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Jason Riley interviews Robert Woodson, a black conservative, and we get a look at what policies might have been pursued if we had a president who was not a left ideologue.
‘I know black contractors who have gone out of business because their black workers were not prompt or had negative attitudes. I know black workers who take pride about going to work any hour they feel like it, taking the day off when they feel like it. . . . Many leaders who are black and many white liberals will object to my discussing these things in public. But the decadence in the black community . . . is already in the headlines; the only question is what we should do about it.”
Recent remarks from Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin? Nope. That’s Jesse Jackson in 1976.
Bob Woodson reads the quote when I ask him to respond to the backlash over Mr. Ryan’s telling a radio interviewer last month that there is “this tailspin of culture in our inner cities, in particular of men not working and just generations of men not even thinking about working or learning the value and the culture of work; and so there’s a real culture problem here that has to be dealt with.”
Robert L. Woodson Sr. is a no-nonsense black conservative who heads the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise and knows a thing or two about that culture, the nation’s inner cities and Mr. Ryan.
“Paul approached me about a year ago,” says Mr. Woodson, sitting recently in his Washington office. “He knows we have groups all across the country that deal with the plight of the poor. He asked me to take him on a listening tour. He said, ‘I’d like to learn about the alternatives to what we’re already doing, and I know you’ve been involved in assisting people at the local level.’ ”
Mr. Woodson agreed but warned that there would be a time commitment. “I said to his staff, ‘I don’t do drive-bys, so he’s got to give me an entire day.’ If you’re serious, you’ll put in the time. And he did. I’ve taken him now on 12 trips—all to high-crime, drug-infested neighborhoods. And he was not just touched but blown away by what he saw.” …
Rather than trying to bring the country together, Bernard Goldberg says the president spends his time stoking resentments.
… I guess one more thing is possible: that he is so enamored with himself that he has no idea why he has become one of the most polarizing political figures in American history.
Here are a few reasons …
With the midterm elections approaching, Mr. Obama has been trying to energize his base with some old, often reliable standbys. There’s the supposed Republican war on women, for one. Republicans, we’re told, are against a higher minimum wage and against equal pay for equal work legislation – because, well because, they’re pro-business anti-women.
Never mind that hiking the minimum wage would cost the economy hundreds of thousands of jobs – that according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.
As for the Paycheck Fairness Act, the GOP put out a statement saying it’s already illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender, adding that, “This law will not create ‘equal’ pay, but it will make it nearly impossible for employers to tie compensation to work quality, productivity and experience, reduce flexibility in the workplace, and make it far easier to file frivolous lawsuits that line the pockets of trial lawyers.”
And this is what Ruth Marcus, the columnist at the Washington Post wrote about the Democrats’ war on women strategy:
“The level of hyperbole — actually, of demagoguery — that Democrats have engaged in here is revolting. It’s entirely understandable, of course: The Senate is up for grabs. Women account for a majority of voters. They tend to favor Democrats. To the extent that women — and in particular, single women — can be motivated to turn out in a midterm election, waving the bloody shirt of unequal pay is smart politics. Fairness is another matter.”
Ms. Marcus, by the way, is no conservative. When liberals start saying such things, you know Mr. Obama and his party will do just about anything to take the voters’ minds off of other things, like the weak economy and ObamaCare. …
… Mr. Obama also spoke to Sharpton’s group, telling them that Republicans want to take their civil rights away. “The stark, simple truth is this,” the president said: The right to vote is threatened today in a way that it has not been since the Voting Rights Act became law nearly five decades ago.” Why? Because those racist Republicans want voter ID laws.
So should we be surprised when even the great Hank Aaron, who broke Babe Ruth’s all-time home run record 40 years ago, compares Republicans to the Ku Klux Klan?
“Sure, this country has a black president, but when you look at a black president, President Obama is left with his foot stuck in the mud from all of the Republicans with the way he’s treated,” Aaron told USA Today. “We have moved in the right direction, and there have been improvements, but we still have a long ways to go in the country. The bigger difference is that back then they had hoods. Now they have neckties and starched shirts.” …
Jonathan Tobin says not all the healthcare horror stories are lies.
