posted
I just think 1) the Estate Tax deserves it's own thread in which to be fully discussed and 2) Obama's Speech deserves to be more fully discussed. And doing both in the same threat would give me a headache. Posts: 3295 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
Obama's mention of how his story was only possible in America, that was very Abraham Lincoln. And about Americans being decent people, that's the Reagan appeal. But I do think he brought his own ideas in that were quite important too.
Naming the anger was an interesting thing to do.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:Obama's mention of how his story was only possible in America, that was very Abraham Lincoln.
I'm not even sure these "Only in America" claims are true. Is it so hard to believe it could happen in Canada, and Disraeli was the Jewish prime minister of England over 100 years ago. India, Pakistan, and Indonesia elected women as heads of state much earlier in their democratic tradition. To be sure, there are many countries where Obama's story would have been snuffed out, but I'm not sure how former Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri would have done in this American Democracy.
If this was Obama's great speech on race, I'm disappointed. It seems to me to be another speech to make white people feel good about themselves and their country, without asking them to actually sacrifice or [i]do]/i] anything, of course, except vote for him.
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I keep reading that as "White folks have been discussing it..." Oops.
I thought the speech was amazing. It beautifully described much of what I believe, and took it even farther, giving me much to think about. And I'm sure there's more there that I missed the first time through.
Posts: 959 | Registered: Jan 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong: If this was Obama's great speech on race, I'm disappointed. It seems to me to be another speech to make white people feel good about themselves and their country, without asking them to actually sacrifice or [i]do]/i] anything, of course, except vote for him.
What should he have talked about Irami? Why are "white people" the only ones who can feel good about the speech? I can tell you from personal experience that you are not representative of the average black person.
It would be nice if you stopped using "white people" as a derogatory term.
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quote:Originally posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong: Democacy hurts....if you talk about desegregating schools, I think your kid should attend the local public school.
How are you defining "segregated school" in this context, Irami?
Irami, since you're back in the thread, and since I know how easy it is for a short little post like this one to get lost in the shuffle, I thought that I'd repost this question from the first page.
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quote:How are you defining "segregated school" in this context, Irami?
The lab school is segregated by class and race. Hyde Park is a college neighborhood surrounded on three sides by black Chicago and a lake on the fourth. One of the reasons the University can retain professors is because it set up a K-12 private school on campus, with reduced tuition for some faculty. There are tests and prohibitive pricing for non-faculty children, and the result is a school that doesn't reflect the community as much as it services the desires of the tenured college and hospital faculty.
Posts: 5600 | Registered: Jul 2001
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So are you asserting that Obama's daughters are in a school with white children in it but the white children and black children are taught in different classes?
University of Florida has a lab school too. It's not solely because U of C is surrounded by south side.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:If this was Obama's great speech on race, I'm disappointed. It seems to me to be another speech to make white people feel good about themselves and their country, without asking them to actually sacrifice or [i]do]/i] anything, of course, except vote for him.
Irami,
That doesn't come close to the reactions of my black coworkers here. Everyone who has actually talked about it thought it was an important speech - and I'm downplaying the terms used to describe it.
I don't know if made them "feel good" - or if it made me "feel good" for that matter. But the general consensus here is that it was a powerful speech we appreciated.
Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:it seems to me to be another speech to make white people feel good about themselves and their country, without asking them to actually sacrifice or [i]do]/i] anything, of course, except vote for him.
From the speech:
quote:In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations.
quote:How is it segregated? Does it forbid students from certain races or classes?
The tuition is between $17,000 to $20,000 a year for non-faculty members. That's prohibitively priced. It's de facto segregation in the same way a poll tax under Jim Crow is de facto segregation.
Posts: 5600 | Registered: Jul 2001
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...because black = poor? Does that mean all poor people are black or that gaining enough wealth to send your kids to private school means you are no longer black?
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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So they are black children in an exclusive and therefore mostly white school. I'm having a hard time understanding why that means segregated. It may not be fair, but "segregated" means something else.
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The devil is always in the details. Does he intend to enact a massive tax on all of us for national healthcare? How will he pay for the investment in schools? How do you enforce civil rights laws? How do you ensure fairness in our criminal justice system? What does fair mean? How is he going to keep jobs in America? How is he going to win in Iraq? How will he stop special interest groups like AARP, Unions, Trial Lawyers, Big Oil, and so on? It was a very pretty speech but there is no 'how' to it
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:What percentage of the kids who go to the school are not the children of faculty members?
