have college pedigrees you can pad your resume with. Dont have a police record because then even Goodyear dont want you. Lots of shitty service jobs where you work your ass off for $7-8 (and tips if you are a waiter/ress) and hardly any worthwhile benefits. The Mexicans live in trailer parks too, some live on massa's farm in huts and trailers on the land they farm for massa.
Typical con game of how unemployment was lower in a 4th quarter of last year as all the shitty walmarts, etc. needed more slave labor for xmas.
Some of these kids probably make better money selling dope and the prostitutes make way better selling ass on the boulevards than trying to work 2 jobs to make ends meet.
Yes....they ARE on the corners......In the trailer parks and really low income home areas.
Poor whites are a bit less noticeable. We have one friend that brews moonshine and cooks meth in the woods. Lots of meth activity around here.
This fucking country owes its' citizens something in fact.......lots of somethings. We need to stand up together and demand REAL CHANGE that benefits the needs of the many, not just the needs of the few.
God damn it we can do better!! We fucking DESERVE better.
Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)What does it MEAN? I need to know.
Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)Billionaires are gonna keep black kids from hanging out on street corners, and apparently Obama couldn't get this done.
Absolutely better on race relations, or some such...
bravenak
(34,648 posts)mak3cats
(1,573 posts)...and probably sexist too.
Did I guess right?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Squinch
(50,934 posts)YOU (wink, wink) to stop the damn hanging out on street corners. You know, like you do.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Should i be insulted? I usually laught but I am still confused.
I like your explanation but I hope to get more options as to what it means. Bernie knows. He should tell me.
Squinch
(50,934 posts)out to people of color.
No kidding. That's my take.
Are you feeling grateful? Are you hanging out on a street corner right now?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)It's cold though and my kids would hate it, but I guess I gave to. I have so much time to make up for.
Squinch
(50,934 posts)do fun things there?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)JRLeft
(7,010 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)It puts a damper on my purp drankin.
JRLeft
(7,010 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)JRLeft
(7,010 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)I need a place to hang out all day
JRLeft
(7,010 posts)You know that's all we do is hang on the corner all day and night 40 in one hand and a blunt in another.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)JRLeft
(7,010 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)JRLeft
(7,010 posts)all american girl
(1,788 posts)sign: white woman....more I learn about this wonderful man, the more I love...and I will admit, I'm a way late to his party, and that is unforgivable on my part.
Squinch
(50,934 posts)It's boring, and it makes them look stupid.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Squinch
(50,934 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Squinch
(50,934 posts)No one is happy.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Squinch
(50,934 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)betsuni
(25,442 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)in the black community. Which is what Bernie said and you would know if the OP had been wise enough to provide the full quote.
Absolutely," he said in response to a question from the moderator. "Because what we will do is instead of giving tax breaks to billionaires, we are going to create millions of jobs for low-income kids so theyre not hanging out on street corners. Were going to make sure those kids stay in school are able to get a college education."
"So when you have childhood African American poverty rates of 35 percent, when you have youth unemployment at 51 percent, when you have unbelievable rates of incarceration which by the way leaves the children back at home without a dad our even a mother, clearly we are looking at institutional racism," he said. "We are looking at an economy in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And sadly in America today, in our economy, a whole lot of those people are African American."
We also are smart enough to read the dozens of sociological studies that have revealed that poverty and racism are indeed linked.
Fortunately, one of our more engaging and intelligent DUers provided a link to the above information. (Warning, it is quite a bit longer than the truncated quote provided by the OP.)
POVERTY AND RACISM INEXTRICABLY LINKED, SAYS UN EXPERT
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511221589
mgmaggiemg
(869 posts)that bernie is a studs terkle guy who thinks that just a fair wage is going to solve all of america's cultural problems....obviously everyone is for a living wage but it does not solve state violence against minorities...discrimination...etc....obviously education and health care are great but he's not showing how he would shift the budget priorities to make it happen....no one thinks that regulating the banks is going to suddenly make the poor rich...etc
bravenak
(34,648 posts)mgmaggiemg
(869 posts)it's a free country...hang out on any street corner you like...I think in his mind he equates jobs (which are a great thing...don't get me wrong) as a social fixer...for america's social problems....ok so now people have jobs...and after work they hang around on street corners....yeah...it doesn't make sense...it's a non sequitur....
yourpaljoey
(2,166 posts)Because we live in a connected world... and ALL lives matter.
That was easy... next question.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)thomservo
(147 posts)Duckhunter935
(16,974 posts)We know
yourpaljoey
(2,166 posts)Let us begin there.
Response to bravenak (Original post)
NowSam This message was self-deleted by its author.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Response to bravenak (Reply #49)
NowSam This message was self-deleted by its author.
Response to NowSam (Reply #111)
NowSam This message was self-deleted by its author.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Response to bravenak (Reply #119)
NowSam This message was self-deleted by its author.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Nice to meet you. Good day.
Response to bravenak (Reply #140)
NowSam This message was self-deleted by its author.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)result of institutional racism.
Absolutely," he said in response to a question from the moderator. "Because what we will do is instead of giving tax breaks to billionaires, we are going to create millions of jobs for low-income kids so theyre not hanging out on street corners. Were going to make sure those kids stay in school are able to get a college education."
"So when you have childhood African American poverty rates of 35 percent, when you have youth unemployment at 51 percent, when you have unbelievable rates of incarceration which by the way leaves the children back at home without a dad our even a mother, clearly we are looking at institutional racism," he said. "We are looking at an economy in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And sadly in America today, in our economy, a whole lot of those people are African American."
bravenak
(34,648 posts)But why is he connecting us 'hanging on strert corners' with solving race relations? How? Why? It is not cool. Stereotype.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)If you don't want to read it in context, be my guest.
72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)The main reason race relations are poor is because too many black kids hang out on street corners.
72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)Squinch
(50,934 posts)72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)Read it in context.
Of course it's sarcasm.
Squinch
(50,934 posts)Somebody downthread is saying "all lives matter."
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)institutional racism.
