Sowell explains why racism is rampant in Obama's America

Racism was supposed to end with Obama.  He was supposed to create a better environment for African Americans.  Instead, racism has gotten worse.  Those who champion for equality are angrier than they've ever been.  

Race riots that were rampant during the 1960s have returned.  There have now been 5 Race Riots in Obama's Post Racial America.  If we add the Baltimore riots to this count, there have now been 6 race riots in Obama's Post Racial America.  

Obama blames Inequality facing minority men behind the unrest in Baltimore and Ferguson.  He also blames slavery and Jim crow.  During an interview with David Letterman, he said: 

If you have slavery, Jim Crow, discrimination that built up over time, even if our society has made extraordinary strides -- and I'm a testament to that, and my children are -- (applause) But it's built up over time.

Thomas Sowell, The Inconvenient Truth About Ghetto Communities' Social Breakdown, said Obama is all wrong.  He said:

Totally ignored was the fact that a black policeman in Alabama fatally shot an unarmed white teenager, and was cleared of any charges, at about the same time that a white policeman was cleared of charges in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.

 He added:

When the recorded fatal shooting of a fleeing man in South Carolina brought instant condemnation by whites and blacks alike, and by the most conservative as well as the most liberal commentators, that moment of mutual understanding was very fleeting, as if mutual understanding were something to be avoided, as a threat to a vision of “us against them” that was more popular.

That vision is nowhere more clearly expressed than in attempts to automatically depict whatever social problems exist in ghetto communities as being caused by the sins or negligence of whites, whether racism in general or a “legacy of slavery” in particular. Like most emotionally powerful visions, it is seldom, if ever, subjected to the test of evidence.

The “legacy of slavery” argument is not just an excuse for inexcusable behavior in the ghettos. In a larger sense, it is an evasion of responsibility for the disastrous consequences of the prevailing social vision of our times, and the political policies based on that vision, over the past half century.

Anyone who is serious about evidence need only compare black communities as they evolved in the first 100 years after slavery with black communities as they evolved in the first 50 years after the explosive growth of the welfare state, beginning in the 1960s. 

You would be hard-pressed to find as many ghetto riots prior to the 1960s as we have seen just in the past year, much less in the 50 years since a wave of such riots swept across the country in 1965.

We are told that such riots are a result of black poverty and white racism. But in fact — for those who still have some respect for facts — black poverty was far worse, and white racism was far worse, prior to 1960. But violent crime within black ghettos was far less.

Murder rates among black males were going down — repeat, down — during the much-lamented 1950s, while it went up after the much celebrated 1960s, reaching levels more than double what they had been before. Most black children were raised in two-parent families prior to the 1960s. But today the great majority of black children are raised in one-parent families.

Such trends are not unique to blacks, nor even to the United States. The welfare state has led to remarkably similar trends among the white underclass in England over the same period. Just read Life at the Bottom, by Theodore Dalrymple, a British physician who worked in a hospital in a white slum neighborhood.

You cannot take any people, of any color, and exempt them from the requirements of civilization — including work, behavioral standards, personal responsibility, and all the other basic things that the clever intelligentsia disdain — without ruinous consequences to them and to society at large.

Non-judgmental subsidies of counterproductive lifestyles are treating people as if they were livestock, to be fed and tended by others in a welfare state — and yet expecting them to develop as human beings have developed when facing the challenges of life themselves.

Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social theorist, political philosopher, and author. Oh, and if you're keeping track, he's also among the most successful African Americans in the U.S.

You can't solve problems with good intentions and money, or how democrats screwed up education and healthcare

It's been in the news the past few days that some democratic Congressmen are outraged that their constituents are going to have to pay a stiff penalty for not having health insurance by the deadline that has passed now.  In fact, the penalty is going to be much higher than originally reported, and these democrats are just beside themselves that this could happen.

How could they be? They voted for it.  These are the people that are supposed to have read the bill, liked what they saw (it's a big F#$%ing deal, mouthed Vice President John Kerry at the signing of th bill).  These are the same people who told their constituents everything they wanted to hear in order for them to support Obamacare.  The said things like:

• Premiums will go down (they went up)
• Deductibles will go down (they went up)
• Out-of-pocket was going to go down (they went up)

All the way around Obamacare has made health insurance more expensive.  So either they lied through their teeth to their constituents in order to gain support for the bill, or they were outright ignorant. 

