The Twins should be required to forfeit all their home games from this year.

They should hire Jayson Blair o satisfy these quota-counting bigots.

There are people of color in Minnesota?

Yes, and both of them are pissed.

Hey, Dave Winfield and Prince resemble that comment!

Just out of curiosity, how did the MSR determine the color of all the business owners?

What about the Jews?

Aren't they supposed to go with the low bidder?

I'm not sure why, but I liked this:

the Minnesota Twins organization has proclaimed that its new downtown Minneapolis stadium is “uniquely Minnesotan in all respects.”

The Twins hired Delaware North Companies Sportservice, a Buffalo, NY company

They are diversified. They have businesses owned by people of Swedish and Norwegian descent.

They are diversified. They have businesses owned by people of Swedish and Norwegian descent.

So they colluded to shut out the German majority :P Geez, are they still sore about WWII?

"Lukefisk! Ve got der lutefisk! Get 'em vile deer good und congealed!"

So they colluded to shut out the German majority :P Geez, are they still sore about WWII?

And what about the Finns and the Danes?!?!?

Wait. I thought Danes were Finns. This is hard to keep up with.

Danes have fins, but Finns have wings. Try to stay on top of this stuff; it's important.

There are people of color in Minnesota?

Yes, and both of them are pissed.

Who's the one that isn't Prince?

What, white isn't a color?

EDIT: Now that I look at it, the real question is how to tell the color of a business. "...several questions related to why there are no businesses of color, and specifically no Black businesses..." I am now imagining a form where the hue is determined. Is it derived from a formula or elective? I bet the Secretary of State has the regs for this...

Who's the one that isn't Prince?

Prince's stunt double. A man who, by all appearances, is about to make a fortune in stadium concessions.

Many major corporations have vigorous diversity vendor programs that require some degree of spend take place with businesses owned by women, people of color, physically challenged or Veterans. Many CA based companies have percentages as high as 25 percent.

Pacific Gas and Electric is telling providers that if they use subcontractors 50(!) percent of that spend has to be diversity owned businesses. I was told this number. I did not fact check.

But it would not surprise me.

Based on 2008 data, Minnesota is between 36th and 38th in percentage of non-white state population. Granted, that's a low racial diversity rank. But it's not like we're Maine or something. Non-whites do exist here, especially in the Twin Cities.

Not quite on topic, but the Murray's steak sandwich at Target Field was ridiculously disappointing.

WEll, Wiki has the Twin Cities at 84% white your link has the whole state at 88%.

McCoy, I just saw that too. I don't get it. Wiki does have the entire Twin Cities at 84%, yet it has Minneapolis at 70.2% and St. Paul at 66.7%. Most every other place in the metro area would have to be almost homogeneous to make that add up. Edit: The populations of Minneapolis and St. Paul add up to 674,198. The Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI metro area has a population of about 3.5 million. That probably explains it. The metro area includes lots of places that I don't normally think of as part of the Twin Cities.

Supposedly a large population of Somali refugees in the Twin Cities, IIRC.

Supposedly a large population of Somali refugees in the Twin Cities, IIRC.

Somali and Hmong. And yes, the suburbs are very, very, very homogenous. I grew up in one and we had zero diversity (although it has changed in the last 10 years).

"Businesses of color" is one unfortunate neologism.

Not quite on topic, but the Murray's steak sandwich at Target Field was ridiculously disappointing.

Well, the Murray's steak sandwich at Murray's is also ridiculously disappointing, so I'm not surprised.

Not quite on topic, but the Murray's steak sandwich at Target Field was ridiculously disappointing.

Well, the Murray's steak sandwich at Murray's is also ridiculously disappointing, so I'm not surprised.

whatever you do, don't ask Murray's wife about Murray

Living in Minneapolis has been such a HUGE culture shock for me. I work for a big company (30K), and I'm basically the only Latino there. It's borderline ridiculous.

I lived in North Miami and was the only non-latino. Most everyone left us alone...they thought I was a cop.

"We asked, for example, how the organization solicited the exclusively White-owned companies doing business at the ballpark and the products being sold there."

