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“Do you think in the future, a Democratic Administration will nominate Barack Obama to the Supreme Court?”Look—I’m unabashedly a conservative Republican. But I can say with absolute certainty that I’m not being biased when I say Barack Obama would be one of the least qualified people ever nominated, if in fact he were to be nominated.There are probably a few obscure nominees with less relevant experience… but I can’t think of any.Let’s just compare to the current Court’s resumes, shall we?Legal jobs/accomplishments in bold italics.Chief Justice John RobertsJ.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School—1979Managing Editor, Harvard Law ReviewClerked for Judge Henry Friendly, Second Circuit—1979–1980Clerked for Chief Justice William Rehnquist—1980–1981Special assistant to USAG—1981–1982Associate Counsel to the President—1982–1986Associate at Hogan & Hartson—1986–1989Principal Deputy Attorney General—1989–1993Partner at Hogan & Hartson—1993–2003Argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court, won 25Associate Judge, DC Circuit—2003–2005Chief Justice, Supreme Court—2005–presentTOTAL: 26 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSSenior Associate Justice Clarence ThomasJ.D. from Yale Law School—1974Assistant Attorney General of Missouri—1974–1977Attorney for Monsanto Chemical—1977–1979Legislative Assistant to Senator John Danforth—1979–1981Assistant Secretary of Education for the Office for Civil Rights, U.S. D.Ed.—1981–1982Chairman of Equal Employment Opportunity Commission—1982–1990Associate Judge, DC Circuit—1990–1991Associate Justice, Supreme Court—1991–presentTOTAL: 6 years legal experience prior to SCOTUS, but with intervening years spent in legally-intensive civil service—effectively 17 years including prior judicial appointmentAssociate Justice Ruth Bader GinsburgJ.D. from Columbia Law School—1959Harvard Law Review and Columbia Law ReviewClerked for Judge Edmund Palmieri, U.S. District Court SDNY—1960–1961Research Associate, Columbia Law—1961–1963Co-authored a book on Swedish civil procedureProfessor, Rutgers School of Law—1963–1972Co-founded law journal Women’s Rights Law Reporter—1970Professor, Columbia Law—1972–1980Co-authored first casebook on sex discriminationFellow at Stanford University Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences—1977–1978General Counsel for ACLU—1973–1980Associate Judge, DC Circuit—1980–1993Associate Justice, Supreme Court—1993–presentTOTAL: 34 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Stephen BreyerLL.B. from Harvard Law School—1963Clerked for Associate Justice Arthur Goldberg—1964–1965Special Assistant to USAG for Antitrust—1965–1967Professor, Harvard Law—1967–1994Assistant Special Prosecutor, Watergate Special Prosecution Force—1973Professor, Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government—1977–1980Author of several texts on deregulationAssociate Judge, First Circuit—1980–1990Chief Judge, First Circuit—1990–1994Associate Justice, Supreme Court—1994–presentTOTAL: 31 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Samuel AlitoJ.D. from Yale Law School—1975Editor, Yale Law JournalClerked for Judge Leonard Garth, Third Circuit—1976–1977Assistant U.S. Attorney, District of NJ—1977–1981Assistant to U.S. Solicitor General—1981–1985Argued 12 cases before the Supreme Court, won 10Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel—1985–1987U.S. Attorney, District of NJ—1987–1990Adjunct Professor, Seton Hall University School of Law—1990–2004St. Thomas More Medal for “outstanding contributions to the field of law”—1995Associate Judge, Third Circuit—1990–2006Associate Justice, Supreme Court—2006–presentTOTAL: 31 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Sonia SotomayorJ.D. from Yale Law School—1979Editor, Yale Law JournalAssistant District Attorney, New York County—1979–1983Board Member, Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund—1980–1992Solo law practice—1983–1986Associate at Pavia & Harcourt—1984–1988Board Member, State of New York Mortgage Agency—1987–1992Partner at Pavia & Harcourt—1988–1992Member, NYC Campaign Finance Board—1988–1992Judge, U.S. District Court SDNY—1992–1998Associate Judge, Second Circuit—1998–2009Associate Justice, Supreme Court—2009–presentTOTAL: 30 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Elena KaganJ.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School—1986Supervisory Editor, Harvard Law ReviewClerked for Judge Abner Mikva, DC Circuit—1986–1987Clerked for Justice Thurgood Marshall—1987–1988Associate at Williams & Connolly—1989–1991Professor, University of Chicago Law School—1991–1999Special Counsel to Senate Judiciary Committee—1993–1995Associate Counsel to the President—1995–1996Deputy Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy—1997–1999Professor, Harvard Law School—1999–2009Dean, Harvard Law School—2003–2009U.S. Solicitor General—2009–2010Associate Justice, Supreme Court—2010–presentTOTAL: 24 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Neil GorsuchJ.