 |
| The Official "Girls" Fan Club celebrates another great episode! Oh, wait ... |
Via Untethered, here's a picture of Obama Campaign Headquarters in Chicago from the Obama 2012 Tumblr account. There's definitely one African-American in the back row-center (a large man in a black shirt). There might be another black or two in the back row, but that appears to be about it. Please do click on the picture to see it full size.
In 2011, I blogged:
Will the EEOC apply the Four-Fifths rule to this organization?
From a help wanted ad:
Company: Obama 2012 Presidential Campaign
Location: Chicago, IL
Web: www.barackobama.com
The Obama for America Analytics Department analyzes the campaign's data to guide election strategy and develop quantitative, actionable insights that drive our decision-making. Our team's products help direct work on the ground, online and on the air.
We are looking for Predictive Modeling/Data Mining Scientists and Analysts, at both the senior and junior level, to join our department through November 2012 at our Chicago Headquarters. We are a multi-disciplinary team of statisticians, predictive modelers, data mining experts, mathematicians, software developers, general analysts and organizers - all striving for a single goal: re-electing President Obama.
Using statistical predictive modeling, the Democratic Party's comprehensive political database, and publicly available data, modeling analysts are charged with predicting the behavior of the American electorate. These models will be instrumental in helping the campaign determine which voters to target for turnout and persuasion efforts, where to buy advertising and how to best approach digital media.
Our Modeling Analysts will dive head-first into our massive data to solve some of our most critical online and offline challenges. We will analyze millions of interactions a day, learning from terabytes of historical data, running thousands of experiments, to inform campaign strategy and critical decisions.
If the Obama for America Analytics Department doesn't hire at least four-fifths as many Hispanic females as Asian males, then Eric Holder is going to want to know why!
Or, I guess not.
Here's the disclaimer at the end of last year's Obama quant ad:
Obama for America is committed to diversity among its staff, and recognizes that its continued success requires the highest commitment to obtaining and retaining a diverse staff that provides the best quality services to supporters and constituents. Obama for America is an equal opportunity employer and it is our policy to recruit, hire, train, promote and administer any and all personnel actions without regard to sex, race, age, color, creed, national origin, religion, economic status, sexual orientation, veteran status, gender identity or expression, ethnic identity or physical disability, or any other legally protected basis. Obama for America will not tolerate any unlawful discrimination and any such conduct is strictly prohibited.
Just kidding!
I started working at a Chicago marketing research firm thirty years ago, doing similar work, and we always had a higher percentage of black employees than you see in this Obama Chicago HQ picture. My boss was black in 1986-1988.
People always say, "Who ever imagined a black man would be President?" Well, I always assumed it would happen. I was kind of surprised it wasn't Colin Powell in 1996. But I am surprised by this photo of the black President's campaign staffers. That's not something I would have forecasted a generation ago.
Mark Steyn talks about how 21st Century British pop stars, such as James Blunt, are much posher in upbringing than pop stars were in the Rod Stewart days. Blunt (officially, Blount; "Blunt" is just easier for the proles to pronounce) is an Old Harrovian and graduate of Sandhurst, who spent six years as an officer in the Life Guards, the senior regiment in the British Army. Wikipedia's bio of him features the greatest sentence of all time: "The Blount family has a long history of military service, dating from the 10th century." So, the Blounts are in their third millenium in the officer class.
Anyway, it appears that a lot of the key careers in culture and politics are getting more upscale.
Flaunting the "rainbow requirements" is one way to demonstrate your power.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/LWN3clhvSik
ReplyDeleteThere's definitely one African-American in the back row...
ReplyDeleteDat rayciss!!!
.
My boss was black in 1986-1988... But I am surprised by this photo of the black President's campaign staffers.
ReplyDeleteIn all honesty, I'm more surprised that you had a black boss at an analytics firm.
If he's still alive [a guy who was 50 in 1986 would be 76 in 2012], I wonder whether he follows your career?
For that matter, have you followed his career?
My old boss died of cancer a few years ago, at a around 50. This was not long after the young man who had worked for me under him had died of lymphatic cancer in his late 30s.
ReplyDeleteIt was kind of like the Dodgers outfield of the early 1990s where all three starters, Brett Butler, Eric Davis, and Darryl Strawberry, got cancer.
I had a black junior lecturer in Philosophy in first year. I remember being suitably impressed. He is now chairman of the biggest mining company in Africa. Talented n'th with a dab of charisma.
ReplyDeleteGood for the Blount legacy...while everyone else's careers are getting harder and harder to maintain. Oh well, I guess there's always artisanal chocolate.
