While I feel that both Cosby and the writer make valid points, I believe the underlying cause has still been over-looked.

Cosby states that blacks are more prone to invest their money on items that appear to make you look as if "you have made it", like clothes, shoes, cars, and jewelry. He also states that blacks do this instead of investing in things that will profit them in the future, such as educational tools, healthcare etc.

The writer stated that the reason behind all of this was an underlying need and search for social status. Since blacks tend to try and impress other blacks and whites tend to try and impress other whites, that blacks are not necessarily trying to keep up with whites but due to the fact that the average household income of blacks is still substantially less than whites, blacks will always be behind the "power curve"

This brings me to the reason. I read an article many years ago about Spike Lee's production company and how it got the name "40 acres and a mule productions". Well in the article I received a history lesson about blacks in this country. In article it talked about the broken promise that was made by our country to give each freed slave family 40 acres and one mule to start their new lives with after slavery was abolished. Since slaves were considered 3/5ths of a man, they were definitely behind the social status power curve. So how do you catch up in the social status race when you were so far behind in the beginning? It is much easier to end up with something when you start out with somthing. But starting out with not only nothing but 'less than nothing" can be an insurmountable task.

Well, the promise of 40 acres and one mule would have been a decent start to level the playing field but since it never happened, blacks have always been behind and continue to be so, even to this day. So, the article about Spike's company stated, and I agree, that instead of freed blacks investing in things that will benefit them/us in the future, blacks learned to purchase things that made it appear that they/we have "made it".

So the bottom line is that due to the poor start, the broken promises, and the mentality of "looking" like I made it, blacks in America are still behind the power curve and will continue to be until we can learn to apply some of the things that Bill Cosby stated.

bellis