May 24, 2010

The Rand Paul Brouhaha and 21st Century Reality

For the last half dozen days, the punditry have been convulsed with debating -- assuming the country got into a giant time machine and went a half century back into the past -- would Senate candidate's Rand Paul's position on laws on the public accommodations portion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act be a good thing or not.

Few seem to have noticed that we are actually living in the 21st Century, when the  issues about discrimination law don't revolve around disparate treatment but around disparate impact, a different legacy of civil rights law. Firefighter cases, as in today's Supreme Court decision regarding the Chicago Fire Department, seem to provide the most public examples of what the current law is, which isn't anything at all like what everybody has been talking about:
Supreme Court backs black applicants in firefighter discrimination suit
Chicago could be liable for as much as $100 million in damages in the case in which minority candidates passed a fire department exam but were not hired.

By David G. Savage, Tribune Washington Bureau
May 25, 2010

The Supreme Court reinstated a discrimination ruling Monday in favor of 6,000 black applicants for Chicago firefighting jobs in the 1990s, saying they had properly sued after it was clear that an entry-level test had a "disparate impact" based on race.

The ruling leaves public employers in a pickle if they are required by law to use tests for deciding who should be hired or promoted.

After two Supreme Court decisions with very different results in the last year, public employers can be sued for using tests that screen out most blacks and other minorities; they also can be sued by high-scoring white applicants if the test scores go unused.

The apparent conflict is built into the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the justices said Monday. "It is a problem for Congress, not one federal courts can fix," Justice Antonin Scalia said.

He spoke for the court in a 9-0 ruling in a case that began in 1995 when 26,000 applicants took a written test to become city firefighters. Faced with the large number applicants for only several hundred jobs, the city decided it would only consider those who scored 89 or above.
In other words, this was one of the objective, blind-graded tests that the Daley Administration spent about $5 million dollars with outside consultants to develop for the fire and police departments in the mid-1990s to come up with a non-discriminatory way to hire and promote public safety employees.  The city decided to choose randomly among the highest scorers, rather than hire in rank order, which is obviously the best way to hire. Blacks who scored below 89 sued on the theory that the city should have hired randomly from among the huge numbers who scored 65 or higher.
This cut-off score excluded a high percentage of the minority applicants. After a trial in 2005, U.S. District Judge Joan Gottschall ruled the test had an illegal disparate impact because the city had not justified the use of the cut-off score. Experts had testified that applicants who scored in the 70s or 80s were shown to be capable of succeeding as firefighters.
Why not the best? Especially because the fire department's future leaders will come from the entry level ranks.
The city did not appeal the disparate impact finding, but in Lewis vs. Chicago said the firefighters had waited too long to appeal. The high court disagreed.

Last year, however, the high court ruled that disappointed white firefighters were victims of discrimination by city officials in New Haven, Conn., which had dropped a promotion test after they learned no black candidates were among the top scorers. In a 5-4 ruling, the justices said this amounted to illegal racial bias against the white firefighters.

Nationwide, about 20 million employees work for city and state governments. And in many of these agencies, tests are used to hire and promote employees. That in turn has led to years of litigation on whether the tests are fair.

The decision dealt a potentially costly defeat to the city of Chicago. Earlier this year, a lawyer for black applicants estimated the total damages in the case could reach $100 million.

The ruling was welcomed by John Payton, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, who argued the case. "This victory goes well beyond the immediate results in Chicago. It should ensure that no other fire department or employer uses a discriminatory test," he said.

Though the recent court rulings have focused on city agencies, the civil rights provision involving disparate impact policies applies to all employers, private and public.

Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley voiced some weariness with the years of litigation. "For decades we have tried to diversify the Chicago Fire Department. But at every turn, like most cities, we have been met with legal challenges from both sides."

Since 2006, Daley said, the city has used a "pass-fail" approach so that all those who have passing scores are eligible for jobs.
In other words, to get around the EEOC's four-fifths rules, Chicago has made the test so easy in 2006 that about 96% of white applicants pass the test and about 77% of black applicants, which is four-fifths as good, and that selects fire cadets randomly from those who pass, which means that all the test does is eliminate complete idiots.

