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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMark Kirk: "We" drive faster through black neighborhoods
The comment, with its racial undertones, came during a sit-down interview with the Peoria Journal Star and followed a question about how to encourage business development in Kirk's home state.
“I want to make sure we have elected people constantly looking at helping the African-American community,” Kirk said. “With this state and all of its resources, we could sponsor a whole new class of potential innovators like George Washington Carver and eventually have a class of African-American billionaires. That would really adjust income differentials and make the diversity and outcome of the state much better so that the black community is not the one we drive faster through."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/13/mark-kirk-black-neighborhoods_n_7056612.html?utm_hp_ref=politics
Geez.
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bravenak
(34,648 posts)Most of us drive near the speed limit no matter what. Conditions permitting, of course. He's stupid.
YoungDemCA
(5,714 posts)In 2015, no less!
What could ever have given you the impression that he doesn't care about the black community?
bravenak
(34,648 posts)
cali
(114,904 posts)and the shit about black billionaires? Yeah, just what we need, more billionaires.
I have no idea how billionaires are going to help anything at all. Help us suffer harder, if anything.
YoungDemCA
(5,714 posts)...let's also have rich black people exploit poor black people. Yeah, that sounds like a great solution to racial and class inequality. Progress!! 
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)Isn't that special?
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)
BlueJazz
(25,348 posts)So somehow this country is going to turn some Blacks into billionaires ?
I think the poor among them would just like respect, kindness, understanding and a better/higher paying job ????
Downwinder
(12,869 posts)why do blacks get stopped more often?
Liberal_in_LA
(44,397 posts)Mitchell did offer a more charitable interpretation of Kirk's comment -- that people drive faster through black communities because they don't want to see poverty (as opposed to being frightened of crime). But even that interpretation rests on dicey theories about race and wealth. As Mitchell went on to note, Chicago has a number of upper-middle class black neighborhoods, for example. He took umbrage, moreover, with the idea that simply putting a few rich people in poorer neighborhoods would solve poverty in those communities.