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School—1991Editor, Harvard Journal of Law and Public PolicyClerked for Judge David Sentelle, DC Circuit—1991–1992Clerked for Justices Byron White and Anthony Kennedy—1993–1994Associate at Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel—1995–1998Partner at Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel—1998–2005Principal Deputy to the Associate Attorney General—2005–2006Associate Judge, Tenth Circuit—2006–2017Associate Justice, Supreme Court—2017–presentTOTAL: 26 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSAssociate Justice Brett KavanaughJ.D. cum laude from Yale Law School—1990Notes Editor, Yale Law JournalClerked for Judge Walter Stapleton, Third Circuit—1990–1991Clerked for Judge Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit—1991–1992Fellowship with U.S. Solicitor General—1992–1993Clerked for Justice Anthony Kennedy—1993–1994Associate Counsel, Office of the Independent Counsel—1994–1997Partner at Kirkland & Ellis—1997–1998Associate Counsel, Office of the Independent Counsel—1998–1999Partner at Kirkland & Ellis—1999–2001Associate White House Counsel—2001–2003White House Staff Secretary—2003–2006Associate Judge, DC Circuit—2006–2018Associate Justice, Supreme Court—2018–presentTOTAL: 25 years legal experience prior to SCOTUSYou see those veritable seas of bold, italic text? These men and women have eaten, slept, and breathed law, since graduating law school.Now let’s review,President Barack ObamaJ.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School—1991President, Harvard Law ReviewVisiting Law and Government Fellow, University of Chicago Law School—1991–1993Lecturer, University of Chicago Law School—1992–2004Associate at Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland—1993–1996Of Counsel, Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland—1996–2004Illinois State Senator—1997–2005U.S. Senator—2005–2009President of the United States—2009–2017Speaking engagements—2017–presentTOTAL: 13 years legal experience, no judicial experience, no appellate argumentHe hasn’t been a lawyer by trade at all since 2004, nor even licensed to practice since 2007. He hasn’t been a full time attorney since 1996 (over 20 years). He was never a tenured professor, never wrote any notable legal treatises, and frankly (as near as I can tell) was utterly unremarkable as both attorney and law professor—I’m sure he was fully competent… but if he hadn’t gone into politics, I see no evidence that we’d even know his name.This isn’t a “bash Obama” answer. I’m not saying he was a bad lawyer, nor that his lack of legal accolades has any bearing on his presidential career. Even the fact that he’s no longer licensed says nothing about his 20-years-ago competency or about him as a person—merely that law has been a complete non-priority for him in he past decade.But his resume frankly looks nothing like the resume of a well-qualified Supreme Court Justice.An Obama nomination would be rank partisanship, in a way that we truly have not seen in my lifetime—it would make both the Garland affair and the Kavanaugh borking look like mature bipartisanship.Because the only conceivable reason to nominate Barack Obama to the Supreme Court would be because of the outcomes he’d be likely to vote for—he’s not qualified… but he sure will vote reliably liberal!That being said, I’ve heard no one seriously proposing this. We haven’t sunk that far yet.

So, this last weekend, I was up visiting my in-laws, and we got nailed with something they call a “bomb cyclone.”[1] It was a big two-day snowstorm that dropped about two feet of snow where I was and blew it all over hell. We’re talking 6–8 foot drifts.I have a Subaru Outback, which I was able to buy with a Good Son Discount from my parents and I’m very appreciative of that. It’s a very nice car, and it can go through just about anything with the excellent ground clearance and all-wheel drive. It’s very safe, and since I now have a kid, that’s why my folks were willing to sell it to me.My in-laws live well off the beaten path, off of a minimum maintenance road that doesn’t get plowed by the county. They hire a guy, but he often doesn’t come for days or sometimes even weeks. So, my father-in-law has a plow on his truck and has to plow out the road himself much of the time.We waited until Duluth was downgraded from “ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE” to at least “snow covered roads; travel not advised,” and my father-in-law had plowed out the road to at least the main county road (about 8 miles away,) which had been plowed by the county, before we left.And we made it home. It was a little hairy at times, but we made it home, and because of that, I didn’t have to take an extra vacation day from work over it.My Subaru can and did make it through some pretty nasty stuff, but really, we made it home because of the snowplows clearing away enough that we could do the rest on our own.Without those plows, we would have gotten stuck. I have the utmost faith in the Subie (and my wife will tell you that I have probably too much faith in the Subie), but I wouldn’t have even attempted it without the plows.At least in the United States, yes, life is much easier if you’re a white person, because essentially, white people are driving behind a large social snowplow that