ReplyDeleteDon't forget this picture, about which Obama will be talking increasingly the closer we get to November.
ReplyDelete15 people of identifiable gender: 13 men, 2 women (with one of the women way in the back, trying to catch a glimpse over several much taller men).
13 people of identifiable race: 12 whites, 1 half-white/half-black.
That picture of the Obama campaign staff is also remarkably male. Wonder what the gay/straight ratio is among the men.
Blacks with talent don't generally go in for below-the-fold work. Combine their talent with corporate AA policies, and they can make bucks in the private sector. If they go into politics, they wanna be the big man, not placing calls to Aunt Millie in Duluth to make sure she votes in the state primary next Tuesday.
I had two different black bosses at my prior employer, a Fortune 100 company: both veeps, both egotistical asshats who insisted on limos when they took business trips. One wouldn't even allow you to drop by his office to discuss work. You had to go through his secretary. If you tried talking to him at his door he would ignore you.
My mother used to work for another Fortune 100 company and I met several of the (white) veeps for whom she worked, including one who was on the board of directors. Every single one of them down-to-earth. Not one with a God complex.
How long, o lord, how long will the children of white male privilege perpetuate the illusion that denies their own origin?
ReplyDelete"I'm not sure what a technocrat is," Randy said. "Am I a technocrat? I'm just a guy who went down to the bookstore and bought a couple of textbooks on TCP/IP, which is the underlying protocol of the Internet, and read them. And then I signed on to a computer, which anyone can do nowadays, and I messed around with it for a few years, and now I know all about it. does that make me a technocrat?"
"You belonged to the technocratic elite even before you picked up that book," Kivistik said. "The ability to wade through a technical text and to understand it, is a privilege. It is a privilege conferred by an education that is available only to members of an elite class. That's what I mean by technocrat."
"I went to a public school," Randy said. "And then I went to a state university. From that point on, I was self-educated."
Charlene broke in. She had been giving Randy dirty looks ever since this started and he had been ignoring her. Now he was going to pay.
"And your family?" Charlene asked frostily.
Randy took a deep breath, stifled the urge to sigh.
"My father's an engineer. He teaches at a state college."
"And his father?"
"A mathematician."
Charlene raised her eyebrows. So did nearly everyone else at the table. Case closed.
"I strenuously object to being labelled and pigeonholed and stereotyped as a technocrat," Randy said, deliberately using oppressed-person's language, maybe in an attempt to turn their weapons against them, but most likely (he thinks, lying in bed at three A.M. in the Manila Hotel) out of an uncontrollable urge to be a prick. Some of them, out of habit, looked at him soberly; etiquette dictated that you give all sympathy to the oppressed. Others gasped in outrage to hear these words coming from the lips of a known and convicted white male technocrat. "No one in my family has ever had much money or power," he said.
"I think that the point that Charlene's making is like this," said Tomas, one of their house guests who had flown in from Prague with his wife Nina. He had now appointed himself conciliator. He paused long enough to exchange a warm look with Charlene. "Just by virtue of coming from a scientific family, you are a member of a privileged elite. You're not aware of it--but members of privileged elites are rarely aware of those privileges."
Randy finished the thought.
"Until people like you come along to explain to us how stupid, to say nothing of morally bankrupt, we are."
"The false consciousness Tomas is speaking of is exactly what makes entrenched power elites so entrenched," Charlene said.
--Cryptonomicon
Kumbaya...
ReplyDeleteThere's obviously an endless supply of chumpy whites out there. Appears to be a young and therefore naive crowd.
ReplyDeleteHow people can be very smart and very stupid at the same time is just one of the complexities of life.
Whiskey,
ReplyDeleteYou of the its-all-the-White-women's-fault theory,
explain all those White guys in Obama's campaign headquarters pix.
I am not seeing that "definitely black" figure on the picture. I don't think it exists.
ReplyDeleteWow... Since the 10th century? So it predates the Norman conquest?
ReplyDeleteI worked with, and for, a fair number of smart blacks. And by smart I mean good with math. However, all of them were immigrants -- from Caribbean, from Africa, and from Britain.
ReplyDeleteThere's definitely one African-American in the back row
ReplyDeleteSure that isn't a security guard?
Obama is not running on racial platform. His politics is not racial one. Other black politicians are actually similar to David duke in black .
ReplyDeleteThat must be a Clinton rally. You can seen a young Richard Lewis in the foreground.
ReplyDeletegetting more upscale
ReplyDeleteI saw an episode of Starsky & Hutch last night, and all the backdrops looked like 1930's bowery.
