Challenging Affirmative Action and Gerrymandering: AEI's Edward Blum

Pending court cases pertaining to race-based legislation.

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Challenging Affirmative Action and Gerrymandering: AEI's Edward Blum

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"It is my hope that we will finally achieve what the great founders and visionaries of the civil rights movement taught us, and that is that your race and your ethnicity really shouldn't count for anything, whether it's college admissions or jobs," says Edward Blum, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) specializing in civil rights policy issues, with a focus on affirmative action, voting rights, and multiculturalism.

Blum spoke at Reason Weekend, the annual donor event for the nonprofit that publishes this website, about how certain states' voting districts are gerrymandered into racially homogeneous zones, and detailed four lawsuits pending before the courts pertaining to race-based legislation. 

About 29 minutes. 

Produced by Anthony L. Fisher. Camera by Paul Detrick and Zach Weissmueller. Additional audio mixing by Meredith Bragg. 

Music: "3 Days Until Ressurection feat SkyRider" by S.J. Mellia (http://soundcloud.com/sj-mell)

Scroll down for downloadable versions of this video, and subscribe to Reason TV's YouTube channel for daily content like this.

Comments

[adolphowisner]

My mom makes $70 every hour on the computer . She has been fired from work for 9 months but last month her pay was $18079 just working on the computer for a few hours.
See here. ?? ????????? http://www.jobsfish.com

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Of course it would be an older, white cis-male giving the speech.

-progderp

[kV]

Who know who else was an older, white cis-male who liked to give speeches?

[Brian D]

Stannis Baratheon?

[some guy]

NO SPOILERS!

[Pan Zagloba]

Cato the Elder?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Bill Clinton?

[trshmnster the terrible]

I'm not sure that "fucks anything that moves" qualifies as cis

[Almanian!]

Joe Biden?

[Bobarian (sexbot hand model)]

I'm not sure that "grope anything that moves" qualifies as cis

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Also, as to Reason Weekend, you know, it would be nice if the poorer people out here had an event we could go to. The Four Seasons Santa Barbara? What the fuck?

[sarcasmic]

You can't afford five hundred bucks a night?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

I suppose I could if I had to, but I'd rather drop $200 a night and go some place nicer than SB. Especially in March.

The Grande Colonial in La Jolla is half that and I'd be willing to bet its a nicer place.

[some guy]

I say just go with the Holiday Inn Express in Barstow.

[Swiss Servator, Switzier!]

"Barstow, Gateway to Daggett"

[PusaAtDaga]

How about Blythe or Bishop? It is generally best to avoid the Bs in California.

[Careless]

If you don't have monocle money, wtf are you doing here?

[Hamster of Doom]

I think they assume the rest of us will do the usual. Barbecue at your uncle's and drink each other's tequila.

[The Late P Brooks]

Meanwhile, over at the Champions of the Downtrodden Worker desk...

Working for Uber might come with its perks, then, but it also comes without the benefits and protections many businesses provide for their employees. That's unfair and illegal, a Boston labor lawyer is now arguing in court, potentially threatening the business models of the dozens and dozens of popular apps that make up the so-called "on-demand economy."

--------

Since Uber drivers are contractors, they receive few of the perks that employees do. They do not receive unemployment compensation when they are fired or laid off, for instance. They are not offered retirement-account matching, health insurance, or life insurance. They do not get reimbursed for gas or repairs. And they need to pay their own taxes out of their own earnings; there is no withholding. That means that Uber drivers make less than they otherwise would, Liss-Riordan argues.
.
The horror.
The HORROR.
What happens if she litigates Uber right into the ditch, and all those drivers out of a job? Pfft. What is that, compared to a glorious triumph for the Communitariat?

[tarran]

Massachusetts labor law is a fucking abortion and is a serious drag on entrepeneurship here, ever since the CFO of a startup sued the startup for not paying him minimum wage during their "we have no revenue and need to be very parsimonious and only hire officers who are willing to work for no pay" stage.

Luckily most entrepeneurs don't give a shit about the law, so it's widely flouted, but the DA's office has been sniffing around for low hanging fruit.

And the whole reason behind the labor law is that $100,000 spent on employees by an employer results in greater taxes in the commonwealth's coffers than $100,000 spent by an employer on contractors.

It has nothing to do with protecting anyone, and everything to do with the insatiable greed of Massachusetts politicians for other people's money.

[Enough About Palin]

"And they need to pay their own taxes out of their own earnings"

Who doesn't?

