When you sit in the man’s pews for 20 year and you appoint a guy who pretty much makes Wright’s sermons the basis for policy at the Justice Department, then you can’t help but wonder about that which is the basis for this Pigford bill being debated in Congress:
Zombie covered some of this “math” that Representative Bachmann speaks to way back in July:
• There are approximately 40,000 African-American farmers in the country.
• Of that 40,000, not all of them have gotten into financial trouble. Some have successful farms.
• Of those who had financial trouble, not all of them sought out loans. Some tried to stay afloat on their own.
• Of those who sought out loans, not all of them sought out loans from the USDA. Some got loans from banks or friends.
• Of those who sought out loans from the USDA, not all of them were denied loans. Some got the loans as requested.
• Of those who were denied loans, not all of them were denied due to discriminatory racial practices.
In the end, a total much much smaller than 40,000 could legitimately claim to be victims of discrimination.
As shown above, it was originally estimated to be no more than 2,000 possible total plaintiffs.
Somehow, that number quickly swelled to 16,000 wronged claimants.
And now, as of February, the government has announced its plans to hand out at least $50,000 each to over 70,000 more claimants, over and above the original 16,000.
This means that the U.S. may be recompensing at least 86,000 African-American farmers for past racial discrimination. But how could that possibly be true if there are only 39,697 African-American farmers in existence nationwide? And if only some subset of them ever applied for loans in the first place and were then unfairly denied loans?
It really is looking like reparations… but if one of you have a different explanation, by all means, weigh in.