Steve, since I was never a marketing guy, I'd be more interested in your take on what all these 'analytics' could possibly do for the campaign. Would Obama spots in October really be any different if they just relied on political intelligence from a crop of 1992 dem operatives?
ReplyDeleteI saw this remark by Glenn Reynolds on Instapundit today.
ReplyDeleteThe thing to remember about race-talk in contemporary America is that it’s mostly a status/power thing among various groups of white people.
Ideas keep slowly percolating from the HBD-sphere into the mainstream. Without attribution, of course, but I suspect that you can have power, or fame, but not both at once.
I had a black junior lecturer in Philosophy in first year. I remember being suitably impressed. He is now chairman of the biggest mining company in Africa.
ReplyDeleteIf you're a smart black guy - and some such do exist - you've got a ticket to the top in any profession.
"explain all those White guys in Obama's campaign headquarters pix."
ReplyDeleteCold hard Cash. I'd have taken the job(though I'm fairly apathetic to the republican nominee).
"Whiskey,
ReplyDeleteYou of the its-all-the-White-women's-fault theory,
explain all those White guys in Obama's campaign headquarters pix."
That's easy, allow me. Those are the same sandal-wearing guys pushing the stroller and coping with the diaper bag that you see out and about with the kind of white women Whiskey refers to.
IOW, they're just following the lead of their women, partly out of principle and partly because that's where the p**** is. They're white women's useful idiots. (Only their usefulness is pretty much confined to doing tofu stir-fry and changing diapers. Don't expect them to know how to unstop a toilet or change a tire.)
They look effeminate, weak, and empty minded. My first thought was: Look at all these losers. My God! The doom of the nation
ReplyDeleteWell these kids are doing basically unpaid work serving Obama. They're sort of like slaves. So I don't think they care or are really worried that there isn't much "diversity" among the slaves.
ReplyDeleteIf you're a smart black guy - and some such do exist - you've got a ticket to the top in any profession.
ReplyDelete"Smart" is relative though. A black with a 100 IQ will probably come off as a genius relative to other blacks but a 100 IQ is completely middling among whites.
It's not so much about being genuinely "smart" as being able to spell, write complete sentences, not use ebonics, and dress appropriately and shower.
>explain all those White guys in Obama's campaign headquarters pix<
ReplyDeleteImagine saying to one of Whiskey's dreamboats: "I work with Barack Obama. I analyze metrics and measure analyses with one goal - to put Barack back in office. See my shiny badge?"
>There's definitely one African-American in the back row<
ReplyDeleteNo, looks like a silhouetted white guy. Almost anyone who isn't an albino would be that dark against that window. Or, he may be hispanic.
enforcing diveristy would be a sure way to take down the obama campaign, it would be funny to see all the work-arounds they came up with
ReplyDeleteKylie:
ReplyDelete"Those are the same sandal-wearing guys pushing the stroller and coping with the diaper bag that you see out and about with the kind of white women Whiskey refers to."
The kind of white women Whiskey refers to are the hot and leggy blondes, almost none of whom would be caught dead with 95% of the unattractive dorklings in that photo, unless nerdboy pulled down $150k+ a year more than she does. For the most part, men who look like the "men" in that photo date and marry unspectular looking frumpy girls who look like the geeky women in that photo.
David:
"I work with Barack Obama. I analyze metrics and measure analyses with one goal - to put Barack back in office. See my shiny badge"
Even on the 50-50 chance that the gorgeous blonde shiksa did support Obama, she still wouldn't even consider sleeping with with those dorks. Attractive girls don't screw nerds just because they vote similarly. Contra you and Kylie up there politics, like any collective rivalry such as religion, team sports, nationalism, race, etc. is mostly a competition between groups of men. 90% of women don't really care deeply about politics at all, particularly young and attractive ones.
"No, looks like a silhouetted white guy. Almost anyone who isn't an albino would be that dark against that window. Or, he may be hispanic."
ReplyDeleteNo, it's a black dude; none of the white guys in close proximity to him are significantly darkened.
There aren't any NAMs in the photo because Obama intends to win the coming election.
ReplyDeleteHis team isn't stupid. They understand the same statistical truths about people that we do. But since they know that they won't be audited for diversity, they hire based on effectiveness. Hence all the white fellows.
You guys are missing my point.
ReplyDeleteWhiskey *SAYS* White guys vote AGAINST Obama / leftism. He says the only reason leftists get elected is all those votes from leftard women who do so to stick it to the beta men they work with that they HATE HATE HATE.
Whiskey says Jews, being only 2% of the population, couldn't *possibly* be the problem. So it MUST be the fault of the White women.
