Lawrence,
I must respectfully disagree with your assumption that just because minority leadership and elites gain, their purported “constituents” do.
I won’t be so crass as to argue that the people claiming benefit are lying. I’m sure that they benefit, at least in the short run.
However, only a small number of minorities gain from set asides and quotas. For the rest, these serve as an impediment, as it masks the true state of their position.
The simple reality is that the kids failing and droppping out of school or getting diplomas they can barely read, are the true losers. Their plight is either ignored by black and hispanic leadership, or used as an excuse for more funding for failing socialist systems.

I do agree that conservatives do need to have the courage to take the position that just because a PC minority benefits, that does not make a discriminatory policy justified or moral.

I entirely agree with Ron (and with Jason L. Riley) that blacks are objectively morally harmed by being coddled and puffed up and given unearned benefits. Yet the fact remains that probably a majority of blacks, and, more importantly, black America as an organized community, LIKES those unearned benefits, wants more of them, and gets furiously angry if anyone threatens to take them away. There is therefore something comically tone-deaf about the endless pious conservative editorials in places like the New York Post and the Wall Street Journal arguing that racial preferences hurt blacks, when the black community itself is aggressively demanding those same racial preferences. It does not help to develop trust and respect between the races when blacks sense (correctly) that whites don’t see blacks as they really are, but only see them through the lens of white preconceptions. This present issue is an example of that.

Whites can’t begin to get serious about stopping affirmative action until they recognize the fact that, whether or not affirmative action is morally harmful to blacks, a decisive number of blacks nevertheless like it and want it.

What this means is that the racial preference system can only be terminated through the moral leadership of a white majority that believes in the principles of individuality and fairness and is prepared to enforce those principles on the whole society, including those groups that are currently deriving enormous benefits from race preferences. It should also be clear that an individualist, single-standard, race-blind system cannot be reached by endless appeals to a supposed widespread black sympathy for such a system that in fact doesn’t exist. Instead, building such a system would require the realization of the following uncomfortable facts: (1) that blacks on average have a significantly lower level of intellectual abilities than whites; (2) that under a race-blind system, blacks on average will always be behind whites by economic and other measures; (3) that attainment of a truly race-blind system involves acceptance of such inequality of results (reasonable ameliorative efforts should of course be pursued, if without the utopian expectation that total racial equality is attainable); (4) that because of these intrinsic racial inequalities, many blacks have a strong motive to oppose any return to a race-blind system; and (5) since it’s overwhelmingly whites who believe in the individualist, race-blind system, leadership in actualizng such a system must, as a practical matter, come mainly from whites.

The paradox is that a return to a truly liberal society based on individualism and a single standard (which is what today’s mainstream conservatives believe in) would require political leadership by a non-liberal, race-conscious, white majority.

The situation has its complications. AA is, among other things, a graded system of payments to members of the black elite, with higher-ranking members getting much larger payments. As such, it has obvious effects: it separates the interests of black elites from those of their ostensible constituents, and turns them into fanatical defenders of the established order that gives them the goodies.

Joe Guzzardi has an interesting discussion at Vdare ( http://vdare.com/guzzardi/look_the_other_way.htm ) of another consequence of AA: it turns black leaders into dedicated proponents of mass third-world immigration. Mass immigration obviously injures rank-and-file blacks, but it benefits black elites by strengthening the centralized race-manipulating state on which they depend.

I think the “AA only helps the black elite” argument is often overstated. While the ones at the top get the most privileges, a large part of the black community has benefited from the vast network of special racial privileges now afforded to blacks by American society. While the direct beneficiaries of AA in hiring and admissions may not be an absolute majority of the black population, they are not a narrow unrepresentative elite either. Also, we should remember that in any community, it is the active and capable minority that represents the community, that “counts” politically. And even the lower class blacks who have not benefited directly from AA nevertheless have benefited psychologically in terms of enhanced self-esteem from seeing blacks raised to such a lauded, prominent position in America—a symbolism at which President Clinton was particularly adept.

Lower class blacks also benefit from the current regime in a way John Derbyshire has discussed: corporations and other private employers are a) terrified of being accused of racism, and therefore coddle incompetent minority employees, and b)these same minority employees are the objects of ambulance-chasing by “unscrupulous” (in reality only doing their jobs) lawyers, thereby making said employee eligible for lump-sum out-of-court settlements.

An “AA only helps the black elite” argument would of course make no sense. So for that matter would an “AA only helps blacks and other favored minorities” argument. AA helps any number of people — the Clintons, winners of the litigation lottery, lawyers as a class, social scientists as a class, bureaucrats as a class, etc., etc., etc. Nonetheless, it does seem to me that AA in the end makes life worse overall for blacks in general but not for elite blacks (unless you take into account the moral damage involved in living a lie). And since it corrupts the black elite it makes it much less likely that black leaders will step back, look at the effect of the system on the overall life of their people, and propose moving in a better direction.