BTW, large corporations hire contract workers from temp agencies that provide about the same benefits as Uber, yet no one is saying we should outlaw Kelly Services. Robert Half, etc.

[Rhywun]

I thought Uber was for part-timers who want to pick up extra cash? Why would anyone deliberably do that full-time without all those sweet benefits unless, you know, they wanted to?

[tarran]

You just want to force women to be chained to ovens and rolling pins for 36 hours a day, you Lochner denying cis-shitlord!

[Agammamon]

#BACKTOTHEKITCHEN

[Almanian!]

Biden said, "they'll be puttin' ya'll back in chains".

I did not know it would be Uber.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Darling, I don't need Uber to make $200 an hour on my computer, all I have to do is email every Congressman saying "pay up or your guilty secret will be exposed!" Click this link to find out how you, too, can move to Easy Street on the proceeds of blackmail:

wouldn'titbeashameiftheyfoundout.com

[John]

Because no one would ever drive for uber as a second job or to pick up some extra money when they are going somewhere. That is impossible. Everyone who works is a single mother or father of a housewife and three kids whose entire family depends on that single income.

God these people are fucking retarded.

[tarran]

Not retarded, John, evil..... They are C.S. Lewis' moralizing tyrants in the flesh.

[MarkLastname]

No, I'd go with retarded. Which is worse. An evil person may still have self interest, but a full on retard will drive the whole bus right off a cliff just to see if it can fly. These people are not evil geniuses. They're the kid who kills the bunny by petting it too hard.

[Migrant Log Picker]

I'm stealing that Mark. I laughed my ass off.

[Azathoth!!]

They're the kid who kills the bunny because they can---and then act like it was an accident so the moronic grownup will buy them another.

Tarran's right--they are evil.

[Rhywun]

But what if all I know how to do is drive for Uber? My father drove for Uber, and his father before him. It's not fair to make me learn another trade!

[John]

What about the poor orphans forced into slavery driving uber? What about them?!!

[Zeb]

They do not receive unemployment compensation when they are fired or laid off, for instance. They are not offered retirement-account matching, health insurance, or life insurance.

You can buy all of those things, you know. There is a reason contractors tend to get more hourly than a comparable employee would. I have no idea how much Uber drivers get paid, but it seems like they do pretty well if they are good at it.

They just hate the self employed because they have too little control when there isn't an employer/employee relationship to regulate.

[Zeb]

That means that Uber drivers make less than they otherwise would, Liss-Riordan argues.

Then Liss-Riordan is fucking retarded. What, does she just assume that Uber would pay the same exact rate if they also provided benefits and payed payroll tax?

[The Late P Brooks]

Mre:
But according to the participants in the suit, the deal violates labor standards. It also puts Uber's competitors at a disadvantage, since they need to charge higher prices to cover their labor costs. "I'm getting so many calls not just from workers, but from complying competitors, who are outraged," Liss-Riordan said. "They're following the rules, and treating their drivers as employees, and paying into unemployment and worker's comp. And they're being undercut by companies that are not playing by rules. It creates a race to the bottom."

As a class-action lawyer on workplace issues, Liss-Riordan sees that kind of race to the bottom everywhere, and she has become one of Boston's most prominent attorneys for fighting it. She sued the iconic Hilltop Steak House, now closed. She sued on behalf of Logan Airport's skycaps. She also won a case on behalf of all of Starbucks's Massachusetts baristas, netting them about $15 million, or more than $1,000 per plaintiff. And when not busy suing prominent businesses, she and her husband run a Harvard Square pizza parlor that she had previously litigated against. It used to be called the Upper Crust. It's now called the Just Crust, and its workers own part of the company.
.
Businesses are failing faster than they are being created? Productivity is falling?
It's a conundrum, it is.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Somebody should start a campaign of lawsuits against this woman and litigate her dumb ass out of business.

I'd also be willing to bet her husband has a waist bigger than his chest, has a neck barely strong enough to hold his head upright and has a penis the size of a thimble.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Plus, she looks like Rocky Dennis with a dead tooth.

[Almanian!]

*throws up in mouth a little*

Shouldn't have looked - my bad

[Heroic Mulatto]

21 dollars for an 18" pepperoni pizza?

Fuck you.

[sarcasmic]

But it's organic!

[Almanian!]

And artisanal!

[Rhywun]

The regular is only 16. (No free-range chickens.) I have no idea if that is expensive for a pie, but it sounds within reason to me unless you're used to cheap Pizza Hut or something.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

I hope someone puts her out of business just like she ruined people.

