Burgess Owens: White Americans Don't Owe Me Anything (VIDEO)

This is great.

Owens is the author of Liberalism or How to Turn Good Men into Whiners, Weenies and Wimps.

Teaching That America is Hopelessly Racist

A great piece, from Peter Wood, at Minding the Campus.

Edward E. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told

At Amazon, Edward E. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism.

John Ogbu, Black American Students in An Affluent Suburb

At Amazon, John U. Ogbu, Black American Students in An Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement.

As MLK Foresaw, U.S. Racism's Been Largely Overcome

From the great Jeff Jacoby, at the Boston Globe:

.@Jeff_Jacoby: As MLK foresaw, racism in America has been largely overcome https://t.co/KJR7G4eO1S

— The Boston Globe (@BostonGlobe) January 18, 2019

“I have no despair about the future,” wrote the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in his 1963 “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” “I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham. . . . We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom.”

He was right.

It is a commonplace that racism is America’s original sin. Hardly a day goes by without attention being focused on instances of the racial injustice, friction, and double standards that can still be found in this nation. Open the morning paper or watch cable news, and there will be something to remind you of the country’s racial tensions — from controversy over flying the Confederate flag to NFL players protesting police brutality, from accusations of voter suppression in Georgia to an Iowa congressman defending “white nationalism.” It isn’t surprising that when Americans are asked in opinion polls whether race relations are getting better, many of them — sometimes most of them — gloomily reply that racism is still a major problem.

But it isn’t. It is only a minor problem now, one that has grown steadily less toxic and less entrenched. King predicted confidently that America would surmount its benighted racial past, and his confidence was not misplaced. Though his own life was cut short by a racist assassin, he foresaw that racism would lose its grip on American life.

“We’ve got some difficult days ahead, but . . . I’ve been to the mountaintop,” King said in his final speech. “I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land.” He knew that American racism would wither away. Fifty-one years later, it mostly has.

Consider some of the data on changing American values...

Keep reading.

Martin Luther King, Jr., Why We Can't Wait

At Amazon, Martin Luther King, Jr., Why We Can't Wait (Signet Classics).

Where Have You Gone, Martin Luther King, Jr.?

A great video, featuring Jason Riley, at Prager University:

Douglas A. Blackmon, Slavery by Another Name

At Amazon, Douglas A. Blackmon, Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II.

Ariela J. Gross, What Blood Won't Tell

Ariela J. Gross, What Blood Won't Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America.

Black Friday Deals

At Amazon, Today's Deals New deals. Every day. Shop our Deal of the Day, Lightning Deals and more daily deals and limited-time sales.

See especially, All-New Fire HD 8 Kids Edition Tablet, 8" HD Display, 32 GB, Blue Kid-Proof Case.

Also, Dyson V8 Absolute Cordless Stick Vacuum Cleaner, Yellow.

More, Cuisinart SS-15 12-Cup Coffee Maker and Single-Serve Brewer, Stainless Steel.

Plus, Polaroid Originals 4725 Polaroid 600 Camera, Express, Blue.

And, Gotham Steel Titanium Ceramic 9.5” Non-Stick Copper Deep Square Frying & Cooking Pan With Lid, Frying Basket, Steamer Tray, 4 Piece Set - Graphite.

Still more, Bose QuietComfort 35 (Series II) Wireless Headphones, Noise Cancelling, with Alexa voice control – Triple Midnight.

Here, Toshiba 32LF221U19 32-inch 720p HD Smart LED TV - Fire TV Edition.

BONUS: Stephen B. Oates, Let the Trumpet Sound: A Life of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Richard Kluger, Simple Justice

At Amazon, Richard Kluger, Simple Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black America's Struggle for Equality.

Harvard Rated Asian-Americans Lower

I'm discussing civil rights in my American government classes this week, and I want to read and blog this blockbuster piece that was at the New York Times in June.

See, "Harvard Rated Asian-American Applicants Lower on Personality Traits, Suit Says":

Breaking News: Harvard consistently rated Asian-American applicants lower on personal traits, according to an analysis by a group suing the school for bias https://t.co/rkb3pUi3Y7

— The New York Times (@nytimes) June 15, 2018

Harvard consistently rated Asian-American applicants lower than others on traits like “positive personality,” likability, courage, kindness and being “widely respected,” according to an analysis of more than 160,000 student records filed Friday by a group representing Asian-American students in a lawsuit against the university.

Asian-Americans scored higher than applicants of any other racial or ethnic group on admissions measures like test scores, grades and extracurricular activities, according to the analysis commissioned by a group that opposes all race-based admissions criteria. But the students’ personal ratings significantly dragged down their chances of being admitted, the analysis found.

The court documents, filed in federal court in Boston, also showed that Harvard conducted an internal investigation into its admissions policies in 2013 and found a bias against Asian-American applicants. But Harvard never made the findings public or acted on them.

Harvard, one of the most sought-after and selective universities in the country, admitted only 4.6 percent of its applicants this year. That has led to intense interest in the university’s closely guarded admissions process. Harvard had fought furiously over the last few months to keep secret the documents that were unsealed Friday.

