I recently wrote a column on how Democrats in California are being challenged to put their money where their mouth has been on reparations. For years, Democrats have insisted that reparations are a moral imperative. Now, however, the bill has come due and advocates in a Wednesday hearing confronted members of the California Reparations Task Force in asking “where’s the money?” Some are now demanding more than $5 million per resident as Reparations Board member Lisa Holder of the Equal Justice Society promised that the committee’s “recommendations will be breathtaking.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) created the Reparations Task Force, which just reached its own recommendations for $223,000 per person. Others have insisted the figure should be $350,000 for individuals and another $250,000 for Black-owned businesses. One California politician insisted the figure needs to be $800,000 per person, reflecting the average cost of a home in the state. In the meantime, a similar board has recommended $5 million payments to eligible residents of San Fransisco.
Notably, California’s law expressly states that this money should not be treated as compensation for federal reparations. That raises the question of whether a resident could receive $5 million from San Francisco, $223,000 from the state, and additional payments from the federal government.
Some congressional Democrats have pushed for similar federal reparations and passed a bill out of the House Judiciary Committee in 2021 that failed to receive a floor vote. BET founder Robert Johnson has called for $14 trillion in federal reparations.
In the hearing on Wednesday, the growing expectation and impatience was evident among witnesses. Yet, some reparations advocates in cities with even smaller reparation programs admit that they do not know how cities will fund the payouts.
One witness described the payments of $5 million per person as “nothing” and “too little.” The correct figure was suggested as more like $7.6 million.
Reverend Tony Pierce asked “Where’s the money? Where’s the cash? Where’s the check?” “$5 million, San Francisco’s already made a move. $5 million is nothing.” Pierce mocked the notion of $5 million if it is “spread over 50 years would only amount to $100,000 year, and then with taxes, you’ll be lucky if you end up with $40,000 a year.” He also rejected the notion of $223,000 for housing as woefully inadequate.
For her part, Holder is pledging “breathtaking” reparation payments, including “monetary compensation to Black people who are descendants of enslaved and persecuted Black Americans.”
Those continued assurances are fueling demands for the money without further delay. After years of being told that the payments are moral imperatives, many are losing patience. In a prior hearing, one well-known California activist declared in a prior hearing that “It’s a debt that’s owed, we worked for free. We’re not asking; we’re telling you.”
Despite Gov. Newsom’s underestimating the state debt figures by billions, this bill has now come due and many critics are challenging the left to show that the prior pledges were not mere political opportunism or virtue signaling. California is set to face the true costs of these pledges and many are in no mood to haggle over price.
In other words, California Democrats may have finally reached the “show me the money” moment.
Let’s use our imagination for a moment. Say your an Hispanic voter in California and your ancestors worked for slave labor wages in the California vegetable fields. Wouldn’t you be asking, “where’s my reparations?” The difference would be that this happened only fifty years ago rater than two hundred years ago. What we are really seeing is the continuation of the race hustler hustle and the white virtue signaling that encourages the scam. Hispanics in California will be forced to pay their fair share even though they weren’t around in 1865. The pound of flesh will also be extracted from the Jews, the Italians, the Poles the Hispanics and other groups who never set foot on American soil until the early nineteen hundreds when none of their ancestors owned a single slave. Hustle on.
Until we sane Americans stand up and openly confront this con job each and every time it is used as a vote getting tool it will not stop. WE enable this by not saying NO, this is insane both logically and historically. We control congress and state legislatures with the ability to vote these charlatans out of office, why aren’t we doing this? The prog/left media has brainwashed into tools for the prog/left. Demographically, we are running out of time to put a dead stop to this insanity.
You can earn Cents, you can spend Cents but you can’t buy any common sense Does anyone truly believe paying for a sin of their forefathers is just. Ha! Throughout history man has conquered man but, in few instances, men have stood up and sacrificed their own survival to free the conquered. I ask how large does the sacrifice have to be? What are the recipients giving for the payment? Cost/benefit?
I’m fine with a fair and accurate accounting of reparations ‘due’ – before paying out an additional cent, we must first determine the costs already paid – the rampant crime and urban decay, incarceration costs, a complete refund of every public cent spent ‘educating’ people that did not become law-abiding contributors to society, social/welfare spending – if we add it all up, we will find that the descendants of slaves actually owe the US several million dollars each. Let them pay that back first before considering anything more…
This an ugly comment. Insinuating that African-American descendants of slaves are collectively the cause in fact of the ills you decry is sickening. Reparations would be a truly awful thing to do. But that doesn’t mean we paint fellow citizens with a broad brush. There is a rainbow coalition of the law-abiding contributors to society.
“Insinuating that African-American descendants of slaves are collectively the cause in fact of the ills you decry is sickening.”
Change the ethnicities, and that is the very same “sickening” premise of the reparations mob.
