Affirmative Action

Affirmative action kind of hits right to the heart of how conservatives and liberals are different. Let me tell you right off the start that I definitely believe that many minorities are at a major disadvantage when it comes to their opportunity to get their piece of the American Dream. I also firmly believe that we need to do everything we reasonably can to create a level playing field for every American citizen. Having said that let me also firmly declare that I've never owned a slave, none of my ancestors ever owned a slave and being a Canadian we were actually on the side of those trying to free the slaves. Slavery was definitely a tragedy and it should never have happened. No human being has the right to own another human being. Not in America, not in Africa (where it still goes on), not in the middle east, not in ancient times, not in any time or any place. This is what I've always believed and no one can tell me that I need to pay restitution to anyone else for slavery.

I must admit that most Liberals I know have very sincere emotions and they really want everything to be fair. That is how "affirmative action" was born. These poor minorities didn't get a good education so we should just let them into college anyway, just to be fair. The problem with this is that they still don't have a good education because they weren't prepared for college so now when they go to get a job they're often not qualified so it is hard for them to get a job so we need to force companies to hire them anyway, even if they're not qualified. Now you have an under qualified employ working a job that may jeopardize other peoples lives.

The conservative looks at the kid who wants to graduate from High School and says, "you just failed the exit exam. You need some extra work". They then go way back to the elementary schools and improve the kids education. If they need extra resources to learn to speak proper English they give it to them. If they need tutoring they make it possible. If the only schools available to them are inferior they give them school vouchers so they can go to better schools. For the kid trying to pass high school they do the same thing. Give them the extra resources so they can pass the exam. This way they will actually be prepared for college when they get there.

If a minority graduates and can't get a job then you need to find out why. There are many cases where a minority is not hired because of their race. If this is the case then you need to enforce the laws already on the books that prevent that. Those employers need to be thrown in jail. Unfortunately what often happens is that employers are given a requirement that forces the ratio of minorities among their employees to match the ratio of minorities in the local population. What happens if they can't find enough qualified applicants? The employer is then forced to relax their qualifications. This means that they have unqualified people in jobs where they could endanger others or cause serious financial harm.

To keep this short, the conservative philosophy is to raise the quality of the person, don't lower the standards for the job. If it costs extra money to help qualify that person then it is money well spent and will make this great nation even greater.

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In the last federal election there were more minority young voters than there were white young voters.

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