The documents came out as part of a lawsuit charging Harvard with systematically discriminating against Asian-Americans, in violation of civil rights law. The suit says that Harvard imposes what is in effect a soft quota of “racial balancing.” This keeps the numbers of Asian-Americans artificially low, while advancing less qualified white, black and Hispanic applicants, the plaintiffs contend.

The findings come at a time when issues of race, ethnicity, admission, testing and equal access to education are confronting schools across the country, from selective public high schools like Stuyvesant High School in New York to elite private colleges. Many Ivy League schools, not just Harvard, have had similar ratios of Asian-American, black, white and Hispanic students for years, despite fluctuations in application rates and qualifications, raising questions about how those numbers are arrived at and whether they represent unspoken quotas.

Harvard and the group suing it have presented sharply divergent views of what constitutes a fair admissions process.

“It turns out that the suspicions of Asian-American alumni, students and applicants were right all along,” the group, Students for Fair Admissions, said in a court document laying out the analysis. “Harvard today engages in the same kind of discrimination and stereotyping that it used to justify quotas on Jewish applicants in the 1920s and 1930s.”

Harvard vigorously disagreed on Friday, saying that its own expert analysis showed no discrimination and that seeking diversity is a valuable part of student selection. The university lashed out at the founder of Students for Fair Admissions, Edward Blum, accusing him of using Harvard to replay a previous challenge to affirmative action in college admissions, Fisher v. the University of Texas at Austin. In its 2016 decision in that case, the Supreme Court ruled that race could be used as one of many factors in admissions.

“Thorough and comprehensive analysis of the data and evidence makes clear that Harvard College does not discriminate against applicants from any group, including Asian-Americans, whose rate of admission has grown 29 percent over the last decade,” Harvard said in a statement. “Mr. Blum and his organization’s incomplete and misleading data analysis paint a dangerously inaccurate picture of Harvard College’s whole-person admissions process by omitting critical data and information factors.”

In court papers, Harvard said that a statistical analysis could not capture the many intangible factors that go into Harvard admissions. Harvard said that the plaintiffs’ expert, Peter Arcidiacono, a Duke University economist, had mined the data to his advantage by taking out applicants who were favored because they were legacies, athletes, the children of staff and the like, including Asian-Americans. In response, the plaintiffs said their expert had factored out these applicants because he wanted to look at the pure effect of race on admissions, unclouded by other factors.

Both sides filed papers Friday asking for summary judgment, an immediate ruling in their favor. If the judge denies those requests, as is likely, a trial has been scheduled for October. If it goes on to the Supreme Court, it could upend decades of affirmative action policies at colleges and universities across the country.

Harvard is not the only Ivy League school facing pressure to admit more Asian-American students. Princeton and Cornell and others also have high numbers of Asian-American applicants. Yet their share of Asian-Americans students is comparable with Harvard’s.

In Friday’s court papers, the plaintiffs describe a shaping process that begins before students even apply, when Harvard buys data about PSAT scores and G.P.A.s, according to the plaintiffs’ motion. It is well documented that these scores vary by race.

The plaintiffs’ analysis was based on data extracted from the records of more than 160,000 applicants who applied for admission over six cycles from 2000 to 2015...

Keep reading.

Stephen B. Oates, Let the Trumpet Sound

At Amazon, Stephen B. Oates, Let the Trumpet Sound: A Life of Martin Luther King, Jr.

David J. Garrow, Bearing the Cross

At Amazon, the best book on MLK, David J. Garrow, Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

James Forman, Jr., Locking Up Our Own

Now out in paperback.

At Amazon, James Forman, Jr., Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America.

Racial Injustice Today

I saw this last week but neglected to post. Racial injustice just ain't what it used to be.

Behind the making of this weeks NYer cover. #NewYorker #Magazine #magaazines #illustration #gouache #MLKDay2018 #MLK https://t.co/3sOwENSMrd pic.twitter.com/pGLn6UoVci

— Mark Ulriksen (@MarkUlriksenArt) January 9, 2018

Where Can a Black Person Get Their Hair Done?

When I had an Afro back in the day, my mom used to take me to a black barbershop in Santa Ana, which was the only place where they knew how to give me a haircut. And when I was college in my 20s, even though I wore my hair short and close-cropped, some of the barbers at the local barbershop in Costa Mesa used to groan as I sat down in their seat. I don't know why you're a barber if you don't like giving a mulatto man a haircut?

At the far-left Affinity Magazine (and I do mean far-left, *smh*):

I'm tired of being rejected from hair salons for being black. How can a "professional" hairstylist not be able to do black hair? https://t.co/KBBk64EvVl

— Affinity Magazine (@TheAffinityMag) January 11, 2018

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

This has turned into racial virtue signalling day for the radical left. Here's the New York Times, attacking President Trump, at Memeorandum, "Donald Trump's Racism: The Definitive List."

And WaPo's taking the president to task for golfing, although President Obama golfed all the time, and it was never a problem. At Memorandum, "On MLK Day, President Trump visits Trump golf course."

So, with that, here's President Trump's M.L.K Day greeting. We're lucky we have this president:

Timothy B. Tyson, The Blood of Emmett Till

At Amazon, Timothy B. Tyson, The Blood of Emmett Till.

Linda Gordon, The Second Coming of the KKK

At Amazon, Linda Gordon, The Second Coming of the KKK: The Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s and the American Political Tradition.