====
My point is, with that many men in BO's election campaign and so few women, I'm now seriously questioning how many self-proclaimed leftist women actually even voted for him.
And don't cite exit polls, since the exit polling data in 2004 being so grossly wrong about the actual votes cast, proves that how people TELL a pollster they voted and how they ACTUALLY voted are not necessarily the same thing.
(That is, of course, unless you're one of those crazy conspiracy theorists who claim Bush stole the election. Which if Whiskey tries THAT tack, that would just undermine his whole assertion that beta White men vote Republican.)
By the looks of that pic, the cause of our problems is leftard men.
Now, you may be right that these men working for the election of, and voting for, Obama do so in hopes that supplication to leftardettes will garner them nookie, but that doesn't change the fact that they ARE voting and working to elect BO.
So now the onus on Whiskey is to PROVE that leftist women actually bother to vote for Obama and that beta males are ACTUALLY voting rightist. This pic casts doubt on his thesis.
JSM:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2012-04-01/swing-states-poll/53930684/1
What a crowd! Very trendy!
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing rate of gun ownership in this group cohort is 0%. This is a low income high status 911 caller demographic.
Notice the office beard style is classic 20th c. Marxist here, instead of classic 19th c. Marxist as sported by Million Edit Wiki Man. Like I said - trendy!
VD:
ReplyDeleteYour link is supposed to refute me how? It's to a *poll.* It's useless. That's my point.
Because, if the exit polling inaccuracies of 2004 are any indicator, (and they are, unless you are a crazy conspiracy theorist) polls are worthless: We can conclude from the screaming "miss" of the exit polling data of 2004 calling for a win for Kerry, that the candidate people TELL pollsters they'd vote for, is not a reflection of which candidate they, in the privacy of the voting both, *actually* vote for.
Exit polling is heralded as an exacting science. But that process HUGELY missed in 2004. So unless you are a conspiracy theorist proposing that Bush stole the election, polling is NOT a science. It's pseudoscience.
But a *PIC*, now, of the people so committed to Obama that they will WORK to get him elected, an indicator of favor far surpasssing a mere reply to a pollster, shows mainly beta White guys.
A picture being worth a thousand words, I'm thinking now we should blame the betas for our current mess.
(Ok, I'm being sarcastic. I, in truth, favor the theory that it's the billionaire Jews' outsized influence through PAC donations and media control.)
I predict these 50 or so SWPLs will go on to have a total of about 10 kids. Five of them will belong to the black guy in back.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I count 2-3 black guys in the picture, all in the very back. #1: in the middle, standing, tall, with a black shirt and hat and an ID dangling. #2: Second from right, sitting, with a light blue long sleeve shirt. #3 (possible): exactly between the two, just to the left of the window,.
ReplyDeleteThere's about 50 people in the picture, total, so that makes an office 4-6% black, which would be impressive if this were a Google or Goldman Sachs office. Not very impressive considering it's Chicago and it's a Democratic campaign and it's a black Democrat. Blacks comprise ~30% of the Democratic Party, easily. There should be 15 blacks in this picture, or 12 if you go by the 4/5ths rule.
One of the problems Obama and other African Americans who rise to the top of an organization must endure is the pressure from other blacks and liberal whites to hire more blacks in positions of power. A white CEO (within limits) can hire the best person for the job, regardless of color, but powerful blacks are under enormous pressure to employ a lot of blacks. The problem is all the smartest blacks are already hired to fill affirmative action slots, and there are just not enough bright blacks left to hire, so black owned companies are forced to hire unqualified blacks or risk being called Uncle Toms by other blacks who don't understand why a black executive is only hiring white people since everyone "knows" all the races are equally intelligent.
ReplyDeleteSo not only are black businessmen disadvantaged by their own genetically insufficient IQ, but the black community pressures them into hiring other lower IQ blacks in top positions, thus guaranteeing black owned businesses can't succeed.
Blacks will often say "Jews hire other Jews, why can't black owned businesses hire more blacks?" What these blacks don't understand is that Jews have a much bigger pool of talent to choose from and thus have the luxury of ethnocentric hiring without jeopardizing the level of competence. This is an example of how HBD denial hurts blacks themselves, particularly black owned businesses.
I'd say there are considerably more than 50 people in the room, although the race of the people toward the back is hard to distinguish. Clearly, the people who work up front in the room are white or Asian, while some number of blacks were likely invited in from outside the room (e.g., from their security guard stations?)
ReplyDeleteHold on there, Mr.& Ms. White Privilege! Don't be so quick to change your long sleeve / tank top hair shirt just yet!
