Let’s talk a little bit about the protests in the NFL, whether it’s players kneeling during the national anthem, locking arms to show unity against our president, or some other form they use to show dissatisfaction with some aspect of our country. I’m sure it comes as no surprise to you that I’ve got a couple thoughts about this situation.

First of all, the liberals do what they generally do and that is to start calling people names and attaching opinions to us when we disagree with them. Let’s get one thing very clear, the vast majority of people who do not like the protests taking place during the national anthem are upset with the perception that these protesters are disrespecting our country and what that flag stands for. They are not racists, they do not support rogue cops, they hate bigotry and racism as much as anyone else. But if you listen to the mainstream media including pundits in the sports talk world, you would think that our disagreement with their form of protest means that we want to enslave them and send them to fields to pick cotton.

Maybe they should study history or they would learn that it was not just white people owning slaves, but every race, every society in history has owned slaves or enslaved others at one time or another. Who do they think white and black Americans were buying the slaves from in Africa? Yes, black Americans did own slaves. But it was also white America that put an end slavery. It was white Americans that founded organizations such as the NAACP.

Now I have said in the past that there is not institutional racism in America like there used to be. That is accurate but technically I should have said there is not overt institutional racism in America. There is very much alive in our federal government policies, covert racism. It is the belief, mostly by liberals, that minorities in America cannot take care of themselves. There is a belief as evidenced by policies such as affirmative action, welfare, and other transfer programs, that Blacks especially are incapable of achieving anything in this society. And when they point to the reason why, it is almost always slavery getting the blame. But is that accurate?

One of the biggest problems facing any family is the single parent household. In black communities, single mother households are much more common than in other demographic groups. We know from studies that children growing up in fatherless households are more likely to join gangs, commit crimes, commit suicide, exhibit behavioral disorders, and to end up dependent upon government programs for sustenance.

In 1961 just 20% of black children were born to single mother households. Now, 50 years later, almost 70% of black children are born to single mother households where a father is not present. Is that the legacy of slavery or is it the legacy of the war on poverty which created the welfare state? For the first roughly 100 years after the abolition of slavery, family life was pretty stable in the black community. Since then, after the war on poverty started, not so much.

For a period of time after slavery, the majority of black families, whether two-parent or single-parent households, were poor. The poverty rate among the black community was pretty high. Today, 30% of black families are considered poor by government statistics. But when there are two parents in the household, only 8% of the families live in poverty. And in black households were both mom and dad work, the rate of poverty is below 4%. The poverty rate in families headed by single black women is 37%. The welfare state is directly responsible for about because fathers no longer had to be responsible for their offspring or the women with whom they procreated. They were not held responsible for financially taking care of their children.

Under Obama, the unemployment rate among black teenage males soared into the high 20% area. From 1890 until 1954, according to Census Bureau data, the unemployment rate among black teenage men was usually below that of white teenage men. In fact beginning in 1900, the average duration of unemployment for a black teenage male was 15% shorter than that of a white teenage male. And it stayed that way up through the mid-1950s. It wasn’t until the late 1960s, after the war on poverty started, that we began to see unemployment rates and duration rates in the black male teenage population increase exponentially.

Can you argue that during the late 19th and early 20th centuries that racism was less prevalent in our society than it is now? Not if you know history. During this timeframe there were laws on the books, especially in southern Democrat-controlled states, that promoted segregation and racism against the black population. Those laws have since gone the way of the dinosaur and our society is less racist than it was at that time yet the plight of the black community is worse.

It is the politicians, the current crop of civil rights leaders, and academics who have done more harm to the black community than any of the problems they might face as a result of the legacy of slavery. It is the belief in this group that Blacks cannot help themselves or achieve any type of success without the help of the government that is the real racism present in our society today. Many of us on the right side of the aisle have been battling that for decades but too many in the black community have bought into the idea that slavery is to blame and until we all understand the real problem, it is unlikely that there will be a solution.

But there can be a solution, we have to support the policies put forth by our president that will increase jobs across all communities in America, that will hold schools accountable and give people the freedom to choose where to send their children so that they can get a good education, to reduce the regulations and taxes upon our society that have stifled the growth of this economy. And whether they realize it or not, if we can do those things, institutional racism in American government may not disappear, but it’s negative effects will be greatly reduced.