Most people surely don't care about this, but it bothers me when people capitalize words which should not be capitalized. People who think it is correct to capitalize white or black (when used to describe skin color) are wrong. Moreover, my perception is that they tend to be race-obsessed, if not racists. No surprise then, to find this story comes from a race-based newspaper.

"The only current economic opportunities for people of color inside the new ballpark appear to be jobs as concession workers, servers and clean-up personnel at Twins games."

Brian Fuentes $9,000,000
Orlando Hudson $5,000,000
Delmon Young $2,600,000
Francisco Liriano $1,600,000
Denard Span $750,000
Randy Flores* $650,000
Alexi Casilla $437,500
Jose Morales $412,500
Alex Burnett $400,000

These non-white employees are doing fairly well by the Twins.

*I think Flores may be 100% white. I don't know. But I figure he also counts as Latino.

Have people really studied the logic behind diversity recruitment programs?

It's not about quotas. It's more about the fact that hiring calls generally have a limited range and even in a post-racial "color blind" society, it doesn't really tend to even out.

Imagine if I was doing the contracting for the city of Chicago. Imagine if unintentionally I only really paid much attention to the people who read the trade publications I read, or hang out in the neighborhood businesses I hang out in, or went to the schools I attended. Let's even say that some of my preferences were for people who listened to what I listen to or speak like I do.

I mean, how many whites in Chicago spend time at the Bud Billiken parade, or went to Julian or Englewood high schools? How many read the Defender?

Some communities might not be as segregated and might not suffer the damage that segregation does. But it's worth understanding nevertheless and understanding the imperfect responses to it.

I grew up in a very diverse neighborhood. We had Italians, Serbians, Slovaks, Ukrainians, Poles, Syrians and Jews.

Seriously, we can and must ensure equality of opportunity, but we cannot ensure equality of outcomes. The hue or gender of the person owning the business isn't going to guarantee that they provide quality service at an affordable price. Color blind means not seeing color, it does not mean setting aside a predetermined portion for those who may or may not be up to the task.

They aren't serving all the food, but minorities reportedly did ok during the construction of Target Field, getting preferential treatment in awarding of contracts.

Roughly 130 small, women-owned and minority-owned businesses procured more than $100 million in contracts, or about 32 percent of all the money spent on the project. That beat the project goal of 30 percent.

Take that as you will.

Supposedly a large population of Somali refugees in the Twin Cities, IIRC.

Yes, you get a significantly different student experience living on the West Bank. There was a Somali cafe on Riverside near my freshman dorm that had the best tea ever. The only things near the dorms on the East Bank are pizza and Chinese places.

from the link in 34

aggressive practices to include small, local, women and minority businesses as both contractors and ballpark operators

Apparently they failed in the second half of the objective. Be nice to know why. but I don't equate "aggressive practices" with preferential treatment of bids. It's aggressive to do what X outlines in 32 rather than sliding contracts to the usual suspects.

&, Flash, when color blind means not seeing existing inequalities because one would have to talk about color, the proper name for it is willful blindness.

"I lived in North Miami and was the only non-latino. Most everyone left us alone...they thought I was a cop."

This was my experience living in almost entirely black section of West Oakland. A black co-worker of mine pointed out to me that everyone likely assumed I was a cop. That thought had never occurred to me. The only racism I experienced--very mild at that--was with the Nation of Islam guys who were selling bean pies* outside of Safeway.

*As it happens, I lived pretty near a business called Your Black Muslim Bakery. I presumed when I first saw it that it was an NOI operation, and thus off limits to me, the white devil. However, I learned later (watching his insane cable access show) that the owner was not a part of the NOI, but he was somehow affiliated with Elijah Muhammed, who he endlessly quoted on his TV show. The owner was also a psychopath and allegedly a serial rapist.

The week I moved out of Oakland, one of the owner's sons, who was a big-time heroin dealer, was shot and killed in a big gangster shootout. The owner of YBMB was running for mayor of Oakland at that time, and the news about his son being a gangster probably hurt his chances for office.

Many years later the business was shut down when another one of the sons (who took over after his father died of cancer awaiting his rape trial) ordered the murder of a journalist (from the black press) who was investigating YBMB's finances.

Much like the NOI itself, YBMB was built on psychopathic racism and criminality. But if you passed it on San Pablo Avenue, it looked just like any other small business. I recall, in fact, that they opened a YBMB inside the Oakland Coliseum--probably after the Coliseum was pressured into doing business with more black-owned companies.

