I may not agree with everything Walter Williams says. But I agree with a great deal of it. And so much of what he says in his latest column makes so much sense that I thought I would provide this link so you can read it….and give you a taste of his commentary below:
Peoplein the media and academia are mostly leftists hellbent on growinggovernment and controlling our lives. Black people, their politiciansand civil rights organizations have become unwitting accomplices. Theleftist pretense of concern for the well-being of black peopleconfers upon them an aura of moral superiority and, as such, givesmore credibility to their calls for increasing government controlover our lives.
Ordinaryblack people have been sold on the importance of electing blacks tohigh public office. After centuries of black people having beenbarred from high elected office, no decent American can have anythingagainst their wider participation in our political system. Forseveral decades, blacks have held significant political power, in theform of being mayors and dominant forces on city councils in majorcities such as Philadelphia, Detroit, Washington, Memphis, Tenn.,Atlanta, Baltimore, New Orleans, Oakland, Calif., Newark, N.J., andCincinnati. In these cities, blacks have held administrative officessuch as school superintendent, school principal and chief of police.Plus, there\’s the precedent-setting fact of there being 44 blackmembers of Congress and a black president.
Whathas this political power meant for the significant socio-economicproblems faced by a large segment of the black community? Clearly, ithas done little or nothing for academic achievement; the number ofblack students scoring proficient is far below the national average.
Eachyear, roughly 7,000 – and as high as 9,000 – blacks are murdered.
Ninety-fourpercent of the time, the murderer is another black person.
Mostof the problems faced by the black community have their roots in ablack culture that differs significantly from the black culture ofyesteryear. Today only 35 percent of black children are raised intwo-parent households, but as far back as 1880, in Philadelphia, 75percent of black children were raised in two-parent households -and it was as high as 85 percent in other places. Even duringslavery, in which marriage was forbidden, most black children wereraised with two biological parents. The black family managed tosurvive several centuries of slavery and generations of the harshestracism and Jim Crow, to ultimately become destroyed by the welfarestate.
Thecultural problems that affect many black people are challenging andnot pleasant to talk about, but incorrectly attributing thoseproblems to racism and racial discrimination, a need for morepolitical power, and a need for greater public spending condemnsmillions of blacks to the degradation and despair of the welfarestate.
It is precisely for this kind of thinking that Walter Williams – along with other Black commentators offering a similar message – are condemned as Uncle Toms…by people who never have any shortage of excuses for why all the money spent on all the programs for all these years, which have fattened the wallets of all those wonderful, always-correct-in-their-own-minds left wing drones, has resulted in the cultural, educational, moral, violently criminal mess we find in so many inner cities.
Maybe it is time to start listening to the Walter Williams\’ of the world.