Here is the full quote:
Absolutely," he said in response to a question from the moderator. "Because what we will do is instead of giving tax breaks to billionaires, we are going to create millions of jobs for low-income kids so theyre not hanging out on street corners. Were going to make sure those kids stay in school are able to get a college education."
"So when you have childhood African American poverty rates of 35 percent, when you have youth unemployment at 51 percent, when you have unbelievable rates of incarceration which by the way leaves the children back at home without a dad our even a mother, clearly we are looking at institutional racism," he said. "We are looking at an economy in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And sadly in America today, in our economy, a whole lot of those people are African American."
George II
(67,782 posts)...and working in a candy store.
When I was finished for the day my friends and I hung out on the corner.
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)here is the question and Bernie's answer in full
Asked by PBS debate moderator Judy Woodruff if "race relations would be better under a Sanders presidency than they've been," the Vermont senator replied, "Absolutely."
"Because what we will do is say, instead of giving tax breaks to millionaires, we are going to create millions of jobs for low-income kids so they're not hanging out on street corners," he said. "We're going to make sure that those kids stay in school or are able get a college education. So I think that when you give low-income kids, African-American, white, Latino kids, the opportunities to get their lives together, they are not going to end up in jail. They're going to end up in the productive economy, which is where we want them."
http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/11/politics/bernie-sanders-race-relations-democratic-debate/]
bravenak
(34,648 posts)azurnoir
(45,850 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Look. The idea that us hanging on street corners is why race relations are poor is insulting. If you cannot see that I cannot help you see.
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)azurnoir
(45,850 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)boston bean
(36,220 posts)in turn Obama caused black working age youth to hang out on street corners. Causing all sorts of trouble and if they had a job they wouldn't be hanging out on street corners causing racism.
Bernie won't allow that.
Thats the best i can do.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)Arazi
(6,829 posts)IIRC, that's always been one of your singular issues - jobs for AAs (along with mass incarceration.)
Your faux lack of understanding is a really boring schtick by the way.
/Trash thread
HassleCat
(6,409 posts)Young black men spend a lot of time hanging around on street corners. So do young white men, but young black men do it more because their other opportunities are more limited. We will have federal programs that take in many of these young men, of all colors, and including some young women, and we will encourage them to get a high school diploma or GED. And we will train them to write software, fix cars, build houses, etc. And most of them will complete the program and go back to hanging out on the street corner.
But there will be a few who catch fire, maybe five percent, and they will go to college, get a decent job, things like that. And they won't be hanging around on the street corner. And that's a good thing for them, and for all us, including those who are scared by young black men on street corners.
And the Republicans will say, "There are still black kids hanging out on street corners in DC, Detroit, and Compton so the Democrat giveaway program didn't work. It failed to clear our street corners of scary young black men with their hoodies pulled up. So let's pull all the funding and build some missiles instead."
And the cycle continues.
Sanders is proposing a bigger investment in something that works, but doesn't work well enough to make everybody happy. But it's a better use of tax dollars than bailing out banks, so he's on the right track here.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)HassleCat
(6,409 posts)I'm glad you like my reply so much.
boston bean
(36,220 posts)It stark raving anti progressive.
RiverLover
(7,830 posts)brought to heel.
That is some sick republican thinking.
SMC22307
(8,090 posts)HOLY SHIT. Not sure how I missed that little gem over the years...
72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)are convinced that "race relations" is an entirely economic issue, that can be solved by job programs or something. In which case, I'm wondering why LBJ doesn't get more credit for ending all racial problems in the US.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)I am just trippin up here.
RiverLover
(7,830 posts)Really, what does she plan to do?
I haven't heard anything. She & Bill have only hurt the black community to date.
72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)The question is what Bernie meant.
I keep reading that he's the smartest guy that ever lived, he has the most integrity, he's never been wrong on any issue.
I wouldn't think an articulate explanation of his views is too much to ask.
Duckhunter935
(16,974 posts)Bet you can not or will not respond.
RiverLover
(7,830 posts)Bernie Sanders on Racial Justice
Tackling structural inequality is at the heart of Bernie Sanders campaign, and at the foundation of this policy is his belief that we must address what he calls the parallel problems of economic disparity and institutional racism. The imbalance inherent in Americas institutions whether our education, healthcare, immigration or criminal systems point to a fundamental lack of justice for Americas people of color.
Bernie has long worked to address intrinsic and explicit racism from multiple angles. His extensive record as an advocate of racial justice goes back to his activism in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. He is proud to have marched on Washington with Martin Luther King, Jr. and watch him give his I Have a Dream speech. Bernie was also a student leader of the Congress of Racial Equality when he was arrested for protesting institutional segregation. Throughout his three decades in public service, Bernie has both been vocal on issues related to racial justice and voted to support those views a legislative record thats earned him a 100 percent rating from the ACLU and a 100 percent from the NAACP.
Bernie believes racial justice is so important, and so intertwined with his vision for America, that racial justice has its own issue page on his campaigns website. In it, he details how to address different kinds of violence perpetrated against people of color: physical, legal, political, and economic.
https://berniesanders.com/issues/racial-justice/
Criminal Justice: The American justice system is crippled by over-incarceration, disenfranchisement, and poor prison conditions, and people of color are disproportionately affected by this situation. A total rehaul is required.
Economic Justice: People of color face systemic discrimination in every aspect of our economy, from education to hiring to compensation. We must create more jobs, raise the minimum wage, and increase access to education and training. We must also expand social safety net programs and guarantee affordable healthcare and nutrition programs so that we enable working families of color to get ahead.
Voting Rights: State by state, our voting rights are increasingly under attack. Various voter suppression tactics very directly affect people of colors ability to participate in our democratic process. We must combat voter ID laws and felony disenfranchisement.
Housing Discrimination: Residential segregation and lack of access to quality affordable housing has a pervasive and disproportionate impact on people of color.
The Conversation About Race: Americas entrenched history of racial inequality is systemic and we must confront it head on.
Immigration Reform: As a nation of immigrants, we must reform a system that keeps too many hardworking laborers in the shadows most of them people of color.
