Pause.
Words. For Your Consideration...
"Affirmative action, age 45, is dead.
In 2003, after the Supreme Court limited race to one of many factors that could be considered in school admissions, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor predicted that affirmative action, born with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, had at most 25 more years to live. She was too optimistic.
...Without protection from reverse-discrimination lawsuits, virtually every instance of affirmative action can now be forever tied in a legal tangle that chokes the life out of it.
...So, why now? More often than not, it is the American left that gets lost in absurd fantasies about race in this country. They pretend there has been no progress in recent decades, even when they see the rise of a black middle class and witness the election of a mixed-race president and the likely confirmation of a Hispanic woman to the Supreme Court. But today, it is the right wing and its supporters on the high court who are making stuff up. They pretend that the nation is already so transformed that a colorblind America is a reality and that affirmative action is superfluous...
After the Ricci ruling, President Obama said that any hiring or school admissions practices based solely on race are unconstitutional, and he condemned the use of quotas. In an interview with the Associated Press, the nation's first black president stressed that the Supreme Court did not completely "close the door" on affirmative action, if properly structured and in certain circumstances, but he conceded that the court had moved "the ball" away from such efforts. Obama also asserted that affirmative action "hasn't been as potent a force for racial progress as advocates would claim," and as consolation, he offered that the best form of affirmative action is a good education for all Americans.
Essentially, Obama delivered a eulogy for affirmative action.
...The bold national experiment that came to life 45 years ago with the equal employment section of the Civil Rights Act is now over -- even if discrimination is not.
It is time to think about how to deal with racial inequity without affirmative action."
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