> black people were brought to this country against their will and their culture

This is a nice argument for maybe the first few generations, but all of us, you and me and everybody had no choice where we were born even what color we are. People get shuffled and moved around this earth for all sorts of misfortunate reasons. You also have to deal with the fact that there has been voluntary immigration of blacks since slavery. I was just reading how more sub-Saharan immigrants have came to the US since slavery than the entirety of those shipped here by slave traders. Much of the renewed culture has been attributed to those with a choice and fresh connections to Africa.

> I am also not very reassured to hear that maybe they're merely rejecting people with the wrong class background out of hand.

Nobody said it was good that anybody would do it, but it is entirely different problem that is not racism, and something that is within the power of change. A person can't change his skin color to get a better chance at a job, but a person can change their name. This goes for people of all color born with a name that does not perform as well. A white Harvard grad with the name Butkiss is likely going to have trouble true. The point is discrimination on immutable characteristics is what we are fighting here.

> All these solutions presume the inferiority of black candidates when we're looking at the reality that identical credentials are less valued from black candidates. The idea that black people are uniquely lacking in "delayed gratification" is also bordering on offensive racist caricature.

Please go read my comment again. My solutions are applied to the poor, not by race, that is my entire point. Fix the poor problem and the race issues described in this thread go away. Why? Because we will have more people educated, including whites that may have grown up to be racist or at least had bias tendencies. Affirmative action is like taking pain killers for a curable problem. Educating the masses and raising the bar for all is the actual cure. I feel you have grossly interpret something from my comments that is totally off basis. The ability to display delayed gratification is one of the biggest indicators of future success in life, and it is something that is probably not taught by the parents of the poor, I know it was not in my household. No assumption about the candidates were being made at all, although many have suggested considering a lower marked minority over a higher marked white person. I don't make derogatory generalization about any group identified by a immutable characteristic. The only sensible thing to do when two candidates who are equally qualified for a position is simply flip a coin. This would remove any bias and over time have a more natural result in what you are attempting to achieve.

> It is all well and good to improve the schooling circumstances of black students, but it seems equally important to make it so black candidates do not have to be overwhelmingly superior to even be considered over white ones.

Again, I said poor, not black students, poor. I am not concerned with the candidates. Quite simply if a qualified black candidate does not get the job because of his race then that is discrimination and should be dealt with, there are means to do so already in place. I am 100% on board with everybody having an equal opportunity. If you can show that somebody is selecting one candidate over another based on things like color (especially to underrepresented people), then we should be going after them full force and ensuring they correct their hiring processes. You simply can't create a right with two wrongs. Once you give people the power to discriminate it is hard to go back.

Nobody should ever not get a job because they had the wrong skin color, and when you say chose somebody based off skin color you are ensuring the number of people who don't get a job because of their skin color goes, not down. We should be striving to remove race based decisions from our society not adding them.