As an introduction, watch this video from 2013, where Bernie discusses his first-ever visit to Washington, D.C. where he marched for civil rights with Martin Luther King, Jr. who like Bernie saw the fight for racial justice as interlinked with the fight for economic justice. Indeed, Kings final cause was the Poor Peoples Campaign, which he was building at the time of his assassination in 1968.
In this video, Bernie discusses both how far we have come, and how much more we have to go to achieve Kings dream of racial justice in America:
Criminal Justice
The United States justice system is crippled by over-incarceration, poor conditions in our jails, and the systematic stripping of the rights of the incarcerated, a disproportionate amount of whom are people of color.
Bernie believes that America squanders far too many resources on over-incarceration and misguided crime policy and that this money could be better spent providing jobs and education to those who might otherwise get lost in the criminal justice system. Bernie also advocates for police reform through increased transparency and accountability as well as the demilitarization of Americas police forces.
Watch him discuss how our broken criminal justice system disproportionately targets people of color in this May 2015 video:
So whats the scope of our incarceration problem?
We have more prisoners than any other country in the world:
The interesting thing is America hasnt always been like this. Heres how much our incarceration rate has spiked domestically over the years:
Wow. Tell me more about how mass incarceration affects people of color.
The majority of the U.S. prison population is male and under the age of 40, and a disproportionate amount of them are of people of color.
The hard data speaks volumes incarceration rates among both blacks and Latinos have risen much faster than for whites:
According to a 2013 report by the Sentencing Project, a research and advocacy group, one out of three black men can expect to go to prison in his lifetime, compared to one out of 17 white men. And specifically, see how blacks are disproportionately arrested for drug crimes:
This video highlights the racial bias in the American criminal justice system:
Does going to prison reform people and reduce crime?
Regarding reforming people, the answer is no. In fact, incarceration aggravates the situation. Young people of color who go to jail or juvenile detention centers have decreased literacy rates, can expect lower grades, drop out of school at a higher rate, and end up committing more crime. Beyond suffering from limited access to education or unsafe living conditions while in prison, having a criminal record makes it harder to get a job particularly for blacks:
Racial_impact_of_criminal_record_interview_callback
Source
(As if all of the above werent bad enough, going to prison means you can lose the right to vote! Due to state laws that restrict convicted felons from voting, one out of 13 black Americans is disenfranchised, meaning his voice is lost in the democratic process. Learn more about Bernies stance on felony disenfranchisement here. )
And with regards to reducing crime, a 2014 National Research Council report which studied years of evidence of crime trends, causes of rising prison populations, and consequences of imprisonment concluded that nearly every aspect of our countrys historically unprecedented and internationally unique rise in incarceration since the 1970s has not been worth the benefit in deterrence in crime reduction. Indeed, the report recommended that the U.S. revise its current sentencing laws (particularly with regards to drug enforcement) and cut back prison rates. Learn more at the Criminal Justice issue page.
Seems like a massive problem. How does Bernie propose we address this?
Bernie ties criminal activity to lack of economic opportunities, and research shows that people behind bars are more likely to be young people of color who havent had access to good education or work training. As Bernie stated in a June 2015 Senate address:
It is no great secret that, without work, without education, without hope, people get into trouble, and the result is that, tragically, in America today we have more people in jail than any other country on Earth.
Bernie believes we need jobs, not jails. To this end, he has proposed a massive bill that would put millions of Americans to work on rebuilding Americas crumbling infrastructure, another to provide job training for at-risk youths, and yet another that would raise the minimum wage currently at $7.25 per hour, which he calls a starvation wage to $15. (Learn more at the Youth Employment, Minimum Wage and Racial Wage Gap issue pages.)
Moreover, Bernie wants to increase access to education and job training, so that less youth of color and otherwise are pushed through the school-to-prison pipeline. In fact, America has over-invested in prisons to the point that there are more prisons than colleges in the country. To this end, Bernies also introduced the Free College For All Act, which aims to make all public colleges and universities tuition-free, so that everyone can afford a higher education. Finally, Bernie wants to reform sentencing laws, including eliminating mandatory minimums for non-violent offenses, and re-examining our drug policy in particular. (Learn more at the Education, Criminal Justice, and Drug Policy issue pages.)
Theres also been a lot in the news lately about people of color being the victims of police crime, right?
Sadly, yes. While black people make up only 13 percent of the population, they account for 31 percent of all victims killed by police. Blacks make up nearly 40 percent of unarmed individuals killed by police with a gun and 42 percent of unarmed individuals that are killed by police by means other than a gun.
Sobering FBI data shows that black teenagers are 21 times more likely than white teenagers to be killed by police:
And remember that statistics on police shootings are self-reported, so this data probably underestimates this depressing state of affairs.
Wheres Bernie on all this?
In a July 2015 speech to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a primarily black civil rights organization once led by Martin Luther King, Jr. that traces its roots to the Montgomery bus boycott, Bernie addressed police violence against people of color:
Too many African-Americans today are simultaneously having to deal the crisis of racial justice while coping with the effects of poverty and economic deprivation, such as drugs, crime, and despair.
As Martin Luther King, Jr., said; Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.
Across the nation, too many African-Americans and other minorities find themselves subjected to a system that treats citizens who have not committed crimes like criminals. A growing number of communities do not trust the police and police have become disconnected from the communities they are sworn to protect.
Sandra Bland, Michael Brown, Rekia Boyd, Eric Garner, Walter Scott, Freddie Gray, Tamir Rice. We know their names. Each of them died unarmed at the hands of police officers or in police custody. The chants are growing louder. People are angry. I am angry. And people have a right to be angry. Violence and brutality of any kind, particularly at the hands of law enforcement sworn to protect and serve our communities, is unacceptable and must not be tolerated.
We must reform our criminal justice system. Black lives do matter. And we must value black lives.
Bernie doesnt see these incidents as isolated events or reflective of recent developments, stating: Anyone who thinks this has not been going on decade after decade would be very wrong.
Hes fighting for a vision of America where a young black man or woman can walk down the street without worrying about being falsely arrested, beaten or killed.
Learn more about reforming this broken system at the Criminal Justice page.
