The "Smoking Gun" Confirming the Racist Intent of NC's Voter ID Law

Racist homophobe, GOP Gov. Pat McCrory

As noted in a piece last evening, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down North Carolina's racially motivated voter ID law - a similar GOP backed voter ID law in Wisconsin was also struck down by a different court).  A piece in the Washington Post gives further analysis of the 4th Circuit's ruling and the blatant motivation of the North Carolina GOP in passing the measure.  Increasingly, the GOP cannot win elections except through gerrymandered districts and restricting likely Democrat voters from voting.  Rational individuals would get the message that they need a new message and agenda, but not in today's Christofascist and white supremacist controlled Republican Party.  Here are highlights from the Post article:

In addition to requiring residents to show identification before they can cast a ballot, the law also eliminated same-day voter registration, eliminated seven days of early voting and put an end to out-of-precinct voting. The federal court ruling reinstates these provisions, for now.

Supporters of the law, like North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, have long maintained that requirements like these were necessary to prevent voter fraud. But time and time again, scholars and legal experts have found that the type of fraud these laws are meant to combat is largely nonexistent.

One of the most comprehensive studies on the subject found only 31 individual cases of voter impersonation out of more than 1 billion votes cast in the United States since the year 2000. Researchers have found that reports of voter fraud are roughly as common as reports of alien abduction.

 

The federal court in Richmond found that the primary purpose of North Carolina's wasn't to stop voter fraud, but rather to disenfranchise minority voters. The judges found that the provisions "target African Americans with almost surgical precision."

[T]he court found that North Carolina lawmakers requested data on racial differences in voting behaviors in the state. "This data showed that African Americans disproportionately lacked the most common kind of photo ID, those issued by the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV)," the judges wrote.

So the legislators made it so that the only acceptable forms of voter identification were the ones disproportionately used by white people. "With race data in hand, the legislature amended the bill to exclude many of the alternative photo IDs used by African Americans," the judges wrote. "The bill retained only the kinds of IDs that white North Carolinians were more likely to possess."

The data also showed that black voters were more likely to make use of early voting — particularly the first seven days out of North Carolina's 17-day voting period. So lawmakers eliminated these seven days of voting. "After receipt of this racial data, the General Assembly amended the bill to eliminate the first week of early voting, shortening the total early voting period from seventeen to ten days," the court found.

Most strikingly, the judges point to a "smoking gun" in North Carolina's justification for the law, proving discriminatory intent. The state argued in court that "counties with Sunday voting in 2014 were disproportionately black" and "disproportionately Democratic," and said it did away with Sunday voting as a result.

This is about as clear-cut an indictment of the discriminatory underpinnings of voter-ID laws as you'll find anywhere. Studies have already shown a significant link between support for voter ID and racial discrimination, among both lawmakers and white voters in general.

"Faced with this record," the federal court concludes, "we can only conclude that the North Carolina General Assembly enacted the challenged provisions of the law with discriminatory intent."

The take away?  When you hear Republicans blathering about the GOP being the party that supports the constitution, supports morality and decency, know that it is a lie.  The GOP has become the enemy of constitutional government, morality and decency.  

Walker Quits 2016 Presidential Race

Candidly, at times it is hard for me to decide which of the Republican Presidential nominee candidates is the most despicable.  There are so many contenders, almost all of whom spew coded messages of racism, anti-Hispanic bigotry, homophobia and a contempt for women, not to mention an agenda that makes war on the poor and less fortunate.  But certainly, Scott Walker has been among those at the top of my list.  In his war against unions in Wisconsin he has shown himself to be against average Americans and their families, and his ridiculous anti-Muslim and anti-climate change harangues have shown that he's either an idiot or a knowing liar.  Thus, I was most delighted to hear that Walker has suspended his presidential campaign.  Indeed, the most decent thing I have heard him say were the words of his brief statement announcing the suspension of his campaign.  Here are highlights on this welcome development from the New York Times:

Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, whose early glow as a Republican presidential contender was snuffed out with the rise of anti-establishment rivals, announced on Monday that he was quitting the race and urged some of his 15 rivals to do the same so the party could unite against the leading candidate, Donald J. Trump. 

Mr. Walker’s pointed rebuke of Mr. Trump gave powerful voice to the private fears of many Republicans that the party risked alienating wide swaths of the American electorate – Hispanics, women, immigrants, veterans, and most recently Muslims – if Mr. Trump continued vilifying or mocking those groups as part of his overtures to angry and disaffected voters.

Still, Mr. Walker’s exit was not selfless: He was running low on campaign cash, sliding sharply in opinion polls, losing potential donors to rivals and unnerving supporters with a steady stream of gaffes, like saying he would consider building a barrier wall along the Canadian border.

