Should Diversity in the Military Take Precedence Over Qualifications?

The Military Diversity Commission (MLDC) has issued a report saying that too many white men are in top positions in the military. So, this means that whitey must step aside for the sake of minorities regardless of the consequences, even if it costs lives because inexperienced minorities filled the uppermost ranks just because racial quotas had to be filled, all in the name of diversity.  This is ludicrous! This is pure insanity! Retired Lt. Colonel and Florida Republican Rep. Allen West is calling this  "a slap in the face” to all those minorities who have achieved seniority in the military. 

Rep. West stated: “Everyone that comes into the military has an equal opportunity to get promoted to the next level. It is not about outside entities trying to engineer and design results and outcomes or create a sense of equal achievement and when some military diversity group writes a report saying there are too many white men on top,” West said. “It is kind of a slap in the face to those who have risen through the ranks such as four star General [Lloyd] Austin, [General] Kip Ward, many others. We don’t need these outside entities trying to design or shape a military.”

From The Daily Caller:



"Ordered by Congress in the 2009 National Defense Authorization Act, the report seeks to increase diversity."
“The commission’s recommendations support two overriding and related objectives: (1) that the Armed Forces systematically develop a demographically diverse leadership … and (2) that the services pursue a broader approach to diversity that includes the range of backgrounds, skill sets and personal attributes that are necessary to enhancing military performance,” the report reads.
"According to the document, 77 percent of active duty senior officers are white, 8 percent are black, 5 percent are Hispanic and 16 percent are women — something that needs to change, according to the MLDC.
“Leveraging diversity as a vital strategic military resource will require the commitment, vision, and know-how of leaders at every level,” the report continues. “Without this commitment to instill respect for diversity as a core value, the needed cultural change may not take place.”


The military's definition of diversity is this: 








Should diversity really be a priority for the military?  


In order to decipher whether the data given by the MLDC for each ethnic/racial/gender group is actually lower than average, average, or above average the data needs to be compared to the figures of each ethnic/racial/gender group and their percentage of the total population in the United States but what will determine this more so is the percentage of each ethnic/racial/gender group serving in the military.  Since the 2010 census hasn't been posted on the web yet I am relying on the statistics in the 2000 census.







According to Wikipedia: In the 2000 Census, respondents were tallied in each of the race groups they reported. Consequently, the total of each racial category exceeds the total population because some people reported more than one race. 




The above chart shows that African Americans make up about 12 percent of the U.S. population. According to this site 14 percent of African Americans serve in the military. I found the approximate percentage of Hispanics in 2009 here so I will use that number since for some reason the 2000 census didn't have Hispanics as whole as an ethnic group on the list.  The percentage of Hispanics in the U.S. is about 16 percent and the percentage of Hispanics who are in the top positions in the military is 5 percent.  According to the Army Times Hispanics constitute 13.5 percent of those serving in the military.  According to this site the number of females represented in the the total U.S. population is 50 percent.  The data here shows that about 14.5 percent people serving in Combat are women and 15.2 percent serving in the Reserves & Guard are women.  According to About.com, women make up about 20 percent of today's military and 16 percent constitute the uppermost ranks of the military.  The number of women, Hispanics, and African-Americans serving in top ranking positions in the military doesn't seem to be that bad of a ratio but seems average when taking into account the percentage of each group serving in the military.  


The data shows that the number of African-Americans serving in the military has declined since 2000. 