ReplyDeleteNotice these sons & daughters of Mr. Charlie & Miss Ann working indoors in air-conditioned comfort while Mr. Holders' people are doing the dirty, sweaty & potentially dangerous field labor of street beat-downs! How long, Lawd? How long?
"I'd say there are considerably more than 50 people in the room..."
ReplyDelete50 is about the number whose race can be reliably ascertained. 6% is an upper bound estimate for the share of blacks. The more important point is that it's not the 13% black share of the US population Obama's campaign is to be compared against, but the 25-30% of the Democratic Party that is black, plus Chicago's large minority population.
There's maybe 3 Asians (all women, closer to the front), ZERO Hispanics, and it skews male (though maybe only 60/40). Fewer women, Asians, Hispanics, and blacks than you'd expect compared to Democratic voters. The population of this office skews against every single Democratic demo it can be compared against, especially when you consider that it's Chicago.
In theory the Obama Campaign recruits nationally. In reality a job for young, temporary workers will draw locally, from people who won't have to move or pay rent.
"but powerful blacks are under enormous pressure to employ a lot of blacks."
ReplyDeleteTo the contrary: being black, or a minority of any sort, frees them from the charges of rcaism, and they're free to hire whomever. They may face personal pressure to hire blacks, but legal or corporate pressure is probably substantially less. The bigger problem is that, having reached well beyond the level of their incomptence, they'll eff things up themselves.
Thanks, Marlow!
ReplyDeleteI just bought a used copy of Cryptonomicon at used amazon for $0.01!
I see two Asian broads and a lot of wikipedia editors in flannel shirts.
ReplyDeleteYou can read Cryptonomicon here.
ReplyDeleteAh, the stupidity of youth.
ReplyDeleteThey are so young and the irony of his not doing anything to keep their futures from looking frightningly is just so damn, sadly delicious.
OT, but speaking of the EEOC, have you been following the EEOC discovery battle with Kaplan? EEOC sues Kaplan for credit history use having a disp impact...Kaplan asks for EEOC's internal policies on credit checks...EEOC says it will, then refuses, then judge orders EEOC to turn over...interesting
ReplyDeletehttp://www.jdsupra.com/post/documentViewer.aspx?fid=f898d136-155b-4531-a5f4-0e23f5c9b181
In other OT EEOC news, did you see that retiring EEOC commissioner Ishimaru has landed a job with the newly founded Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, in its Office of Minority and Women Inclusion? A couple of points here: 1. Why does this remind of the "more cow bell" snl sketch? 2. Did Ishimaru leadership dent racism in employment or what exactly did he do there tangibly that he should be put in charge of anything else? 3. In case you were wondering, "inclusion" is in and "diversity" is out. I hope to see a forthcoming iSteve post on what the hell inclusion is.
So not only are black businessmen disadvantaged by their own genetically insufficient IQ, but the black community pressures them into hiring other lower IQ blacks in top positions, thus guaranteeing black owned businesses can't succeed.
ReplyDeleteLemme get this straight. You're suggesting that black bosses are more vulnerable to the charge of "RACISM!!!" than White bosses? In the arena that matters (the press and PR), I mean?
To the contrary: being black, or a minority of any sort, frees them from the charges of rcaism, and they're free to hire whomever.
Catperson has a remarkable facility for abstruse BS.
I'd say there are considerably more than 50 people in the room, although the race of the people toward the back is hard to distinguish. Clearly, the people who work up front in the room are white or Asian, while some number of blacks were likely invited in from outside the room (e.g., from their security guard stations?)
ReplyDeleteJess rayciss, rayciss, rayciss, rayciss.
Bob Arctor, thanks, I believe you're right.
ReplyDeleteLemme get this straight. You're suggesting that black bosses are more vulnerable to the charge of "RACISM!!!" than White bosses? In the arena that matters (the press and PR), I mean?
ReplyDeleteWhite bosses just need a token black or two on their staff to prove they aren't racist, but black bosses are expected to have a conspicuous overrepresentation of black employees to prove they're not an uncle Tom or a self-hating Oreo. It's expected because as a black who finally achieved power, they have a responsibility to hire lots of blacks, and since they are black themselves, it's only natural that they should be surrounded by blacks. For example cornel west condemned Obama for surrounding himself with white and jewish men, but bill Clinton never endured such criticism even though his inner circle was equally non-black. Michael Jackson's black publicist Bob Jones said Jacko was a racist for not employing more blacks, but no one expected Madonna to have blacks running her complex business empire.
They look effeminate, weak, and empty minded
ReplyDeleteBut also very self satisfied.