When results for minorities were disappointing, the city established a cut-off score of 89 and hired randomly from the top 1,800 “well-qualified” candidates.
In 2005, a federal judge ruled that the city’s decision had the effect of perpetuating the predominantly white status quo, since 78 percent of those “well-qualified” candidates were white.
The clock normally stops ticking on civil rights cases 300 days after the employment action is taken. The first lawsuit was filed 430 days after the test results were announced.

But, African-American firefighters maintained — and the Supreme Court agreed — that a new act of discrimination occurred every time the scores were used to hire firefighters between May, 1996 and October, 2001. That’s when the city stopped using 89 as a cut-off point because the number of candidates had run out.
Plaintiffs’ attorney Matthew Piers said the decision means Chicago must hire roughly 120 African-American firefighters and adjust their pensions as if they had been on the job since 1995. Six-thousand  others will share roughly $45 million in damages.

“They have to immediately put them on. They can’t say, ‘We don’t have the money,’ ” Piers said.

If class members are too old to perform the physically demanding job, the damages could top $100 million, Piers said.

From the Chicago Tribune:
The Chicago case began in 1995 when 26,000 applicants took a written test to become a city firefighter. Faced with the large number applicants for only several hundred jobs, the city decided it would only consider those who scored 89 or above.

This cut-off score excluded a high percentage of the minority applicants. And after a trial in 2005, U.S. District Judge Joan Gottschall ruled the test had an illegal "disparate impact" because the city had not justified the use of the cut-off score. Experts had testified that applicants who scored in the 70s or 80s were shown to be capable of succeeding as firefighters.

The city did not contest that conclusion, but it won a reversal from the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals on a procedural technicality. The appellate judges said the applicants had waited too long to sue. They had not sued during the year when the test results were released, but sued only after the scores were used to decide who would be hired.

Civil-rights lawyers appealed on behalf of Arthur Lewis and the other black applicants. They were joined by the Obama administration, which said the federal civil rights law forbids the "use" of discriminatory tests. And by that standard, the suit was filed on time.

The high court agreed Monday in Lewis v. Chicago. "Our charge is to give effect to the law Congress enacted," Scalia said. The class of black applicants had sued at the time the test was used, and it resulted in their not being hired, he concluded.

The unanimous ruling stands in sharp contrast to the deep split within the Supreme Court last year over a case involving white firefighters from New Haven, Connecticut. They sued after they were denied promotions when the city scrapped a test because its impact on black applicants. They won a 5-4 ruling from the Supreme Court saying they were victims of illegal discrimination.

Chicago
's case involved the opposite situation. Where New Haven had backed away from using its test results, Chicago pressed ahead and was later sued for using a test that had a discriminatory impact on blacks.

In Monday's opinion, Scalia acknowledged this law creates "practical problems for employers" and can "produce puzzling results." He concluded, however, "it is a problem for Congress, not one that federal courts can fix."

But 21st Century reality will get infinitely less coverage than hypotheticals about Rand Paul's views.

41 comments:

  1. Illegal immigration and 'disparate impact' are two winning issues that today's Republican Party is too stupid or cowardly to seize as their own. America was a nice country while it lasted.

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  2. For the utterly predictable file:

    The unanimous ruling stands in sharp contrast to the deep split within the Supreme Court last year over a case involving white firefighters from New Haven, Connecticut. They sued after they were denied promotions when the city scrapped a test because its impact on black applicants. They won a 5-4 ruling from the Supreme Court saying they were victims of illegal discrimination.

    Chicago's case involved the opposite situation. Where New Haven had backed away from using its test results, Chicago pressed ahead and was later sued for using a test that had a discriminatory impact on blacks.


    Or as I wrote last summer about Judge Garafis' decision in the New York firefighters' case,

    The obvious corollary of this analysis [finding the New York exams had discriminated] is that if the City of New Haven had not set aside the results of the exam and simply allowed itself to be sued, it would have lost and racial quotas would have triumphed. I don’t think other municipalities will miss this.

    Chicago certainly drives the point home.

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  3. Can white basketball players sue when they are not picked for professional basketball teams?

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  4. Can Protestant judges sue that they were not selected for the Supreme Court?

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  5. "The Chicago case began in 1995 when 26,000 applicants took a written test to become a city firefighter. Faced with the large number applicants for only several hundred jobs, the city decided it would only consider those who scored 89 or above."

