By Betsy McCaughey
Unless you’re a person of color or a favored minority, brace yourself to be treated unfairly by the Biden administration.
President Joe Biden is pushing racial equity. That’s very different from equal treatment regardless of race. Racial equity means government can treat people unequally, discriminating against white people, to equalize outcomes. For the Biden administration, it means closing the wealth gap between the white and Black populations—by whatever means.
You may think it’s “unfair” to be forced to pay off other people’s student loans after you’ve already paid back your own. But Biden’s White House actually defends debt cancellation as a way to close the “wealth gap” between races, citing data showing that 20 years after starting college, the average Black borrower still owes 95% of the loan, while the average white borrower has paid off all but 6%.
At the other end of life’s spectrum, older people who are white will find it harder to get an appointment with a doctor who takes Medicare. The Biden administration is forcing physicians to categorize their patients by race and demonstrate they have an “anti-racism” plan to combat health disparities. (Federal Register, Nov. 19, 2021, page 65969). To meet that test, Black patients will be in demand—white patients, not so much.
Doctors who insist on treating patients as individuals rather than by race will be punished with lower payments. Most doctors are expected to give in to avoid the penalty.
If you’re white, good luck dealing with the costs of buying a home. Fannie Mae’s new Equitable Housing Finance Plan will help with appraisals and closing costs, but only if you’re Black.
If you’re a white business owner who sells to the federal government, get ready to lose business to a competitor who identifies as “underserved,” “marginalized” or “disadvantaged.” All euphemisms for identity groups. The Biden bureaucracy gives preference to minorities in federal procurement. Straight white men can take a hike.
Stunningly, the 2021 Medicare payment rules for physicians printed in the Federal Register parrot the language used by inflammatory college professor Ibram X. Kendi in his 2019 book How to Be an Antiracist. Physicians must show a “commitment to anti-racism” to qualify for merit pay from Medicare. They’re told it will require “considerable time and resources” to “prioritize” certain “populations.”
That’s instead of treating all patients the same. Kendi argues that colorblindness sustains racial inequality. “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination.”
Many physicians are horrified, predicting the rule will undermine trust between doctor and patient. It suggests Black patients will get more time with the physician and more diagnostic tests. White patients will worry they aren’t getting an antibiotic or a referral to a specialist because of their race.
Eight states and Do No Harm, a physicians organization, are suing to overturn the rule. Stanley Goldfarb, chairman of Do No Harm, blasts it for pushing doctors to “prioritize some patients over others.” Rep. Gary Palmer (R-Ala.) has introduced a bill in Congress banning the rule’s “reverse discrimination.”
“Critical race theory has no place in the healthcare profession,” says Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, one of the litigants. He says he will not allow doctors in his state “to be penalized for refusing to bend to extremism.”
Extremism it is. It’s being forced on Americans by what Biden calls a “whole-of-government” approach. We were warned, even before election night 2020, that a Biden administration would trample America’s commitment to fairness and equal treatment under the law.
On Nov. 1, 2020, Kamala Harris tweeted, “There’s a big difference between equality and equity.”
Fair warning: Equity is what we’re reeling under now.
Federal courts have struck down several of Biden’s anti-white programs as unconstitutional. More will likely fall. But in the meantime, Biden’s push for equity will foment racial hostility not seen in half a century.
Don’t be fooled by the president’s rhetoric on Sunday, when he commemorated civil rights leaders who marched on Washington, D.C., 59 years ago. They were fighting racial injustice. Biden is not. He’s imposing anti-white discrimination on everything, from housing to health care. It’s racism by another name.
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. Follow her on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey. To find out more about Betsy McCaughey and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
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