SPO – but “collective guilt” and “collective rights” are the essence of the claim for reparations.
All this is BS. Nothing more than extortion and bribery. This should not be even a token issue. There is no one alive in this country who owned slaves just as there no living slaves here. Just an excuse to avoid getting a job and beibg responsible.
What I find facinating is the seeming public acceptance of the utterly non-representative nature of the California Reparations Task force which ostensibly would (and does) taint any findings. Instead the findings are discussed as serious rather than as evidence of enlightened self interest. Of the 9 members of the taskforce, 8 are African Americans – all beneficiaries of their recommendations. Now given that only 1 in 20 Californians are African Americans, the demographics of the task force did not result from a random process. The public unfolding of this spectacle makes manifest the abysmal lack of judgement and supervision by the California elected officials, particularly, including Gavin Newsom. The voters did have multiple opportunities so one could conclude that they got what they deserve.
Considering that slavery was illegal in California, and it was not uncommon for slaves who were brought to CA to be emancipated, I’m not sure why CA needs to pay anyone. I’m not saying things were perfect as, even today, some people will hold others in de facto slavery here in the US. But as Mexico had abolished slavery in Mexico (including Alta California as it was known under the Mexican rule) 1829 and CA was a Free Territory and then admitted as a ‘Free State”there wasn’t much history of it.
But you go ahead liberal CA. Tax the hell out of people and give it away. That more-and-more of the talent will CA and it can continue its path to irrelevance.
This is what happens when your population is stoned all the time. People don’t even vote. They just hand over their ballot for a few joints.
>BET founder Robert Johnson has called for $14 trillion in federal reparations.
14 trillion? He is a highly successful businessman. Where does he think the federal government would get that kind of money? It is two-thirds of the total US debt and is almost two and a half times the 2022 budget. If you think inflation is terrible now, wait if his proposal or virtually any of the other “pie in the sky” proposals get adopted.
Los Angeles county is a dumpster fire, has been for a very long time (full disclosure: I have a sergeant in the LAPD in the family whi has been on the force for a couple of decades, and my dad was born there). Last time I was in Santa Monica my wife and I were stepping over people passed out on the sidewalk, though not avoiding human doodie as they do in the Bay (tents everywhere, though). It’s really sad for the parts of California that haven’t completely lost their minds (yes, they do exist, just as they do in Oregon or Washington, or New York – the boroughs of a place are not the state). Between the Bay and LA, CA is on fire in a different sense, and the people that live in other, less populous parts of the state? Screw ’em. That is Newsom’s mentality. Especially the Central Valley, where ironically, a great deal of the immigrant population are.
The big, blue, cities in CA are a disaster. An absolute disaster, which is in keeping with the rest of the country in blue places (*cough*Chicago*cough*). Good luck finding a way to actually do this, Newsom, and heaven help the fallout when it’s apparent it was all a political canard in the first place. Rodney King? Ha, ha, ha, ha! That will be preschool by comparison. And do to your and the DA’s neutering of them, the cops won’t care this time; indeed, they have been hamstrung to even intervene. Enjoy watching those state dollars continue to float away to other, more receptive places.
Actually there is a revenue source CA could tap into: Property taxes.
Decades ago, they put a tax cap on property taxes to, IIRC, 2% increase a year.
Change it to be based on the sqft of the property. The average sqft of a home in the US is 2,400sqft. Call that zero (they still pay property tax, just not the reparations tax). Anything above that, gets a reparations tax that goes up for every 200sqft by say 8%.
Get all those rich people with Mega-McMansions (or three) to pay their fair share. You know, like that Zukerburger guy, Nancy Pelosi (and family), that formerly UK Royal couple that had a great guest appearance on South Park.
You have no idea how Prop 13 works. It benefits corporations (they hold property long-term) and people who don’t move. But if you buy a new house, you’re paying through the property tax nose. My mother-in-law lived in a $15K house she and my father-in-law bought back in the 1950s that appreciated into a $500K house. They paid less than a thousand/year. My brother-in-law bought a new house for $350K and was paying close to 10K/year in property taxes.
Most people move every three-to-five years. Prop 13 isn’t the problem in CA. The problem is CA spends way too much money making life difficult for the average Californian. On average the State spends $3,500/citizen a year on welfare programs with 20% of it’s budget going to welfare.
“where’s the money?”
Here’s what I suggest:
Create a bank — The Bank of Newsom. Borrow whatever you need from the Fed. Pay the moochers with an interest-free loan with no repayment terms (like the Bidens got from communist China). Declare insolvency. Get a bailout. Rinse and repeat for the next round of looters.
The TV Show Finding Your Roots with Dr. Henry Louis Gates had an episode with Bryan Gumbel a year ago where Mr. Gumbel, who is black, found out that his black great grandfather ( a free black man) owned slaves in New Orleans and was in the soldier Confederate Army. So what about the Free Blacks that owned slaves? Should these Ancestors of these slave owning blacks be paid reparations? I think not.