non-white people often do not get to drive behind.I’m sure I’m about to get a giant pile of US white people who will comment about handouts and affirmative action and “well, I’m poor and I know a lot of white people who are and it sure as hell doesn’t feel easier to me!”And that’s true. All of that is true. That road might still be pretty shitty, and you might have done a lot of work to get where you are.Listen. I probably look like the model of the self-made man. I worked hard, got an education, and now I’m doing my best to make something of myself. I’ve worked plenty of hard, manual, “dirty” jobs, and I’ve worked my way up to where the health problems I have mostly stem from a profoundly flattened ass.I’m also a lily-white heterosexual Christian Midwestern dude from a moderately middle-class family who came over on the boat when land was ultra-cheap.My success in life is partly due to hard work, and partly due to the fact that I won the birthright jackpot.There are at least two things that are solely due to the melanin content of my skin and family history that have massively greased the skids for me compared to similarly situated people who are not white: generational accumulated opportunity, and structural privilege.These two things are like a snowplow. They cleared a path for me, and people like me, particularly people who look like me, to more easily succeed.Generational Accumulated OpportunityBuy land. They ain’t makin’ any more of the stuff. - Will RogersOver Thanksgiving, I got in a stupid political argument with a family member, as you do when you live where the air hurts your face and you’re sitting in a blizzard warning watching multiple feet of snow whipping around outside.While we were arguing about deregulation and unrestrained, unbridled capitalism, I pointed out that we had that at one point, and conditions were bad enough that it led to a number of constitutional amendments and the Progressive Era to correct for the Gilded Age and the robber barons. There were a lot of people who didn’t think it was as great a time to be alive as John D. Rockefeller did.He brought up something that I’m guessing Ben Shapiro must be saying lately because I’ve been seeing it pop up a lot in recent weeks: “Well, if the Gilded Age was so bad, why did so many people immigrate here at that point in history?”That answer is, in good part, cheap or even free land.When my folks came over from Germany during the Gilded Age, they got land in Wisconsin for less than a dollar an acre. Even adjusted for inflation, my family was able to buy upwards of a half a square mile of land for less than $5,000 in today’s money. (That same land is well over $5,000 an acre today.) At other points in history, you could get 40, 80, even 160 acres of land from the Federal government for the price of “pack a wagon, go there, and work it up.”[2] A lot of land was granted to timber companies and railroads, who in turn sold it cheaply to new immigrants for a profit to them.[3]Understand that land in Europe was virtually impossible to get your hands on. People didn’t own real property, for the most part. To own 40, 80, 160 acres would have been wealth beyond the dreams of most people.Understand the history of just English property law.[4] Basically, the king owned everything, and doled out tracts of that to the aristocracy, who in turn might dole out some of that to other aristocracy or gentry. Most people lived on someone else’s land and either paid rent or worked for the aristocracy or gentry. Other European nation-states were similar.Whatever the local law was, one thing was certain: Owning land meant income.Let me repeat that: owning land meant income.When you read those old English novels by Austen and Bronte, and it seems like nobody really had a job, that’s why: they were living on the income generated by the land they owned and the people living on it.Even when real property law in European/Western nation-states evolved and individuals really owned the land more than just the local monarch, there was the problem of a lack of frontier. There was a limited supply, and it was already owned by people. Nobody was making more of the stuff.Until some people trying to go find a better trade route bumped into a whole new chunk of it that they’d previously been unaware of.And since the folks who already owned and occupied that land weren’t white or European or Christian, the people who were white and European and Christian kind of looked the other way whilst other white, European Christians cleared the folks from that land and then those other white, European Christians all looked at each other and went, “Whaaaaaaat?! A whole continent that doesn’t have anyone on it?! SWEET!”It’s ours, boys! Ours for the taking! Manifest destiny! WOOOOO!Jon Stewart pointed this out very well, this problem that the United States has always had an entitlement mentality, in The Rumble in the Air Conditioned Auditorium back in 2012, a debate with Bill O’Reilly:We are an entitlement nation. We were born that way. We’re a country [of people] who came to another country with people already on it and went, “Yeah, I think we’ll have that. That’ll be nice.”But it wasn’t just that we wanted to come