08-14-2020, 01:28 PM
(08-14-2020, 08:40 AM)hollodero Wrote: You're probably right, I did not exactly double-check, my overall point would be that there is no significant gap in representation.
Yeah I don't want to compare grievances, and I guess blacks might win such a competition, on the grounds that their ancestors didn't come to the US by their own free will alone. The childbirth death rate is persuasive too. But Hispanics sure face some of those bad treatments as well. The cliche of the Mexican gardener and other gross stereotypes are well-known even to me, many are held in a semi-legal state, pay taxes, don't get healthcare, are threatened with deportation, the war on drugs hit them too, they too face violence on the streets within their community too etc,. it's not like all is fine with this demographic.
Of course, they have nothing on Native Americans, comparatively. There just aren't enough of them for either party to care.
Quote:But as stated, comparing grievances imho is pointless. In a sense, I find the idea to pick a certain ethnicity or gender for an important post as some kind of compensation for bad treatments said ethnicities or genders had to endure as kind of a flawed approach. It feels like window dressing. Even more so for it's still about policies and not about faces and appearances. Condi Rice is a black woman and Bernie Sanders is anything but, but if it comes to healthcare the latter, one might argue, might still do way more for the community or the blck women you referenced.
I am consistently impressed with how accurate your assessments of US politics typically are. What you're describing, in a nice way, is pandering. Biden committed to a black woman because black oppression is the dominant discussion of the moment. He did so for no other reason. As you, correctly, point out, this excludes a large number of, IMO, more qualified and better overall (see Duckworth for one example) candidates. Defenders will excuse this for the exact same reasons that it was wrong to do, historical wrongs, current zeitgeist, etc.
Unfortunately in the US, race is the ultimate trump card (no pun intended). We obsess over it like the Brits do over social class. The Dems pander to it while the GOP try and ignore it is much as possible. Both approaches are flawed.