Even if it were true that AA is good only for the black elite, that would not change that fact that the black elite represents black America. The members of the Congressional Black Caucus, for example, are by definition part of the black elite, yet they are also the highest elected representatives of black America, most of them being elected in majority black districts. They are also, needless to say, passionate advocates of affirmative action. The same goes for every recognized black leader.

My point is that the “elite/grass roots” dichotomy is something of an illusion, since the black elite (to use Voegelin’s terminology) existentially represents blacks as a community. Therefore the overthrow of the affirmative action regime is not going to be led by blacks, nor can it be achieved by white conservative editorialists appealing to a largely non-existent black opposition to affirmative action. It could only be achieved by a principled white leadership, representing a majority of the country, that imposes its will on both the white left and the black community.

It seems to me important though to maintain the view — if it can be maintained in good faith, which I believe it can — that the struggle over AA is not simply a struggle between the interests of blacks and the interests of whites but a struggle for a public good that benefits people generally.

I entirely agree that this is a struggle “for a public good that benefits people generally.” On that basis, the believers in the ideal of a common public order should appeal to all citizens. At the same time, we need to recognize that the black community as presently constituted does not share that ideal, and therefore that this struggle will of necessity involve opposing and criticizing assumptions and agendas widely held by blacks, as well as by liberal whites.
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Suppose there was an office composed of 9 people: 4 white professionals (2 of whom are Jewish) and 5 black support staff. Four black support staff do nothing most of the day and the 5th puts in an unknown amount of hours and will not tolerate supervision. The black support show up late every single day and only on days they feel like showing up. The blacks have no accrued sick leave; the whites have thousands of accrued hours, each. The 4 white professionals show up every single day, work hard, wish the support would disappear so that another professional could be hired, and, at least two (one brilliant Jewish worker, one Catholic) put in a lot of unpaid overtime. The black support staff doesn’t even ask for work. This would be evidence that Mr. Auster’s hypothesis is valid.

I don’t believe that blacks can ever be persuaded that AA is wrong because AA allows them to live lives of wealth and power and the black race may be the most materially-minded of the races. AA can only be stopped by white people and it may be already too late.

Even if AA hurts black people in some immaterial way, they don’t care, and neocons seem oblivious to this fact. I think its because neocons are essentially leftists who cannot imagine people as thinking differently from themselves. This self-infatuation partly explains why leftists refuse to believe in racial differences but it also explains other leftist behaviours too. Leftists seem often experience cognitave dissonance when they come into contact with conservative views because in their minds those views should not exist.

“AA can only be stopped by white people …”

Thanks to Sporon for stating so succinctly what I’ve been trying to say.

Maybe we can hope for a modern day George Washington Carver, a saintly and brilliant black man that insisted on self-reliance and a pure soul. If there must be a set aside holiday for blacks, it should be for Mr. Carver instead of the hyped-up MLK. Heck, he might beat out all other famous Americans in the race for an American idol.

But even if there were such a black leader, he would not be able, any more than upright black leaders of today like Ward Connerly have been able, to change the black community’s attachment to AA. They’ve got it, and they are not willing to give it up. Whites gave it to them. Only whites can take it away.

Conservative whites and blacks who think that this issue hinges on an increase of conservatism among blacks do not understand the realities of power and leadership. Their view is analogous to Bush’s effort to secure the support of the Europeans and of the Arabs BEFORE proceeding with the war against Iraq. A year ago the conventional wisdom was that the war could not go forward unless there was first a peace between Israel and the Palestinians, because otherwise the Arabs would rise up against us if we attacked Iraq. That was putting the ball into THEIR court, and it got nowhere. Instead, as actually happened, Bush had to lead by taking the initiative and creating new facts on the ground, and then those countries that were willing to follow, followed, or at least accepted what the U.S. had done and began to adjust to the new realities. You cannot lead by waiting for the followers to take the initiative.

It’s the same with whites and blacks and getting rid of AA. Whites must lead, and then blacks will follow. But if whites wait for this change to be initiated from within the black community, nothing will ever happen.

The statement, “Affirmative Action harms blacks,” is one of many used by prominent “conservatives.” Others are:

“I am against illegal immigration. I support legal immigration.”

“I am for women in the military. They just should not be in combat units.”

“Hispanics are a natural Republican constituency.”

“Immigrants are basically conservative.”

These are just a few words of wisdom I have seen used by the mainline right.

A correspondent writes:

“One of the key underestimated dynamics across a host of issues is long-term vs. short-term. This occurs most obviously in areas like trade and debt. Americans are having a fun time consuming the world’s goodies today. But there will be hell to pay tomorrow.

“With regard to affirmative action, affirmative action is patently and massively beneficial to blacks in the short-run.

“Maybe it is bad for blacks in the very long-run. But most black Americans don’t care about the very long run—and in this they are being just like all other Americans.”