politics

The United States is an Entitlement Nation

Tony Thompson
For this post, I’ll be donning my most favoritest hat of all time.

I’m about to say something that will shock readers. No, I’m not going to put up a trigger warning because those things are stupid. Trigger warnings are a creation of politically correct leftist liberal feminist communist marxists who whine and cry about any little thing. Who cares if a post about sexual assault triggers horrific memories in readers? Why does it matter if someone is made uncomfortable because a discussion of childhood abuse brings back awful memories? By God, this is still a free country and I’m tired of my rights being infringed. The First Amendment guarantees me the right to say what I want, when I want, and where I want, even if the things I say might trigger those who have been victimized. And don’t even think about criticizing me, because I’m within my rights as a citizen of this country!

Now, that shocking thing I was going to say?

This country has become an entitlement nation. We have become a nation of people looking for handouts from the government. The free housing was bad enough, but many of these moochers also get free food and the Nanny State liberal supporters are ok with this! Instead of people having a strong work ethic like they did back in the glory days of yesteryear-before the Civil Rights Movement, the Gay Rights Movement, and Women’s Liberation ruined this country with their pursuit of “equality”–people just want shit handed to them on a platter. As if we all have a right to housing. Or food. What’s more, our tax dollars support this! Mine, and yours, yours, and yours too. Our money, that we work hard for, is being used to assist people who have been fired or laid off from a job, or those people who have disabilities that prevent them from working.  With the release of a new Census Bureau survey, I’ve found another group that conservatives ought to direct their ire toward:

Continue reading “The United States is an Entitlement Nation” →

The United States is an Entitlement Nation
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What would YOU like to ask the White House?

Tony Thompson

Imagine sitting down with the President to discuss the issues of the day while munching on a piece of a 1,400 pound block of cheese. Hard to conceive eh? That’s exactly what happened back in February, 1837. President Andrew Jackson did just that-holding an open house in the White House foyer for thousands of citizens and his staff. Last year, the Obama administration-ostensibly in an effort to make themselves appear more open and transparent-resurrected this charming (tho a bit antiquated) idea in the form of ‘Big Block of Cheese‘ Day.

Here at the White House, we’re dedicated to making President Obama’s administration the most open and accessible in history. That’s why, for the second year in a row, we thought it’d be a gouda idea to brie-unite a certain cast of characters to help us bring back a tradition that dates back to the days of President Andrew Jackson.

On February 22, 1837, President Jackson had a 1,400-pound block of cheese hauled into the main foyer of the White House for an open house with thousands of citizens and his staff, where they discussed the issues of the day while carving off slabs of cheddar.

This year, we aim to do even feta. On Wednesday, January 21, in fromage to President Jackson (and to President Bartlet, if you’re a fan of The West Wing), we’re hosting the second-annual virtual Big Block of Cheese Day, where members of the Obama administration will take to social media to answer your questions about the President’s State of the Union address and the issues that are most important to you.

Log on to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr, and ask away using the hashtag #AskTheWH. We’ll do our best to answer as many questions as we can.

So be sure to visit WhiteHouse.gov/SOTU to watch the State of the Union address on January 20, 2015 at 9 p.m. ET and check out the schedule of all the ways you can engage on the following day, January 21. We camembert to think you’d miss it.

While I’m sure there will be more than a few people asking snide or ridiculous questions (coughcoughteapartynitwitscoughcough and coughcoughrepublicandunderheadscoughcough), there are plenty of legitimate questions one could ask of the Obama administration. For each of the blocks of time conveniently set aside by the White House for a specific topic, I’ve come up with a question (or two) I’d love to hear an answer for:

9:15 a.m. ET: Housing in America

Instead of continuing with plans to create a fleet of F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Jets, why not spend that money on housing every homeless person in the United States?

10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. ET: General Overview and State of the Union Themes

  • Director of the Office of Public Engagement Paulette Aniskoff – @PAniskoff44

  • Principal Deputy White House Press Secretary – @Schultz44

  • Associate Communications Director Stephanie Young – @Stephanie44

  • Deputy Communications Director Amy Brundage – @Brundage44

Contrary to the beliefs of Republican or Tea Party officials, the Democratic Party doesn’t lean left very much and is definitely not progressive. What, if any, efforts are underway to shift the Party platform in a more progressive direction?

