since they still make only half as much $ as whites and have to do a lot of the shitty jobs wouldn't it be more fair to just give them greater political representation until we can even out the economic inequalities.  consider it payback for 400 years of opression honkey.
215375
Well since they don't put any money into the economy, how about a quarter vote instead.  \n\nOr how about to make it fair we give everyone IQ tests and you get a number of votes equal to your IQ, then you can have your two votes.
569771
Affirmative action is not here to "pay back" previous discrimination but to prevent current discrimination.  Whether it exists or not in large amounts (there will always be at least one person in America who is racist and in a position of power) is somewhat difficult to determine to say the least.\n\nSome would argue that racists whites established themselves in positions of power early in this country's history and do everything they can to make sure racist whites stay in power, so even now they are at the top and affirmative action is there only to ensure a more equal chance for minorities.  Others argue the point of affirmative action was to equalize it out and now that it has been in place for many years it has done its job and it is now time to quit before it equalizes "too much."  \n\nI'm not sure myself if it is right (I'm Hispanic), especially since I don't like it being attributed to affirmative action when I get a decent job.  But I have seen it happen already too many times that I did lose a job because somebody felt I should go back to Mexico (I was born in the United States and I'm around 6th generation in from my Mexican ancestry, 3 generations in from my European ancestry, and native from my Native American ancestry).  I think it is helpful and needed but I do understand why whites (especially the males) would feel it unfair.  Sometimes they lose the job even when more qualified because of it.
449250
In respect to the ban on affirmative action, many leaders in the minority community support this.  They believe it hurts schools and businesses as they are forced have to meet quotas of minorites in their employment, not getting the best candidates based on merit.    \n\nSo if you have to have 10 spots open and you need 8 minorities, you hire the people based on the quota's you have to meet, not choosing the best who applied.  You are just filling spots.  You can't hire a white man because you need one more woman or mexican person to comply with the law or face fines.   Or you don't hire a black woman with an MBA because you have your quota of blacks, so you hire a white woman with an associates degree.   Discrimination is discrimination and it works both ways.  \n\nAs for the school funding initiative, where is the funding going to come from?  The state would of had to fund minimum requirements of 565 million per year.  With this state losing so many jobs and the lottery obviously not covering education funding, what are they going to get the money to fund the shortfall?   You can't just print money!  So will there be an increase in taxes for gas, cigarettes, sales, businesses, or property in the future?  Increase DMV fees, tags, start toll roads, \nwhatever they can?  \n\nMichigan is at 7.1% unemployment whereas the nation is at 4.4%.  We citizens cannot afford to spend more to fund a mis-managed government.
568655
If?  They're already over halfway there, and I think the Republicans are in the boat with them on half of it.  But the answer to your question is . . . sort of.  If they get their way America will have what Britain calls "the dole".  Anobody who becomes "unemployed" is entitled to a regular paycheck from the federal government, we have that at the state level right now, but you usually have to have worked and paid in within a recent period to be eligible.  \n\nIf the ideal liberal world ever comes about everybody will pay everything they produce into a big central till where it will then be divided up equally so everybody has the same house (or cubicle apt.), same car, same clothes, same amount of money to spend, same thoughts in their brainwashed heads, same belief that the government is great, and the same ignorance of the party elite who will live like THE KINGS they will have become.  But, like I said we are already halfway there and the brakes don't seem to be working that well.  \n\nI'm for limited government, no taxes or very low taxes at the federal level, state and local autonomy, no interference in the economy of any kind, and FREEDOM for Americans forever.  In other words, I am for the Constitution as it was originally written and intended.  Happy Surfing....
636463
If they got a job, they would have to pay taxes and would lose their welfare checks.  They would be forced to contribute to the society that owes them something for being 'less fortunate'.
542117
We have it here too mate. Certain jobs are funded by Government funds. eg: Aboriginal Welfare workers, Legal Aid, Aboriginal health etc. I can remember 40 years ago, my mother being extremely angry because Aboriginal Parents received an extra $10 a week to send their children to school. No such luxury for white children. Was that racist?
635541
To be honest I think most Blacks are looking for pay back, I heard some say innocent whites need to be kill just as innocent black were. Yes blacks need equality but lets be honest giving blacks equality doesn't offset over 300 years of oppression and struggle. On paper all people need equal rights seems fine, but look deeper into this issue, you will find that the black race deserves much more than equal rights. \n\nWhen Blacks were first "bought" (not sold) into slavery they were oppress from the time they were "purchase," not sold to whites. You can't sell nothing if no one is WILLING to buy it. Blacks were oppress from the time they got own until the time Dr. King died in 1968, by whites not Africans. Is giving the black race equal rights make right all the oppression they face?\n\nHow can 400 years of oppression which include segregation be made OK by giving them equality? Will equality fix or bring justice to the Millions America kill unjustified. Will equality fix or bring justice to tens of thousand that were lynch during the early 1900's. What about their lost knowledge of a language, religion, culture and customs? Will Brown was shoot over 1000 times beaten , then burned alive. These things did not happen in ancient times but in my and my parents generation. We were oppress so we couldn't vote this was only the 60's. So the ones who were slaves could not get anything for their misfortune because they had no rights to back then. Equal rights could not repay all that was done against the Black race. So in reality the two groups will never be equal one side had 300+ years of struggle and robbery while the other had/has 300+ years of privilege and benefits and the expense of one group, not just from free labor but from being on the side of the oppressors. That in it's self gave you privilege.\n\nTruth is the people who would have inherited the money their father SHOULD have got are still here. Just as the people and nation who inherited that borrow wealth, is still here, and the wealth is still here. So if Blacks got paid for that wealth they would have left their descendants with something rather than a spirit of poverty. As a result 70% of elderly blacks have no  financial assets. Which is a direct result form segregation design to keep the wealth in the white community and keep blacks from the houses, shools, and inherited wealth they help build for the white community. It's never to late to do what rights, however reparation will divide the country.\n\nBlacks don't need reparations but equality, and as I said equality is not giving blacks equal rights. Truthfully all the things the white race did or has done against the black race most surely can not be repaid with equality, neither can it be repaid with all the wealth this nation has.
