He is, like today’s Democrats always are, counting on the news media to sanitize his remarks and make sure this is a one day scandal at worst. When Ross Perot referred to the NAACP as “you people” early in his 1992 third party Presidential run, he was excoriated by the Left, the media, and black groups as displaying his bigotry. Newsom’s use of “you” was no different, and worse, he presumed that “they” were incapable of scoring well on a scholastic achievement test. But never mind: he’s a Democrat, so those naive blacks won’t notice.
Certainly his (black) on-stage interviewer/moderator was an easy mark: he just chuckles as Newsom literally says “I’m illiterate and not too bright just like you all!” with a wink and a smile. A competent moderator is obligated not to let that pass, both to allow Newsom to rehabilitate himself if he can, and also to draw attention to his statement. “Excuse me, what was that? Are you assuming that because we are black, everyone in this room is as cognitively challenged as you are?” would be the required and responsible response.
Nah. Can’t say that: might help Trump.
First, Newsom is pandering to DEI sensibilities: being handicapped is a good thing. (Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof”: “I realize there’s no shame in being poor … but it’s no great honor either!”) True, he’s boasting about his achievement in succeeding in life despite disadvantages, but the California governor wasn’t exactly raised by sharecroppers. His father, William Alfred Newsom III, was a state appeals court judge and attorney for Getty Oil. Second, the Guv was trying to make the point that he had no reason to think he was better than regular folks but botched it, and realized the botch as soon as it jumped out of his mouth. Saying “I’m no better than you,” which was his course correction, is a different point than saying, “I’m like you: I can’t read or do well on tests either.”
Progressives are already spinning Gavin’s dyslexia as proving that he is of superior intelligence, as many sufferers are. But not everyone with dyslexia is wise, smart or trustworthy. I have spoken before about the late Tom Donohue, one of my mentors and the long-time President of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He was dyslexic and didn’t learn to read until after he entered college. He was also brilliant, perceptive, witty, talented and honest. I knew Tom Donohue. Tom Donohue was a friend of mine. Gavin Newsom is no Tom Donohue.
For some strange reason, I suspect that it is because Ann forces herself to be a contrarian as a branding exercise even when, as in this case, it makes no sense, Ann Althouse wrote of Newsom’s gaffe, “his antagonists may screw up trying to take advantage of this.” I don’t know how. Rapper Nikki Minag leapt on the remarks, writing on social media that he spoke to a largely black audience “as if they’re children.” I sensed that tone too. But, it is true, I already believed that Newsom had proved himself beyond a shadow of a doubt to be an empty suit.
I also find it astounding that anyone thinks this guy has a snowball’s chance in a microwave of getting the Democratic nomination in 2028. He is almost as gaffe-prone as Joe Biden. His record in California is objectively terrible. Most of all, he is a white, heterosexual male, and his party has painted itself into a corner. It cannot nominate a central casting old-school handsome white guy for President until it gets a woman, ideally one “of color,” into the White House, and any diversion from that mission will alienate the Democrats’ nut-cake base.
But the Axis media will still circle the wagons every time Newsom reveals that those low SAT scores weren’t only because of his dyslexia.
Ethics Alarms 
You nailed it, good sir!
Newsome is saying the quiet part out loud, and this is what DEI-supporting progressives have believed for years…decades…centuries actually, back when many of their predecessors were slave-owners in the 19th Century: that blacks are second-class humans with second-rate brains, lacking the intelligence to make something of themselves without help from “whitey.”
It’s pathetic and disgusting.
Try saying “I am like you. I’m a 960 SAT guy. I can’t read.” to someone like Condi Rice…or Vikings Hall-of-Famer Alan Page…or Barack Obama…or Denzel Washington…or any of the countless other African Americans with accomplishments that would put Newsome to red-faced shame.
Sorry Jack, I’m kind of just repeating your frustration, but dang…
I call those “Grawwwk! I agree!” moments.
Newsom, in the process of pandering to the crowd, accidentally said the quiet part loud.