11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. ET: Education, Immigration, and Latino Issues

  • Dr. Jill Biden – @DrBiden

  • Director of the Domestic Policy Council Cecilia Muñoz – @Cecilia44

  • Executive Director of Reach Higher Eric Waldo – @ReachHigher

  • Director of Hispanic Media Katherine Vargas – @Vargas44

  • Deputy Director of Hispanic Media Antoinette Rangel – @LaCasaBlanca

  • Department of Education – @USEdGov

Given the importance of an educated populace, what efforts are underway at the federal level to assist the 30+ states who-having slashed their budgets during the Great Recession-still provide schools with less funding per student than they did 7 years ago?

In 2013, the Obama administration deported a record 438,421 undocumented immigrants. In what way (if at all) does the United States benefit from deporting immigrants?

1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. ET: Climate, Energy and Conservation

  • Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz – @ErnestMoniz

  • Special Assistant to the President for Energy & Climate Change – @Utech44

  • Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell – @SecretaryJewell

  • Department of Interior – @Interior

  • Environmental Protection Agency – @EPA

  • Department of Energy – @Energy

Despite vague and often unsubstantiated claims of overreaching regulations, the EPA is a vital agency that provides important public protections and resources, so why does it keep getting its funding slashed?

2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. ET: Economic opportunity, infrastructure, minimum wage, and women’s economic agenda

  • Member of the Council of Economic Advisers Betsey Stevenson – @CEABetsey

  • Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget – @DeeseOMB

  • Secretary of Labor Tom Perez – @LaborSec

  • Department of Labor – @USDOL

  • Department of Transportation – @USDOT

  • Counselor to the President John Podesta – @Podesta44 (climate)

In 2013, the American Society of Civil Engineers gave the United States a D+ on its infrastructure report card. While the President urged lawmakers to fund upgrades to U.S. infrastructure, what concrete efforts is the Obama administration making to improve the infrastructure of the country?

Why is there not a fair (and tied to inflation) minimum wage applicable to all 50 states and why are states allowed to set their own minimum wages?

One of the effects of intimate partner violence is a reduction in productivity of women in the workforce. Why has the Violence Against Women Act not been passed yet?

3:00 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. ET: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math

  • Director of the Office of Science & Technology Policy Dr. John Holdren – @WhiteHouseOSTP
  • U.S. Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith – @USCTO
  • OSTP Assistant Director for Strategic Communications and Senior Policy Analyst Kristin Lee – @Lee44

The United States has fallen far behind other industrialized nations in math, science, and technology. Reducing (or eliminating) the unique barriers women and People of Color face in higher education (such as stereotype threat and the opportunity gap) is important if the US is to truly compete in a global economy. What efforts are underway to push back against these barriers?

4:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. Foreign Policy

Like his predecessor, President Obama has engaged in an overseas Drone War.  Seven countries have been bombed, with civilians and suspected terrorists being killed indiscriminately. What evidence exists that killing one’s opponents is an effective means of reducing the threat of terrorism? Moreover, how can the United States condemn terrorism when they engage in the same tactics as the people they consider the “bad guys”?

5:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Health Care

  • Assistant Press Secretary Jessica Santillo – @Santillo44

  • Department of Health and Human Services – @HHSGov

While the Affordable Healthcare Act has brought healthcare to millions of USAmericans, all human beings are entitled to healthcare. When will the United States government stop focusing so much on the profits of corporations and start paying attention to the needs of its citizenry in matters of health?

For some reason, I don’t think I’d get open and transparent answers to my questions.

What would YOU like to ask the White House?

Republican official showcases upper level ignorance

Tony Thompson,

Last week, Russell Pearce, a top Arizona GOP official had some interesting things to say about low income Arizonans (Arizonians?):

Tuning into The Russell Pearce Show on Saturday nights on Phoenix talk-radio station KKNT 960 AM can be illuminating.

For example, on one recent episode, the recalled former state Senate president got off on the subject of public assistance in all its various forms.

He suggested that if people would just give him the authority, he’d set things right with all these here gub’mint programs.

“You put me in charge of Medicaid,” Pearce told one caller, “the first thing I’d do is get [female recipients] Norplant, birth-control implants, or tubal ligations. Then, we’ll test recipients for drugs and alcohol, and if you want to [reproduce] or use drugs or alcohol, then get a job.”

Down deep, Pearce really is an old softy. This is just his version of tough love.

