The total illogic of the "Personal Responsibility" meme of the right wing.

[IassaFTots]

The Katrina refugee issue has brought some unsavoriness to the Dallas area as well.  It is a shame, but, it is the truth.   

[jtyangel]

Then they are the true racists. Maybe someone should slap them.

Many minority groups don't care about the inherent racism in democratic beliefs precisely because they benefit from that kind of racism. In essence it makes the whole racist cry a sham.

[MrsSmith]

Melissa Harris-Lacewell is Associate Professor of Politics and African American Studies at Princeton University. She is the author of the award-winning book, Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought, (Princeton 2004). And she is currently at work on a new book: Sister Citizen: A Text For Colored Girls Who've Considered Politics When Being Strong Wasn't Enough. Her academic research is inspired by a desire to investigate the challenges facing contemporary black Americans and to better understand the multiple, creative ways that African Americans respond to these challenges.

What's The Role Of Race In Health Care Fracas?

August 14, 2009
Is race the subtext for some of the attacks on the Obama administration's attempt at a health care overhaul? Or is that a misleading argument? Melissa Harris-Lacewell, African-American Studies professor at Princeton, and Tony Blankley, who was press secretary to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, discuss the subject with Melissa Block.

>>>

Prof. HARRIS-LACEWELL: Sure. So in this case, one of the things that I'm hearing from people at the town hall meetings is anxiety about illegal immigrants coming in and taking over. The other thing I hear a great deal is this question of the public option somehow keeping Americans from taking responsibility for their own health-care provision.

And what we know over the past 25 years is that language of personal responsibility is often a code language used against poor and minority communities.

>>>

 

I do worry about whether or not, at least for some of those opponents of health-care reform, that part of what they're saying is a reflection of an anxiety about: I want an America back where African-Americans, where Latinos, where women were truly second-class citizens rather than first-class, equal members with a full right to govern.

More of her opinions:

But there is another insidious effect: our often racially separate worlds can breed prejudice, distrust, and misunderstanding. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina national public opinion research revealed huge racial differences in how Americans perceived the disaster and how they thought the country should respond. In a similar way New Orleans politics has been deeply racially divided since the storm. Many votes of the city council have split along racial lines and race has been used as a wedge too many times.

These same patterns are obvious in American politics. Despite the historic election of our first African American president, race has often taken center stage in current national politics, infecting everything from immigration discussions to the health care reform debate.

Judging from the first article, which side is it that insists race is infecting the health care reform debate? 

Standard lib tactic...tell a lie often enough, and get it repeated enough times...and eventually many people will consider it true.   

[jtyangel]

And what we know over the past 25 years is that language of personal responsibility is often a code language used against poor and minority communities.

Its not a code word for anything you knucklehead. It means precisely what it looks to mean and that is IF you want to be in control of your own life, then take control of your own life. Make wise decisions that will help you in life and not hinder you.If you make a mistake, learn from it and move on and do something different. If it seems it is disproportionately applied to the 'poor' and 'minority' communities, then perhaps that says something about the values in those communities where being in charge of one's life beyond being rampant consumerism and collectors of bling is non-existent. What amazes me is that so many mush heads probably sit here and think this woman knows what she is talking about because of all her pedigrees when the argument she is trying to make is crap and easily argued against. I would submit to her that she makes anything that requires people to take a look at their own behavior about something it is not in order to deflect responsibility and continue negative behaviors and perpetuate cycles in the interest of keeping things status quo. What would be her motivation? Well either she is a well-educated idiot that bought every line of crap she was fed, she has her own issues that keep her from accepting reality because accepting a myth is far easier then blaming mom, dad, or herself, or she gains something personally by encouraging irresponsible behavior in other people and then projecting that behavior on to others.

So for any poor or minority reading this, are you satisfied to keep being a loser in life so that this woman can be 'right' and have a job or does your own life have enough value that you will stop pointing the finger at others and do what it takes to be successful or have a safe community or work for the things you want in life? Isn't this one of those times that you would like someone like this to be wrong? Everyone has obstacles in life EVERYONE! There isn't one of us who does not have our cross to bear in some way whether it is being shy, having a low self-opinion, having a family member who is ill we must care for, or being born into a poor family. The beauty of life in the states is you were born into a country where your doors are WIDE open. You may have to rise above some shit that your family has saddled you with by how they raised you or the community they raised you in, but it is not insurmountable. There are people who have suffered some pretty horrific things who manage to conquer their disadvantages...being born 'poor' in a rich country with opportunities galore is a relatively small hurdle by comparison.