How far we’ve come, or not
• The gulf between white and African-American incomes has hardly narrowed at all. In 1968 – the year of Martin Luther King’s assassination — blacks earned, on average, 55¢ for every $1 of white income. By 2001, they were getting 57¢—a gain of 2¢. At that, parity could be achieved in another 581 years.
• Half a century after Brown v. Board of Education, poor children of color – and regardless of color — are routinely, and increasingly, assigned to schools filled with other poor children—a practice with a long, proven record of failure.
• Women, though they have come a long way, are still on the wrong end of a 25% wage gap. http://www.demos.org/inequality/facts.cfmpace
The progress report is we’ve not come very far at all. This is why when a radio host making millions slurs a group of women attending university it’s a real insight into the progress we have made in the last 50 years. About the only thing that has changed is the ability to be overtly verbally racist, and even this is enforced on an ad hoc basis.
It is no defense to go on the air with an apology and say things like ‘you people’ which underscores the separation that this rich white man feels about those around him who aren’t quite equal in his eyes. It makes sense that he felt comfortable enough in the personalized bubble world of his privilege to slander a group of women in an unguarded moment showing who he truly is inside.
Why is this important? Because he was fired under pressure from the public showing the power that a collective community can bring on a system that has at least a dozen more million dollar radio show hosts spouting their brand of vitriol that also need to be fired. The same brand that underscores, explains, lets the citizens of this country understand the liberal reasons why we still need an Equal Rights Amendment, and enforcement of the Voting Rights Act, to change the facts above of how far we’ve come.
If you think things are drastically better you haven’t been paying attention. These are some of the issues Tom 4 Prez thinks are important questions to be asking the other candidates about.
The Equal Rights Amendment, first proposed in 1923, is still not part of the U.S. Constitution. http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/
The ACLU monitored election polls nationally and is responding to incidents of voter intimidation, vote suppression or election foul-up .
http://www.aclu.org/votingrights/index.html
Think the basketball team got slimed? Check-out this piece and ask yourself why he isn’t fired. http://mediamatters.org/items/200703200012
Make a difference! http://www.stopbigmedia.com/=shutout
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