"S. Douglas Smith, a spokesman for Army Recruiting Command at Fort Knox, Ky., pointed out that recruiting is down, not just for African-Americans, but for all groups. This year, the Army missed its recruiting goal by more than 6,600 new enlistees, the first time it has missed an annual recruiting target since 1999." 
"Smith said the improving economy is mostly to blame for the recruiting slump, but the war also has been a factor, he said, "and the public perception that this is a risky time to be a soldier."
"Smith said the Army has been focusing recruiting efforts more on Hispanics and Asian-Americans and other minorities in recent years. In fiscal year 2001, Hispanics made up 10.5 percent of active-duty Army recruits. In fiscal year 2005, they comprised 13.2 percent of active-duty recruits, according to Army statistics, slightly higher than their overall percentage in the U.S. population of 12.5 percent. The percentage of Asian recruits rose from 2.6 percent in fiscal year 2001 to 4.1 percent in fiscal year 2005, about on par with their percentage of the U.S. population."
"The Army appealed to blacks for decades because they saw it as one of the most integrated institutions in America, said Charles Moskos, a sociologist at Northwestern University who specializes in military affairs.
"Eventually, blacks made up one-third of all enlisted women and one-fifth of men, including many senior noncommissioned officers.
"It's been the only institution in America where whites have been routinely bossed around by blacks because many of your (non-commissioned officers) are black," Moskos said."




Experts cited these factors as to reasons why there is a decline in African-Americans serving in the military: 



-Better economic and educational opportunities.


-The high rate of incarceration among young black males. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, about 8.4 percent of all black males in the United States between 25 and 29 were in a state or federal prison last year, compared with 2.5 percent of Hispanics and 1.2 percent of whites in the same age group.


-An erroneous belief, dating back to the Vietnam War, that blacks and other minorities suffer a disproportionate share of combat casualties.
Statistics don't bear out those perceptions. According to independent researchers with Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, a Web site that tracks casualty statistics based on Defense Department press releases and media reports, whites have suffered 74 percent of deaths in Iraq, while blacks have suffered 10.4 percent and Hispanics 11 percent.


-Blacks have been much less supportive of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan than whites and other ethnic groups, according to U.S. military surveys.
According to a report titled "U.S. Military Image Study" commissioned last year by the Army, African-Americans who viewed the military favorably decreased from 22 percent in November 2003 to 11 percent in November 2004.


Compared with other ethnic groups, African-American youths are also the least supportive of the war in Iraq, the least likely to believe that the war was justified and the most disapproving of the U.S. government's handling of foreign affairs, researchers found.
The study also found that black adults are less likely than adults in other ethnic groups to recommend military service to youths, in part because of the war.




The summary of the Military Leadership Diversity Commission's report is here.  One area the report focuses on is outreach.  I think outreach is good but I don't think that it should be limited to certain racial or ethnic groups.  One additional recommendation is to expand the pool of candidates which is a good goal but the in which they plan on doing this is to "Require the Services to review and validate their eligibility criteria for military service."   Does this mean that the military is going to be lowering the standards for acceptance?  If so, that would be highly detrimental to the military and could cost lives.  The military says that there definition acknowledges that people not only enter the military with different cultural backgrounds but also with different skills, experiences, and talents.  This statement makes perfect sense.  Then the report follows up with a sentence on working to further eliminate discrimination.  Is it discrimination to be disqualified from being promoted for a particular position if that person is lacking in the necessary skills for that position, or their talents do not match up with a certain position?  


Is it a "right" to to be admitted into the military?  I was under the impression that being accepted into the military is a privilege and not a right.  I would even say that serving in the military is even more so a privilege than attending college.  First an individual must pass the ASVAB to enter the military.  Then if an individual has a certain physical or mental disability he or she is disqualified from joining the military.  In addition, I believe the military even has certain standards on what grades you must achieve in high school to be admitted into the military.  Rep. West said that many people confuse rights with privilege and to him serving in the military is a privilege. 


Should the military pick who is best to serve in command positions or who is promoted up the line based on a proven record of success - based on merit - based an individual's abilities or should it be determined by race-based quotas just so the top brass can be a diverse group?   Would meeting diversity requirements based on race and not merit be considered racist?  Would minorities be following Martin Luther King's dream that people “would be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,” a vision which is also known as a "colorblind" society by demanding to be promoted using the criteria of diversity?  It seems as though Americans, specifically liberals, have strayed away from this vision - from Martin Luther King's Dream -  many believing they have a right to certain benefits based on their race.  I believe that "content of character" means based on merit and on an individual's qualifications and not having a person's skin color play a part in whether an individual is promoted or not. 







