FROM LBJ TO BLOOMBERG, promises of equality. LBJ actually did something positive; why is Bloomberg offering more of the same?
Where is the “disconnect” between LBJ in 1964 and Bloomberg in 2020? Why is yet another “equality” program needed? Isn’t 56 years enough time to “catch up”?
According to the Associated Press (https://tinyurl.com/vse2axp), Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg made a pitch to African American voters before the national holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr., visiting a black church in Tulsa, the site of a race massacre nearly 100 years ago that left hundreds dead and the city’s thriving African American community in rubble.
The former New York City mayor spoke out against racial income inequality and outlined an economic proposal aimed at increasing the number of black-owned homes and businesses. The plan includes a $70 billion investment in the nation’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods.
“I do believe the next president has to make the issue of economic inequality a top priority, and there’s no better place for me to talk about it than right here in Greenwood,” Bloomberg told parishioners Sunday at the Vernon African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Bloomberg described the initiative as a “plan for righting what I think are historic wrongs and creating opportunity and wealth in black communities.”
The history.com website (https://tinyurl.com/y6b3hjxp) notes that Lyndon Baines Johnson created the “Great Society” in 1964.
- In March 1964, Johnson introduced the Office of Economic Opportunity and the Economic Opportunity Act during a special message to Congress. He’d hoped to help the underprivileged break the poverty cycle by helping them develop job skills, further their education and find work.
- a Community Action program for people to tackle poverty within their own communities
- the ability for the government to recruit and train skilled American volunteers to serve poverty-stricken communities
- loans and guarantees for employers who offered jobs to the unemployed
- funds for farmers to purchase land and establish agricultural co-ops
- help for unemployed parents preparing to enter the workforce
To do this, he created a Job Corps for 100,000 disadvantaged men. Half would work on conservation projects and the other half would receive education and skills training in special job training centers.
In addition, Johnson tasked state and local governments with creating work training programs for up to 200,000 men and women. A national work study program was also established to offer 140,000 Americans the chance to go to college who could otherwise not afford it.
Other initiatives the so-called War on Poverty offered were:
Beyond these programs, LBJ’s administration also brought
- Medicare for all and Medicaid for the indigent
- Head Start and Education Reform
- Urban Renewal
With all the programs available, why, 56 years later, does Bloomberg need to promise more of the same?
When will it end?
How long will it take?
By comparison, the State of Israel was declared in May, 1948.
It was immediately attacked by Muslim states which it managed to fend off.
Since then Israel has, despite other wars and constant terror attacks, managed to become the technological leader in the Middle East.
It has absorbed people from around the world, people of color as well as whites.
These immigrants, some from what most Americans would term “primitive” cultures with little modern education, have been integrated into Israeli society, partly through government assistance but largely through their own efforts.
Some of these immigrants have risen to high positions in government, the military, and education.
What is the difference between the people whose disadvantages President Johnson set the government to eliminate and, say, an immigrant from Ethiopia or Yemen?
To be absolutely honest, neither the Ethiopians nor the Yemenites were warmly welcomed by the Euro-Jews in Israel, but by their own effort, they overcame the disadvantages.
LBJ’s Great Society, if Bloomberg’s claims are correct, is a failure.
According to Bloomberg advertisements, only Bloomberg can be credited for any advancements in education and job opportunities.
New York, New York, a hell of a town.
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