Last week, one of the parents told me half, but that half isn't from the neighborhood. It's a great school, parents carpool and drive from all over for it, and none of them are black. This is striking because the while Elementary schools in the neighborhood are reasonably diverse, the local high school, Kenwood Academy, is a few blocks away, and is 95 percent black. The Lab School graduated 125 students last year, and three of them were black males.
Posts: 5600 | Registered: Jul 2001
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So Lexus is a segregated car manufacturer? Is it unethical to offer products or services which not everyone can afford?
Posts: 3275 | Registered: May 2007
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quote:What percentage of the kids who go to the school are not the children of faculty members?
Last week, one of the parents told me half, but that half isn't from the neighborhood. It's a great school, parents carpool and drive from all over for it, and none of them are black. This is striking because the while Elementary schools in the neighborhood are reasonably diverse, the local high school, Kenwood Academy, is a few blocks away, and is 95 percent black. The Lab School graduated 125 students last year, and three of them were black males.
Hm. So the high cost probably isn't intended to keep non-faculty members' children out of the school. And you say that test scores for kids at this school are comparable to those of kids in the surrounding schools?
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:The tuition is between $17,000 to $20,000 a year for non-faculty members. That's prohibitively priced. It's de facto segregation in the same way a poll tax under Jim Crow is de facto segregation.
So basically your argument is that because it is a private school, requiring tuition, it is segregated? Is there no financial aid or scholarships at this school? Does that mean that all colleges and universities who have tuitions above the $17,000 to $20,000 range are also segregated?
Furthermore, would a public school be any less segregated? Public schools are not in any way segregated by tuition, but they are segregated by geography to a similar degree. Inner city public schools, after all, end up with a very different demographic than suburban and rural schools.
It seems like the bar you've set for qualifying as "segregated" is so low that it would be impossible to have a desegregated school.
Posts: 8120 | Registered: Jul 2000
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quote:Originally posted by DarkKnight: The devil is always in the details. Does he intend to enact a massive tax on all of us for national healthcare? How will he pay for the investment in schools? How do you enforce civil rights laws? How do you ensure fairness in our criminal justice system? What does fair mean? How is he going to keep jobs in America? How is he going to win in Iraq? How will he stop special interest groups like AARP, Unions, Trial Lawyers, Big Oil, and so on? It was a very pretty speech but there is no 'how' to it
Go read his webpage.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:So Lexus is a segregated car manufacturer? Is it unethical to offer products or services which not everyone can afford?
I think this is closer to Obama talking about environmental care, then buying an SUV because they are so darn convenient.
quote:And you say that test scores for kids at this school are comparable to those of kids in the surrounding schools?
The scores are comparable at the elementary school level. The Ray School kids(public) are at or slightly above grade level, while the Lab School students are two or three grades above. At the high school level, it's not even close, part of the problem is the faculty yanking their kids out of the public system.
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posted
What Irami is saying is that unless your kids are in a bad school, you don't care about black people.
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But not just Obama does that. Lots of tree-huggers in the west have SUVs so they can go hug the trees.
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quote:At the high school level, it's not even close, part of the problem is the faculty yanking their kids out of the public system.
I guess that's part of the problem. The other part of the problem is they go teach at Stanford because then they won't have to send their children to a school with a 25% success rate.
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The school has 35% students of color and over 44 nationalities. Kenwood Academy is 95% black, so his school is more diverse then the public school Irami think his kids should go to.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:I think this is closer to Obama talking about environmental care, then buying an SUV because they are so darn convenient.
But an SUV is arguably harmful to the environment which is a direct contradiction to his stated position. How is his kids' private education harmful to public education?
It seems like it should be possible to advocate for improved public education while, if you have the resources, seeking an even better education for your family.
Believing that everyone has a right to a minimum standard of (education/health/housing) is a separate issue from believing that people should be able to purchase an even higher standard if, through good luck or hard work, they can afford to do so.
Posts: 3275 | Registered: May 2007
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Irami, why are you running in that neighborhood? Shouldn't you be running in a more "segregated" neighborhood?
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong: The scores are comparable at the elementary school level. The Ray School kids(public) are at or slightly above grade level, while the Lab School students are two or three grades above. At the high school level, it's not even close, part of the problem is the faculty yanking their kids out of the public system.
I'm not quite sure I follow. Is the percentage of children of faculty in area public schools higher at the grade school level than it is at the high school level?
