For Black Republicans, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is an obligatory fiction | Michael Harriot

From Herschel Walker to Tim Scott, denying racism and extolling self-reliance is the Republican party line

Aside from racial gerrymandering, suppressing votes, underfunding schools, upholding a biased criminal justice system, denying a woman's right to choose, preventing access to healthcare, undermining democracy, opposing reparations and thwarting every effort for equal rights, perhaps the most preposterous part of conservative mythology is the insidiously racist idea of bootstraps".

According to this wholly absurd construct, hard work - and hard work, alone - is a magical key that unlocks the promises of the American dream. And, if one accepts this premise, then the converse must also be true. Anyone who doesn't achieve their dreams is simply not working hard enough.