Economic Justice
Martin Luther King, Jr. believed that economic disparity was tied to racial disparity. In fact, his famous march on Washington in 1963, where King gave his seminal I Have a Dream speech which Bernie was there to witness was actually called the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Indeed, the promotional pamphlet for the march spoke of the twin evils of discrimination and economic deprivation.
How do we fight for economic justice?
The first step is to acknowledge that America has a problem one of structural economic inequality.
Today, the U.S. sees vast inequalities in both income (what we get paid) and wealth (everything we own). While some inequality is expected in any economyand is perhaps even healthythe U.S. today has inequalities allowing those at the top to amass (and keep) huge estates, while 22 percent of children live below the poverty line. Adults can work 40 hours a week and still not make enough to feed their families, while corporate executives in many of those same companies make much, much more.
In terms of wealth everything we own 90 percent of Americans control less than one fourth of the countrys wealth. The top 0.1 percent controls 21.5 percent, which is over one fifth. The amount controlled by the top 0.1 percent (the top one-tenth of one percent) is the largest it has been in over a century.
And when it comes to income what we get paid The bottom 90 percent make $29,840 on average, but other reports based on the U.S. Census show that 40 percent of individuals make less than $20,000 annually, and 30 percent of families live on less than $40,000 a year. We cover inequality in detail on our Economic Inequality page.
And where do people of color land in all of this?
According to a joint report by Demos and the Institute on Assets and Social Policy (IASP), the median white household had $111,146 in wealth holdings compared to just $7,113 for the median Black household and $8,348 for the median Latino household.
Another study IASP conducted over 25 years reveals that the wealth gap between white and African-American families rose from $85,000 in 1984 to $236,500 in 2009.
The Harvard Business Review Compared median weekly salaries from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), revealing a lot about how race and gender relate to pay:
Comparing median weekly salaries from the U.S. Population Survey in 2013, we see that a median black male earns 75.1 cents for every dollar a median white male earns. A median Latino male earns only 67 cents. According to the same data, a median white woman makes 78 cents compared to a white male, and black and Latina women follow making 64 cents and 54 cents, respectively. We see that the racial wage gap is large, and that both gender and race are important factors when examining the wage gap.
(On the other hand, Asian men and women make more than anyone in America, also according to the BLS although this may be explained by the fact they have a higher average educational attainment.)
Is it harder to get an interview as a person of color in the United States?
It appears to be the case. Researchers at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) published an experiment in which they sent thousands of resumes to various help-wanted ads in Chicago and Boston. Some resumes bore the white-sounding names Emily and Greg, and others had the black-sounding names Lakisha and Jamal. Those with white-sounding names got one callback for every 10 applications; those with black-sounding names got one only every 15. (It is worth noting that this study did not check hiring rates or earnings.)
A story that went viral in 2014 seems to confirm the NBER results with regards to Latinos. A Mexican-American L.A. resident named José Zamora detailed how his job search was going nowhere until he changed his name on his resume from José to Joe editing nothing else and started getting callbacks from the same jobs that had ignored him previously.
What other contributors are there to the racial wage gap?
According to a 2001 paper by two labor economists, about half of the racial wage gap can be attributed to differences in work experience, differences in time out of the workforce, and differences in amount of education gained. Differences in amount of education gained contribute more to the Latino wage gap, while differences in experience and time out of the workforce contribute more to the black wage gap.
The same paper goes on to explain blacks in America suffer from a lower labor force participation for several reasons. When displaced from work, black workers take significantly longer than white workers to find new work. Those black people with a criminal record find it much harder than white people with a criminal record to find work. Since black people are incarcerated at a higher rate, this has a multiplicative decreasing effect on labor force participation.
Additionally, the researchers notes that black unemployment is likely understated since incarcerated individuals are not included in the statistic. (Learn more about Bernies stance on mass incarceration.)
Presumably communities of color are pretty concerned about the economy and getting jobs?
Definitely. In fact, Latinos care more about the economy and education (which is a way to get better jobs) than anything else:
And blacks put scarcity of jobs paying decent wages at the top of their concerns list:
How has Bernie worked to address the education and training gap?
In May 2015, Bernie introduced the College for All Act to help increase access to higher education, by making all public colleges and universities tuition-free. Moreover, his youth employment bill would include job training for at-risk youth.
These measures would provide those coming from low-income backgrounds a better chance to access the kind of education and training that would enable them to gain the skills that provide access to better economic opportunities.
And how about the criminal record issue which affect people of colors ability to get jobs?
Bernie has also come out against various contributors to over-incarceration of people of color. He has said that prison money would be better spent on job training and education. Bernie has also declared the war on drugs largely a failure as it has incarcerated far too many non-violent offenders. Instead, he favors reforming our drug policy and criminal justice system to focus on rehabilitation instead of senseless punishment.
If you skipped the previous section on Bernies stances on criminal justice reform with regards to people of color, go back and learn more.
What has Bernie done to address racial discrimination when applying for jobs?
Bernie has supported expanding laws that protect against discrimination. As recently as November 2013, he voted for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.
Lots of people of color cant make ends meet due to rising healthcare costs.
Thats absolutely true. The below graph shows how important it is to fight against the racial disparities and inequalities inherent in our health system:
Thats why Bernie advocates for universal healthcare. Though he has consistently supported the expansion of Medicaid coverage while fighting repeated efforts to cut funding for it, and voted for the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare), Bernie believes America hasnt gone far enough to provide adequate healthcare for all.
Moreover, hes sponsored legislation to curb drug costs and tackle fraud in the industry. He also wants to increase access to affordable housing and childcare, as well as the expansion of Social Security and nutrition programs. You can learn more about all of Bernies healthcare and public assistance policies at the Social Safety Net category page.
What about policies that keep Americans from falling into the safety net in the first place?
The cornerstone of Bernies policy is addressing economic inequality and hes long fought for everyday working Americans. In fact, one of the very first bills he introduced to Congress was the Liveable Wage Act of 1993, a bill to increase the minimum wage which he reintroduced several times thereafter.
Years later, hes still fighting for this cause. A major plank of Bernies presidential campaign is to more than double the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour, up from $7.25 per hour.