Appearing ashen and drained at a brief news conference late Monday in Madison, Mr. Walker said the Republican presidential field was too focused on “how bad things are” rather than on “how we can make them better for everyone.” Without naming Mr. Trump, Mr. Walker issued a plea to fellow candidates to coalesce around a different Republican who could offer a more “optimistic” vision and guide the party to a victory next year that, he admitted with sadness in his voice, he could not achieve himself.

Mr. Walker’s departure is likely to have little impact given the sprawling field. He was competing most aggressively in Iowa, which he deemed a must-win state, but he had fallen from first to 10th place in a recent poll there. He also drew support from less than one-half of 1 percent of Republican primary voters in a recent CNN national poll.

If the demise of Mr. Walker’s campaign underscores anything, it is the increasingly intense pressure that candidates are under to raise enormous sums of money not only for their political operations but also for their “super PACs.”

The need to raise money has had the effect of turning the traditional state-by-state nomination fights into national contests, in which candidates need to prove themselves to donors across the country – rather than merely win over voters in the handful of states that hold the earliest caucuses and primaries. Mr. Walker increasingly tailored his message for Iowans, taking some sharply conservative stands on issues like immigration and same-sex marriage that could pose problems with moderates.

 My analysis is simple: good riddance! 

The Sick, Bizarre World of Trophy Hunting

Douche bag Walter Palmer and his victim

I will admit that I am anti-gun and anti-hunting.  In part this stems from early exposure to the lawlessness and selfishness of hunters.  Growing up in Central New York we lived in the county we lived on 50 acres and had horses.  During hunting season we had to fear for the lives of our horses and ourselves as hunters trespassed at will despite all the "Posted - No Trespass" signs that were up and down our property lines.  That experience was not unique and family members in the Charlottesville, Virginia, area experience the same problem to this day.  Personally, I think the phenomenon links with a psychological defect that makes some feel like "macho males" only when they kill largely defenseless animals.  Part and parcel with this mindset is an attitude that the law and rules do not apply to these "real men."  With the furor over they illegal killing of Cecil the Zimbabwe lion, much needed focus is coming on the sickness of hunters, especially trophy hunters.  A piece in Salon looks at this sick and disturbing world.  Here are highlights:

Minnesota dentist and trophy hunter Walter Palmer ignited worldwide outrage after killing the beloved Zimbabwe lion named Cecil. Hundreds have left angry reviews of his dental practice on Yelp and a Care2 petition condemning his actions has racked up more than 200,000 signatures. Focusing this rage on Palmer overshadows the bizarre practices and unscrupulous conduct that are a big part of business as usual throughout the trophy hunting industry. When wealthy clients pay thousands to kill exotic species, professional hunting guides face enormous pressure to deliver the goods even if that means breaking the law. Trophy hunters maintain that they hunt for the benefit of nature, but when the interests of profit and animals collide, abuse is inevitable.

The practice of trophy hunting originated as a way for humans to demonstrate power over large, dangerous animals, but now that modern high-powered weapons can subdue even the largest animals, the trophy hunter’s focus has shifted from animals that are dangerous to those that are rare.

[T]oday’s trophy hunters are corporate types who may spend tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands to kill a single animal. And the bigger and rarer and more beautiful the animal, the more a trophy hunter wants to kill it: An African lion hunt starts at around $39,000. For $60,000, power brokers can bag a bull elephant.

Exorbitant prices can pressure hunting guides to deliver a “successful” hunt no matter what. Hunters want to feel that their experience is real and that the hunt has not been staged, but when a hunt costs as much as a new luxury car, guides must practically guarantee that clients will take home the trophy they want. This leads guides to undertake unscrupulous and even unlawful methods to tilt the odds in their favor. Palmer’s guides allegedly used bait to lure Cecil away from the safety of Hwange National Park and illegally disposed of the lion’s radio collar. American hunting ranches use bait stations to concentrate animals and cameras to monitor their whereabouts. On African big game safaris, some hunting guides use bush planes to herd animals into firing range of a waiting hunter.

Trophy hunters argue that their pastime helps to conserve wildlife, but the reality of trophy hunting’s success as a tool of conservation has been mixed: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, for the first time in history, may list the African lion as an endangered species—a move that could ban American hunters from importing lion trophies—citing overzealous hunting as one reason for the big cat’s decline.

[R]arity itself makes animals more desirable and causes collectors to value killing them even more, a phenomenon Franck Courchamp calls the anthropogenic Allee effect: “The human predisposition to place exaggerated value on rarity fuels disproportionate exploitation of rare species, rendering them even rarer and thus more desirable, ultimately leading them into an extinction vortex.”