here, take resources, and leave. People wanted the land.It was well worth it to sell everything you owned, hop on a boat, and come here for that. The entry cost was essentially nothing. The requirements were (a) be alive when you get here, (b) don’t have any readily apparent communicable diseases, and at various times (c) don’t be Chinese or Asian-enough to be thought of as Chinese, a Japanese businessman or professional, black (whether free or slave - didn’t matter, you couldn’t vote, own property, etc.), Hispanic or Hispanic looking when we were at war with Spain or various Spanish-descended colonies or nations, or over the quotas for nations established in the 1920’s. This didn’t really change much until the 1950’s. For a solid 150 years of the nation’s history, this was pretty much how it was.The restrictions that did exist around immigration very much favored white people. And once you got here and got in, even if you weren’t white, it was easier for you to get that land if you were white. (I’ll get to that in a bit).What’s that? You there? What does that have to do with why it’s easier to be a white person today, you ask? Be patient. I’m getting there.Here’s the thing about land. Once you’ve got land, you’ve also got a lot of things that go with land.In the law, we talk about owning real property as having a “bundle of sticks.” [5] Those sticks are various rights associated with land ownership. There’s rights to alienate (sell), exploit (mineral rights, water rights, timber rights, crop rights, etc.), to improve, to occupy, and more. You can transfer those rights, in whole or in part, for a set length of time or forever.That makes it a huge asset to leverage. Land is great collateral. It’s (generally) never going down in price, it’s usually stable and not likely to go anywhere like personal property, and the chain of custody and title is usually pretty easily traceable. Who has what rights in real property is usually a matter of public record or well-recorded.It used to be that land was also essential for voting rights. If you didn’t own land, you didn’t have the right to vote. Even after that changed, land ownership still had a significant amount of voting power to it, and still does today. I laugh a little when I hear folks say that land doesn’t vote, people do, because that’s about half true. Because we have geographical representation, folks who own a lot of land also have a lot of influence in local politics, and as any congressional veteran will tell you: all politics are local.On top of that, land can be inherited. It can be passed down generationally. Even if it’s not income-generating land, it’s a huge expenditure that’s saved from occupying someone else’s land as a tenant. That means that income and wealth could be used to leverage other opportunities: education, the purchase of more land, and so forth.If your parents are more highly educated and wealthy, that vastly increases the chances that you will be highly educated and wealthy, because that status provides more networking with other people who can provide opportunity.Think about Sam Walton’s children, for example. Walton paved the way for them, not just with direct wealth transfer to them, but because they grew up knowing a lot of the right people. They could go to private schools, with the kids of other connected people. They made friendships. Later in life, they could leverage those friendships and connections for things like getting on the boards of profitable companies, which pay them a lot of money.Even if Walton put every penny he ever got from Wal-Mart into a charitable trust and his kids never saw a dime directly, it was the opportunities generated simply because that wealth existed that gave them their wealth.So, even if your parents were rich and never passed that wealth directly to you, there’s still a substantial amount of indirect benefit of just being associated with that wealth. A name might open doors that would otherwise be closed.You got a lot of opportunity.All of that snowballs through generations. And a lack of that opportunity also snowballs through generations.[6] (Credit to Feifei Wang for sharing this awesome explanation of privilege and how small differences in opportunity over time really stack up, and can then lead to thinking you never had or needed the snowplow in the first place.)So, if 150–250 years ago, your ancestors had land, it’s very likely that you are still indirectly benefiting from that today, even if there’s not a dollar in your bank account that can be directly traced to that land. You benefit in networking, opportunity, and the absence of sunk costs.So, if we back that all up to the original distribution of real property, policies that made it harder for non-whites to own land, or businesses, or have opportunities, or that actively dispossessed some non-whites of land, businesses, and opportunities that they already had, together massively disadvantaged non-whites.You were very much more likely to have ancestors that had that land, and the opportunities that came from the generational accumulation of opportunity, if you were white.You got to drive behind the snowplow.Fine, you say. What does that have to do with, say, a