How would that help?
Over the past 40 years, the cost of living has increased significantly while workers wages have remained flat despite commensurate increases in the level of productivity. Learn more at the Minimum Wage issue page.
Its all moot though if we cant generate more jobs, right?
Exactly. Bernie believes the fastest way to create millions of jobs is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and hes been saying so for decades. In his introduction to the The Rebuild America Act of 2015, he noted:
Theres a reason that investing in our infrastructure has traditionally enjoyed bipartisan support in Congress. Its a good idea. It creates jobs, income, profits and tax revenues. It lays a foundation for the efficient operation of our economy in the future.
Want to know more about how this idea could generate better-paying jobs for millions of Americans? Check out the Infrastructure issue page.
Voting Rights
Unfortunately, various voter suppression tactics very directly affect people of colors ability to participate in our democratic process. Bernie feels strongly about combating voter ID laws and addressing felony disenfranchisement.
Is voter suppression really still happening?
Sadly, various tactics are used to disenfranchise certain segments of our population. Common methods of voter suppression include last-minute changes to polling locations and hours, reducing the number of polling places, and enacting voter ID laws which suppress voters without a drivers license.
In 2013, the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a landmark bill passed to combat voter suppression at the ballot box, particularly against people of color. The ruling outlawed a key requirement in the 1965 bill which required states with a history of racial discrimination at the poll to preclear any changes to electoral laws with the federal government before enacting them. This change allowed nine states to change election laws without federal approval, mostly to introduce voter ID laws.
What are voter ID laws?
Laws that require people to show an ID before being able to vote. Theyre ostensibly supposed to combat voter fraud but many experts believe the rate of incidence is far too overblown to accept that the threat is credible.
Why is this a racial justice concern?
Such laws suppress people of color so much more than others:
percentage-voters-asked-for-id
How does Bernie think we can fight back?
In June 2015, Bernie co-sponsored the Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would increase federal oversight of elections in states with a history of racial discrimination and voter suppression. The bill proposes that the preclear is required in states where there have been repeated voting rights violations in the previous 25 years. Hopefully this will address the proliferation of voter ID laws across the country.
Good. Every American citizen should have the right to vote!
Agreed, but some citizens are actually explicitly denied those rights by law. Certain states restrict people with felony convictions from voting even after theyve served their time and paid their debt to society. Its estimated that 5.85 million Americans have been legally stripped of their voting rights. And due to racial disparities in the criminal justice system, this disproportionately affects people of color. In fact, one in 13 blacks do not have the right to vote because of this.
But doesnt being a felon mean you forfeit your freedoms?
Youre still protected by the Constitution even if you commit a crime. Beyond suffering from limited access to education or safe living conditions while in prison, disenfranchisement follows former felons for the rest of their lives. The U.S. is one of the strictest nations in the world with regards to felony disenfranchisement.
Sounds bad. Whats the impact?
This directly threatens the notion of universal suffrage, limits free speech, and contradicts the right to representation inherent in our Constitution. Voting rights are essential to keeping inmates connected to civic life and providing them with a better foundation for rejoining society once they serve their time. Critics argue that felony disenfranchisement is a potent tool in the campaign to undercut African-American political power because it so disproportionately impacts blacks.
So, to the extent that people of color are over-represented in our prison system, they are under-represented in our political system. This graph shows the extent of felon disenfranchisement nationwide:
felony-disefranchisement-map
Where does Bernie stand on this?
Bernie has long been a supporter of universal suffrage and proudly represents Vermont, one of two states that do not restrict the voting rights of anyone convicted of felonies. In March 2015, Bernie co-sponsored the Democracy Restoration Act, which seeks to reinstate voting rights to people who have served their time and have been freed from prison.
Learn more about how Bernie is working to make the electoral system work for regular Americans, including those of color, at the Political Reform page.
Housing Discrimination
Residential segregation and lack of access to quality affordable housing has a pervasive and disproportionate impact on people of color. Explicit acts of housing discrimination that defined America before the Fair Housing Act of 1968 (e.g., Jim Crow, Black Codes, sundown towns) may be in the past, but weve hardly solved the problem.
According to a 2012 study by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Urban Institute, subtle forms of housing denial stubbornly persist.
white-home-seekers-favored
Then theres the problem of residential segregation, which persists in our cities and towns in spite of the Fair Housing Act.
But were so diverse. How could this still be a problem in melting pot America?
Lets start by sharing some statistical context. Theres a measure called the index of dissimilarity that researchers use to determine the rates of housing segregation in a particular geographic area. In an extreme case like Apartheid-era South Africa, where whites lived in all-white neighborhoods and blacks lived in all-black neighborhoods, the index of dissimilarity would peak at 100. In an area where people were randomly distributed irrespective of racial background, the index would be 0.
In the 2010 census, Houston had an index of dissimilarity of 61 for its black and white populations. This is considered moderately high and indicates that either 61 percent of whites or 61 percent of blacks would have to move to new neighborhoods in order to achieve perfectly-integrated distribution. Los Angeles had an index of 68, Chicago had an index of 76, and New York City had an index of 78.
Find out more about segregation in your own community by using this interactive map to explore segregation all over America.
Yikes. I guess we are still quite segregated. What are some of the causes?
There are several factors that contribute to housing and residential segregation. Lets take a common one: gentrification.
As a result of disinvestment on the heels of white flight, cities can withdraw public funds and services like building maintenance, garbage collection, and school funding in areas deemed to be low priority. Need an example? Check out Detroit.
This leads to deteriorating property values and quality of life. But if and when money floods back into these neighborhoods, it can leave poorer residents without access to capital behind forcing people out of their homes when they cant afford steep increases in rent or property taxes.
Other factors to consider are real-estate discrimination, socioeconomic status, and the lasting legacy of Americas discriminatory housing policies.
What has Bernie done about it?
He has been a longtime advocate for fair and affordable housing. In his 1981 mayoral campaign in Burlington, Vt., he ran against the incumbents plans to raise property taxes and proposed raising taxes on commercial property instead.