    What was the city supposed to do? Hire more firemen then it needed?

    "Plaintiffs’ attorney Matthew Piers said the decision means Chicago must hire roughly 120 African-American firefighters and adjust their pensions as if they had been on the job since 1995. Six-thousand others will share roughly $45 million in damages.

    “They have to immediately put them on. They can’t say, ‘We don’t have the money,’ ” Piers said.

    If class members are too old to perform the physically demanding job, the damages could top $100 million, Piers said."

    So the city of Chicago will have to pay people for not being firemen and for not having been firemen. Reminds me of Chico Marx, as a musician, explaining why he got paid for not rehearsing: "if we don't a rehearse, so we don't play. And! if we don't a play.......that runs into money".

    This settlement is theft, pure theft - money taken out of the pockets of taxpayers and transferred into the hands of unworthy layabouts and their slimy lawyers.

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  6. The writing is on the wall.

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  7. This settlement is theft, pure theft - money taken out of the pockets of taxpayers and transferred into the hands of unworthy layabouts and their slimy lawyers.


    Well, it may be theft, but it has to be paid for by the citizens of Chicago and Illinois. If you still live there, move. Once there are few tax-paying citizens left, the judgement becomes worthless, doesn't it.

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  8. Steve -- Disparate treatment is just as strong today as it was in 1964. Just against Whites. The Gates Foundation Scholarships exclude Whites while helping people of color. So too does the United Negro College Fund, La Raza, MeCha, and dozens of other scholarships and grants.

    Let me repeat: NO White kids need apply. NONE.

    This is also true for Government in general, which the Supremes have held can discriminate against Whites in favor of Blacks. Specifically, the Gates Foundation, the United Negro College Fund, can tell White kids they can't get served at their Lunch counter. Moreover, that discrimination is backed by the US Government. Even more, the US government itself discriminates against Whites in hiring, in firing, in promotions, in raises, and so on. As well as contracting, and every other aspect.

    This again relates to White women. Why would they be "susceptible to propaganda" versus other groups? One they benefit as well from anti-White guy measures, in a spoils alliance to exclude White guys. But deeper, they loathe ordinary White guys who are supplicating betas, with a deep hatred.

    Look at Prohibition. Constitutional, the law of the land, with an Army quite literally of Prohibition agents, and yet the public disregarded the law and drank like a fish. You can't propagandize people into hating their own race. There are reasons they do. "Racism" is generally thrown around by White women who hate Beta White guys, or deeply feminized White guys seeking favor/approval, lapdog style. Unpopular laws are simply ignored and broken and not enforced. Conclusion: anti-White guy sentiment is popular among White women.

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  9. The decision dealt a potentially costly defeat to the city of Chicago. Earlier this year, a lawyer for black applicants estimated the total damages in the case could reach $100 million.

    The ruling was welcomed by John Payton, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, who argued the case.



    How will de foie gras golden geese escape? For fiscal conservatives, living in Cook County has already become untenable since Cook County's sales tax increased to 10.25% in mid-2008. In 2009, advisory elections in Barrington, Hanover and Palatine Townships passed recommending secession from Cook County to form a new county. Those productive and self sufficient New Trier Township (Home Alone) citizens nearby, who also live below their means, probably feel the same way.

    Since these thrifty are vastly outvoted by Chicago's spendthrift NAM needy, they should form their own county, or failing at that, move to Lake County. Anyway, either their leaving or secession should provide the political imbalance Chicago needs to free itself from the invisible hand of wise management and become a second Detroit.

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  10. The Court's right-wing is forcing the issue. I think it was in the Ricci decision where Scalia mentioned that Congress would have to act sooner or later...Why don't employers give exams to current/ex employees and match scores to worker effectiveness, then use those standards to hire? What are people going to do then?

    EMPLOYER: These hiring decisions are made based on how well applicants apply to the best employees.

    NAACP: That's discriminatory

    EMPLOYER: The CRA says discrimination is ok if the employer proves the selection method picks the best workers...

    NAACP:

    EMPLOYER: HUZZAH!

    Am I the only person who's had this thought?