white person who immigrates today? We’ve ended most of those polices - there aren’t federal land grants, etc. anymore, right?And there’s some truth to that. If you’re a relatively recent newcomer to the U.S., this is probably less of a factor for you.But here’s the thing: you look like the people for whom that was a factor. You might have a name similar to theirs. You might speak English in a dialect that more closely matches theirs.All of that accumulated generational opportunity created something else, a snowplow of a different sort:Structural privilege“If I’d accidentally jostled the Baronet Pettur in the street while I was still barefoot and muddy, he could have horsewhipped me bloody, then called the constable to arrest me for being a public nuisance. The constable would have done it, too, with a smile and a nod.Let me try to say this more succinctly. In the Commonwealth, the gentry are people with power and money. In Vintas, the gentry have power and money and privilege. Many rules simply do not apply to them.” – Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man’s FearUnderstand first what privilege is. It’s not merely advantage. Privilege is the extent to which you are exempted from certain social rules.In the earlier days of the nation, there was a very overt structural privilege built on race. Literally. Under the Naturalization Act of 1790, non-whites were legally not allowed to own property, vote, or testify in court.[7] The notorious Dred Scott Supreme Court decision held that those of African descent could never become citizens, no matter what.[8]Those who argue against white privilege sometimes point to the fact that slavery was not a new institution. However, this generally fails to acknowledge that American slavery was particularly unique, and unique in its cruelty, in that it was built specifically on race and white supremacy.[9] Even the lowliest piece of white trash would always be systemically superior to blacks in this system.This was done purposefully because the people running that power structure were vastly outnumbered by the people they controlled. By creating a system where the people at the bottom of that power structure essentially policed themselves, the people at the top could avoid any unification and uprising against them. Whole fields of pseudo-science were created to try to prove the basis for this. Religion was corrupted to justify it.Even after the Civil War, institutional momentum tried to preserve this status quo, through black codes and Jim Crow,[10] through criminalization targeted at racial minorities,[11] and even through simple class warfare that disproportionately (and intentionally) impacted blacks more than whites.[12]All of this was designed for one simple purpose: to create a hidden system of social rules for non-whites that did not apply to whites, which preserved a social order of white supremacy.Today, we’ve made some strides in trying to at least legally abolish the overt structural racism. There’s various Civil Rights Acts, the Fair Housing Act, anti-poverty and affirmative action programs that are meant to balance out that generational accumulation of opportunity.Now, I didn’t actively participate in any of the creation and perpetuation of the systemic problems, for the most part. The vast majority of all this machinery was put into place long before I was ever born, and even the attempts to correct for it were started considerably before I came about.But it still exists. And I benefit from it.My life is easier because of both that generational accumulated opportunity and the systemic privilege.In terms of generational accumulated opportunity, I got to go to college. And law school. And I had a place to stay if needed, and parents who could backstop me if I had a sudden massive expense. I got a lot of these opportunities because I had parents who could afford to spend time with me as a kid, make sure that I did well in school, provided external opportunities to learn and grow, had a hobby farm where I could learn skills such as home construction, mechanical repair, woodworking, and much more.They got a lot of that opportunity to provide those opportunities for me because of the work of previous generations snowplowing the way for them.My family mostly covered my wedding, and we had numerous baby showers when my son was on his way. Just these two alone probably freed up nearly $20,000 for me. That all came from a bunch of people who all got to follow a snowplow of their own, and who could afford to put it together for us.Because of who my grandfathers and grandmothers and parents were, my name carries with it a certain reputation that opened doors. In my lifetime, there are over half a dozen employment opportunities that I got that I can directly trace to people who gave me a chance because of my family.Go back to the point where my family really started generationally accumulating that opportunity, just in the United States, and at least some of it is due to policies that advantaged them for being white.In terms of structural privilege, there are a whole host of social rules that do not apply to me because I am white.[13]I am far less likely to be stopped by the police.