This ties into how you called him a "white" black man:
And to be Black in America today means that you must subscribe to preferential liberalism in some way or another politically. And if you don't then your identity itself is--is--is kept from you so that the Black conservative who does not agree with--with preferential liberalism is, by definition, not Black. So we see Clarence Thomas is not Black. Colin Powell is marginally Black. His--his support of affirmative action helps him. Condoleezza Rice, marginal.
Peter Robinson: Shelby Steele.
Shelby Steele: Shelby Steele is probably not because I'm against the use of racial preferences, affirmative action. So that--that political position, in effect, denies one--one's racial identity. And that's the--the power--that--that's why we see I think, you know, ninety some percent of the Black vote coming out for whatever democrat runs for president because the identity itself is--is held hostage.
Some other parts you might have missed:
Peter Robinson: Do you buy the argument that the failure of public schools disproportionately harms Black students because they're the ones who…
Shelby Steele: Absolutely.
Peter Robinson: You buy that.
Shelby Steele: Yes, yes I do.
Peter Robinson: Okay. So it wouldn't surprise you that polls show that, depending on the poll, forty to fifty percent of African Americans favor voucher programs which is a higher level of support than you find in virtually any other ethnic group in the country.
Shelby Steele: Right.
Peter Robinson: No surprise to you there?
Shelby Steele: No.
Peter Robinson: Now, here's the surprise. Kweisi Mfume, President of the NAACP, quote, "The attacks of the right on our children's future have solidified around a concept of exclusion and selective opportunity called vouchers. No other scheme poses a greater danger to the idea that no child should be left behind." Now here you have a Black leader violently opposed to an idea to which ordinary African Americans, the polls indicate, are quite open. How come?
Shelby Steele: I call this group in--in--in my last book, the grievance elite, and--and I think the NAACP sadly is--is--is among that crowd. And they are an elite and their purpose is to keep alive the idea of victimization and they are very much in lea--in league with the Teacher's Unions, with this whole ideology of preferential liberalism, of government intervention, of--of--of money infusion and so forth. And--and vouchers is again a conservative idea. It's an idea that--that tries to introduce choice in a situation where there is none now and competition in the situation where there is none now. And these are very threatening ideas to a grievance elite that is entirely grounded in--in preferential liberalism.
Peter Robinson: Last topic, what are the prospects for a change in African American political leadership?
Peter Robinson: The economist, Paul Samuelson has joked that, I'm quoting him now, "We make progress in economics one academic funeral at a time." That is to say, deep changes occur not when the intellectuals realize that there's a new idea but when an entire generation, a new generation embraces it. Is that what we--we simply have to wait a generation or two for the Black leadership to turn over or can it happen more quickly?
Shelby Steele: I think it will happen more quick--quickly. Again, if you look at the--the--the--the--the stature of the Black leadership in America today as of--as opposed to the '60s, when--when there was genuine and profound moral authority…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: Martin Luther King giving that marvelous speech…
Shelby Steele: …and you look at today, the Black--a Black leadership of--of Kweisi Mfume, of Jesse Jackson, of Al Sharpton pe--called frequently in the media, shakedown artists, exposed in--in this way and in that way. They simply lack the--the stature and the moral authority that…
[Talking at same time]
Peter Robinson: It's a Berlin wall, it could fall at any moment?
Shelby Steele: It could fall at any moment. There--I can tell you that in the Black community, there are rumblings. And--and many Blacks are not happy being represented by this group and this policy--these--these policies.
Peter Robinson: Let me--last question then, we've talked about those SAT scores which are useful and damnable for the same reason. They reduce a great deal to a single number.
Shelby Steele: Yes.
Peter Robinson: When does that gap substantially close? Is that something we can see in a decade?
Shelby Steele: However long it takes for us to--to get the idea that we must become intellectually and academically competitive with the very best in American life that our entire group depends on. That single variable more than any other. And--and so again, I--I'd--I'd--I'd be happy to get rid of the SAT tests on the day that the gap is gone. But we need the SAT now more than any other group in American society. We need to understand what our competition is. We need to have an idea of what excellence is. And without the SAT, we don't have that. We have nothing to shoot for but mediocrity.