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  11. The Rand Paul coverage perfectly illustrates your 2006 point that "For 40 years, progressives have toiled tirelessly to replace interest-group politics with identity-group politics."

    Paul's economic ideas are extreme, and unpopular when examined at all closely. But Democrats have shown no interest in pointing this out. They want to bring everything back to race.

    Democrats will get clobbered in November. With colorblind economic populism they'd be more successful politically, since Republicans don't even hide that they're in office to represent plutocrats. However, Democrats threw away their New Deal coalition with their own sneering elitism. Step 1a in going back to progressive roots would be endorsing colorblind civil service fairness.

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  12. “This victory goes well beyond the immediate results in Chicago. It should ensure that no other fire department or employer uses a discriminatory test,” [John Payton, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund] said.

    In 2005, a federal judge ruled that the city’s decision had the effect of perpetuating the predominantly white status quo...

    This cut-off score excluded a high percentage of the minority applicants.

    Civil-rights lawyers appealed... They were joined by the Obama administration, which said the federal civil rights law forbids the “use” of discriminatory tests.


    Read these excerpts again, especially "It should ensure that no other fire department or employer uses a discriminatory test", and imagine them applied to McDonald v. City of Chicago.

    Absolutely noone can argue that "disparate impact" is not present in the results of Illinois gun policy-- and almost certainly to a greater degree than in hiring firefighters. So by keeping silent about this other, greater abuse, the civil rights establishment is effectively admitting 'disparate impact' is a bunch of hooey.

    They should be reminded of this at every opportunity.

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  13. Steve:

    His statement about Civil Rights is rather mundane. I mean shouldn't private businesses decide who they serve?

    Instead, I'm curious what your thoughts are on Rand Paul's more extreme libertarian positions (i.e. getting rid of the Dept of Education).

    Are you planning on writing a post on this?

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  14. The city decided to choose randomly among the highest scorers, rather than hire in rank order, which is obviously the best way to hire.

    I don't know: I've encountered some doctors who may have done well enough in school, nonetheless I'm not sure I'd want them to treat my dog, much less me. So I'm less sure that, for a particular job, hiring in rank order from a test is always the right thing to do.

    In this case it definitely was not, as HBD ensures 'disparate impact', and thus guarantees all the follow-on legal hassles. And I'm not so sure I blame people for claiming a test should not be the only or even primary consideration for hiring firefighters. Maybe for promotions, but not for the rank and file.

    What cities should do instead is combine testing with an interview process. I don't think it should be all that difficult to keep test results confidential. Or to establish and make known a minimum required score that would guarantee a large enough pool of non-white test passers. And then it would also not be too difficult, in the end, to hire enough -- meaning proportionately -- non-whites (presumably lower scoring, on average) to keep their loudmouth advocates satisfied.

    ...Chicago has made the test so easy in 2006 that about 96% of white applicants pass the test and about 77% of black applicants,...

    This is just ridiculous, and not necessary at all.

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  15. I'm guessing the geniuses who came up with 'disparate impact' didn't realise just how different on average US blacks and whites are in ability. Was the 1 standard deviation IQ gap unknown at the time, or believed to be purely the legacy of past discrimination?

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  16. It's a good thing Chicago doesn't have budget problems.

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  17. "But deeper, they loathe ordinary White guys who are supplicating betas, with a deep hatred."

    Usually I just ignore this person's posts or if I am unlucky enough, or bored enough, to actually read them, consider them not worth consideration. People who view the world so simply always end up sounding more insane than those who accept the reality of baroque conspiracies. It isn't that there isn't an element of truth (or something aspiring in that direction); it's just that the premise is so little in its scope. So absurdly minimalist.
    "Women hate "betas" " Define please, because I don't know wtf you are talking about. Jocks? Those in a 90% tax bracket? Rapists?Murderers? Men who heroically shoulder the responsibility of a family and keep their lower tendencies (now referred to as "alpha" under check?
    I'm probably slightly more discerning than most, but not that much more. Most women would call bs, but there don't seem to be too many around here.
    This is a bizarro world. Religions promote sinners, governments conspire against their own people, schools try not to teach the truth (HBD being only one example), sexual inclinations that used to be shameful are now a badge of honor (not that there's anything wrong with that--just don't shove it down my throat at every turn); the "respectable" mainstream media disinforms us.
    Humans as alphas and betas? I learned the alphabet in kindergarten. I'm a little beyond that now. There are 26 letters in the English alphabet last time I checked.