I watched a similar episode with a Black actor whom Gates informed had Native American background. “How could that be?” the actor asked. Gates explained that Native Americans in the owned Black slaves. Further, in the southeastern United States, where the actor has his roots, this continued for about a year after the Civil War ended. Whoops! Will there be any effort to shake money out of the tribes from that part of the country.
In fact, the black slaves held by Indian tribes were the last to be freed, because neither the Emancipation Proclamation nor the 13th Amendment applied to the tribes, which were sovereign nations. The liberation occurred by treaty, in the summer of 1866, I believe.
Just a couple of clarifying questions: If you once wore blackface, does that make you eligible? And if california says this isn’t “reparations”, can you cash in now and keep “reparations” in the closet until needed again?
$5 million is absurd. What is 50 years of Affirmative Action, if not reparations. It appears to me that some people took advantage of Affirmative Action and others did not. Life is full of choices.
The Woke deal with emotion. Science is an anathema to them. They can’t even count, as demonstrated by this blog. Everywhere they are prominent is a disaster.
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‘Unacceptable incompetence’: CDC made dozens of basic data errors on COVID, epidemiologists find
The CDC found itself hoist with its own petard by making 25 basic statistical and numerical errors related to COVID-19, particularly with regard to children, while purporting to expose COVID vaccine misinformation, according to an analysis led by University of California San Francisco epidemiologists.
…”The errors are damning,” coauthor Vinay Prasad, a former National Institutes of Health fellow, said on Twitter. “Basic counts of dead kids, causes of childhood death. Unacceptable incompetence.”
…The errors were heavily weighted toward exaggerating COVID’s risk to children. …Perhaps the most consequential error was the CDC’s repeated promotion of a preprint that deemed COVID a “top 5” cause of death in children
…David Boulware said it actually shows Paxlovid is “likely near zero benefit” for under-60s with a “normal immune system” and vaccine- or infection-induced immunity.
https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/unacceptable-incompetence-cdc-made-dozens-basic-data-errors-covid?utm_source=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter
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Why does the left have so much faith in Woke policies? How can people who show a degree of intelligence fall for this. $5 Million per black person in San Fransisco; vaccinate the young whose death rate from Covid was minimal. The left seems to have a death wish, and some of them, as we have seen, actually take that wish to the end.
“Where’s the money? Where’s the cash? Where’s the check?”
In a better age, such a demand would be called what it is: Looting.
Can I take a page out of the trans cult book, which Democrats fully endorse, and say that I “feel” black therefore I am black? Gimme my money…I didn’t work for it, I didn’t actually earn it, but I am entitled to it. So hand it over or I’ll burn down your city.
It never occurred to them that with no Republicans to block passage and take the blame, they were painting themselves into a corner. The only thing that’s preventing them from doing it is the knowledge that it will ruin their individual political futures and the party at large in California. Hispanics are a much larger part of their constituency, and they will not be in any way pleased at the sudden enrichment of what will become a competitor minority, after which the well will be dry for generations. This is so poisonously divisive that the Democrat Party in California cannot possibly survive it. One-party rule removes all wiggle room for excuses.
IDK, I think the whole purpose is to start the reparations process with one group, blacks, and have it continue to others. Hispanics will certainly be next and then some groups of asians. Whites will never ever be considered even if poor as they are collectively looked upon as kulaks who should have all assets confiscated and then summarily executed or starved. There is no question that elite whites will be exempted. For now.
Only morons trust politicians. Remember this with social security and medicare – those bills are coming due.
Dear Prof Turley,
How black do you have to be to get some of that cash? Is there a skin color-shade chart? Or what?
*As you know, I was born a poor black man then demoted to a heathen-hued Hillbilly and Grandma was 1/2 Cherokee red skin .. . I’ve Got It All.
“…Democrats in California are being challenged to put their money where their mouth has been on reparations.” Um, no, counselor. Democrats have not, are not, nor ever will, give their *own* money to reparations or any other government program. Those are to be paid by *other people’s* money, only. Granted, it would be a nice change if they did but we already know they will never pay a single dime out of their own pockets for their own ideas. Not. One. Dime. Ever.
Well, they are asking the question I have been asking, “Wheres the money?”
Although, mine was more like “Where is the money going to come from? And will it be taxed?”
The Reverend Tony Pierce, seems to have answered my question concerning the latter. Give them money, then tax it. Be interesting to see if as one of their demands was to make it TAX-FREE.
As I have mentioned in the past, seems to me, the CA government wants the Fed government to pay for the reparations, then the CA government gets to tax it to make up for the lost revenue of people LEAVING CA! Just read another article about how Los Angeles county and Cook county (Chicago) had the biggest population losses in 2022.
Care to take a guess why?