Reparations

Reparations.

Lots of politicians and pundits talking about "reparations." Not very clear on how much? For what? To whom? By whom? A good legal definition and some quick descriptions of reparations in the recent past can be found here.

Cory Booker, deeply affected by his previous life as Spartacus, the rebellious slave, has introduced a bill in the Senate to establish a reparations commission:

Such a commission would seek to remedy generations-worth of discrimination as a result of "overt policies fueled by white supremacy and racism that have oppressed African-Americans economically for generations," the New Jersey Democrat said in a statement, in addition to policies "that have ushered millions of Americans into the middle class" but "systematically excluded blacks." 

"This bill is a way of addressing head-on the persistence of racism, white supremacy and implicit racial bias in our country," Booker added. "It will bring together the best minds to study the issue and propose solutions that will finally begin to right the economic scales of past harms and make sure we are a country where all dignity and humanity is affirmed."

This proposal moves significantly beyond those kicking around for about 150 years to provide some sort of government (aka taxpayer) reparations to former slaves, and then to descendants of former slaves.

Booker's proposal, a virtue-signaling gab fest, if enacted would produce what we all can predict, to wit, a conclusion drafted by the usual commission of prog academics and staffers ("the best minds" don'cha know?) and herded along by the usual prog pundits and race hustlers--a permanent gig for Al Sharpton, for example. You don't know what the commission would conclude? You come from the dark side of the moon?

Let me fill you in (SPOILER ALERT): America and its supremacist white population were and are racist, evil patriarchs who hate black and brown people, as well as poor people, women, gays, lesbians, transgenders, immigrants, Native Americans, and, of course, the environment. Have I missed anything? If so, please fill in additional details and forward care of: Spartacus, Senate, New Rome, DC.

The commission, of course, would recommend reparations. What does that mean? Nobody really knows, except reparations would need management by the "best minds," which means, of course, creating a new, massive government bureaucracy and programs, lots of new programs, to hand out reparations in the form of cash, goodies, or services to those so afflicted by America that they never leave--and, in fact, the commission would invite more people to come here to get oppressed.

We, of course, will need racial purity commissions to determine who is or is not black or brown, and, hence, oppressed. We need a percentage of blood rule. Shall we adopt South African standards? How about Nazi standards of racial purity? Will somebody such as Barack Obama, get "a reparations taste," a man so oppressed by America that he became the world's most powerful man, and descends on both his white American mother's and his black Kenyan father's side from slave owners and traders? Will billionaire Oprah get a cut of the action? How about Bill Cosby? How about Spartacus, himself? Will every illegal alien from El Salvador also get a slice? What about people born as one race or gender but who now identify as another race or gender? The "best minds" have their work cut out for them.

One minor suggestion: perhaps the Democrat Party, the party of slavery and Jim Crow, should cough up for slavery reparations? Just a suggestion.

Can't wait to see this unfold.