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  18. OneSTDV

    Rand Paul's more extreme libertarian positions (i.e. getting rid of the Dept of Education).


    I'm not up on Rand Paul, but eliminating the Dept of Ed doesn't seem all that radical.

    The Dept of Ed is relatively recent creation of Jimmy Carter playing a role only in the rapid decline of public education, not it's prior historical acendency. It's main achievements seems to have been to create a large bueracracy far removed from the concerns of parents. It seems fueled by callous status-seeking and quantitatively destructive elite/leftist ideology that denys and suppresses the reality required for any true improvement.

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  19. I disagree with this nonsense known as: disparate impact.

    BUT.

    Let's consider how proponent might see this:

    They want the burden of proof of the necessity of an intelligence test for firefighting on the employer.

    So far, Steve Sailer has not proven or even made a very convincing case that quasi-iQ exams are particularly relevant to fire-fighting.

    Maybe Sailer is 100% right. I'm betting he is.

    BUT. Sailer has not made the case.

    Not yet.

    Given the history of discrimination, this standard, this burden of proof on the employer, is understandable. Even if I disagree with it.

    I am simply stating that there is a logic to it.

    That's it.

    It's not as outrageous as it would first appear.

    My heart is with White people and I don't want them kept down with this nonsense but the other side has an argument too.

    Let me reiterate, you have simply asserted axiomatically that IQ exams are necessary to firefighting but you have not proven it.

    The court demands that you do.

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  20. Blogger Whiskey said...
    Steve -- Disparate treatment is just as strong today as it was in 1964. Just against Whites. The Gates Foundation Scholarships exclude Whites while helping people of color.

    The foundation supports eight different scholarship programs for both low income and minority deserving students, in fact, on the website you linked to, profiles of whites who have received their scholarships are prominently displayed.

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  21. It's clear who wins here: lawyers.

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  22. Mr. Anonymous said..."This settlement is theft, pure theft - money taken out of the pockets of taxpayers and transferred into the hands of unworthy layabouts and their slimy lawyers."

    Think of it as just another form of welfare. At least these guys were willing to show up and take a test.

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  23. Clearly the goal is to get rid of testing altogether. What's the point of testing if not to "discriminate"?

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  24. Anonymous said...
    My heart is with White people and I don't want them kept down with this nonsense but the other side has an argument too.

    Let me reiterate, you have simply asserted axiomatically that IQ exams are necessary to firefighting but you have not proven it.

    The court demands that you do.


    Amtrak passenger train collides with Detroit fire truck stopped on tracks
    By The Associated Press
    March 01, 2010, 4:34PM


    A Chicago-bound Amtrak train with at least 76 people aboard struck a fire truck Monday that was stopped on the tracks in southwest Detroit, causing minor injuries to several people and likely totaling the $600,000 rig.

    The late morning accident resulted in a long delay for train passengers and left the partly crumpled and heavily dented ladder truck sitting at an awkward angle alongside the tracks.

    Parking a fire truck on railroad tracks is "not recommended. Not at all," said Executive Fire Commissioner James Mack , obviously displeased by the driver's actions. "We're trained professionals. I don't think the citizens of Detroit are pleased he parked on the tracks."

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  25. So far, Steve Sailer has not proven or even made a very convincing case that quasi-iQ exams are particularly relevant to fire-fighting




    I have not seen anyone make the case that quasi-IQ exams are particularly relevant to lawyering or judging either. Shall we hand out permission to practice law on the basis of quotas then? Shall the judges order that Americas judgeships represent Americas population more accurately?

    This is just one more example of the elites shafting working class whites while retaining different standards for themselves.

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  26. Let me reiterate, you have simply asserted axiomatically that IQ exams are necessary to firefighting but you have not proven it.

    So how do you run the double-blind experiment?

    [Or even just single-blind?]

    Purposely hire a bunch of average IQ [i.e. circa IQ-80] illiterate blacks, let them man their own fire department substation for a year or two, and then watch as all the structures in that neighborhood promptly burned to the ground?