67677
Your 100% right Stacey they should make a law that says every 4 years only minorities can run for president.Just like equal opportunity jobs.
538629
It's not fair, but it's the best system available.\n\nPure majority rule, of course, is destined to fail (they'll just oppress the minority and deny them the right to vote, and keep doing it until it's an oligarchy), so you need strong limitations on government power designed to protect minority rights.\n\nThat's a lot more complicated than it sounds.
407169
No.  Anyone who tells you otherwise lives in a bubble or is blinded by racism.\n\nThere are many people who work very hard and are not rewarded.  There are people who do nothing who advance quickly based on who they know.  You will be rewarded in life according to how well you are favored by those who have power over you.  We do not live in a pure meritocracy.  If we did, would a C-student, former frat boy, drunk-until-age-40, ex-male cheerleader currently be our President?\n\nWomen on average still earn less money than men for the same job.  Just because laws don't explicitly forbid certain things, that does mean everyone has equal opportunity.  For example, the Constitution doesn't say that only white men can be President, but only white men have ever actually been President.  Women couldn't even vote until the early twentieth century.\n\nToday gay people do not have equal opportunity to marriage and the associated tax benefits.\n\nIf everyone had equal opportunity in the USA, 90% of the wealth would not be controlled by less than 10% of the population.\n\nI am a heterosexual white male.
637476
No, I own my own business and am obviously older than you.\n\nFirst, study your history.\nBlack slaves were more physically capable than whites or Indians and quickly replaced both in agriculture which demanded hard, manual labor under bad conditions. No other group as a race was as strong and productive. Without them, the South would not have benefitted from a strong cotton and sugar industry. The North that bought these products and processed them would not have been as productive either. It was only when the south threatened to go directly to Europe where prices were cheaper than the more expensive North that the slavery issue became a galvenizing force for the North to attack the more rural and agricultural south. There were still slaves in the North during this conflict so it was not just riteous indignation that spawned the liberation of the blacks.\n\nAfter the war, many blacks continued to work on the farms where they had worked their whole lives. Life was much more difficult then and it has only been in the last 100 years or so that most of our population lives in cities.\n\nAfter the war, it took all of us time to heal. Blacks, Southerners, Northerners, etc. Blacks still helped rebuild the South after the war.\n\nNow, we have a huge population that lives in cities. As a whole, I cannot definitively say that blacks are equal to the other races in productivity. Many of their decendents were brought here for their physical attributes and they have been surpressed after the war as well.\n\nI think that we are now at a cross roads. Blacks, as a race, probably have more rights than whites but have not been allowed to complete a transition that can take decades.\n\nI think most people would appreciate it if you would learn more about history and not feel so cormfortable sitting at your computer and spreading racism. You are being more lazy and hateful than those you attack.\n\nUndoubtedly, your stupid comments have hurt and alienated a good many people of all nationalities. So start using Yahoo for something productive because right now, I think America's economy would be much better off without people like you, no matter what race you are!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
107061
I could go on for hours but, until most people are educated in history, politics, respect and self worth. That goes for black, and any other race in this country. It's not so much that blacks should be upset with whites because our ancestors  bought them from their own people and now some want everything handed to them along with other financial reparations. It's that, if you look at factual history, all of us (every race) were slaves at one time to some great empire. Blacks were just the last! I do not think it is fair  that Americans should live in a fantasy world and show over 50% blacks in advertising campaigns, music, TV programing when they only make up for 16% of the US population of which that number actually about 11% due to incarceration.
616434
Why not, politics is basically a popularity contest anyway... would be nice to see them have to work at what they 'choose to do'.
309092
By all accounts?  Maybe we should keep the Trillions of dollars we GIVE to those 3rd world nations being it's such a miserable failure.\nYour career in politics is off to a good start.  For a liberal.
295900
Yes, they are making it worse, but they do not really care about ending racism.  For a lot of people, playing the race card is the way to get ahead because they are too lazy or too stupid to do it the hard way - working for it.  If racism were to truly end, then there would be no more NAAWP (National Association for the Advancement of White People) would have to be allowed, and some do not want either, because it would not benefit them.  If all racism were to end, then those not qualified for jobs would not get hired just to fill quotas.
497622
Interesting post... even more interesting responses,\n I think you would be surprised to find that the color line would be drawn along age lines rather than political lines. Black and White has lost a lot of it's teeth in the younger generations by which I mean ..15-40, I am white and hang with a near equal black and white ratio, all of my white friends are fiercely anti racist.. maybe because we got a lot of black friends or maybe because we're getting past that horrible barrier once and for all. I think you're on when you say it would draw the hostility out of the ignorant... but that would be a good thing because once revealed they would be rejected by the majority of non bigoted people of all walks...\nI would be totally content with any president male, female, black, white... whatever, as long as they were honest and fouthright.. \n and to be honest.. Obama is a politico man, which means he's got green in his blood,.. he lives in a $1.5 mansion that he bought through public service, how much does he care about you and I? Until the profit is taken out politics we won't have true statesmen we'll have business men that have chosen politics as their career ..\nand skin color is an afterthought  .....
618068
I'm considered as part of the "minority" group...but if and when minorities and people of color take over our government in a complete sense, it will be a living hell. These people have freedom and yet, they continue to live in the past. They have to shut up and let it go. Let's keep things the way they are. We are better off this way!