Either way, this is not good for the country.  It has apparently stunned their constituents who are now stunned that healthcare has gotten more expensive, but it has apparently stunned democrats who voted for it.  

Of course there is a third option, and one might hope to God this is not the case, but it's looking pretty suspicious.  This theory has been noted by some republicans, although blown off by most democrats and anyone else brainwashed by our public school system. 

The theory I'm talking about here is the one where democrats set up Obamacare so that it would fail so that the government could come in and save the day with universal healthcare, something many democrats wanted all along.  

Back in the 1960s our educational system was not perfect, but it was pretty darn good.  Progressives decided they could make it better by creating the Department of Education, throwing more money at it, and making education a Federal Institution.  But instead of making it better they made it worse. Despite money for education being more now that it ever has been, education in the U.S. is ranked worse than many other countries.  

In 2010 the same progressives signed Obamacare thinking they could make healthcare better, and they have ruined that too.  This kind of proves the old adage that you can't solve problems with good intentions and money.  t 

Is the Affordable Care Act really affordable?

They call it the Affordable Care Act. Some simply refer to it as Obamacare. Regardless,  is the idea it's afordable true, or is it a lie.

Consider that it is not affordable for people making minimum wage.  It is not affordable by most young people starting out in life.  It is not affordable for many retired folks living on a single income.

Consider that the cheapest plan available is $400 a month.  I couldn't even afford that, and I have a good job. So the only way most people can afford it is to receive a subsidy, which means your neighbor is paying for it.  It means I'm paying for your healthcare. Or, it means you're paying for mine.

Some people will say: "Your neighbor is not paying for it, the government is paying for it."  But these people don't realize that hard working people like you and me, people who work hard to support our families, are making sacrifices to pay for it.  We are paying more taxes.  We are taking home less money. That means we have less money to buy food and clothing, and we have less money to pay for college.

And, we also have less money to purchase material items like stereos, computers, cable TV, the Internet, snowmobiles, etc.  So the entire U.S. economic system suffers as a result.

To qualify for a subsidy, you have to earn no more than 400% of the federal poverty level. A family of four can qualify for a subsidy, I think, if your family income's $87,000. So I would, if I didn't have a job that offers it, qualify for a subsidy.  I would be a slave to you.

It's not affordable.  If you have to get a subsidy to afford it, it's not affordable, it just isn't.  In fact, it's welfare.  If you receive a subsidy to pay for your healthcare, you are receiving welfare.

I'm not saying welfare is bad, and I'm not judging those who have no choice but to receive it.  I'm just saying that if you have to receive a subsidy to pay for healthcare, chances are you are going on welfare because the government is forcing you to do it.

Those of us who are receiving healthcare as benefits, we are paying for it with a rise in our premiums.  In fact, premiums for most people have doubled since Obamacare passed.  Many people have lost, or are going to lose, their health insurance plans because of Obamacare.  Copays for prescriptions is doubling, even tripling.

If statistics are correct, three out of four people signing up for Obamacare (that's 75%) received subsidies, that means the cost of Obamacare will be even more than anticipated.

hacer.com notes that it's also not affordable on a national scale: "A nearly 100-page analysis from the government’s official revenue estimators at Congress’ Joint Committee on Taxation pegs the price tag at over $1 trillion, almost twice the nearly $570 billion suggested when the law was passed by legislative trickery three years ago."

Actually, the price tag is now up to $2 trillion.

If the price of Obamacare goes up, surely they will find some way of getting this money from us.  They will raise our premiums, or they will take more of our well earned, hard earned, money.  They will take it from our families.  They will take it from our friends.  They will keep taking it until there is none left, and the entire program falls in and on itself, dragging down with it the entire nation.

In fact, many have, or will, lose their full time jobs because, in order for businesses not to have to purchase healthcare for their workers, they have to be under 50 workers.  So if they are at 49, one person will not be hired.  If a company is at 49, there is no incentive to expand the business, because doing so would mean paying out more for healthcare, or paying a tax that might put the company in the red.  If the company is at 55 workers, it means six people will lose their jobs.

For those people no longer working, or who cannot find work, because of Obamacare, it is in no way affordable. In fact, I think we can see here, that the Affordable Care Act is, in fact, is not affordable at all. Those who say it is might just be telling a lie.