    Seriously - in medical double-blind experiments, this would be the equivalent of injecting unwitting patients with Chlorox or Easy-Off Oven Cleaner or [liquid] moth balls.

    PS: And why would you choose to discriminate against all the folks in the left side of the black IQ bell curve - the folks with IQs in the 70s and 60s and 50s - who experience a fair degree of difficulty in simply dressing themselves in the morning [if they even bother to get dressed at all]?

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  27. The problem with the libertarians lie Paul, IMO, is that they are not sufficiently empirical. They have principled positions but they don't always know how to summon what facts apply to their positions. If Paul had been smart, he would have used the New Haven case in his response rather than engage in a discussion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

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  28. So far, Steve Sailer has not proven or even made a very convincing case that quasi-iQ exams are particularly relevant to fire-fighting.

    Maybe Sailer is 100% right. I'm betting he is.

    BUT. Sailer has not made the case.


    This is ridiculous. In fact, Steve has made the case.

    http://www.vdare.com/Sailer/090419_ricci.htm

    You might not agree with it, but on the other hand, if you are not familiar with his writings, why not say so, rather than make claims that are untrue?

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  29. Anonymous asserts:

    "Let me reiterate, you have simply asserted axiomatically that IQ exams are necessary to firefighting but you have not proven it."

    I've published maybe 25,000 words on fire department testing since April 2009. Go look it up.

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  30. Enoch Was Right5/25/10, 7:19 PM

    Hey Steve, I'm a grad student. Last year we had to write a paper about the disparate impact interpretation of Title VII of the '64 Civil Rights Act. We were instructed to reference the "gender discrimination" case against Home Depot.
    In the mid 90’s, it was determined that approximately 70 percent of employees selling merchandise (such as lumber, hardware, carpet, etc.) were men. At the same time, about 70 percent of "operations" employees (such as cashiers) were women. Because of this disparity, the EEOC filed a class action gender discrimination lawsuit on behalf of over 17,000 women who were either currently or formerly employed at Home Depot, as well as those who had applied for jobs.
    Home Depot eventually paid a settlement of $87.5 million to the women in 1997.
    They have also been targeted by the EEOC for race discrimation lawsuits based on nothing more than under representation of minorities. Home Depot has never been accused of disparate treatment in the hiring of any racial group.
    Since 1997, Home Depot has paid out over $100 million in "discrimination" settlements.
    This disparate impact insanity does not just affect the public sector, folks. The race hustlers at the EEOC love to shake down the private sector too.
    If Rand Paul talked about that aspect of the '64 act, he could have made an extremely powerful case that would have resonated with the American people, instead of being piously denounced by every moronic pundit and politician in the country.

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  31. "OneSTDV said...

    Instead, I'm curious what your thoughts are on Rand Paul's more extreme libertarian positions (i.e. getting rid of the Dept of Education)."

    Getting rid of the Dept. of Education is not an extreme libertarian position. It's not even solely a libertarian position. Ronald Reagan ran on it in 1980 (of course he failed to deliver on it). Just about everyone to the right of John McCain would be willing to scrap it, if it could be done. A more worthless government bureaucracy can scarcely be imagined.

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  32. Toadal, that was awesome.

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  33. couchscientist5/25/10, 10:23 PM

    What will it take to get the American people upset? Paying out hundreds of millions because a city wants to hire people who can identify which side of the hose sprays, how many feet of hose are needed to go from the curb to the window, etc. Do people really not mind burning? Do people really not mind that tax dollars are going to be paid for this crap? How can they stand for this system? And guess what, the city will be paying out more in judgments when its newly hired idiots begin to bring upon it more law suits for things like letting people burn. People are so scared of being "racist," which is the ultimate worst thing that a person could be, that they don't even question this trash. Where is the mass anger at a system that allows this?

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  34. Let me reiterate, you have simply asserted axiomatically that IQ exams are necessary to firefighting but you have not proven it.

    You've highlighted a false dichotomy. The just policy (if you want to hire on merit) is to come up with criteria that exclude circumstances of birth.

    The problem is that there are no such criteria that select for good firefighters (or whatever) AND come up with numbers acceptable to NAMs. It's pretty much an either-or situation.