Cunt.

'Grated Mozzarella Cheese, Organic Tomato Sauce, Grated Parmesan'

'White Pizza, Farm Eggs, Spinach, Daniele Prosciutto, Mozzarella + Parmigiano Reggiano'

Which is it? Parmiggiano or Pamesan they use? Important because the latter is the cheap stuff.

Also, it's SAN DANIELE prosciutto you philistines.

I know. I'm being a bitch.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

http://www.prosciuttosandaniel.....niele-ham/

[some guy]

I know. I'm being a bitch.

It's ok. She deserves it.

[Rhywun]

Oh I agree.

[Heroic Mulatto]

A 14 inch pepperoni pizza should go for something like 12 bucks before tax at your average mom and pop pizzeria in northern New England. What you're paying for at Just Crust is location, that is proximity to Harvard Square. Now, I would think a social justice-y worker's cooperative wouldn't be so mercenary as to capitalize on Harvard students being willing to pay a little bit more for convenience, but there you go.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

I agree. A pepperoni pizza should never be $21. That's retarded.

[Heroic Mulatto]

I'm not going to hate on the hustle of exploiting financially irresponsible Harvard undergrads, but don't be fucking sanctimonious about it.

[Dark Lord of the Cis]

At the mom and pop pizza place in my town, I can get an 18" supreme and 10 wings delivered to my house for that.

[Careless]

You'd have a hard time in Chicago

[Zeb]

They might not want to capitalize on their semi-captive audience, but they do have to pay Harvard Square rents.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Just so you know, an 18" at the place she put out of business costs less than $19.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

You know. I wonder if people get/are upset by these assholes who put their favorite places out of business. I mean, from what I hear/read Sweet Cakes was popular. For it to close down because of a couple of jackoffs would piss me off.

[Zeb]

So, a pretty small increase of around $2.

Restaurant food prices seem to have gone up everywhere in the past few years.

I have no idea what a pizza costs at a convenient and trendy location in a city.

[Kaptious Kristen]

This makes me think of this little pizza joint we discovered in South Hero (VT) last summer. She's a two person operation out of a tiny kitchen in a decrepit-looking building. No seating, no credit cards. You call with your order and she tells you when to pick it up, down to the minute (I think she gave us a time of 6:04pm). She's only open 4 hours a day. And I won't get any til August!

[The Late P Brooks]

21 dollars for an 18" pepperoni pizza?

Fuck you.

.
Listen, you parsimonious bastard, free trade social justice is a delectable, if somewhat pricey, pizza topping.
You'll eat it, and like it. Now, pay up.

[Libertarius]

I'm just a small town pizza lawyah, but I do declah that not paying $21 for a social justice pizza is rayciss!

[sloopyinTEXAS]

It's pronounced "PEEET-ZUH"

[Heroic Mulatto]

Forgive me, but I'm fascinated by these things. Is your transcription trying to capture Boston non-rhoticity or Southern? Based on the context it could work either way, but Bostonians don't display the final constant cluster reduction (rayciss) that speakers with a "Blackccent" do.

[Almanian!]

someone needs to watch more commercials

[Heroic Mulatto]

I guess...help a brother out?

[Swiss Servator, Switzier!]

GEICO radio ad.

[Dark Lord of the Cis]

The "I do declah" should be a dead giveaway.

[Hamster of Doom]

Doesn't quite give it the proper multisyllabic pronunciation.

An angry Southern woman can make "declare" the entire first line of a haiku.

[Enough About Palin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dij9XJVPteY

[Almanian!]

Thanks, Palin 🙂

[Rhywun]

Jeez, I wonder what the free-range bacon crust pizza goes for.

[Kaptious Kristen]

That commercial makes me giggle every time.

[Stickler Meeseeks]

OT: Chad Coleman, formerly of the Wire and Walking Dead, gets drunk, makes ass of himself, and then pulls the race card.

http://dailycaller.com/2015/05.....passenger/

[Rhywun]

He says the guy told the girl, 'No, we don't know that n*****,'

Yeah, when I saw that I immediately filed it under "shit that never happened". I think the actor has since "apologized" too.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Sounds like someone needs to get some braaaiiins.

[The Late P Brooks]

You can't be wrong all the time, Bernie Sanders edition.

