THE WAY WE WERE
BY JULIANNE MALVEAUX
The man in front of me at the United Airlines ticket counter is tall and
blonde. With his dark blazer, gray slacks, and power-red tie, his entire
being screams “alpha male”, as does his body language. He fidgets, moving
his weight from one foot to the other. He runs his hand through his hair.
He turns to the left and to the right and makes nervous chatter. At some
point, he turns to his rear and offers one of those impatient smiles. “This
line is a mess, isn’t it,” he offers. “I can’t wait until we get back to
normal,” he says. “Weren’t things wonderful the way they were, now I can
hardly remember normal travel,” he says.
I am sure that I mumbled some response to the man’s friendly overture, but it
wasn’t much of a response. When he spoke of things “the way they were”, a
chill ran up my spine. It was almost as if he were accepting September 10,
2001 as our ideal, economically, socially, and politically. It was as if he
would do anything to get back to “the way things were” before the awful
attack of September 11, the horrid terrorism that cost our nation more than
6000 lives.
If my traveling colleague were to click his heels three times, what kind
of world would he go back to? Would he go back to one where distributional
differences were either accepted or rationalized as a “market” outcome? Back
to a world where black unemployment was double the white unemployment rate,
with no federal focus on closing the gap? Back in the day, before 9-11,
there was a struggle for economic justice, a struggle to close racial
economic gaps, but that, perhaps, is a struggle my colleague could not see or
understand. Would he like to go back to his previous state of
unconsciousness?
On September 10, 2001, we were an arrogant, society plagued with
problems. We had no national unity, with about half of the nation openly
critical of a President who lost the popular vote and probably won the
electoral vote because of his brother’s shenanigans in Florida. The
President slipped on his lip when he said he wanted Osama bin Ladin “dead or
alive”, but this is the same rhetoric that his domestic policy has been
riddled with. He has created divisions when there ought to be consensus on
issues like education. And, prior to September 10, he had thumbed his nose
at the very international community he now seeks to join in coalition to
fight world terrorism.
Before September 10, we were sliding into recession with no possibility of
federal bailout. Until September 11, George W. Bush felt that stimulus
packages were for the Democrats, and that he’d rather stimulate the economy
by cutting taxes, thank you. A national emergency has generated faith (or
hope) in his ability to lead, and freed him from the shackles of his party’s
right wing. Now, the $75 billion stimulus package he offers may well both
jump-start the terrorist-scarred economy and also save him from his father’s
fate – an economic slowdown on his watch.
If the stimulus package takes us back to the “way we were”, then shame on
us. A stimulus package, if it is just and fair, will focus especially at
those at the bottom, those who have missed a decade of economic expansion. A
stimulus package will pay attention both to airlines who need bailouts and to
their small and minority business contractors who are suffering in greater
need. A stimulus package will provide as much aid and comfort for the
unemployed as it does for the displaced.
Public works programs that focus on construction and infrastructure favor
male workers, while programs that focus on service delivery favor women.
There is more focus, though, on rebuilding the World Trade Center, or its
replacement, than there is on providing services, which injects a bias into
the distribution of the spoils Congress may approve. While it is important to
consider rebuilding and get creation of construction jobs, it is also
important to think of the psychic price people have paid because of terrorism
and to generate jobs that soothe them and make it easier for them to return
to productivity.
I am not nostalgic for the way we were, for the gaps, the divisions, the
unfairness, the racial and gender-based differences in employment experiences
that most felt. I don’t want to click my heels three times and go back to a
more “normal”, “calmer” and better time. Instead, I want us to move forward.
Things weren’t so good on September 10, and we gain when we recognize that.
Unless those who care about fairness and justice lift their voices, our
nation will miss an opportunity to move forward by distributing a stimulus
package fairly.