“I know there’s people out there [who] need help, and my heart goes out to them, too,” he explained that same evening. “But you know what? That should never be a government role. That’s a role for family, church, and community.”

So generous. So thoughtful. Why, if only we had more people like him in the world, all our problems would be solved!

::we interrupt this post because I need to go find a bucket to puke in…ah, much better::

Anyone remember the Count?  From Sesame Street.  Imagine his voice as we say:

One, one fail!

Two, two fails!

Three, three fails!

Four, four fails!

Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Fail the first- He’d “get” low income women birth control or tubal ligations? What does that mean? You’d force them?  You do know that’s a violation of their privacy and their bodily autonomy, right?  What’s that? You don’t care?  Oh, silly me. I forgot we’re talking about the women folk.  In this country, they get different, and fewer rights, than men do (at least according to the GOP assbigots).  Oh, and is he going to “get” these to the women folk free of charge?

Fail the second- Drug testing low income government assistance recipients.  ::Le sigh:: This.  Again.  How many times must reality smack these Republican nincomfucks upside the head before they will listen (yeah, yeah, I know)?  Here is yet more evidence that Republican views are divorced from reality:

The testing is meant to assure taxpayers their money isn’t being “wasted” on the less desirable, those who would somehow manage to buy drugs with the assistance. But in Tennessee, where drug testing was enacted for welfare recipients last month, only one person in the 800 who applied for help tested positive. In Florida, during the four months the state tested for drug use, only2.6% of applicants tested positive. Meanwhile, Florida has an illegal drug use rate of 8%, meaning far fewer people on services are using drugs than their better-off counterparts. The drug testing cost taxpayers more money than it saved, and was ruled unconstitutional last year.

Then there’s the lovely state of Utah:

Utah has spent more than $30,000 to drug test welfare applicants after it passed a new law last year. But in that time, just 12 people have tested positive for drug use, according to state figures.

Utah doesn’t randomly test applicants or require them to all undergo a drug test, but instead requires them to complete a written questionnaire that is meant to screen for drug abuse. Those who have a high probability are then given drug tests. The state spent nearly $6,000 on written tests for 4,730 applicants, 466 of which had to take a drug test, which cost more than $25,000. The law doesn’t disqualify those who test positive but instead requires them to go into a substance abuse treatment program.

And in Virginia:

Virginia Republicans are reviving plans to force welfare recipients to take drug tests before receiving benefits, saying they have found ways to reduce the price tag that doomed the proposal earlier.

“We got hung up last year on the cost, and it seems that we determined the costs aren’t as great as we were told last year,” said Del. Dickie Bell, R-Staunton, the bill’s sponsor. “There are new methods of screening and testing used other places, and some are practical and could be applied here.”

Bell hasn’t introduced drug test legislation yet for the 2013 General Assembly session. The bill he introduced in the last session would have screened all state welfare recipients and then administered drug tests to those suspected of drug use.

The legislation failed, however, after the state estimated it would cost $1.5 million to administer the tests, compared with the estimated $229,000 that would be saved by stripping benefits from those who test positive.

I’m starting to see a pattern:  Republicans are idiots.  Drug testing welfare recipients is a waste of taxpayer dollars because there are insufficient numbers of low income Americans who are doing drugs. Stop trotting this bullshit out.

Fail the third-Pearce’s comments make use of the GOP talking point that welfare recipients are not working.  A large number of them are working:

Over the last two decades, large shares of SNAP households have become working households. In 1989, 42 percent of all SNAP households received cash welfare benefits and only 20 percent had earned income. By 2010, over three times as many SNAP households worked as relied solely on welfare benefits for their income.

Despite the large jump in unemployment during the recession, the share of SNAP families with earnings has continued to increase in recent years.  This suggests that for a growing share of the nation’s workers, having a job has not been enough to keep them out of poverty.

(via Media Matters)

Another thing that many Republican officials fail to realize is that many of the people who benefit from government assistance are children and the elderly.  You know, the people who don’t/can’t work or are retired.

Most SNAP recipients were children or elderly. Nearly half (48 percent) were children and another 8 percent were age 60 or older. Working-age women represented 28 percent of the caseload, while working-age men represented 16 percent. (source)

That ties in nicely to fail the fourth-that the government shouldn’t assist low income families.  It’s funny, to hear the arguments from opponents of marriage equality, it is in the government’s best interest to forbid same sex marriage because think of the kids. If the government has a vested interest in thinking of the kids as a reason to make same sex marriage illegal-don’t they have an interest in supporting those families with kids who are struggling to put motherfucking food on the table?!  But no, think of the kids is a refrain only trotted out to oppose marriage equality (and of course, it’s not about the kids in that case either, otherwise, they’d see the many LGB families with kids that would greatly benefit from having their parents in a legally recognized marriage).