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote: Employer Contribution: Employers that do not offer or make a meaningful contribution to the cost of quality health coverage for their employees will be required to contribute a percentage of payroll toward the costs of the national plan. Small employers that meet certain revenue thresholds will be exempt.
That is kinda frightening
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by pooka: But not just Obama does that. Lots of tree-huggers in the west have SUVs so they can go hug the trees.
Or all those rich folks who met for an environmental summit in Bali and found the airport did not have enough room for all their private jets.
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quote:Is the percentage of children of faculty in area public schools higher at the grade school level than it is at the high school level?
The percentage of children of faculty in the area public schools is much higher at the grade school level.
quote:Irami, why are you running in that neighborhood? Shouldn't you be running in a more "segregated" neighborhood?
During the summer, I run by the lake, during the cold seasons, I run around the neighborhood. His house and Farrakhan's house are on my route.
Posts: 5600 | Registered: Jul 2001
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The tuition is between $17,000 to $20,000 a year for non-faculty members. That's prohibitively priced.
You're right. This college is prejudiced against me, too, because there is no way I could ever afford to send my children there.
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quote:The tuition is between $17,000 to $20,000 a year for non-faculty members. That's prohibitively priced.
You're right. This college is prejudiced against me, too, because there is no way I could ever afford to send my children there.
There is something to be said for that, especially considering that human resources departments require college degrees for employment that doesn't seem to require them. I have another opinion entirely about the proliferation of bourgie Masters degrees prestigious colleges are hawking for 30 grand a pop.
posted
Oh hang on. I think I see what you're getting at Irami... It's hard to make sense of what you're saying when your posts drip so much hate and bitterness, and your hate and bitterness is blinding you, and you are in fact completely missing the point. You're seeing hypocracy in Obama's actions and words, when in fact there is none.
Yes, in a way, the schools in Chicago are segregated. They are segregated by class and yes, by race -- because each public school serves a neighborhood and neighborhoods tend to be, by choice, history, and housing prices segregated by race and class. At least in the city.
You're saying Obama is sending his kids to a segregated school but the truth is that ALL the schools are segregated. By your own admission the public 'neighborhood' high school is no more diverse than the Lab School he sends his kids to. You hold it against him cause you see him as a traitor. Crossing the line and sending his kids to the 'high class white kids school'.
That's just dumb. He has the means to send his kids to a good school. And in doing so he is making the school more diverse. You ought to be encouraging him, because if there were more people like him then you wouldn't have a beef with the school for race at all. Cause it would be diverse. Maybe then you'd just have a class beef with him. So he has money. Well yeah, you sorta have to to get very far in public office -- and by the same measure getting very far in public office means you get money. I mean the senate salary is no small amount.
So the school requires people to pay high tuition and that causes defacto class, and in some ways race segregation. Well yeah, it's a private school. It doesn't get public money (or much of it) and it has a pretty small class size. As a result it needs to charge it's students quite a bit in order to afford the resources to educate them. I mean teachers don't really come that cheap, nor do the teaching resources.
When you hold it against him for sending his kids to the 'high class white school' and then saying things like this:
quote:Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven’t fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today’s black and white students.
You're completely missing the point. Read on:
quote:For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man who's been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Emphasis mine. He's talking about fixing the segregation problem of the schools and improving the schools to bring them up to the levels of the best schools. He's talking about working with white people to do it, instead of battling them and seeing it as us and them as you insist on doing Irami. If you look at his plan for education it involves giving schools more money, more governmental support, and finding ways to get them better teachers and better resources. Look at his plan for education, it's on his website in quite a bit of detail:
I'll requote some of the key and more pertinent points here:
quote:Reform No Child Left Behind: Obama will reform NCLB, which starts by funding the law. Obama believes teachers should not be forced to spend the academic year preparing students to fill in bubbles on standardized tests. He will improve the assessments used to track student progress to measure readiness for college and the workplace and improve student learning in a timely, individualized manner. Obama will also improve NCLB's accountability system so that we are supporting schools that need improvement, rather than punishing them.
He's talking about poor inner city schools that were most hurt by NCLB.
quote:Address the Dropout Crisis: Obama will address the dropout crisis by passing his legislation to provide funding to school districts to invest in intervention strategies in middle school - strategies such as personal academic plans, teaching teams, parent involvement, mentoring, intensive reading and math instruction, and extended learning time.
Again aiming at schools that have a drop-out problem - poor inner city schools.