Once in office, the city required property owners to give residents two years notice before their apartments could be converted to condos as well as giving renters the preemptive right to buy converted units. Bernie prevented landowners from bulldozing affordable-housing units unless they first built an equal number of new units, and he implemented economic development projects and a communal land trust for affordable housing policies considered radical in the early 80s but which are more commonplace today.
As a senator, hes fought to create the Health Trust Fund, which targets excess profits from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to provide a new dedicated revenue source for states to finance very-low-income rental housing construction and rehabilitation projects.
The Conversation About Race
Bernie sees Americas persistent racial imbalances as a multi-layered problem. We must tackle discrimination inherent in the criminal justice system through sentencing reform and programs like community policing. Moreover, nothing will change if we dont address the root causes of economic inequality and confront the hard truths of Americas history of racial injustice from its roots in slavery to misguided policies meant to address the disparities today.
Want to know more about Bernies views on the subject? Check out this video:
Read more about Bernies racial justice policy platform at his campaigns site. And get a more in-depth look at his perspective and policies on the rights of specific groups of color, visit the Black Rights, Latino Rights, and Native American Rights issue pages.
Immigration
This country was built by immigrants, Bernie has said. He believes we must reform our immigration system to invite greater innovation, diversity, and economic opportunity, and further must endeavor to fight racial discrimination against our immigrants of color.
How many immigrants are there in the country?
As of 2013, there are 41.3 million foreign-born people living in the United States.
What are the racial demographics of our immigrant population?
Given that only 48 percent of the foreign-born reported their race as white, most immigrants here are people of color.
Additionally, 26 percent self-reported as Asian, 15 percent as some other race, and more than two percent as having two or more races. Finally, 46 percent or 19 million people reported having Latino origins. As Latino is an ethnic and not a racial category, its hard to discern exactly how many of those are people of color.
What are Bernies views on immigration generally?
Bernie believes Americas current immigration system is broken and requires comprehensive reform. An important aspect of immigration reform, according to Bernie, is to establish some pathway to legal residency or citizenship for the 11 million undocumented workers living in the United States so that they need not work and live in the shadows.
While he believes that border security is important for the country, Bernie doesnt believe that a fence is the way to achieve that security. Finally, Bernie believes that our visa system must protect American jobs instead of simply allowing corporations to score cheap labor via temporary work visas.
What are some racial justice issues our country faces with regards to immigration?
While not always correlated, language and race are closely entwined within the immigrant population, particularly given that most immigrants in the U.S. are people of color.
Attempts to make English the official language of the United States have been described as a way to circuitously make it legal for private and public entities to discriminate against people who cannot speak, read or write in English.
For instance, if English were legally designated as the national language, a government agency might be able to argue that it need not provide forms or information in any other language, hindering many immigrants ability to access social services and other essential public programs, not to mention basic information. In turn, this might discourage certain foreign-born from staying in America or deciding to come here.
What has Bernie done around language discrimination?
Bernie voted in 2007 against legislation that would have declared English the official language of the U.S. government, so as to enable government materials to still be available in other languages. In 2008, Bernie voted against a bill that would have cut funding from programs that would support people who had been fired from their jobs by employers who used their lack of English proficiency as an excuse.
Are there elements of economic exploitation of immigrants in the United States? And is there a racial element to it?
Unfortunately, yes. Bernie is very concerned with the exploitation of undocumented workers and their standard of living. He believes that such immigrants have been routinely cheated out of wages, held virtually captive by employers who have seized their documents, forced to live in unspeakable inhumane conditions and denied medical benefits for on-the-job injuries.
In a July 2015 speech, Bernie highlighted that undocumented workers are doing the extremely difficult work of harvesting our crops, building our homes, cooking our meals, and caring for our children. They are part of the fabric of America.
The racial element comes into play with the fact that of the 11 million undocumented people in America, 52 percent of the undocumented population are Mexicans alone. While we cant know exactly what the racial breakdown is among those, its likely that many or even most are people of color. And while more precise demographic data about undocumented people in the U.S. is necessarily difficult to come by they are undocumented after all! they are likely comparably diverse to our general immigrant population, which consists mostly of people of color.
How does Bernie want to address the economic exploitation of undocumented workers of color, and otherwise?
Given that Bernie believes undocumented workers are already part of the nations fabric, they should have a path to citizenship that will allow them to be fully participating members of American society and contributors to its economy.
Bringing undocumented workers out of the shadows will make it more difficult for employers to undercut the wages and benefits of all workers.
Check out the Immigration and Latino Rights issue pages for more on Bernies stance on these topics.
http://feelthebern.org/bernie-sanders-on-racial-justice/
dana_b
(11,546 posts)because they don't want true answers and discussions. They think that they have an "I gotcha!" moment but when you post the actual articulate answer to their "question" - it screws up the "gotcha".
polly7
(20,582 posts)dana_b
(11,546 posts)I hope it becomes an OP
polly7
(20,582 posts)cosmicone
(11,014 posts)one_voice
(20,043 posts)RiverLover
(7,830 posts)Works for me.
Common sense solutions usually do work if people are smart enough to implement them.
Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)Try trickle down social justice.
high tide floats all boats, etc... except some boats have been at the bottom of the sea for many years.
This one size fits all approach is exceedingly tone deaf. Based on some of the responses in this thread, some folks will never get this as they revel
in their righteousness.
jillan
(39,451 posts)72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)Maybe that cop wouldn't have busted him for being a burglar in his own house.
Response to 72DejaVu (Reply #95)
Name removed Message auto-removed
one_voice
(20,043 posts)comment. for the jury results.
AUTOMATED MESSAGE: Results of your Jury Service
Mail Message
On Sun Feb 14, 2016, 12:57 PM an alert was sent on the following post:
And maybe if he had stayed calm
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1251&pid=1231837
REASON FOR ALERT
This post is disruptive, hurtful, rude, insensitive, over-the-top, or otherwise inappropriate.
ALERTER'S COMMENTS
racist infiltrator
You served on a randomly-selected Jury of DU members which reviewed this post. The review was completed at Sun Feb 14, 2016, 01:11 PM, and the Jury voted 3-4 to LEAVE IT.
Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Meh.