    Call it whatever you want, but whatever mental test you come up with will be a test of IQ by proxy.

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  35. The same thing is being done to Paul that was done to Dean in 2000: he's been labeled as Unserious. That means he expresses opinions that contradict those of the power elite in the US. This puts him in the same category with all the pundits who didn't cheerlead for our invade/invite/in hock strategy during the Bush years.

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  36. eh:

    What cities should do instead is combine testing with an interview process. I don't think it should be all that difficult to keep test results confidential. Or to establish and make known a minimum required score that would guarantee a large enough pool of non-white test passers. And then it would also not be too difficult, in the end, to hire enough -- meaning proportionately -- non-whites (presumably lower scoring, on average) to keep their loudmouth advocates satisfied.

    ...Chicago has made the test so easy in 2006 that about 96% of white applicants pass the test and about 77% of black applicants,...

    This is just ridiculous, and not necessary at all.


    You see, don't you, that Chicago did exactly what you suggested? They made the test easy that they could get a huge pool of passers.

    Essentially, what the courts are pushing the cities toward is a gamed entry process that results in racially proportionate hiring. One way to do that is to (as the district court in the Chicago case suggested) was hire people from the pool scoring in the 70s and 80s in lieu of the 89 cutoff. Strict cutoffs are squarely in the Justice Departments sights (and were in the Bush administration -- you can't blame Obama for this).

    Unions, cities, "public interest" lawyers and the Justice Department have been fighting over interviews for some time now -- even the racial composition of the interviewing panel gets negotiated.

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  37. Unions, cities, "public interest" lawyers and the Justice Department have been fighting over interviews for some time now -- even the racial composition of the interviewing panel gets negotiated.

    So if you can't give written tests, and if you can't give verbal interviews, then what are you supposed to do - flip a coin?

    Here's an idea: Propose "chat room" interviews, where the interviewer and the interviewee "talk" to one another by typing ASCII text at a computer.

    It would allow the interviewee to be confident that the interviewer wouldn't know his race [or her sex or anything else], and it would allow the interviewer to judge the quality of the interviewee's spelling and punctuation and grammar [not to mention the ability to commmunicate thoughts about firefighting].

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  38. it would allow the interviewer to judge the quality of the interviewee's spelling and punctuation and grammar [not to mention the ability to commmunicate thoughts about firefighting].

    I assume this is a joke. In the New York litigation, the city's firefighter exams were condemned specifically because they required applicants to read at a discriminatorally high level.

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  39. I assume this is a joke.

    Yeah, I seem to be striking out lately with the jokes.

    But you have to admit - ASCII text "chat session" interviews would solve all the problems - no one could possibly complain about them [at least in theory]...

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  40. Whiskey,
    this was one of your worst pieces. After some convoluted ring-argumentation you wind up with the usual complaint that leggy blondes don't like you. But you let the obvious culprit in the gang, Gates, drive through the church in a 20ton truck.
    Gates made his fortune off white betas, and him and his co-ethnics were forever harping on non-racialism as a way of harnessing talent. So how come they are now ganging up on whitey?? Big question mark.

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  41. Your points are accurate but this is a classic straw man.
    I am a self identified libertarian and I have given a bunch of money to Rand's dad.
    His comments that businesses are private property and should be able to exclude specific races is batshit crazy. I run a business in LA (the most diverse ethnic area on earth) and I well and truly notice an ethnic link to the willingness of people to pay their bill. There are two ethnic groups that will try everything not to pay - Blacks and Persians.
    What I have done is to institute payment procedures that virtually guarantee payment from everyone - regardless of whether we are working for a black family in Crenshaw or a Persian family in Beverly Hills.
    What I haven't done is to take the emotional way out and exclude blacks or Persians from service. Yes they suck as customers - but they are also 20% of our profit.
    Do I wish they would grow up and join the rest of us who view a contract as something to be honored, not something to be wriggled out of at any cost? You bet. Do I laugh myself to tears when they call the cops because they don't want to pay and we are enforcing it? Hell yeah.
    Libertarianism to me is everyone having a fair shake at doing well. Losers and loser races will exclude themselves from success. The last thing we need is to go back to "No N...ers" signs. And yes, it is very clear that was what Paul was advocating.

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