[14]I am far less likely for those rare, but routine police encounters to turn violent.[15]I am far less likely to face incarceration.[16]I am far less likely to be suspected of petty crimes such as shoplifting or drugs.[17]Nobody ever asks me where I am really from. Nobody ever suggests to me that I should head back to Germany. Nobody ever looks at me and wonders if I’m a citizen or illegal immigrant purely based on the color of my skin.If I, a lily-white Midwesterner said, “It all goes down tonight. It’s going to be a huge blast. People will be talking about this for years,” what do you picture? Could be a party, right?Go back and say it with a Middle-Eastern accent.[18]I’m more likely to be rented an apartment, and pay less in rent when I do.[19] I’m more likely to achieve upper management positions in corporations.[20] I’m more likely to be paid higher than equally qualified candidates of non-white ethnicities.[21] I’m more likely to get called back for a second interview. I’m more likely to get an interview.[22]Nobody asks me to buy something or leave at Starbucks, and nobody would ever call the cops on me if I didn’t.[23]Nobody would call the police because I was sleeping in the student lounge of the dorm I lived in.[24]These rules exist for people who are not white, and the application of these rules and my exemptions from them are predicated on my race. The rules my life operates on are fundamentally different than if I were not white.Now, does this mean I haven’t earned a damned thing in my life? No.Does it mean I should feel guilty over my life having been easier? Absolutely not.It just means I should recognize the ways I am following the snowplow.I didn’t make the snowplow. I didn’t hire the snowplow driver. I didn’t send the snowplow out to clear that road for me. That snowplow didn’t clear that path with me in mind in particular and would have cleared that path whether I existed or not.But now I drive on that road.It would be wrong of me to think that I earned that plowed road, or that I deserve that plowed road, or that I would have totally gotten everything I have now without that snowplow clearing the way for me, or that the snowplow never existed.It doesn’t negate what I have done, what I have earned, or the validity of the road I have traveled to acknowledge that it was a hell of a lot easier than it is for others driving down a road that hasn’t been snowplowed, or worse, plowed in.So, what does it mean?In more civilized times, we called it noblesse oblige.[25]I was also lucky over this weekend, because one of my family members had a snowblower that hadn’t been used in years. He was going to throw it out. He’d barely ever used it because his neighbor has an ATV with a plow on it and just does his driveway for him. I asked if I could buy it from him, and he told me to just take it. If I could get it running, it was mine.I’ve been shoveling this whole time, and it’s wearing on me. I busted up my shoulder and my back playing rugby in college, and I’m getting old and fat and out of shape. And me being outside shoveling means my wife is in the house taking care of our kid, and she’s so exhausted, I try to take whatever shifts I can.I don’t have much spare income for a snowblower right now. I’d been dreaming about one, but it just wasn’t really in the cards at the moment. And our driveway is small enough that I couldn’t justify the hundreds of dollars, even for a used one.So, this was a godsend if it worked.All I ended up having to do was clean some leaves out of the tank and put some fresh gas in, which my father in law did for me while we were visiting. It started right up and runs perfectly.When I got home from that long trip, I still had to plow out our driveway. We didn’t get nearly as much as my in-laws, but still got about 5–6 inches. And, the town had gone through with the plow and dumped a big ridge in my driveway, enough that I didn’t want to pack it down before getting my wife and son in the house. I shoveled a quick path for them, and then set to work snowblowing the driveway with my new snowblower. It took me probably a third of the time it took to shovel and was so much easier. May God smile upon the inventor of the snowblower, for he is an unsung hero of the world.Now, I could have just stopped when I done with our driveway and put it away until the next time it snows.But our neighbor is going through a divorce, and she is essentially a single mom with four kids, one of whom has some serious health issues. She’s doing everything she can to stay afloat. She doesn’t have a garage with her house, so I let her have access to our garage to use our tools like the mower and shovel.She just needs a little landing pad for her minivan and a path to her door. She’d already borrowed our shovel and cleared some of it out, but she wasn’t able to do a lot. Not a knock against her; it was that wet, heavy heart-attack snow and she doesn’t have that much time for these things.I took the snowblower over and cleared that out some more for her. I cleaned up the piles next to the end of the driveway that she might have backed into on her way out. I dug it down to the concrete pathway so it wasn’t so slick. I ground down the packed ridge