The plight of minorities in America

On the drive down from Santa Fe this morning I was listening to Bill Bennett's Morning in America radio show. At the end of his last segment of the morning he spoke briefly about the drug legalization movement, which seems to be on the upswing again. Bennett mentioned a forum that he attended when he was drug czar. At that forum was Charlie Rangle and all Rangle could harp on was the need to identify the root causes. While Bennett didn't totally disagree with Rangle's position but the most important thing to do first was to get the drugs and dealers off the streets and in prison - to free the communities from the dealers that were preying on them. Yes there are problems in the ghettos that need to be addressed - root causes that are blamed on poverty by the social engineers. Actually, the real root cause of problems in the ghettos is the lack of personal responsibility and the government and its armies of social engineers that continually tell the minorities and poor people, that fill up the ghettos, that they cannot stand up on their own and succeed without the government and that all of their problems can be blamed on hardworking non-minority Americans. Interestingly, if sadly, the drug dealers themselves are the counter to this argument. They epitomize the American entrepreneurial spirit - even though it is illegal. They are very much like the original Italian Americans that became the roots of the Mafia. The downside to this drive to riches is that these dealers are victimizing their own people - minorities and families of their communities. The liberals over the decades have convinced blacks and other minorities that they are incapable of succeeding without the government. They have convinced blacks that if they just depend on the government their lives will be better. Too many black babies are born out of wedlock - a result of liberal undermining of moral standards - give condoms and we all know that they are going to have sex anyway - it is the lazy way to solve a problem. Rather than teach them responsibility we give them condoms and toss them over. Pop culture tells young blacks that the route to success is to become a rapper or a sports star - these are the 0.01% people - rather than working hard in high school and college or learning a vocation. Minorities are led to believe that these are not glamorous routes to riches. Well, maybe they are not but it is rare for a carpenter or plumber or lawyer or doctor to be shot by another carpenter, plumber, lawyer or doctor. The mortality rate among young black men is through the roof and most of it is a result of other young black men. So, how do we help the plight of the minorities - stop giving them crutches to use as excuses for failing - to paraphrase George Bush, "We need to stop the soft bigotry of low expectations." We need to get drugs out of the ghettos - we need, as Bill Bennett says, "Send in the sheriffs," and clean up the drugs and get rid of those who prey on their fellow community members. Then we start teaching these children that their future is totally depended on their own initiatives and willingness to work hard and succeed. If you cannot teach them that then they will never succeed and get out of the debilitating environment of the ghettos.