Hey, what’s white and goes Oob! Oob! ?
A dyslexic ghost! 👻
I like that one.
I think a much more racist, condescending tell is when the Democrats argue voter ID laws are discriminatory because black people are incapable of getting IDs. They seem to think there are still black people being born in dirt floored cabins in the rural South where vicious white health department employees refuse to issue “niggrahs” birth certificates per the orders of Boss Hogg, the county sheriff. Of course, in today’s South, most of the government employees and sheriffs are black.
“They seem to think there are still black people being born in dirt floored cabins in the rural South where vicious white health department employees refuse to issue “niggrahs” birth certificates per the orders of Boss Hogg, the county sheriff. Of course, in today’s South, most of the government employees and sheriffs are black.”
Well, that’s essentially the Systemic Racism narrative they are running with even if they don’t explicitly use your description.
Did Gavin Newsom provide evidence with his speech that he is to dumb to become the next President of the USA? Just asking.
Democrats have been telling since the Johnson administration that Republicans are racist. Gavin Newsom’s speech indicates that that is all projection; the patronizing attitude of affluent white liberals towards blacks show time after time that they believe that white people are smarter than black people. That is why affirmative action has been supported by white liberals; this program is based on a deep seated belief that black people are intellectually inferior, and need to be assisted by benevolent white people at every inch of the way to enjoy educational and professional success.
So now let me ask the taboo question: is it possible that Gavin Newsom is actually right? Are white people on average smarter than black people? The reaction of Gavin Newsom’s public seems to confirm that perception; they either agree with him on this, or they are just too dumb to understand the implications of Newsom’s statements.
Is there perhaps some scientific research on intelligence that gives clarity on this matter? Actually there is: in 1994 Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray published a book “The Bell Curve. Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life”. This book indicated that intelligence is partly genetic, and that therefore genetics cannot be ruled in explaining differences in IQ between different demographic groups. This book is so notorious that proper scholarly review and debate is impossible, and Charles Murray was chased off the campus of Middlebury University in Vermont by a violent mob in 2017 before he could give a lecture. So let’s reach the tentative observation that scientifically the matter of difference in intelligence between the races is not settled.
The statements of Gavin Newsom, and the support for affirmative action and DEI make me believe white liberals secretly believe the main theses of the Bell Curve. However this is a taboo belief that fills them with unbearable white guilt and anxiety, and needs to be repressed at all cost. Psychologists may call this phenomenon reaction formation; this is a psychological defense mechanism where an individual unconsciously replaces an anxiety-producing or unacceptable impulse with its exact opposite, often exhibiting exaggerated, over-the-top behavior. It acts as a shield for the ego against uncomfortable emotions, such as showing excessive kindness to someone actually disliked. Another example is a firebrand evangelic pastor who often gives thunderous sermons against sexual immorality while secretly soliciting prostitutes. The Democrat’s invocations against racism are like that, in my opinion.
So let me ask the question again: are black people on average dumber than white people? I like to believe that I am not; however mu skeptical and agnostic attitude propels me to say that I do not know the answer. But when I look at the squalor in black neighborhoods, the low graduation rates, the crime rates, the welfare dependency, and the propensity of black people to vote as a block for the same failing politicians and parties decade after decade because those politicians succeed in race baiting, then I am tempted to answer the question in the affirmative. So I would recommend black people to prove themselves smart by voting slimy pols like Gavin Newsom out of office. If not, call me indifferent to the black plight: you get what you vote for and you deserve it good and hard.
All data suggest that on average, Asian’s have higher IQ scores than whites, and whites have higher IQ scores than blacks, but since IQ scores “measure whatever it is that IQ scores measure” and not intelligence, whatever THAT is, the data is useless and even unjustly prejudicial. Individuals matter, not group averages. How would public policy use such averages? It’s like saying that the Brontes on average were brilliant writers, but assuming that Branwell was anything but a jealous, irresponsible hack can’t be sustained on that basis.