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The Democratic Party's Legacy of Racism: Interested in a Discussion on Racism?

Would anyone be interested in a discussion on race relations within both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party?  Earlier this week, I posted this article called,  The Democratic Party, Racism, & The Inferiority Complex and Malcolm from Diversity Ink offered to repost my article since he and other blogsters look for viewpoints that differ from his.  I think understanding why others have differing viewpoints is a great idea! Please go over to Macolm's site and join in the discussion. Malcolm has a very reasonable comment policy. Please view it here.  I am very excited to join in on the discussion!!!

I recently discovered another article on the Democratic Party and racism, written in 2002. The article is called:
 The Democratic Party's legacy of racism:

Under pressure from fellow Republicans, Mississippi Senator Trent Lott recently stepped down from his post as Senate Majority Leader because of racially offensive comments he made earlier in the month. He was persuaded to take this step by Republicans who believed that his comments were at odds with the principles of their party.

Of course, Democrats have used the Lott affair to pillory the Republicans as racists. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, who had first dismissed the idea that Sen. Lott was a racist, later claimed that his stepping down did not really address the Republican Party’s inherent racism. "Republicans have to prove, not only to us, of course, but to the American people that they are as sensitive to this question of racism, this question of civil rights, this question of equal opportunity, as they say they are," Senator Daschle told CNN. Among high-profile Democrats, Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer offered similar comments.

It’s about time that Republicans quit pussy-footing around on the issue of race. They need to point out that in both principle and practice, the Republican Party has a far better record than the Democrats on race. Even more importantly, they need to stress that on the issues that most affect African-Americans today, the Democratic position represents racism of the most offensive sort—a patronizing racism that denigrates Blacks every bit as badly as the old racism of Jim Crow and segregation.

Republicans can begin by observing that their Party was founded on the basis of principles invoked by Abraham Lincoln. He himself recurred to the principles of the American Founding, specifically the Declaration of Independence, so we can say that the principles of the Republican Party are the principles of the nation. In essence these principles hold that the only purpose of government is to protect the equal natural rights of individual citizens. These rights inhere in individuals, not groups, and are antecedent to the creation of government. They are the rights invoked by the Declaration of Independence—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—not happiness, but the pursuit of happiness.

We should remember that the Republican Party was created in response to a crisis arising from the fact that American public opinion on the issue of slavery had drifted away from the principles of the Founding. While the Founders had tolerated slavery out of necessity, many Americans, especially within the Democratic Party, had come to accept the idea that slavery was a "positive good." While Thomas Jefferson, the founder of what evolved into the Democratic Party, had argued that slavery was bad not only for the slave but also for the slave owner, John C. Calhoun, had turned this principle on its head: slavery was good not only for the slave holder, but also for the slave.

Calhoun’s fundamental enterprise was to defend the institution of slavery. To do so, he first had to overturn the principles of the American Founding. He started with the Declaration of Independence, arguing that "[the proposition ’all men are created equal’] as now understood, has become the most false and dangerous of all political errors....We now begin to experience the danger of admitting so great an error to have a place in the declaration of independence." Thus Calhoun transformed the Democratic Party of Jefferson into the Party of Slavery.

The most liberal position among ante-bellum Democrats regarding slavery was that slavery was an issue that should be decided by popular vote. For example, Stephen Douglas, Lincoln’s opponent in the 1858 Illinois senate race and the 1860 presidential campaign, advocated "popular sovereignty." He defended the right of the people in the territories to outlaw slavery, but also defended the right of Southerners to own slaves and transport them to the new territories.

