THE RACE QUESTION!!!

[mburbank]

Boy, does the whole question of Race in the aftermath of Katrina PISS PEOPLE OFF!

I initially had been uninterested in discussing this, but anything that garners such a strong reaction is obviously something that needs discussing.

and of course, there's todays poll.



(CNN) -- White and black Americans view Hurricane Katrina's aftermath in starkly different ways, with more blacks viewing race as a factor in problems with the federal response, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Monday.

The poll found that six in 10 blacks interviewed said the federal government was slow in rescuing those stranded in New Orleans after Katrina because many of the people in the Louisiana city were black. But only about one in eight white respondents shared that view.


Now, y'all know me, I'm a class war guy. I think the poor should all make common cause against the rich 'cause there's way more poor folks. But here are my questions.


1.) WHY do way more black people think race was at issue than white people? I tried out several answers just to see how they sounded, and they all seemed... well... pretty racist.

2.) A lot of people acknowledge that not only will the poor suffer dispraportionately in Katrina's wake, the poor got totally screwed during Katrina, in that if you didn't have a car you were way more hosed than if you did. That being said, the vast majority of poor folks in NO are black. Statistically, African American's are way more likely to be poor than whites. If Race isn't part of the equation, what explains it? If the playing field is even, why are African American's mired in poverty? Are they just worse than whites? Is there culture inherently inferior?

I don't think GW is inherently racist. I don't think he sat on his ranch thinking "Let them people rot, they jus' darkies anyway." I think most people (but not anywhere near all) are past that stage of overt racism.
I think GW (and most americans) racism is far more subtle and unintentional, but its entrenched, it goes deep and it's getting worse.

I also think that at this point, racism in the US is inextricably tangled with classism. I don't think America hates it's poor, I think it can't see them. It certainly doesn't understan them. How else could we have a minimum wage so far bellow what you can live on? How else could we have new bankruptcy laws that ignore the fact that most bankruptcies are caused by pepple with no medical insurance getting sick. How else could we have a million more people in poverty this year, so many people who if they lost their housing might never again be able to get first, last and a security deposit together again?

If you are born into poverty it is very, very, very hard to escape. Not impossible, but hard. A disproportionate number of blacks are born into poverty and I contend they will face disproportionate difficulty in housing, in jobs, in the justice system.

I don't think poverty stricken blacks suffer any more than poverty stricken whites. I don't think if Katrina had hit a city who's poorest citizens were white help would have gotten there any more quickly. I do think if the Hurricane had hit martha's Vineyard or Kennebunkport the reaction would have been lightening fast becaue you don't mess around when rich, powerful people are at stake.

If you are born poor in America, you have a very hard road ahead of you. And if you're black, you are more likely to be born poor, and more likely to stay poor, and the vast majority of white voters don't want to talk about it, and more and more you see anger if the question is raised.

It's not the Ku Klux Klan. It's not even Archie Bunker. But I think it's still racism.