Discriminations

Jonah Goldberg reminds us that Obama supports the “horrid” Akaka bill, which would create separate race-based governmental programs for those, as I pointed out here and elsewhere, “with a drop of Hawaiian blood.”

Peter Kirsanow of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has a good description of this bad bill, from last fall.

The House of Representatives is poised to pass the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act (known in the Senate as the “Akaka Bill”), the apogee of an aggressive multiculturalism that has manifested itself in local, state, and federal legislation in the last two decades. The bill faces a certain White House veto, but it’s unclear whether there are enough votes in the Senate to sustain it. If the Senate overrides the veto, it will speed the country’s embrace of a form of post-nationalism (already held by many elites) — a confederation of various races, ethnicities and interest groups competing for special privileges, exemptions and recognition.

The Akaka Bill creates a race-based government for native Hawaiians. Even its supporters don’t deny that the bill could lead to outright secession. In the meantime, the bill will produce a regime of racial preferences, reparations, and lawsuits fueled by ethnic grievance, victimhood, and entitlement....

The Akaka Bill is a legislative abomination on steroids. Its spirit runs counter to our animating principles and national ideal. As I’ve stated before, the bill is the worst piece of legislation ever analyzed by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (that’s saying something)....