C N N's Christine Romans of ' This Is Your Money Asks ', " Does the President Owe African Americans?" (585 hits)

(CNN) Despite Martin Luther King Jr.'s incredible achievements, his ability to tackle poverty in the African-American economy was cut short by his tragic assassination. It was nearly 50 years ago now. With so much progress since the days of MLK, overwhelming racial in equality in the economy, in money, is still the norm today. So, the next question we want to ask: is it fair -- is it fair to expect President Obama to do more about it?

ROMANS: We have seen President Obama take strong stands for many causes -- immigration, gun control, and his support of gay marriage even led "Newsweek" to dub him the first gay president. But President Obama has done little to ease racial inequality when it comes to America's pocketbook. The U.S. is the country where the unemployment for African-Americans has long, long been doubled the rate for whites.

In 2012, the median net worth of Americans was -- white Americans -- was more than $110,500. That's almost 18 times, 18 times, the median net worth of African-Americans, just shy of $6,000, just about $6,000. That gap grew significantly in the wake of the financial crisis. But since President Obama took office, he has mostly steered clear of these issues, rarely addressing topics like affirmative action, mass incarceration and racial profiling. That changed following the protests over George Zimmerman's acquittal in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.

OBAMA: Understand the challenges that exist for African- American boys. The poverty and the dysfunction that we see in those communities can be traced to a very difficult history.

ROMANS: Former "New York Times" columnist Bob Herbert is a distinguished senior fellow at Demos. Bob, 95 percent of African-Americans voted to put President Obama in office in 2008, 93 percent voted to keep him there in 2012. There is a question, this president has really steered clear of the color of money until recently.

BOB HERBERT, DEMOS: Right.

ROMANS: Do African-Americans, does the black middle class and the black electorate, do they want more from him on these issues?

HERBERT: Yes. You know, I had extensive conversation was people across the country and working on the book. If you talk to African-Americans privately, you will sense feelings of disappointment. But you will very seldom see them expressed publicly because people are torn -- on the one hand, they'd like to see the president do more. On the other hand, a lot of blacks are resentful of the way Obama has been treated by the Republicans, by sort of the racial tenor of the criticism of him and that sort of thing.

So, black people are sort of in a push-pull situation.

ROMANS: It's interesting, because you can say the same thing about the LGBT community and the president sort of delivered for them. You can say the same thing about people who wanted to get out of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, want to close Guantanamo, but they still support this president. He's tried to be a president for all Americans, not a president for different actions. Even as he has turned -- policies tailored to specific groups, should he have policies tailored to specifically African-American. He mentioned young men, young boys -- African- American boys.

Does he immediate to come out and do something?

HERBERT: Even before you get to the policies, you have to address these issues. You have to talk about them. And -- you know, he is, obviously, the president of all Americans but that means that if there is a problem over here with women, if there is a problem here with gays, if there's a problem with African-Americans, you have to address those problems honestly and, you know, I think vigorously. You know, too often when it comes to African-Americans, that hasn't really happened. It is not -- it is not just with this president but, I think, this president may even have been more reluctant than some other Democratic presidents with issues related to blacks, I think, in Obama's case.

ROMANS: Why do think so?

HERBERT: I think that in Obama's case, he feels that it is -- harmful to him politically to address the race issue very often at all. That will be -- there will be -- will be pushed back from the white community, certain percentage of whites, whatever it might be, we'll say, oh, hey, he's there to give everything for the blacks or something along those lines. I think that's a mistake, by the way, but that's the calculus he's made.

ROMANS: When you talk about -- the president talked about poverty, especially poverty for young black youth, 35 percent of blacks live in poverty in this country. Compare that to 13 percent of whites. Before this segment we posed the question -- is it fair to ask the first black American president to do more for black Americans in their money? Is it fair to expect more from him on this?

HERBERT: You know, it's a question of what you mean by to expect more. What I would expect from Obama is not more nor less. What I would expect from him is to look at the issues as they are -- as they prevail right now and to address them. Address them forthrightly. I don't think that President Obama has.

ROMANS: All right. Bob Herbert, we'll talk about it again. Thank you. Nice to see you.

HERBERT: Yes, great.

"CNN NEWSROOM" starts right now.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/130...





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