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Jeff Goldstein penned a satirical post yesterday that delves into the debate on whether or not Affirmative Action is still a necessary tool for U.S. racial (and gender) equality.

Specifically, Jeff cites Ward Connerly's essay that Mr. Connerly wrote as a rebuttal to DeWayne Wickham's USA Today editorial where Mr. Wickham glowing approves of Barack Obama's continued support of that questionable policy, Affirmative Action.

Barack Obama on one hand campaigns and espouses the tag line "Race doesn't matter!" and "CHANGE!" but on the other hand still embraces the racial and gender preferences that affirmative action programs champion, even after the Supreme Court struck down (in Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education) a lower court's rulings that continued to allow schools to assign students to schools based solely on the color of their skin. Judge Roberts, writing for the majority..."The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race".

From DeWayne Wickham's essay...

"In response to a question I put to him a day earlier, Obama answered that he opposes efforts to pass constitutional amendments this year in Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska to ban affirmative action in state contracting and college admissions.

"Sen. Obama believes in a country in which opportunity is available to all Americans, regardless of their race, gender or economic status. That's why he opposes these ballot initiatives, which would roll back opportunity for millions of Americans and cripple efforts to break down historic barriers to the progress of qualified women and minorities," Candice Tolliver, an Obama campaign spokesperson, told me.

"White women and blacks are the biggest beneficiaries of affirmative action programs.

...

"While Obama has long been on record in support of affirmative action, speaking out against the effort by Ward Connerly, a black California businessman who spearheaded successful campaigns to ban it in California, Michigan and Washington, is an act of political courage.

"It comes at a time when Obama is trying to win over working-class whites, many of whom believe affirmative action gains by women and blacks come at their expense. Nothing reflects Obama's call for a departure from the old political thinking more than his belief that he can address the concerns of disaffected whites without abandoning the interests of minorities and women —the Democrats' core constituencies.

...

"By opposing this effort at the same time that he's reaching out to working-class whites, Obama is forging a strategy that could deal a fatal blow to the movement Connerly has led for more than a decade. That would be a good thing.

"Obama believes America can keep its promise to women and blacks without dashing the hopes of working-class whites. He doesn't think opportunity guarantees made to one group must come at the expense of another. His is admittedly a new political vision, one that may well propel him into the White House —and help this nation fully live up to its promise."

A promise, it seems, that seeks to continue the political divide in the U.S. based on identity politics: empathizing those divisions that seek to put race and gender considerations above all others.

Mr. Connerly responds to Mr. Wickham...

"With all my heart – and for the betterment of my country – I desperately wanted to believe that Sen. Barack Obama was not one of the same tired voices who peddle arguments about "institutional racism."

"I have heard him say that America is not about "black and white." I was inspired when his supporters chanted at his rally on the night of his victory in South Carolina that "race doesn't matter." I thought his March 18 speech about race had the potential to become a defining moment in our endless struggle to confront and conquer this issue. I was encouraged by his perceptive acknowledgment that affirmative action breeds resentment and hostility. As millions of whites cast their votes for him in predominantly white states, I held out hope that, perhaps, he truly was a transformative leader.

...

..."Mr. Obama supports race preferences.

"As many readers will know, I am intimately involved in the effort to enact race-neutral ballot initiatives around the country (right now in Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska). I find it difficult to understand how the senator can "strongly oppose" any initiative that does precisely what he professes to believe and is consistent with the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

"This is the language of the initiatives I am now sponsoring: "The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin, in the operation of public employment, public education or public contracting."

"The rationale for using race preferences to "eliminate historic barriers," upon which Mr. Obama relies as his primary justification, has been rejected consistently by the Supreme Court since the Bakke decision in 1978. Only the pursuit of "diversity" by higher education meets the strict constitutional test for race preferences. As a lawyer, I am sure that Mr. Obama must know this.

"He must also know that blacks and whites are not the only racial groups in America. Every year there are more than 48,000 applicants for one of the 4,500 seats at the University of California campus at Berkeley. Before the passage of the initiative in that state to outlaw race preferences, thousands of Asian students were denied admission so that a greater number of "underrepresented minorities" could be admitted.

"Similar circumstances exist across the nation, because college admissions, public jobs and government contracts are the ultimate "zero-sum" game, and race and gender should not be the determining factors in picking winners and losers. It simply stretches credulity to argue that an "opportunity" given to one, on the basis of race, is not discrimination against another for the same reason.

"The issue that troubled many Americans about the widely publicized sermons of Rev. Jeremiah Wright was his view that America is an "institutionally racist" society. This view lies at the heart of the defense advocates of race preferences make for "affirmative action." It is also at the core of Black Liberation Theology.

"By supporting race preferences, Mr. Obama is unmistakably attaching himself to despicable ideas like Rev. Wright's. And, if he believes in those precepts, how does he reconcile his impressive political success and that of Mrs. Clinton with this perspective? Thirty-six million Americans didn't vote for the two of them because the majority of the American people are racist and sexist.

"If Mr. Obama wants to be the candidate of "change," why doesn't he change the idiotic racial classification system that burdens millions of Americans? Why doesn't he call attention to the barbaric "one-drop" (of hereditary blood) rule that continues to haunt our nation, and which drives him to identify with the "black community" at the expense of his white ancestry? If he wants to unite the American people, how does he propose to do that by asking some Americans to accept preferential treatment for others and discrimination against themselves?"

Well, Mr. Connerly, there wouldn't be that ever-divisive Democratic party without those various identity groups that comprise it wanting more and more for doing less and less. This fractured Nation, a once-great melting pot, now is divided into small sub-groups, each wanting a piece for themselves at the expense of the other groups. And all of these factional sub-groups want their piece of the pie at the expense of the greater identity that the U.S. as a nation needs, especially right now, to face the real challenges we're up against right this minute: the energy costs that are cutting our economy to ribbons; the challenges of jobs leaving the U.S. for cheaper-working nations (India and China come to mind, where you don't see so many separate identity groups working against the goals of the nation-state); the continued worldwide threat of terrorism sponsored by factions of Islamofascists...those issues aren't going to be solved by continuing to allow our country to compartmentalize into ever-louder groups of infantile crybabies. Spoiled, crying children; the base of the Democratic Party.

And Barack Obama isn't going to make a bit of difference. If anything, he represents not his stated and overused (and continued ephemeral) catchphrase "Change", but given his position on affirmative action and his embrace of divisive leftist politics he's more 'Stay the same course, and we'll continue to divide the U.S., and even further, because I want to emphasize our diversity, and, O!, let's make sure every other nation approves of us, because, you know, we just want to fit in and be accepted by the world community!'

There's some change for you.