Brother Punisher

Back in May of 2005 I blogged about Amanda Marcotte's description of Priscilla Owen as a Sister Punisher: "a woman whose willingness to turn on other women to curry the favor of sexist men knows no bounds."

Now I read that Ward Connerly, California's "brother punisher" is trying to kill affirmative action in Michigan education just as he did in California. For me Connerly is just a guy whose willingness to turn on other minorities to curry the favor of racist men and women knows no bounds.

There is no question that Connerly's efforts in California reduced opportunity for minorites seeking higher education. Michigan can look at the California experiment and see the results of Connerly's hidden agenda.

For more look here.

Race was obviously a big issue there," Connerly said in an interview. "I felt that the people of Michigan would probably understand this issue more than in any other state, other than California."

Even a year before the election, the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative has roiled the state's political waters.

Opponents have staged loud rallies, prominent Republican and Democratic politicians have opposed the ban and court battles have raged over the initiative's validity. Supporters say the measure would end racism, while their foes deride the initiative as "the California amendment."

In other words, Michigan looks a lot like California, circa 1996.

Many California higher-education leaders say Prop. 209 devastated their ability to enroll adequate numbers of black and Latino students. Educators and administrators fear the same could happen in Michigan.

"It's unfortunate that there's an attempt to import an experiment from California that hasn't been terribly successful," said Marvin Krislov, a University of Michigan vice president and the institution's lead attorney in the Supreme Court case.

"We all, of course, hope that progress can be made," he said. But, in California, "the data suggests this has been a dismal failure."

Yet hundreds of thousands of Michigan residents signed a petition qualifying the Civil Rights Initiative for the ballot. Donations supporting the measure have poured in from across the country, including East Bay cities such as San Ramon, Livermore, El Cerrito and Kensington.

How pathetic.