Juror #4 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: If this person had said something like maybe he should have just let the police verify who he was I might have considered leaving it. But adding this. 'as any white person trying to break into their own home would have to do,' made it racial in my opinion. Hide it.
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: I would have alerted on the race-baiting OP over this one because it has set the tone for posts like this -- except I don't consider this as racist.
Juror #6 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #7 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: Nuke the racist.
Thank you very much for participating in our Jury system, and we hope you will be able to participate again in the future.
edited to add I was juror 4
Response to one_voice (Reply #169)
Name removed Message auto-removed
72DejaVu
(1,545 posts)Head straight down to SC and join the Sanders team's outreach to AA voters.
Please.
Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)islandmkl
(5,275 posts)continuing to exhibit cognitive dissonance so great that your response to every attempt to have you educate yourself is a repeated question begging the original question of your OP...
kind of Rubian for a Democrat...
bravenak
(34,648 posts)It did not have anything further, they have editors you can speak with online.
islandmkl
(5,275 posts)it isn't up to your responders to look up what you left out' in you OP...but, as you can see, we are happy to try to keep you informed of the whole story....
bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)It means so they will have actual jobs. Things to do, you know.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)fix racism, perhaps you could tell us how YOU think a President should do it. Please proceed.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)It's on us then, ok, thank you very much, you have been helpful in opening my eyes. I get it now.
thereismore
(13,326 posts)Armstead
(47,803 posts)They merely enable people to have housing, food, transportation, support the kids....little unimportant things like that.
Is it a panacea for all of the dimensions of race relations? Nope.
Does taking off the pressure of basic survival and living a better life make it easier to set up an better environment for understanding and addressing racial issues? Yep.
I'm not sure why you think that doesn't matter.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Armstead
(47,803 posts)Hypothetically, do you think overall relations between groups are better or worse if everyone is hungry homeless, angry, desperate, fighting for scraps.....Or if they are secure, well-fed and generally having a higher quality of life?
cosmicone
(11,014 posts)Race relations will be better under Bernie than President Obama.
Gender relations will be better under Bernie than Hillary Clinton.
and to extrapolate this further ....
Latino relations will be better under Bernie than Julian Castro.
LGBT relations will be better under Bernie than Harvey Milk.
etc. etc.
We should accept is as eternal and incontrovertible truth. It came straight from Bernie Sanders and should not be questioned.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Uh un. No!
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)Its a damn insult to low income kids, obviously.
I was a low income kid and I wasn't a thug Bernie!
Plus this has racial implications as well SMH
bravenak
(34,648 posts)I do it all day
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)We managed not to kill or rob anyone either, go figure.
I guess things are different in Bernie Sanders world, eh? SHM
bravenak
(34,648 posts)workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)The tone deafness of the Sanders race is never going to change.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)And it means what Bernie said: Full quote:
Absolutely," he said in response to a question from the moderator. "Because what we will do is instead of giving tax breaks to billionaires, we are going to create millions of jobs for low-income kids so theyre not hanging out on street corners. Were going to make sure those kids stay in school are able to get a college education."
"So when you have childhood African American poverty rates of 35 percent, when you have youth unemployment at 51 percent, when you have unbelievable rates of incarceration which by the way leaves the children back at home without a dad our even a mother, clearly we are looking at institutional racism," he said. "We are looking at an economy in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And sadly in America today, in our economy, a whole lot of those people are African American."
cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)She dint mean nuthin' either.
It ain't workin'. Too bad you don't see that.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)polly7
(20,582 posts)Props for trying so hard though I guess.
cherokeeprogressive
(24,853 posts)yourout
(7,526 posts)supporter.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)surgeon. Neither is Hillary and neither is Obama. You personally could start improving race relations by actually answering questions from white posters. Like this one: How will Hillary improve race relations? What is her plan?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)TIME TO PANIC
(1,894 posts)Absolutely despicable.
Rosa Luxemburg
(28,627 posts)polly7
(20,582 posts)I almost feel sorry for those so obsessed with it.
They don't care. Using those who could have their lives improved as a political tool to do this with is really something. I can't believe it's been allowed to go on here for so long.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)I guess that makes me evil now in some eyes
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)with you."
bravenak
(34,648 posts)jfern
(5,204 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)jfern
(5,204 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)All out fault. You know we all had jobs during slavery, amazingly enough it did nothing to improve race relations.
jfern
(5,204 posts)bravenak
(34,648 posts)Why do black with jobs get racially harassed? Sitting on corners?
jfern
(5,204 posts)Perogie
(687 posts)slipslidingaway
(21,210 posts)because you only posted a portion of the dialogue and we know you are not stupid enough to have looked at the total back and forth in the debate without asking an 'oh my' type of question.
"What does that mean? I am not feeling this at all!
Provide the entire discussion and then come to your own conclusions. Please do not play dumb, for the sake of ALL people, female, black, white or whatever. If you want a discussion on certain issues, this is not the way to do so.
So tired of the divisive game that has been played on DU for well over a year, life is too damn short!
Recursion
(56,582 posts)He really needs to work on this.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)And, yeah, I absolutely get why minorities are skeptical of this message: they've heard "a rising tide lifts all boats" before. And before that.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)That is obviously directed at people that are not me especially with a few fantasy crumbs tossed out to try to whet my appetite. Like, I totally see what he's doing and I am kinda pissed he thinks we can't tell. We obviously do hear exactly what it mean because we are not impressed. It's what he won't say that is the loudest.
Number23
(24,544 posts)Because we are apparently, only allowed to talk about the tone deaf and stupid stuff that Hillary does.
The tone deaf and stupid stuff that Sanders says and does only make him more noble and valiant or... something.
kennetha
(3,666 posts)He thinks in quasi-marxist fashion, that class antagonism is more fundamental than any other form of antagonism, more fundamental than racial antagonism in particular. That doesn't necessarily mean that he thinks racism isn't real, but he thinks that if you bring about true economic justice, racial justice will somehow follow in its wake -- but probably not the other way around. Indeed, he probably thinks that it would be impossible to achieve racial justice without first achieving economic justice.
