teejay:
I want you to go back through the last two pages of posts on this thread and you can see for yourself that an argument is being made for reparations(repair, amends) to blacks for slavery, based upon the U.S. providing foreign aid to Israel. Nobody has brought up foreign aid to Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia or anyone else but Israel. We provide in excess of $3 billion annually to Egypt. Who and why the U.S. spends foreign aid on is totally irrelevant to whether blacks living in the United States in 2001 deserve or should get reparations from the government. They are not mutally exclusive. It's a disconnect. I'm not suggesting that people who don't want foreign aid payments to Israel are anti-Semitic anymore than others could claim that NOT wanting to pay reparations to blacks in the U.S. is racist, uncaring or insensitive.
The whole notion of paying handouts to people in this country based on race is in and of itself an absurdity. How much money would it take to make amends? What criteria would you use to determine that repairs were adequate? What about successful blacks in our society, and there are now significant numbers? Should they also get a handout? If not, why not? What about blacks who came to the United States since slavery was abolished? Are they too entitled to a hand out? As I said before, the whole idea is intellectual silliness. If you as a white person are so racked with guilt that you want to rid yourself of your demons, sit down today and write a check to the United Negro College Fund or the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Quit trying to transfer your guilt on other innocent white people. Some want to argue that because the government made payments to Japanese descendants of WWII internment or providing reservations to American Indians, that the precedent holds. I disagree, because tracking those who actually descended from slaves is almost impossible 140 years after the fact and these were also bad decisions that have not gained us freedom from collective guilt. You can't buy that with money.
Are you a Nazi because you don't want our tax dollars given freely to Israel? NO! Are you being consistent by ignoring that being given to Egypt and other Arab nations? OF COURSE NOT!
So my whole point is we as a nation, regardless of our color, need to stop this emotionalistic wallowing in racial guilt and finger pointing. Move on, do something positive to promote good race relations and quit looking for government solutions.
Drahcir bin Yarrum
