This is a fallacy I see again and again.

The constitution is the law that is supposed to govern the government. Notice it’s pretty light, vague, and full of loopholes. And then they don’t even follow that.

US statutes are laws that are supposed to govern the people, etc. Notice these are heavy, wordy, confusing, inscrutable, etc.

Both the short length of the constitution and the long length of statutory laws stem from the same problem. The government gets to do what it wants and the people do not.

Why not just throw the whole idea of minority assistance/affirmative action away and give people jobs biased on what their capabilities are?

Because assessing those capabilities is the problem. Look, we did it the informal way for decades, where managers were supposed to just know how capable their employees were; the not-so-surprising result of that was that regardless of who was actually more qualified than whom, the managers usually perceived the whites as more qualified than the blacks and the men more qualified than the women.

Frankly, until libertarians and conservatives are willing to grapple with the decades-long systematic racism against women and minorities that persists even to this day, their “white-man-just-can’t-catch-a-break” nonsense just looks like self-centered privilege. It’s still the case that the resume of a white person with a felony record still gets twice as many callbacks as the resume of someone with no criminal record and a black-sounding name.

Also, if you’re “sue’d if you do, sue’d if you don’t,” you’re in the same position as facing no threat of lawsuit. Do the right thing. There’s normally one person on a jury who sympathizes with that.

#3 — I’ve yet to hear how someone who believes a firefighter’s promotion test could even possibly be biased is not, by definition, a racist.

You are hereby informed that you have infringed on Dave Krueger’s sarcasm copyright, and that you must cease and desist immediately and forthwith.

/served

So?

I have yet to hear a detailed discussion on whether the test was actually fair or not. Most editorials and pundits just seem to assume it was if they are rooting for the plaintiffs, and assume it wasn’t if rooting against.

Fairness isn’t really the issue so much as whether the city was complying with its legal obligations when they chucked the results.

Oh good. I feel so much better now; surely this investigation will lead to swift punishment of those who violated regulations or the law. (Insert eye-roll … here)

So the “new professionalism” solution to disturbing the peace is to disturb the peace. That’s about right. Fits in with their mission of saving an otherwise non-violent neighborhood from potential violence by bashing in doors and instigating violence.

That’s because it’s exactly 109.09 times more important.

He probably doesn’t want the CSPI and the Meme Roths of the world giving him a headache about “producing food porn”.

#12 | Spleen | June 30th, 2009 at 11:08 am

I have yet to hear a detailed discussion on whether the test was actually fair or not.

I noticed this also. One of the interviewees on NPR said black people don’t do as well on multiple choice tests, and this test was 60% multiple choice. This is evidence of racial bias?

Yes, and that same NPR story also said that the UNION requires that the tests be this way.

Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch of Statists.

I laughed so hard I blew fucking coffee out my nose all over my monitor.

Glad to see police brutality is moving up the food chain!

“One thing, one thing leads to another …” — The Fixx

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzymBKGV8rw

In other words, another person arrested on the charge of being arrested.

I have yet to hear a detailed discussion on whether the test was actually fair or not.

I noticed this also. One of the interviewees on NPR said black people don’t do as well on multiple choice tests, and this test was 60% multiple choice. This is evidence of racial bias?