Evanston, Illinois launched the first reparations program for Black residents with a $10 million housing and mortgage program. Considering the horrors and legacy of slavery, ultimately nothing short of handing over the whole country will suffice—and that still wouldn’t be enough. Next in line are America’s countless other victims…
Let the Reparations Begin
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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My suspicion is that the taxes that will be levied to raise this money will come, and probably disproportionately, from the poors themselves (so proportionally more black people than white people) or by taking the funds from some social services program that aids the poor (again, proportionally more blacks than whites). That is, the black community is “getting” reparations, but they’re also, when all the books are checked, going to discover that the money that went into their left pocket came out of their right one. The community “leaders” will claim a victory. I guess that’s what’s important.
As was said by one American Indian activist (I don’t remember who): The only reparation for stolen land is land. What was done to slaves can’t be made whole because they’re dead. That’s what makes it so monstrous. You can’t just cut some descendant a check, especially when you’re taking the funds you’re handing to the victims FROM the victims, at least in part if not, in reality, almost totally due to tax avoidance strategies and sin taxes. Here’s your $10 million. Sorry we had to close the libraries and the music programs at the schools.
Putting aside the African-Americans and the Asian-Americans, the only reparations to the Native Americans that would approximate making up fairly for the past would be to give the whole country back to them. The European-Americans would have to go back to Europe. But I don’t think the Europeans want us.
We can’t fix the past. We should concentrate on fixing the future. I think the only way to do that, and do it fairly, is to erase the economic inequality that we’ve inherited from the past. End all private property. Share everything. This would also solve a lot of other problems — in fact, all of them. Admittedly, this scenario is difficult for most people to imagine.
Baizuo (pronounced “bye-tswaw) is a Chinese epithet meaning naive western educated person who advocates for peace and equality only to satisfy their own feeling of moral superiority.
A baizuo only cares about topics such as immigration, minorities, LGBTQ and the environment while being obsessed with political correctness to the extent that they import backwards European values for the sake of multiculturalism.
The Chinese see the baizuo as ignorant and arrogant westerners who pity the rest of the world and think they are saviours.
From the census bureau, Evanston has about 74000 people 16.5% of which are black. That means there are some 12000 blacks in Evanston. So $10 million amounts to just over $800/person. This seems to fall under the Viet Nam era dictum as a “simple solution to a complex problem.” After 50+ years, the solution is now given by government (no longer by anti-war commies) with “and profoundly insulting” has been added to “simple.”
The Chinese see the baizuo as ignorant and arrogant westerners who pity the rest of the world and think they are saviours.
Chinese might say bye-tswaw, but anywhere else in the world it’s prononced americans.
Ted, I’m pretty sure it’s one million dollars because the maximum $25,000 grants are also said to be available to sixteen families. The money is earmarked for help with home remodeling or first time home buying (by qualified buyers). No help for renters.
The money, as some have perhaps presciently speculated above, is to come from a tax on cannibis. (Sheesh! nobody ever thought of a real-estate transfer tax?)
I’ll put my faith in Touré Reed’s analysis (author of Towards Freedom) about reparations until someone convinces me to think otherwise.