The fail is further added to when you recognize that private charities are not up to the task of providing for the millions of Americans who require financial assistance and they NEVER were (libertarians, take note).

The power of the fail is strong in Russell Pearce.  Thankfully, he has since resigned.

 

Republican official showcases upper level ignorance

Don Lemon interviews Pharrell about Ferguson

Tony Thompson, , ,

CNN’s Don Lemon recently sat down with artist Pharrell Williams to discuss the slaying of Michael Brown and the events in Ferguson:

Around the 1:20 mark, Lemon mentions the Facebook campaign to get black men to pull up their pants and wear them around the waist. Pharrell responds by asserting that no one can tell him how to wear his pants.  He goes on to say that saggy pants aren’t a “black thing” bc white people also sag their pants. For the Facebook campaign to be mentioned in the same breath as the events in Ferguson skirts dangerously close to victim blaming. It’s an example of ‘respectability politics’ (which Lemon is quite agreeable to):

On Saturday, Don Lemon listed five steps the black community must require black men to take to become respectable: Stop sagging their pants, stop saying the n-word, stop littering, finish high school, and have fewer children out of wedlock. If black men do those things, they will show that they respect themselves, and then, you see, things will be better. (On Sunday, Lemon welcomed LZ Granderson and Ana Navarro on the air to pat his hand while he groused about the negative response to his comments.)

[…]

But in order to become “respectable,” the targeted group is always encouraged to change. And the changes always, always require the targeted group to become more like the dominant group. If black people act more like white people, or women act more like men, or gays and lesbians act more like straight people, they’ll all see the same outcomes. But the underlying goal of this is to stop being “different.” Act “normally,” and you’ll be treated normally, but if you step outside those boundaries, it is your fault and your fault only.

Of course, the problem with respectability politics is even if they sound good, they don’t actually mean all that much for real people.

[…]

What respectability politics assume, though, is that any bad outcome for black people is the fault of and can only be solved by black people. More importantly, anything black people do that the arbiter of “respectability” doesn’t like is also a black problem requiring a black solution.

Respectability politics alienate their target from the rest of society. They make their targets uniquely bad and irresponsible in a way that other groups aren’t. White dropout rates aren’t the problem of the white community. White men aren’t lectured as a group about the 627,541 out-of-wedlock births to white mothers in 2010. The only response respectability politics has is to treat the black dropout or the black out-of-wedlock birth as a black failure rather than a societal one. Not only are black people somehow uniquely and voluntarily flawed, all of them are responsible for the failures.

 

If you dress right, you’ll fit in.

If you carry yourself correctly, you’ll be allowed in the club.

If you act in the manner that the majority deems acceptable, you won’t be shot and killed.

This is at the heart of what Lemon is talking about.  Respectability politics shifts the responsibility for the oppression and discrimination faced by a marginalized group from the shoulders of the oppressors onto the shoulders of the oppressed.  It works by telling the oppressed that they can get by and get ahead in life (or not be killed) if they’ll subsume themselves to the desires of others. You can exist, just not on your own terms.  If you choose to exist on your own terms and not do what we say, we can’t be responsible for what befalls you-that’s on you.  That’s what “sagging pants” represents.  The mere mention of the campaign pushes the idea that black people can be more easily accepted into white culture if they pull their pants up and act in a manner white people approve of.

Fuck.

That.

Noise.

