Bush`s Tiny Step


President Bush has spoken. Giving 20 bonus points to
public college and university applicants just for being

black, Hispanic, or Native American
is "divisive,
unfair, and impossible to square with the

Constitution
."

This is a vital step forward and away from the
Clintonian social engineering regime, under which the

Reno Justice Department
consistently sided with the
racial bonus point-givers. (For a quick refresher,
Internet users, Google

"Sharon Taxman," "Piscataway,"
and

"Deval Patrick.")

But Bush`s announcement is only a teeny-tiny step in
the right direction. In 2001, this administration, not
Clinton-Gore, backed the federal government`s payment of
cash bonuses to highway construction firms that accept
bids from companies owned by members of certain minority
groups. (See "Randy
Pech" and "Adarand.")

And in his

remarks
Wednesday on the

University of Michigan
case now before the Supreme
Court, Bush voiced continuing support for the
Clinton-Gore-Reno fantasy that government-engineered
racial diversity can and should be achieved "without
using quotas" or other unconstitutional means. As
examples of model programs, Bush cited public university
admissions plans in his home state of Texas and his
brother Jeb`s state of Florida.

As I`ve

noted before
, W.`s "10 percent" and Jeb`s "20
percent" plans are the same

old, tired racial-preference policies
disguised
under the slipcover of "compassionate conservatism."

Jeb`s "Talented 20"
program, for example, guarantees
state university admission to the top 20 percent of
students in every Florida high school senior class.

That percentage—that, ahem, quota—was engineered to
ensure no net loss in minority enrollment in the state
university system.

Although many observers have focused on the effects
of Jeb`s "One Florida" program for university
admissions, the plan actually expands racial preferences
in state hiring and contracting. Despite Jeb`s

ostensible commitment to nondiscrimination
, he
advocates "enhancement of minority business development
through financial and technical assistance programs that
target the legitimate development needs of emerging
minority businesses, minority construction firms and
minority franchisees."

In other words, more

color-coded government aid.

Instead of encouraging minority businesses to compete
on their merits, Jeb Bush

pledged
to "reduce the red tape in the minority
certification process to encourage more minority
businesses to become certified." But why should they
certify by

racial status in the first place?
Because, Jeb Bush
openly admitted,

"My plan is not race-neutral. . . . Race-consciousness
is appropriate."

The vast majority of Americans of all races and
ethnicities reject race-consciousness in public life.
Voters in multiracial California and liberal Washington
state did just that when they passed ballot initiatives
banning government racial preferences in

1996
and

1998
. Nevertheless, the president (and his brother)
continue to spurn one of the conservative movement`s
greatest, modern-day civil rights heroes, the man behind
those ballot measures:

Ward Connerly
. Jeb Bush

helped sabotage
Connerly`s effort to pass an
anti-racial preference initiative in the Sunshine State;
the president has avoided Connerly like the plague.

The victory against racial preferences in Washington
State, which I witnessed firsthand, was stunning.
Connerly, founder of the

American Civil Rights Institute
and a California
university regent, helped

Initiative 200
overcome

slimy
, deep-pocketed

opposition
from the business, civil rights, and
media elite. It garnered a whopping 58 percent of the
vote, with substantial support from Democrats,
independents, and women.

Connerly`s latest crusade has similar wide appeal.
The

Racial Privacy Initiative
would bar California
government officials from requiring people to check off
their race when they apply for a job, register for
school, or have a child. It would abolish those

oppressive little boxes
that encourage college
applicants, for example, to cram themselves into one of
a litany of categories, including “African American,"
"American Indian/Alaska native," "East
Indian/Pakistani," "Chinese/Chinese American,"
"Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Pacific
Islander," "other Asian (not including Middle Eastern)",
"Mexican American/Chicano," "other Spanish
American/Latino," "white/Caucasian (including Middle
Eastern)," and simply "other." [To see for yourself, see
page 9, section 135, of this University of California

application
(PDF)]

Such intrusive government bean-counting for the
purpose of awarding race-based bonuses, to use President
Bush`s words, is "divisive, unfair, and impossible to
square with the Constitution." The time for Connerly`s
prescription is at hand: To prevent the government from
boxing Americans in, throw away the boxes.


Michelle Malkin is author of


Invasion: How America Still Welcomes Terrorists,
Criminals, and Other Foreign Menaces to Our Shores
.

Click here
for Peter Brimelow`s review.
Click here
for Michelle Malkin`s website.

COPYRIGHT

CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC
.