The Democratic Party’s war against African-Americans continued after the Civil War (which many Democrats in fact opposed, often working actively to undercut the Union war effort). Democrats, both north and south fought the attempt to implement the equality for African-Americans gained at such a high cost. This opposition was often violent. Indeed, the Ku Klux Klan operated as the de facto terrorist arm of the national Democratic Party during Reconstruction.

Democrats defeated Reconstruction in the end and on its ruins created Jim Crow. Democratic liberalism did not extend to issue of race. Woodrow Wilson was the quintessential "liberal racist," a species of Democrat that later included the likes of William Fulbright of Arkansas, Sam Ervin of North Carolina, and Albert Gore, father of Al, of Tennessee.

In the 1920s, the Republican Party platform routinely called for anti-lynching legislation. The Democrats rejected such calls in their own platforms. When FDR forged the New Deal, he was able to pry Blacks away from their traditional attachment to the Party of Lincoln. But they remained in their dependent status, Democrats by virtue of political expediency, not principle.

As the incomparable Ann Coulter has observed, when Strom Thurmond, the praise of whom landed Sen. Lott in hot water, ran a segregationist campaign in 1948, he ran as a Dixie-CRAT, not a Dixie-CAN. When he lost, he went back to being a Democrat. He only repudiated his segregationist views when he later became a Republican.

Even the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which supposedly established the Democrats’ bona fides on race, was passed in spite of the Democrats rather than because of them. Republican Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen pushed the bill through the Senate, despite the no-votes of 21 Democrats, including Gore Sr. and Robert Byrd, who remains a powerful force in the Senate today. In contrast, only four Republicans opposed the bill, mostly like Barry Goldwater on libertarian principles, not segregationist ones.

Indeed, the case of Sen. Byrd is instructive when it comes to the double standard applied to the two parties when it comes to race. Even those Democrats who have exploited the Lott affair acknowledge that he is no racist. Can the same be said about Sen. Byrd, who was a member of the KKK and who recently used the "n" word on national TV?

"Ah, but this is all in the past," say the Democrats. "Now we push a pro-African-American agenda." But the reality differs significantly from the claim.

Take the issue of education. The single biggest obstacle to the achievement of true equality in the United States is not poverty, but education. If Democrats sincerely wished to help the minority children on whose behalf they claim to labor, they would embrace school choice to help such children escape the trap of sub-standard schools. But that would offend the teachers’ unions upon which the Democrats depend for financial and "in-kind" support. So as has often been the case with the group politics of the Democratic party, African-American interests are sacrificed to other groups who have more pull.

"Affirmative action" has become the touchstone of Democratic racial politics. Democrats portray anyone who opposes affirmative action as racist. But affirmative action, as currently practiced, is racist to the core. It is based on the assumption that African-Americans are incapable of competing with whites. It represents the kind of paternalistic racism that would have done honor to Calhoun. For the modern liberal Democratic racist as for the old-fashioned one, blacks are simply incapable of freedom. They will always need Ol’ Massa’s help. And woe be to any African-American who wanders off of the Democratic plantation. Ask Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, or Ward Connerly. Although they echo the call for a "color-blind society" that once characterized the vision of Martin Luther King Jr., they are pilloried as "Uncle Toms" of "Oreos" by such enforcers of the Democratic plantation system as Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton.

If we need the perfect symbol for the true character of the Democratic Party when it comes to race, we need look no farther than Rhode Island Congressman Patrick Kennedy. Rep. Kennedy portrays himself as a friend of African-Americans. But his touching solicitude for African-Americans as a group is gross hypocrisy. When inconvenienced by a real African-American woman trying to do her job, Rep. Kennedy shoved her out of his way, giving her arm a yank for good measure. In practice, the Democratic Party as a whole cares as much about real African-Americans as Rep. Kennedy does.




H/T goes to Mackubin  T. Owens at the Ashbrook Center Source URL: http://outlawrepublican.blogspot.com/search/label/diversity
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