I mean that's why he rails and rails against the Billionaire class. He thinks they and their greed are the source of almost all social/political/economic ills. So I wouldn't say he's "tone" death, as much as he is monomaniacal in his singular focus on the billionaire class as public enemy number one.
It's worth thinking how plausible it is that the billionaire class really deserves to be labelled public enemy number one. Personally, I've got no brief for the billionaire class. I do have to admit that I wouldn't complain if somebody dropped a few billions on me and made me one of them. But I'm just not sure that they are the only villains worth fighting or how many of our many woes they are directly to blame for.
First off, if we going to talk the billionaire class, we gotta realize that we're not just talking an American class, but a sort of global international cooperative. Rein in just the American segment of the class and you still got global international capital to contend with. And it's not at all clear how many problems you can really solve just by addressing the American segment of the global class. (That's why some Marxists -- like Trotsky -- thought that the revolution of the proletariat had to be a world wide revolution.)
So here's a question for Bernie, can you really de-rig the American economy, without de-rigging the Global economy?
Now I wouldn't want to deny that there surely some truth to the idea that the billionaire class would very much like to make the US government into its wholly owned subsidiary. But I don't think they've quite succeeded entirely. Miscreants of many types have a piece of the thing -- evangelicals, nativists, racists, old people, the rural folk -- Certainly not all of them are card carrying members of the billionaire class. One of the reasons politics is such a mess in this country is that it's a big complicated sprawling thing with many centers of power, many veto points, with a constitution that is designed to prioritize stasis and conflict over change. Makes it damned hard to get anything done.
That's why it's sort of silly to think that it's the billionaire class that is wholly responsible for the fact that we don't have single payer health insurance. I grant that a lot of resistance comes form the drug companies and the insurance companies. And these folks are charter members of the billionaire class. But I think you can go a lot further down the economic ladder than the billionaire rung and find a lot of people who are resistant. Most doctors aren't card carrying members of the class. But a lot of them -- especially the specialists -- are highly opposed to "socialized medicine." People who work for big companies with generous benefits always fear they are going to be net losers in any new scheme that at all lifts those below. That's a pretty American thing. And you don't have to be a billionaire to be subject to that particular affliction -- call it "I got mine-ism." American as apple pie.
And, by the way, it was president Jimmy Carter -- no servant of the billionaire class, who actually torpedoed Kennedy's national healthcare bill back in the late 70's, prompting Kennedy to challenge him for the Democratic nomination.
It's less clear to me whether it's the evil billionaire class that is supposed to be responsible for mass incarceration in Bernie's mind. Personally, I tend to blame white people at large and their fear of the black other for that one. I don't think it was the billionaires who insisted for decade after decade that politicians be "tough on crime." It wasn't the billionaire class that got that insane and costly three strikes and your out law passed in California. It was a lot of angry and afraid white people -- a lot of them working and middle class.
Now as a quasi-Maxist economic determinist, comrade Bernie probably thinks their racism is due to "false consciousness." What angry white racists need is a little class consciousness to make them immune from being played against their black brethren in chains by the billionaire class.
Same thing with illegal immigration, I guess. Have to find a way to lay xenophobia at the feet of the billionaire class. That's a little tricky, since you might naively think that the billionaires would be for open borders -- cause, you know, more cheap exploitable labor, and all.
Obviously some of the desolation of America -- the desolation of its heavy industries, the emptying out of rural American -- is due to the GLOBAL billionaire class, at least in part -- cause you know global capitalism, agribusiness, and all that capital moving around the globe at the speed of light. That kind of stuff takes livelihoods with it in the blink of an eye, enriching those over here, while impoverishing those over there, with a brutal and indifferent efficiency.
Dealing with that is tough stuff. One of the biggest challenges of the 21st Century. Not sure how to stop it. Way more difficult than saying "Main street bailed out wall street, time for wall street to bail out main street." a la Sanders. Way more difficult even than "breaking down all the barriers" al la Clinton too. But at least she recognizes that there are many distinct and interacting barriers and soaking the billionaires while necessary isn't sufficient to break all the barriers down.
Bottom line, even given the partly destructive force of global international capitalism, and the havoc it has wreaked on the American landscape -- I doubt it's just the billionaire class that's responsible for all of our decay. I mean just think about it, even billionaires have to live and work and do business somewhere. They have to draw workers from somewhere. They have to ship resources here and there. So you would think they would want a highly efficient infrastructure, a highly educated workers and all that jazz. That argues for a lot of public investment in things that we haven't been investing much in for a very long time. Who exactly is to blame for that lack of investment? If it's really and truly the billionaire class that is blocking that investment, then, well they are just stupid and working contrary to their enlightened self-interest, aren't they?
Long winded way of saying that comrade Sanders isn't tone deaf -- not exactly -- it's more like he's got tunnel vision. He's a man with a hammer, who sees nails everywhere.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)This is one hell of a good and deep and thoughtful answer.
I am going to read it and think about it again. But yes. I agree.
I also have no fix for this. Really, I can see his pounts but I think that ge got himself stuck on marx and finding a money fix to everything that there is no way, after all these years, that he CAN change the way he approaches things. I think my main issue is how doggedly he sticks to the wrong answer.
Bread and Circus
(9,454 posts)boston bean
(36,220 posts)You have laid it out there.
Bernie's ideology.. One thing I would like to add is that his ideology, actually divides people. In effect, believing that powers in this country USE unwitting citizens, by focusing on specific issues faced by a particular group of people.... That group of people becomes the outsider to the proposed solution. It is an unfortunate bi-product, but one that many white person will accept. Why because it benefits them almost exclusively without having to confront any ism. Bernie needs to confront this. I don't think he will. He is entrenched in this ideology. He truly believes that persons who belong to oppressed groups, need to back burner their concerns in order to resolve what he believes will also solve their grievances. And someday, we will all realize how correct he was. He does not want to really discuss those issues on par with economic justice because he believes it undermines the real solution.
Bernie has spouted this theory for over 4 decades. He has helped to propagate this nonsense. And his supporters, knowingly (some), unknowingly (others) are once again leaving whole groups of people out.