(ThyBlackMan.com) With the signing of the law, making Juneteenth a federal holiday, President Biden’s “Building Back Better,” policy, ought to be the cornerstone, in the destruction of all of America’s rigged systems. The slogan should mean, the un-rigging of current racist practices, especially those under the control of President Biden, that negatively affect all Americans; not just Black American citizens, who have been, and still are the targets of some of the most horrific of these practices. As the British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson said, at the G-7 Summit, to President Biden, the international press corps, and us, “It is time (for Biden and everybody) to level-up.”
Because of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and its enforcement, the dismantling and breakup of the rigged system, which prohibited Black people from voting, was done. Its enactment, and execution proved it is possible, to successfully destroy active systemically racist networks, through federal legislation. What Republicans are doing at the state level, in an attempt to re-rig the electoral voting process, to make it difficult to vote is appalling and un-American. President Biden and Mr. Obama are products of the success of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Mr. Obama, elected to office, as the first African American President, and Mr. Biden, as his Vice President, 43 years after the passage of the Voting Rights Act proves, as said, systemically racist practices can be eliminated.
Remember, it was not Mr. Obama, or Mr. Biden, who put themselves into the elective offices of president and vice-president in 2008, it was us, and other American voters freely exercising our right to vote, allowing our ballots to speak for us. To re-rig the electoral voting system is not just taking the United States backwards, it is the first step in taking away our voices and the right of free elections. And when you deny the right to free elections to American citizens, we are a stone’s throw away from becoming a dictatorial nation. That is not a hyperbole, or an exaggeration. Just like you have to have enforcement systems, to ensure free, and fair elections, you have to also have systems, in place to enforce rigged, and systemically racist elections.
To what extent, these rising systems are “tolerated,” by me, you and all American citizens, such as organizations similar in nature to the Ku Klux Klan (violent white supremacist groups across this nation), state organized intimidation of voters (the reinstatement of poll watchers by Texas), gerrymandering (arranging districts to favor one party or class), tampering with and arranging for fraudulent vote counts (what happened in Arizona), is a test of our commitment and devotion to the freedom, we are presently enjoying. Authoritarianism, at the end of the day, at its core, whether Trump, Putin, or Xi Jinping advance it, means less individual freedom for you, and me.
President Biden, and former President Obama have sounded the alarm that our Democracy is under attack, from within our nation, by former President Trump and his minions, when it comes to voting, yet these men tolerate selectively, one of the most egregious, and odious systems of racism within our federal government. It is the rigged system that undercounts America’s unemployed. Biden is actually stacking the deck against one of the most vulnerable and defenseless populations in our nation, unemployed American workers, and their families.
Here is the problem with President Biden, Mr. Obama, and the Democratic Party. They are selective, when it comes to the rigged systems, they are willing to, number one, make you aware of, and number two, willing to devote money, energy, and publicity to removing. It matters not to them, people go hungry, when you understate the number of unemployed, which leads to understating our unemployment rates. The result is, the unemployed are underserved when it comes to potential and real federal government benefits. It is apparent, they do not see the importance of the need, that our unemployed and their families be visible, through relating the real unemployment rates. Nevertheless, they should be readily visible to policymakers, to voters and the general public. Real data can lead to “real” solutions. Using real data, policymakers can actively address our unemployment situation and actually solve it. However, revealing the TRUTH, as in this article, about our economic situation, does put unwanted pressure on these politicians to produce REAL data driven solutions.
Biden must not be able to hide behind the lie, that his “Official Unemployment Rate” captures the full picture, of what is going on in our economy, when it comes to joblessness. Every month jobless workers and their families are undercounted, by Mr. Biden, is a month, too many. Suffering the distress of losing their income, and then made invisible by politicians, who say you do not exist is “a bridge too far.” Meritorious and great leadership does not traffic in lies. THE TRUTH MATTERS in the calculation of idle workers in our economy. Biden says the May, unemployment rate is 5.8%. Experts say, the REAL RATE is 10.2%. The black rate, which is always 5-6% higher than the national rate is 16.2%. That means, at least 16 Black American citizens out of every 100, could not find full-time jobs in May ( https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-the-real-unemployment-rate-3306198 ).
The Biden’s administration practice, of undercounting unemployed American workers is, a continuation of the policy, of “the Obama administration,” who also undercounted jobless American workers. The Obama administration continued the policy, of the Clinton administration, where this despicable scheme originated. However, the Clinton administration takes no credit, and denies any involvement in originating the flawed policy of undercounting jobless American workers, and their families. Former President Clinton’s Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, in the following statement commented, in an April 9th e-mail to my blog, thefixthistime.com/about/, on the redesign of the unemployment rate categories, which led to the rigged practice. In his comments, he defers to the Bureau of labor Statistics (BLS). His denial, of he and former President Clinton’s involvement, in the advancement of this unsound, and defective policy, is clear in his statement.
“The Bureau of Labor Statistics is a statistical agency whose independence from politics is critically important to its credibility. Neither I as Secretary of Labor nor President Clinton intruded on that independence. The BLS decided and continues to decide how the nation’s unemployment rate is defined, measured, and explained to the public.”
If you read this PDF ( https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/1995/10/art3full.pdf ), the October 1995 article by Bregger and Haugen, who represented in-house economists at the BLS at the time the redesign was done, you will find these insightful comments of their position when it comes to undercounting unemployed American workers, on page 24:
“This (U-6) is the most comprehensive of the new range of alternative measures…” of the rate of U.S. unemployment. (U-6 is the category economists see as the real unemployment rate, which placed the May unemployment rate at 10.2% – click on the link at thebalance, above).
So, what we have here, is an orphan. It is “an Orphan Policy,” because no one takes responsibility for being the father or mother of the rigged practice of undercounting unemployed American workers; not the in-house economists at the BLS at the time the changes in the categories were done, and not former President Clinton, and his than Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, based on Reich’s comments. Do you wonder, why? Anyone, presently taking credit for this messed-up “Orphan Policy,” would have to justify publicly, why President Biden, Mr. Obama, during his eight years in office, and Democrats, insist upon undercounting jobless American workers and their families, who are unemployed due to no fault of their own. The good news is, it is within President Biden’s ability to rectify, what is a deplorably “rigged policy.”
President Biden, Mr. Obama, and Democrats are asking us to join them and do what we can, when we can, to stop those who would take our voices away at the ballot box. And we should! But we will never turn our backs, on our unemployed American brothers, sisters, and families, who are simply seeking visibility, and acknowledgement of their true economic situation, when it comes to the nightmare of being unemployed.
Staff Writer; James Davis
Mr. Davis is a leading expert and consultant in Financial Analysis and Social Dynamics. He is a graduate of Florida A. and M. University (FAMU), a former stockbroker, and a human rights activist who resides in Sanford, Florida. He was awarded the prestigious Governor Haydon Burns Scholarship to attend FAMU and while at FAMU was awarded the first Martin Luther King Scholarship. He is the author of three books, among them is “The Fix This Time,” Boost Your Retirement Income! Simultaneously Create Jobs and Spur Economic Growth (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00MI3PD2M).
Mr. Davis can be reached through his blog @ https://thefixthistime.com.