Sanders, an economic populist and middle-class pugilist, doesn't talk much about guns on the campaign trail. But his voting record paints the picture of a legislator who is both skeptical of gun control and invested in the interests of gun owners?and manufacturers. In 1993, then-Rep. Sanders voted against the Brady Act, which mandated federal background checks for gun purchasers and restricted felons' access to firearms. As a senator, Sanders supported bills to allow firearms in checked bags on Amtrak trains and block funding to any foreign aid organization that registered or taxed Americans' guns. Sanders is dubious that gun control could help prevent gun violence, telling one interviewer after Sandy Hook that "if you passed the strongest gun control legislation tomorrow, I don't think it will have a profound effect on the tragedies we have seen." (He has since endorsed some modest gun control measures.)

[Kaptious Kristen]

He has to tow the Vermont party lion.

[Zeb]

Sounds like Vermont in general. Weirdly communistic, but good on gun rights.

[MarkLastname]

"middle-class pugilist"
What? Does that mean he's a belligerent bourgeoisie? Or are they actually trying to say he 'fights for the middle class?' Because I'm pretty sure he's not even supposed to be trying to; isn't the middle class the enemy of the workers?

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Just to be clear, affirmative action is a culture-war issue, just like "abortion...and homosexuality as well as evolution, censorship, and the Western canon."

http://www.newrepublic.com/art.....ars-review

[The Late P Brooks]

Cont'd (Fucking character limit)

i

None of these views are particularly shocking for a Vermont representative: Sanders' deep-blue state has both high gun ownership and incredibly lax gun laws, and it's perfectly logical for the senator to support his constituents' firearms enthusiasm. And a close friend of Sanders once said that the senator "thinks there's an elitism in the anti-gun movement."

Women, children, Slate writers hardest hit.

[Kaptious Kristen]

thinks there's an elitism in the anti-gun movement.

I'm gobsmacked that Bernie actually sees gun grabbers that clearly. I take back my statement that he's only doing pro-gun because he wants to get re-elected.

[The Late P Brooks]

[Vermont's] incredibly lax gun laws.
Rivers of blood. Bodies in the streets.
It's a slaughterhouse.

[Heroic Mulatto]

You're telling me? Here in NH, since 2010, we've had no knife laws! Why just today, I was forced to behead 3 fools with my khukuri during my daily commute!

[Pro Libertate]

In Florida, we have no laws against rocks. Can you believe that?

[Heroic Mulatto]

And yet, Floridians get stoned all the time!

[Pro Libertate]

Thanks to a lax government.

[Zeb]

Do you even have rocks in Florida? I thought it was all just sand or mud.

[Pro Libertate]

We have limestone, of course, and there's that coquina stone-like stuff made of shells (the fort in St. Augustine is made of that). And Florida tourists smuggle rocks out of other places so that our plans to build a mountain range down the state, ? la Italy, can be realized.

[Zeb]

Nice link.

[GILMORE]

I think this Gerry guy is really starting to be a problem.

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[John]

Where the hell is Pro Liberate? John Wayne a fag? Really.

[Author] Munn said Wayne had also told him that his friend, the stuntman Yakima Canutt, had "saved his life once". Mr Munn later asked Mr Canutt what he had meant by this comment. The incident is thought to have taken place in the early 50s.

"Yakima told me that the FBI had discovered there were agents sent to Hollywood to kill John Wayne," said Mr Munn. "He said the FBI had come to tell John about the plot. John told the FBI to let the men show up and he would deal with them."

Wayne then apparently hatched a plot with his scriptwriter at the time, Jimmy Grant, to abduct the assassins, drive to a beach and stage a mock execution to frighten them. Mr Munn said he did not know what transpired, but heard the two men stayed in the US to work for the FBI. ?

Wayne then relied upon a group of loyal stuntmen who infiltrated communist cells in America and learned of plots to kill him.

"He then gathered all the stuntmen, went to the communist meetings, and had a huge fight," Mr Munn said. This was when Wayne believes Mr Canutt saved his life.

http://pjmedia.com/richardfern.....the-fatwa/

How many commie agents has Saint Tebow taken on? If John Wayne was a fag, then the entire country needs to embrace sodomy.

[Pro Libertate]

"He was, too, you boys. I installed two-way mirrors in his pad in Brentwood, and he come to the door in a dress."

[John]

Like I said, then maybe we should all be wearing dresses.

[Pro Libertate]

"That's bullshit. You're a white suburban punk just like me."

I think I've heard that story. I always liked John Wayne. I remember watching an episode of Maude with him on it, and it was so weird at the time, because movie stars so rarely did TV back then.

