black…MYstory

If a law called the “Clear Skies Act” actually results in more pollution and a Department of Homeland Security actually does little to protect America, it’s probably not a stretch to see the United States Commission on Civil Rights actually undermining civil rights.

In the land of Bush, everything is for sale and every function of government must be done based on partisan ideology instead of being based on competency and on what the mission of a particular entity is supposed to be.

This is why we now see the Civil Rights Commission actually rolling back the gains minorities have made under a system that was supposed to insure against their rights being trampled.

How did this happen? Bush violated the spirit of the charter of the Commission. The Commission’s panel was supposed to have no more than 4 members, of its 8-member panel, be of one political party. The panel already had 4 Republicans. So, he appointed another 2 Republicans who, upon receiving their appointments, re-registered as Independents, skirting the charter.

So, what did this mean? Well, since this majority has been in place, the following have taken place:

Before the changes, the agency had planned to evaluate a White House budget request for civil rights enforcement, the adequacy of college financial aid for minorities, and whether the US Census Bureau undercounts minorities, keeping nonwhite areas from their fair share of political apportionment and spending. After the appointments, the commission canceled the projects.

Instead, the commission has put out a series of reports concluding that there is little educational benefit to integrating elementary and secondary schools, calling for closer scrutiny of programs that help minorities gain admission to top law schools, and urging the government to look for ways to replace policies that help minority-owned businesses win contracts with race-neutral alternatives.

The conservative bloc has also pushed through retroactive term limits for several of its state advisory committees. As a result, some longtime traditional civil rights activists have had to leave the advisory panels, and the commission replaced several of them with conservative activists.

The commission has also stopped issuing subpoenas and going on the road to hold lengthy fact-finding hearings, as it previously did about once a year. The commission had three planned hearings in the works when the conservative bloc took over and canceled them. Instead, the panel has held only shorter briefings, all but one of which was in Washington, from invited specialists.

What this means is that civil rights enforcement has been totally gutted, much to the delight of the more racist elements of the Republican party.

In Bush-speak, this would be called “leveling the playing field”. However, in this case, leveling does not mean making things even. In this case, leveling would be its more destructive meaning, as in leveling a long-standing structure that brought some level of assurance to minority Americans that the government had their best interests in mind, as well.

So, as the t-shirt says, “Kanye was right.”

Popularity: 27% [?]