During a Wednesday House Judiciary Subcommittee held a hearing to discuss the adoption of HR 40, a resolution which calls for a commission to “study and develop reparation proposals for African-Americans,” actor Danny Glover expressed his support for the bill due to damages “inflicted by enslavement and post-emancipation and racial exclusionary policies.”
The proposal would also demand the U.S. government formally apologize "for the perpetration of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity on African slaves and their descendants."
“I am deeply honored to be here today, offering my testimony at this historic meeting about the reckoning of a crime against humanity,” Glover continued, “A national reparations policy is a moral, democratic and economic imperative, despite much progress over the centuries.”
Now, let’s forget for a second that the U.S. government apologized for slavery and Jim Crow back in 2008 -- a fact which many proponents of HR 40 seem to conveniently ignore in their attempt to castigate present-day Americans for the crimes of the nation’s ancestors -- and ask ourselves a single question.
Why, oh why, is Danny Glover, of all people, the representative for those seeking reparations?
Of all the people to choose -- of all the civil rights marchers and slave descendants out there -- what specific perspective does Danny Glover bring to the issue?
Danny Glover, a man with an estimated $40 million net worth, calling reparations a “moral imperative” on Capitol Hill only further exemplifies that Americans, including our political elite, take the opinions of celebrities with no expertise on a topic far too seriously.