Wealthy hunters don’t need to travel to Africa to shoot exotic big game animals. Hunting preserves in the U.S. offer the chance to kill a dizzying array of species, including fallow deer, antelope, zebras and even exotic breeds of domestic goats. Most were bred specifically to be killed, but some game farms purchase animals from exotic animal auctions and even zoos.

In 2014, the Indianapolis Star conducted the first comprehensive investigation into America’s trophy deer hunting industry.  . . . They concluded that the trophy deer hunting business “costs taxpayers millions of dollars, compromises long-standing wildlife laws, endangers wild deer, and undermines the government’s multibillion-dollar effort to protect livestock and the food supply.”

In less than 40 years, deer breeding—which started as a backyard hobby—ballooned into an industry that operates primarily to give wealthy and busy clients the opportunity to kill trophy-size animals with a minimum of effort. The trophy deer breeding industry comprises at least 10,000 farms and hunting preserves in the U.S. and Canada. Over half of the states that permit the hunting of captive wild animals have few or no regulations regarding how captive wild animals are killed.

Chancellor also noted differences in how men and women approach animals right after killing them: “When they approach a kill, most guys high five or have a cigar,” he said. “Women will, almost without exception, sit by the animal, touch the animal. Some say a prayer. Some cry. Some walk with their head in their hands.”

These trophy hunters are a sick bunch and in my view must have microscopic penises if they so desperately need to kill rare and beautify animals so that they can feel like "real men."  Trophy hunting needs to be banned.   As for Palmer, I hope his dental practice is destroyed.  Perhaps he should have spent his wealth on penile enlargement surgery so that he would not need to be off killing prized and beloved animals.

Why the Border Crisis Is a Myth

Anti-immigrant Tea Party fanatics have been protesting along the U.S. - Mexico border outraged, I mean outraged, that non-whites are attempting to cross into the United States to escape violence and hardship in their Central American countries.  The hypocrisy of these "real Americans" is three fold: (i) they are descendants of immigrants themselves, (ii) while they are attacking Barack Obama, the law at the center of the debate was passed on George W. Bush's watch in 2008, and (iii) they falsely claim to be godly Christians even though the reject they Gospel message and seemingly learned nothing from the parable of the Good Samaritan.  Now, an El Paso, Texas judge suggests that the "border crisis" is in some ways a myth.  Here are excerpts from her op-ed in the New York Times:

TO hear the national news media tell the story, you would think my city, El Paso, and others along the Texas-Mexico border were being overrun by children — tens of thousands of them, some with their mothers, arriving from Central America in recent months, exploiting an immigration loophole to avoid deportation and putting a fatal strain on border state resources.

There’s no denying the impact of this latest immigration wave or the need for more resources. But there’s no crisis. Local communities like mine have done an amazing job of assisting these migrants. 

Rather, the myth of a “crisis” is being used by politicians to justify ever-tighter restrictions on immigration, play to anti-immigrant voters in the fall elections and ignore the reasons so many children are coming here in the first place.

Contrary to the heated pronouncements, this is nothing we haven’t seen before. Groups of refugees arrive by plane and are processed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. When they are released, Annunciation House takes them to a shelter where they get a shower, a place to sleep, meals and even health care — all provided by volunteers and private donations. 

The families of the refugees also help, often paying for travel costs and taking them into their homes. The refugees then move on, to Florida, Georgia, New York or elsewhere. 

While the numbers of refugees arriving in El Paso are a fraction of the number arriving in McAllen, in southern Texas, the chain of events is generally the same. Like El Paso, South Texas is not the permanent destination for these refugees. And the response from McAllen’s citizens has been generous, too. 

The same can’t be said of our politicians. What we are hearing from Austin and Washington is an almost Pavlovian response to immigration concerns. My governor, Rick Perry, a Republican, announced this week that he was sending 1,000 National Guard soldiers, at a cost of $12 million a month, to bolster the border.

In Texas, state legislators and the Department of Public Safety are planning to spend an additional $30 million over six months to create a “surge” of state law enforcement resources, an expenditure that some in our state’s Capitol would like to see made permanent. 

The costs are significant. Every day we detain an undocumented child immigrant, it costs Immigration and Customs Enforcement — i.e., the taxpayer — $259 per person, significantly more than we spend to educate a child in a middle-class school district.

The irony is that this cash-intensive strategy comes from leaders who consistently underfund health care, transportation and education. And they ignore the crucial fact that children crossing our borders aren’t trying to sneak around law enforcement: They are running to law enforcement.