As Pharrell rightly states, no one should be dictating to others what they can or cannot wear (this isn’t a discussion of parents telling their child what clothes to wear).  I do wish Pharrell had taken a different tack with his response.  Yes, no one has the right to tell him how he can dress.  But the problem with bringing up sagging pants in a discussion about Michael Brown’s death is that it, somewhat subtly, makes the point that if black people would alter their behavior to make white people more comfortable they won’t get shot and killed.  That’s victim blaming. Instead of Lemon excoriating the actions of Darren Wilson, he chooses to mention the no saggy pants Facebook campaign. As if it’s relevant to the discussion of the slaying of Michael Brown.  To Don Lemon, it’s relevant because he feels that too many black Americans don’t “act right” or “dress right”-and if they started doing things “the right way”, they would be more accepted.  That’s a great message there Lemon- ‘Act White. Stay alive’.  Except not only does it not work that way, it shouldn’t work that way.  Black people should expect to be able to express themselves as they see fit and white America should accept them on those terms.  We don’t exist for the approval of white America.  Yes, we live together in this country. Yes, we need to get along with each other.  But that does not mean we need to lose our individuality or our culture. It doesn’t mean we need to alter our identities so that white America is more accepting of us.  That’s not equality.  That’s assimilation.  As I said before, fuck that noise. The people who need to change their behavior are the Darren Wilson’s of the world.  They are the ones who aren’t acting right.  They are the ones continuing to deny black people the right to exist on their own terms.  They’re not only NOT acting respectable, they’re acting reprehensibly.  Don Lemon needs to wake up and recognize this and call them out.

 

 

 

Don Lemon interviews Pharrell about Ferguson

The right wing rage machine

Tony Thompson

In a recent back and forth at Pharyngula, I was told by a commenter that despite the fact that I’m a gay, atheist, black man, that I have no reason to be concerned about facing violence for being any one or all three of those.  This, despite the fact that the United States still has a problem with anti-LGBT violence and homicide:

The 2012 report documents 2,016 incidents of anti-LGBTQ violence in 2012 (a slight 4% decrease from 2011), and highlights a number of disturbing multi-year trends of severe anti-LGBTQ violence. LGBTQ people of color were 1.82 times as likely to experience physical violence compared to white LGBTQ people, and gay men were 1.56 times as likely to require medical attention compared to other survivors reporting. The report also found that transgender people were 1.67 times as likely to experience threats and intimidation compared to LGBTQ non-transgender survivors and victims. “Though the recent spate of hate violence incidents in New York City has captured the media’s attention, this report demonstrates that severe acts of violence against gay men, transgender people and LGBTQ people of color are, unfortunately, not unique to Manhattan nor to the past month, but rather part of a troubling trend in the United States,” said Chai Jindasurat, NCAVP Coordinator at the New York City Anti- Violence Project.

[…]

In 2012, NCAVP documented 25 anti-LGBTQ homicides in the United States. This continues a multi- year trend in high anti-LGBTQ homicide rates nationally (30 were reported in 2011, the highest ever) , and is the 4th highest yearly total ever recorded by NCAVP. Lisa Gilmore from Center on Halsted Anti- Violence Project in Chicago, Illinois cautions that the number of homicides may be even higher: “Over the last several years, not only have we seen consistently high rates of anti-LGBTQ homicides, but we also know there are many more homicides of LGBTQ people, especially transgender people and people of color, which go unreported. Twenty-five LGBTQ hate violence homicides is an alarming number – and we know it could just be the tip of the iceberg.”

The 2012 report found that 73.1% of all anti-LGBTQ homicide victims in 2012 were people of color. Of the 25 known homicide victims in 2012 whose race/ethnicity was disclosed, 54% were Black/African American, 15% Latin@, 12% White and 4% Native American.

The report also found that 53.8% of anti-LGBTQ homicide victims in 2012 were transgender women. This is a considerable increase from 2011 (40%) and continues a three-year trend toward disproportionate and severe violence experienced by transgender women.

“For a third year in a row, NCAVP’s findings reflect a disproportionate impact of severe and deadly violence on people of color,” said Maria Carolina Morales from Community United Against Violence in San Francisco, California. “This is also true for transgender women victims, all of whom were people of color, and continues a multi-year trend that transgender women of color are targeted for deadly violence.”

It’s clear that being LGBT still puts many Americans at risk for increased violence. Being a Person of Color increases those odds.  Last I checked, I was both of those.

Please don’t misunderstand me:  I’m not paralyzed with fear. I don’t and *won’t* own a gun (that would merely increase my chances of being shot and/or killed; if I want to decrease my chances of facing violence, owning a gun is not the way to go). I’m not going to constantly look over my shoulder and worry that everywhere I go I could be subjected to violence.  I am, however, aware of the increased risk I face, compared to other, more privileged individuals (like the person I spoke about above).  I also know that I live in the south:  an area of the United States that’s far from tolerant of People of Color, LGBT individuals, or atheists (who are distrusted as much as rapists, despite the fact that being an atheist causes no harm to others and has no moral component).