Last Thursday, President Obama used the announcement that there were now eight million people signed up for ObamaCare as the excuse for yet another touchdown dance celebrating what he touted as the success of his signature health-care law. The president’s boasts were as unfounded as the numbers are bogus. As I wrote then, not only are the figures for enrollment untrustworthy because so many of those being counted have not paid for their insurance, but they also include many Americans who lost their insurance because of the law and are now saddled with higher costs and coverage that doesn’t suit their needs. These ObamaCare losers may well equal or outnumber the number of those who have actually benefited from it. Even more to the point, the administration’s delays of many of the provisions of the law have put off the negative impact it will have on jobs and the economy until after the midterm elections.
Americans are bracing for massive health-care cost increases next year. Stories about the hardships faced by many individuals and companies as a result of ObamaCare have been cited by the law’s critics. But the president has denounced them, and other Democratic apologists such as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have claimed they are falsehoods or outright inventions cooked up by the Koch brothers and other conservatives. The truth, however, is not hard to discover. After reading the piece I wrote last week about the president’s claims, one Connecticut businessman (who wishes to remain anonymous) whom I know wrote to me to tell the story of his company’s experience with the law and the way his representatives in Washington had responded to his complaints. Here is his story: …
More on healthcare from Tobin.
… To speak of the debate being over now isn’t merely wishful thinking on the president’s part. It’s a conscious effort to both deceive and distract the American public from the very real problems associated with the misnamed Affordable Care Act. Try as he might, more boasts and attempts to shut up opponents won’t end this debate or ensure ObamaCare’s survival.
The problem with the eight million figure is the same as the seven million number he celebrated earlier in the month. We still don’t know how many of these signups are mere computer forms and how many are paid insurance policies. A conservative estimate is that at least 20 percent of them are not paid and thus shouldn’t be counted. Nor is there any credible assurance that most of those being counted are people who didn’t have insurance prior to ObamaCare. Indeed, there is good reason to believe that, far from being satisfied customers whose enrollment constitutes an endorsement of the plan, many are people who lost existing insurance plans because of the advent of ObamaCare and have been forced onto the scheme where they find themselves paying for more expensive policies that aren’t what they wanted in the first place. …
The Examiner editors write on the politics of lies.
That was quite a victory dance President Obama did Thursday while claiming Obamacare is “working” because eight million people have now supposedly signed up for the health care program. He even indulged in some less-than-subtle mockery of Republicans – and by extension the majority of Americans who have disapproved of Obamacare since before it became law. “The repeal debate is and should be over,” Obama said, taking a dig at Republicans who are “going through, you know, the stages of grief … anger and denial and all that stuff …”
But a president who is viewed by most Americans as less than honest has no business crowing about a victory that remains anything but obvious. And he certainly should not heap insults on people who for four years have profoundly disagreed with him on the wisdom of Obamacare. To put this as “less than honest” is to be charitable. What Fox News found in its most recent public opinion survey was that 61 percent of Americans believe Obama “lies” about important public issues either “most of the time” or “some of the time.” No other president in living memory has conducted himself in a manner that warranted even asking if such a description was appropriate. …
Scott Rasmussen says don’t believe the spin, the law is still a loser.
President Barack Obama announced triumphantly that 8 million people selected a private insurance plan through the health care exchanges created by legislation known as Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act. He added his own interpretation of the numbers: “This thing is working.”
At the same time, however, Democratic candidates across the country still see the health care law as a drag on their campaigns in the midterm elections. After four years of trying, there is still no evidence that the president’s signature piece of legislation has become popular. If the law was really working, and voters were excited about it, Democratic candidates would be talking about it all the time, rather than trying to change the subject.
There’s a simple rule to evaluate contradictions like this. When the numbers and the behavior disagree, there’s something wrong with the numbers. …
Just in time for earthday, Mark Perry tells us the ice coverage of the Great Lakes is 15 times normal.
… Almost 40% of the Great Lakes are still currently covered with ice, which is far above the median of 2.7% for this time of year. Global what? …