And for going to college:
quote:Create the American Opportunity Tax Credit: Obama will make college affordable for all Americans by creating a new American Opportunity Tax Credit. This universal and fully refundable credit will ensure that the first $4,000 of a college education is completely free for most Americans, and will cover two-thirds the cost of tuition at the average public college or university and make community college tuition completely free for most students. Obama will also ensure that the tax credit is available to families at the time of enrollment by using prior year's tax data to deliver the credit when tuition is due.
That might not sound like a lot. But it could actually go a long way toward giving everyone the chance to go to college.
If you want to know the full education plan you can find them both here:
They're long, they're detailed, and they're full of good stuff. That's why he can speak on these issues. Because he means to work to improve the situation he's talking about. The situation exists and he means to improve it.
Incidentally it's pretty clear that even if you listened to his speech you didn't digest it or hear it at all Irami. Cause he has words that speak of and directly to people like you:
quote:A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one’s family, contributed to the erosion of black families – a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods – parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement – all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What’s remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn’t make it – those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations – those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician’s own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
Think about it Irami. He's trying to help, and so are many of the people you often rail against. Maybe you should give them a chance.
quote:But many people, including Obama supporters, may still have two questions that Senator Obama's speech did not sufficiently answer, at least in my opinion. And, for any Democrat whose priority is to win back the White House in 2008, they need to be answered now -- because, if Senator Obama ends up the party's nominee (I am a supporter of Senator Clinton's) -- for sure Senator McCain will insist they be answered in the fall.
These two questions are:
1. If a white minister preached sermons to his congregation and had used the "N" word and used rhetoric and words similar to members of the KKK, would you support a Democratic presidential candidate who decided to continue to be a member of that congregation?
2. Would you support that candidate if, after knowing of or hearing those sermons, he or she still appointed that minister to serve on his or her "Religious Advisory Committee" of his or her presidential campaign?
posted
But he didn't use the N word. For starters, there is nothing equivalent to the "n" word for white people, just as there is nothing equivalent to the "b" word for men.
Davis is a lying sack of spent coffee grounds. How can he start out saying he admired the speech if he believes Obama endorses racism? Wouldn't that make Davis also a racist by association?
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:there is nothing equivalent to the "n" word for white people, just as there is nothing equivalent to the "b" word for men.
I love being a white guy. We're so blissfully unencumbered.
Irami -
I think you're part of the problem that Obama idenfitied back in his 2004 Keynote speech to the DNC. He said something along the lines of stopping the black on black attacks against the idea that a black kid with a book in his hands is acting white.
quote:Originally posted by Kwea:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I have a hard time sympathizing with anyone who could be hit by the estate tax. Anything under $2 million is exempt by the tax, and that number will go up next year, and the year after, then the tax will be eliminated entirely, and then we'll have to figure out what to do with it, but in the meantime, come on. If your parents are leaving you $2+ million dollars, I have a hard time believing you can't send your kids to the absolute best schools in America, assuming they can get in. Hell with that money you could probably grease the skids a little.
Having said that, I do think it is unfair to tax someone twice for their earnings. I say get rid of the Estate Tax, just tax them more while they're alive.
Keep in mind that property is included in that, and in some areas of the country you can own a decent sized house and be half way there.
My parents are NOT rich, but they own 1 house and 1 small condo, one in each state they live in, so they could be affected by it (and the limit isn't 2 mill, btw).
Even though with the current housing market they couldn't sell their house in MI if they wanted to. They tax vale and the actual sale value are so different that when my parents die my sister and I will HAVE to sell the cottage that has been a part of our lives (and is my favorite place on Earth), because we can't afford to keep it.
We may not even be able to break even once all is said and done.
From what I've read, the exemption for 2008 is $2 million dollars, which means everything up to $2 million is not taxed by the federal government, and everything above that is taxed back to the stone age (45%). Next year the exemption jumps to $3.5 million and then disappears in 2010 before reappearing in 2011 back at the 2001 level. If you have different information, I'd be open to reading it. So by my reading of the rules, if your parents have a total estate of OVER $2 million, then only that which is over the mark will be taxed, and it's a steep tax (that I guess I have to say AGAIN, that I personally don't agree with), but from your given description of your situation, I don't see your parents' homes becoming a liability, unless they are luxury homes. You're painting a different picture of the Estate Tax than what I've read on it. But regardless, I don't like the tax, and I'd like for something else to take its place in the revenue generation sphere of the federal government.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:He said something along the lines of stopping the black on black attacks against the idea that a black kid with a book in his hands is acting white.
It is true. I hate the idea of black kids with books.
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