I recall, in fact, that they opened a YBMB inside the Oakland Coliseum--probably after the Coliseum was pressured into doing business with more black-owned companies.

Speaking of Oakland Coliseum, did anybody see the very white dude dive in the empty bleachers after Coco Crisp's HR tonight? He whiffed badly, took a pretty bad digger, and then after the ball caromed back towards him, he fumbled it and lost it. That was high comedy.

The white dude

I live in Minneapolis, in West Phillips. My block is made up of Somalis, Latinos, African-Americans, and two white people (of Italian, Polish, German, Irish and French descent)--my wife and myself.

While I realize it's fun to take the piss out of Minnesotans, and I don't dispute the numbers, I invite anyone who thinks there are less than three black people in Minnesota to take a stroll through my neighborhood with me sometime.

39 is a quality clip ... it's good because he skulks out of there like a skeevy perv after the whole thing goes down. I think he's one of those weird dudes obsessed with getting AS MANY REAL GAME BALLS AS POSSIBLE. Almost as weird as the autograph guy who is always just on the 1B-side of home plate before games at the Coliseum begging for autographs to put in his gigantic binder of sports collectibles -- if he's still there.

To hire and individual or a firm to do work for you, for any reason other than their quality and their price, it screwing yourself. If the black guy is a better employee, but I hire the white guy because I don't like blacks, I now have the worse employee. If the white guy is better, but I hire the black one because I have to meet a quota, I again have the worse employee. Either way, to hire for other than purely economic reasons costs you.

Show me you can do the job for a price I like, and I could give a s*** whether you're black, gay, female, whatever.

"We asked, for example, how the organization solicited the exclusively White-owned companies doing business at the ballpark and the products being sold there."

Most people surely don't care about this, but it bothers me when people capitalize words which should not be capitalized. People who think it is correct to capitalize white or black (when used to describe skin color) are wrong.

Surely you don't think it's unreasonable to be suspicious when Frank, Rondell, and Barry seem to control every part of the Target Field concessions racket.

Avoid the pulled hamstring and swiss and Rondell's.

I grew up in a very diverse neighborhood.

"From Seal to Seal's teeth."

To hire and individual or a firm to do work for you, for any reason other than their quality and their price, it screwing yourself. If the black guy is a better employee, but I hire the white guy because I don't like blacks, I now have the worse employee. If the white guy is better, but I hire the black one because I have to meet a quota, I again have the worse employee. Either way, to hire for other than purely economic reasons costs you.

Show me you can do the job for a price I like, and I could give a s*** whether you're black, gay, female, whatever.

What if the black guy is a better employee - in the sense that he works harder, is more competent, and is willing to work for less $ - but your customers are racist? There could be "purely economic reasons" to hire the white guy. What then?

To hire and individual or a firm to do work for you, for any reason other than their quality and their price, it screwing yourself. If the black guy is a better employee, but I hire the white guy because I don't like blacks, I now have the worse employee. If the white guy is better, but I hire the black one because I have to meet a quota, I again have the worse employee. Either way, to hire for other than purely economic reasons costs you.

Show me you can do the job for a price I like, and I could give a s*** whether you're black, gay, female, whatever.

Again, entirely true, but relevant in the opposite direction.

It's not about quotas; it's about the fact that in the vast majority of cases that if you hired all white heterosexual dudes and your job isn't "getting sunburned as hell", it suggests you may have not done an efficient job soliciting bids or applications or evaluating those bids, etc.

Now in a few isolated areas, there may be other circumstances that create the situation. But if you seriously think that a completely balanced, equitable solicitation process, it's going to frequently happen that the best candidates are almost always going to come from the dominant group, then that's a little weird.

Over an aggregate of businesses, yes. In any single one? Not really. Even a true random distribution exhibits clumping.

It's not about quotas; it's about the fact that in the vast majority of cases that if you hired all white heterosexual dudes and your job isn't "getting sunburned as hell", it suggests you may have not done an efficient job soliciting bids or applications or evaluating those bids, etc.

Maybe all the best firms that do "X" is you area are owned by white heterosexual dudes. Should you not be allowed to hire them?