[John]

He was on Maud? Wow. He was the dinosaur arch conservative by then. It is amazing the Norman Lear would have wanted him on his show. Shows how crazy and intolerant liberals have become over the years. No way would any producer as far to the left today as Lear was then even consider having someone without absolutely correct views guest star on a show.

[Pro Libertate]

Yes. She was a fangirl and couldn't take him to task for his right-wing views, being all tongue-tied when he showed up. Usual sitcom cameo stuff, except with the Duke.

[John]

That is great. But it is also sad. As noxious as people like Lear and Bea Arther were, they are downright enlightened and open minded compared to the left today. The left today are just fucking animals.

[Pro Libertate]

I don't think they were as generally delusional back then as the current left is, though, of course, some of them were nutjobs then, too.

[tarran]

John Wayne's appearance on I love Lucy is all kinds of awesome.

[Migrant Log Picker]

Fucking hilarious tarran. I wasn't born when that bit came out, a few months later, back when people could laugh about stuff. Lucy and Desi were fucking hilarious for a lot of my youth and to anyone not infected with progtardism would agree. Lucille Ball is one of the funniest women ever....as was Carol Burnett. They found humor in day to day interactions, which is where most people that are not insufferable pricks reside.

[Zeb]

John, if you don't know the reference, watch Repo Man.

[Pro Libertate]

I think he knows, he's just giving me shit.

[John]

I am doing just that.

[Zeb]

OK, good. Just wanted to make sure.

[Pro Libertate]

Plate o' shrimp.

[Zeb]

Apparently that story in the movie came from either one of the actors or someone the writers knew who claimed that it was absolutely true.

[Zeb]

Maybe fags have always been the best commie fighters.

[The Late P Brooks]

Jordan Weissman is a maroon.

In reality, however, it's just not clear how strongly taxes influence the overall direction of the economy, given how many other factors are at play. As any mildly snarky liberal will remind you, the country seemed to do just fine in the Eisenhower era, when marginal income tax rates topped out at a confiscatory 92 percent. It also fared pretty well after Bill Clinton raised rates to close the deficit in the early 1990s. If you're looking for a slightly more formal source, when the Congressional Research Service looked at the issue in 2012, it found that there was no statistically significant correlation at all between top marginal tax rates and real GDP growth.
.
I love how these guys will snatch a single variable out of the air and say, "See? It don't make no difference."
Abolish OSHA and the EPA? Tear up fifty thousand pages of the Federal Register? Why would you suggest that? What do they have to do with anything?

[Pro Libertate]

And what was the effective tax rate during the Eisenhower administration years? Bet it was closer to zero than to 92 percent.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

I've actually looked into this before - because of tax writeoffs and because the top rate only actually impacted people making some unGodly amount of money (and then only in the form of income tax since the 92% rate was NOT capital gains) the effective top income tax rate was still higher than it is today, but only by something like 7-10 percentage points. It was certainly higher, but you also have to take into account that today you have to pay for more money in order to deal with regulatory costs, so the actual amount of money the state was costing the very rich may very well have been lower back then than it is today.

And the amount of money they're stealing from the middle class via taxes, fees, and regulation is unquestionably higher today.

[Viscount Irish, Slayer of Huns]

In short, progressives have a really tough time actually looking into the arguments they make and tend to find a really shallow statistic that appears to support their view, then proceed to never do enough research into the subject to realize their argument is actually completely wrong.

[Pro Libertate]

The major problem with the left these days is their complete focus on perception versus reality. Delusion can only take you so far, before reality slaps you in the face. Ask Venezuela or any other reality-denying society.

[MarkLastname]

optics. All about the optics.

[Overt]

The Post WWII era also enjoyed massive gains in our economy as most of the industrialized world outside North America had been bombed into the shithole. There is no reason to think that the gains in that era were due to the tax policy rather than in spite of it.

That said, the point is correct. There are many confounding factors affecting an economy, and it is very difficult to tease out which changes were caused by tax policy vs something else.

(I still believe that all other things being equal, reduced taxes help an economy, but the problem is that all things are not equal and will never be so)

[kopen originele nike]

Bloggers so insightful, admire ah.

[qli63509]

Nathaniel . although Stephanie `s rep0rt is super... I just bought a top of the range Mercedes sincee geting a check for $4416 this last four weeks and would you believe, ten/k last-month . no-doubt about it, this really is the best-job I've ever done . I actually started seven months/ago and almost straight away started making a nice over $79.. p/h..... ?????? http://www.Jobs-Cash.com