from the town plow. I widened out the spot where she was parked so her kids could get in and out a little easier without having to step through the snow to get in the car.Really, it took me maybe ten minutes and twenty cents’ worth of mixed gas.For her, it would have been another half-hour of labor, or hundreds of dollars for a snowblower of her own, which she would have had no place to store.It cost me virtually nothing, because of a snowplow that I got to drive behind. It would have cost her a lot more, because she doesn’t have that particular snowplow.That’s what acknowledging that life is easier is. Nothing more, nothing less.It’s realizing that not everyone got to drive behind the snowplow.It’s advocating for others who don’t get to drive behind the snowplow to have it at least a little easier.It’s not just trying to be nice to everyone, but being good to them.It’s actively working to grant others the same kind of life you enjoy for free.It’s using your place of privilege to make the world a little better.It’s being aware that you can make the world a little better.It’s using that privilege responsibly to help pay it forward. To help plow someone else out who needs it. To make their life at least a little bit closer to as easy as you’ve got it.To make the world just a little bit more fair.I didn’t deserve that snowblower.But I have it.I might as well do some good with it.I have other pictures here, but someone will comment that it was long and there wasn’t an animal at the end. Fine. Here. Enjoy this dog who apparently snowblows the driveway.Mostly Standard Addendum and Disclaimer: read this before you comment.Every time I write about this kind of stuff, it brings out a certain segment of the population.I welcome rational, reasoned debate on the merits with reliable, credible sources.But coming on here and calling me names, pissing and moaning about how biased I am, etcetera and so forth, will result in a swift one-way frogmarch out the airlock. Doing the same to others will result in the same treatment.Essentially, act like an adult and don’t be a dick about it.This kind of nonsense:will earn a special place in the annals of mockery while they howl at the void.I’m done with warnings. If you have to consider whether or not you’re over the line, the answer is most likely yes. I’ll just delete your comment and probably block you, and frankly, I won’t lose an ounce of sleep over it.Being a special kind of dick like the one above might earn you a place in the Hall of Shame, so I suppose if you plan to be a dick, you might as well go full out and make it worthwhile.Debate responsibly.Footnotes[1] Bomb cyclone: Even bigger storm slams Minnesota this weekend[2] History and Overview of the Land Grant College System[3] US Government Land Grants[4] The Social Distribution of Landed Property in England Since the Sixteenth Century[5] https://lawreview.vermontlaw.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/johnson2.pdf[6] The Pencilsword: On a plate[7] The Volatile History of U.S. Immigration[8] {{meta.pageTitle}}[9] The Invention of Race | Specials | WNYC[10] Black Codes and Pig Laws | Slavery By Another Name Bento | PBS[11] The New Jim Crow[12] Exclusive: Lee Atwater’s Infamous 1981 Interview on the Southern Strategy[13] Peter Kruger's answer to Do you believe in "white privilege"? Have you ever witnessed/experienced it?[14] The Stanford Open Policing Project[15] After Ferguson, black men still face the highest risk of being killed by police[16] A Mass Incarceration Mystery[17] https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6419&context=jclc[18] The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour (Video 2008) - IMDb[19] Analysis: African-Americans pay more for rent, especially in white neighborhoods[20] The Relationship of Race and Gender to Managers' Ratings of Promotion Potential[21] African Americans are paid less than whites at every education level[22] Employers' Replies to Racial Names[23] Wrongfully arrested at Philadelphia Starbucks, two black men seek to turn an injustice into good[24] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2018/05/10/a-black-yale-student-fell-asleep-in-her-dorms-common-room-a-white-student-called-police/[25] Definition of NOBLESSE OBLIGE

There is an achievement gap in public schools because there is an achievement gap in the underlying communities.There is an income disparity, educational disparity, housing disparity - any kind of disparity, you name it, within communities inside the United States.I once talked on Quora with a kid from Carmel, Indiana. Nice place, state championship swimming team. The dads in Carmel, Indiana tend to make $90,000 a year. The moms make $60,000. Source: Carmel, Indiana - Wikipedia. Full disclaimer, salaries have risen since those 2011 statistics of median earnings by gender.Either one of these individual salaries is far above the American median household income, and it creates a household income far greater than the national average.Why are the swim teams so great there? Because the moms and dads can pay for educational opportunities above and beyond what the classroom provides. The parents are well prepared to send their kids to school, when 69% of the adults have a Bachelor’s degree, and the rest are likely similarly (though informally) well-educated.