This effort to take away rights that were granted when there was significantly less anti-immigrant fervor isn’t just shortsighted and expensive, it’s un-American. We can debate the wisdom of providing greater protection to Central American children than to Mexican children, but there can be no doubt that giving safe haven to a child facing violence in a country that cannot protect its most vulnerable citizens is what a civilized country, with the resources we possess, should do. 

Franklin Graham: Shyster and Bigot

Franklin Graham: anti-gay and anti-American

I will be frank.  I don't like Franklin Graham and but for his father, the man would likely have been a nobody.  The same goes for his sister and other Graham relatives who have turned religion into a very comfortable livelihood.  In my view, they are little better than leeches or parasites who suck the financial blood of the gullible.  Indeed, one could say that Franklin Graham is a shyster.  And on top of that, he's an anti-gay bigot.  Worse yet, he now is lauding Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.  Such has become the state of today's "godly Christians" that they side with a despot who is opposed to America.  A piece in Queerty looks at Graham's nasty ant-gay venom and his praise for an enemy of America.  Here are excerpts:

Rev. Franklin Graham is not only following in the footsteps of his father, elderly evangelist Billy Graham, he’s also apparently studied Pat Robertson and memorized every trite cliche ever written about gay people. In a new interview with the Charlotte Observer, Frankie, who now serves as CEO and president of Billy Graham Evangelistic Assoc., trots out the decades-old “gays want to convert our children” silliness.

“Of course, gays and lesbians cannot have children,” he offered as a nugget of wisdom, before the reporter informed him that same-sex couples can adopt in many states.

Then as if the recent antigay column he wrote for the Graham empire magazine Decision wasn’t clear enough, the Rev. launches into another disturbing, ill-informed spiel in which he reveals he sees Valdimir Putin as a role model.

“I agree with Putin,” he states. “Protecting his nation’s children… was a pretty smart thing to do.” Riiiight. Putin’s doing an amazing job protecting young people in Russia.

Graham also waxes on about how Congress needs to do more to protect America’s children from the “gay and lesbian agenda” and accuses President Obama of pushing this agenda.

Rackets like Graham's need to be shut down.  Imagine if this man had to get a real job and stop shaking down the gullible and ignorant for money they don't have to be giving away.  A nasty whore has more decency and integrity than Mr. Graham.

Russia Capitulates and Amends Olympic Truce to Include Sexual Orientation

I cannot help but wonder if Vladimir Putin is regretting prostituting himself to the reactionary, gay hating elements of the Russian Orthodox Church but jumping on board the anti-gay laws pasted by the Russian Duma.  In addition to a constant drum beat of negative publicity, fears that American sponsors may reconsider their involvement with the 2014 Winter Olympics, Russia has now been forced to sign an Olympic Truce that guarantees non-discrimination on any basis, including sexual orientation.  The New York Times has coverage.  Here are details:

Every two years, the United Nations adopts a resolution called the Olympic Truce, a perfunctory statement that invokes the ancient Greeks and celebrates friendly competition and “the cause of peace.” 

It usually passes with little deliberation. But not this year. 

While world leaders grappled with the crisis unfolding in Syria, a lesser debate was unfolding at the United Nations over the truce . . .

The controversy was over a rough draft of the truce that mentioned a promise to include “people of different age, sex, physical capacity, religion, race and social status,” according to documents reviewed by The New York Times. It made no mention of gay or transgender people, a particularly sensitive omission given the uproar in the West over a Russian law that has been criticized as antigay.

 

United Nations representatives from around the world spent weeks pushing Russia to amend the language to include gay people, according to interviews with representatives from eight countries. This week, after extensive negotiations behind the scenes, Russia altered the truce’s language to say that it would “promote social inclusion without discrimination of any kind.”

Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, said recently that the truce “may sound like something from the distant past that has no place in our times.” But he maintained that it was still relevant. 

Past truces, including the one that Britain sponsored for the 2012 London Olympics, did not mention gay or transgender people. But this year, with global attention focused on the matter, countries are aiming to set a precedent of inclusion. 

“Along with like-minded partners, the United Kingdom is keen to see principles of nondiscrimination included in the Olympic Truce resolution,” said Iona Thomas, a spokeswoman for the United Kingdom Mission to the United Nations. 

Russia’s law, signed by President Vladimir V. Putin in June, bans “propaganda on nontraditional sexual relationships.” It led to calls for protests and even some boycotts of the Sochi Games. The International Olympic Committee said it had received “strong written reassurances” from the Russian government that all would be welcome at the Sochi Games, regardless of their sexual orientation.

The United Nations is likely to vote on the truce in the coming weeks. 

Overall, this should count as a much deserved major humiliation to Putin and Russia.