FREEPing Out

New blogroll listee Fenster Moop posts today about a fascinating Q&A the Detroit Free Press just conducted with anti-preference leader Ward Connerly.

Moop thought the editors came across as “somewhat one-sided and hostile,” but in a comment on his post Linda Seebach (herself a member of the editorial board of a major Rocky Mountain newspaper) was more struck by “how ignorant they are.”

They don’t know how the Supreme Court decided the Michigan cases; they don’t know that their argument about past disadvantage as a justification for preferences has been decisely rejected by the Supreme Court, on several occasions. Connerly has to correct them repeatedly, and they don’t even hear what he is saying.

Let me give a few examples of the FreeP’s questions, which are italicized below. (I have not reproduced many of them, and they do not appear in this order.)

You’re here obviously on behalf of the petition drive. Michigan already went through the lawsuit against the University of Michigan’s admission’s policy. Some people would say this is settled law, the Supreme Court has ruled, so why are you going to take us down this road again? Why put us through this?

The editors really do seem clueless as to what the Michigan opinions actually said. As Connerly replied, “I would say to those who subscribe to that view that they should read the decisions.” (Attention FreeP editors: the Supremes allowed preferences to produce diversity in admissions. They did not require preferences, or bar their elimination.)

But there is equal treatment in a negative kind of way, and then there is equal treatment in a positive or affirmative way. No? To help make up for what happened before? That’s how some people would perceive affirmative action.

The pact that the American government has with its citizens also guarantees a right to pursue life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If that has not been allowed for a group of people for centuries, and you want to start from scratch and say, starting now everyone is equal, what is the remedy for the people who did not have that opportunity as guaranteed by law? You can’t pretend that they don’t exist and that time doesn’t count.

Part the basis of the Supreme Court’s decision is that people are not treated equally by this society, have not been for a long time and do not have equal opportunity at the moment. And that is why affirmative action is necessary. So, if you are saying, getting rid of this will treat people equally, but the court is saying nothing in society treats people equally yet, so this leg-up is necessary, how do you square those two things?

Again, Connerly: “With all due respect, that’s not what the court said.” Not only did the Court not say that, it has said virtually the opposite for nearly a generation: the desire to cure historical wrongs does not provide a justifiable basis for engaging in racial discrimination in the present. I think it is also worth pointing out that the form and syntax of this question is as garbled as its content.

The FreeP editors seems incapable of comprehending the fact that an obviously informed, capable, affable man, sitting at same table with them, actually believed that a desire to “reflect the community” did not justify discriminating on the basis of race. Their incomprehension was revealed in several questions:

What about hiring in a police or fire department where the goal is to reflect the community?

History here suggests some real tensions develop, particularly with the police force if it doesn’t reflect the community. Some people find that very scary and would wonder why you don’t see that as a problem.

And again, after a number of intervening questions:

One of the guiding principles of this newspaper is that we value diversity, and we want content of this newspaper to reflect the diversity of the community we serve. Does that strike you as a silly principle?

But it is not legitimate in your view for the city of Detroit, for instance, to try to make its police force reflect the community that we serve.

In response to Connerly’s point that our common humanity in the human race was much more important than the somewhat artificial concept of race, the editors stumbled again:

Don’t you concede that at least America’s furthered the perception that race is real by some of the historic patterns of discrimination, some of the institutionalized forms of discrimination that have existed in almost every institution, from education to law enforcement? What is the argument for that if race isn’t real? The perception, at least, is that people in this human family who look a certain way, or come from a certain lineage are disproportionately affected.

“America’s furthered the perception”???? And this is the editorial board of a major paper?

I wonder if this Q&A was, you know, edited before it went to press. If so, you can’t tell from reading it.