[1] The wealth of the families allows them to invest more in education as well.Carmel, IN - Image source (creative commons): [2]The reason why Carmel has immense success on AP classes and science projects and swim teams is because they have $102,000 a year per family to learn about the world through experience, by visiting Hawaii or Yosemite for Christmas, they have money to spend for summer swim camp, and they have teachers who are eager and want to teach at a school that feels like teaching college-educated students, because the majority of the students are going to college without question, as their parents did before them.I might have made these anecdotes up without first hand-knowledge of life in Carmel, but that’s because I lived more of a median income life, my parents sent me to summer activities that were free or that I got scholarships for. I’m sure someone more expert than me can describe the achievement gap of that town.Meanwhile, there’s Mississippi. It’s the poorest state in the US. Its per capita income in 2012 was $20,670.If you look specifically at Holmes County, Mississippi, you’ll find a household family income of $21,757.Remember, the women of Carmel, Indiana make over $62,000 a year, and yet entire households make $21,000 in Holmes County.Holmes County, Mississippi, with FEMA workers. Image Source: Redirect NoticeThe public schools of Holmes County, Mississippi were ravaged by segregation policies.Private schools became the norm for white families, so the school system never solidified. Two of the private schools were founded as segregation academies. The public schools had majority black attendance, but white government officials held the purse strings.28% of Holmes County residents don’t have a high school diploma. Only 12% of the county has a college degree. How can it be expected that the students will attend college at Carmel, Indiana rates, when a quarter of the Holmes area parents haven’t walked across the high school graduation stage, let alone obtained a community college Associate’s degree, or thought about competitive college options like Carmel’s Northwestern, Notre Dame, and Purdue.Here’s a Holmes County residence Image source:[3]Let’s visit another place on America’s map: Arlington, Virginia.Highest median family income of any county in the country.Median household income is $94,876. Median family income is $127,179. This makes Arlington families five times wealthier than Holmes county, Mississippi. Five families in Holmes receive the same income as one Arlington family.The schools of Arlington pay $18,700 per pupil for their schools, with 83% of revenues coming from local government. Remember that this is about what an entire family of Holmes County lives off for the year - rent, food, and all.Arlington has a 93% graduation rate, second best in the country. The nearby Falls Church has a 98% high school degree attainment rate. [Median Household income of Falls Church: $120,522, or six times that of Holmes County, Mississippi.]73% of Arlington, VA has a bachelor’s degree. A quarter of Arlington residents have more than a Bachelor’s degree, with either graduate school or a medical/law degree.Arlington’s higher educational facilities. Image source:[4] One place where their students’ parents get graduate degrees.And now is we turn back to the classroom. I haven’t even mentioned what happens differently, what differences exist in teacher preparedness, classroom offerings, curriculum decisions, textbook choices.But by now, I think it is clear that the achievement gap happens long before the school day begins.A family living in $21,000 a year poverty without a high school education is not going to perform the same as an area overflowing with MIT and Harvard postgraduate degree holders at a rate higher than most counties have plain Bachelor’s degrees from Anywhere U.(such as Middlesex county, Massachusetts).Swim lessons aren’t possible when your state systematically denied access to pools on racial supremacy theories, so sorry that Mississippi black swim athletes don’t do as well as Carmel, Indiana’s competitive swim team.Within my own state, my students’ grandparents attended segregated schools. Those that were the first to enter integrated schools suffered severe PTSD, and some went as far as to say it wasn’t really worth it, but they were glad they paved the way for a little more equality in the country.Achievement gaps happen when there are gaps to equal access of rights, funding, employment, housing, voting/politics, and yes, education.People who advance racial supremacy theories to explain away systematic inequities in educational access are wrong. Full stop. Go get an education before you come back with that drivel.Footnotes[1] Carmel IN Education data[2] File:Carmel-indiana-downtown.jpg - Wikimedia Commons[3] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/FEMA_-_44248_-_Inside_a_FEMA_Temporary_Housing_Unit%2C_Holmes_County%2C_MS.jpg/640px-FEMA_-_44248_-_Inside_a_FEMA_Temporary_Housing_Unit%2C_Holmes_County%2C_MS.jpg[4] File:George.Mason.University.Arlington.Campus.jpg - Wikipedia