Imagine if I was doing the contracting for the city of Chicago. Imagine if unintentionally I only really paid much attention to the people who read the trade publications I read, or hang out in the neighborhood businesses I hang out in, or went to the schools I attended. Let's even say that some of my preferences were for people who listened to what I listen to or speak like I do.

Government may be a different issue, b/c there's no competition to discipline the buyers and make sure more competent minorities win out. But really, contracting in Chicago is assigned by kick-backs.

To hire and individual or a firm to do work for you, for any reason other than their quality and their price, it screwing yourself.

100% agree, but in the construction industry, quality and price does not seem to matter as much as "who do I play golf with?"

But really, contracting in Chicago is assigned by kick-backs.

In Chicago government, sure. But this is not as big a deal at Target Field since anyone who can run kicks back is over at the Metrodome playing for the Vikings.

100% agree, but in the construction industry, quality and price does not seem to matter as much as "who do I play golf with?"

Where I live, it matters much more what town in Mexico you are from.

A small commercial building not far from my house is being built. A few days ago around the noon hour, I was walking by with my dog and saw a handful of construction workers on break, eating lunch near the sidewalk. I said hi, they smiled and nodded and I walked on. But then one of them, by all appearances a Latino, reached out and offered my dog the last quarter of his apple. "Eeet's okay?" he asked me. I said sure and Truman (who is friendly to all people) took the apple in his mouth and enjoyed the piece of fruit.

Because our economy (in the Sacramento area) is so weak and unemployement is so high and construction is so dead, I asked the worker in Spanish if it's been hard getting construction jobs lately. He said it's the worst he has seen in 25 years of working in California. I asked him where he was from. He said León, Guanajuato. He then told me that everyone else working on that one job -- I think there were 15 or so workers on the site -- were also from the city of León. I asked, "But you guys live here?" He said, "No. We live wherever the work is. Our families stay in León. When the contractor calls us for work, we go there. When there are no jobs, we go back to León."

The fact that every guy on that jobsite was from the same place surprised me a little, because they were in a variety of trades. I didn't ask, but I suspect the general contractor must also come from León, Guanajuato. I used to work in real estate development and had seen subcontractors whose entire crews were from one or another town in Mexico. But I don't recall any where everybody in every trade came from one city. The difference, today, I suspect, is due to the tight economy (which allows contractors to pick whichever workers they want) and the fact that almost the only people who work in construction around here are Mexicans. Back when I hired contractors in the Bay Area, only maybe one-fourth of the workers on any job were Latinos.

Because our economy (in the Sacramento area) is so weak and unemployement is so high and construction is so dead, I asked the worker in Spanish if it's been hard getting construction jobs lately. He said it's the worst he has seen in 25 years of working in California. I asked him where he was from. He said León, Guanajuato. He then told me that everyone else working on that one job -- I think there were 15 or so workers on the site -- were also from the city of León. I asked, "But you guys live here?" He said, "No. We live wherever the work is. Our families stay in León. When the contractor calls us for work, we go there. When there are no jobs, we go back to León."

And you didn't call Homeland Security and demand these illegal aliens be expelled from the Land of the Free along with any anchor terror babies they've shed along the way? See, it's do-gooder hippies like you that force the good people of Arizona to take a stand against your anti-American approach to foreign criminals.

#53 -- I don't know how those guys from Guanajuato got papers, but a story I know is probably similar to theirs. A Mexican friend of mine had a brother who came to the U.S. for work after my friend became a U.S. citizen (following the Reagan-era amnesty). The key for the brother was having a close family member who was a citizen. He then got his permanent residency papers, and that allowed him to work here legally. He then brought over his wife and she brought over her sister and two brothers and on and on.

#4 According to National Lampoon's True Facts (the best possible source) North Dakota was once ordered to recruit 20 blacks for the National Guard (and to submit a recruiting plan).

The plan supposedly read (in its entirety), "If we can find a black, we'll attempt to recruit him."

I'd like to think it's true.

#53 -- I don't know how those guys from Guanajuato got papers

And with your blase and apathetic attitude towards the fundamental right of our nation to keep itself free of foreign invaders and their anchor terror babies, you never will. For shame.