A huge contributing factor to the increased chance of violence faced by PoC, LGBT people, and atheists-perhaps an overwhelming one-is the right wing, white supremacist rage machine in the United States. The events in Ferguson, Missouri have shown that the drum beats of the right wing rage machine continue unabated.

How Will the Right-Wing Hate Media Distort the New Evidence in the Michael Brown Murder Case?

The defenders of Darren Wilson, the white police officer who repeatedly shot an unarmed black teenager named Michael Brown at least 6 times in Ferguson, Missouri claim that “the facts” will clear their champion of any wrongdoing.

Unfortunately for Darren Wilson, the facts of what transpired on the day when he shot Michael Brown in the face and body with multiple bullets have not been kind to him.

Independent witnesses have told the press and federal investigators how Michael Brown was unarmed, had surrendered with his hands in the air, and was repeatedly shot by Darren Wilson. These witnesses are African-American.

For the white bigots who defend Darren Wilson, as well as the Right-wing hate media that stoke the flames of white racial resentment and white supremacy, black people’s truth claims about racism (regardless of the mountains of empirical evidence in support of their experiences) are de facto and a priori judged to be insufficient by the White Gaze.

This is part of a centuries-long tradition in America, where for most of the country’s existence, African-Americans were not allowed to testify in court or to have any type of legal standing.

In the post civil rights era–and especially since the election of Barack Obama–the Tea Party GOP and the White Right have demonstrated that they would like to return to an arrangement of civic and public affairs in which black people are silenced and muted. In all, the Tea Party GOP and its allies yearn for the civic erasure of black and brown people—it enrages the White Right that they cannot follow through on their wishful dreams of social and political death for black Americans.

The American Right-wing’s defense of the killer cop Darren Wilson is instinctive: it is an extension of a base hostility to the freedom, well-being, life, liberty, and happiness of black and brown Americans.

To point. The most morally rotted and ethically suspect supporters of Darren Wilson have collectively donated at least 500,000 dollars to protect him from the consequences of killing Michael Brown.

As I wrote here, donating money to Darren Wilson (and other white vigilantes and extra-judicial killers of black people such as George Zimmerman) is the new lynching photography of the 21st century. Instead of buying postcards of hung, tortured, and burned alive black bodies, those who donate to Darren Wilson enjoy the vicarious pleasures of killing a black person by proxy. Michael Brown, and by extension other black American men, are born with a bounty on their heads.

Darren Wilson is the white gunslinger who brought the black “thug” to “justice”. This is cathartic violence for the White Right and its Fox News driven propaganda machine.

My opponent at Pharyngula actually said he thinks he faces a greater chance of facing violence than I do.  This despite the fact that he’s almost certainly a cisgender, white, heterosexual man.  Yes, because cisgender, white, heterosexual men in the United States face sooooo much oppression, bigotry, and discrimination.

The right wing rage machine

Hillary Clinton speaks out about Ferguson. I am underwhelmed.

Tony Thompson

Hillary Clinton has weighed in on the events of Ferguson.  Why she waited this long, I don’t know.  The events have been going on since the beginning of August.  Initially social media was the means by which people learned of Michael Brown’s murder as well as the protests.  Mainstream media ignored the story for a time, coming as it did around the same time as the death of Robin Williams.  In time, the MSM began covering the events in Ferguson, thus spreading the news even further than it had before. I guess it just took some time before Hillary found out about it.  Or perhaps it just wasn’t important enough to her to comment until now. Or perhaps she was one of those fence sitter that felt “I need to know more about the situation” before I comment (as if one can’t form a tentative opinion based on known facts and amend that opinion as more information is revealed).  In any event, here’s what she had to say:

“This summer, the eyes of our country and indeed of the world have been focused on one community in the middle of the American heartland: Ferguson, Missouri,” Clinton said. “Watching the recent funeral for Michael Brown, as a mother, as a human being, my heart just broke for his family because losing a child is every parent’s greatest fear and an unimaginable loss.”

“Behind the dramatic, terrible pictures on television, there are deep challenges that will be with them and with us long after the cameras move on,” she said. “This is what happens when the bonds of trust and respect that hold any community together fray.”

 

That was…underwhelming.  “Oh it’s a tragedy” Clinton says. “Oh what a terrible loss” intones the former First Lady.  “My heart broke” says the former Secretary of State.  Yeah, I can see how torn up you are.  Don’t get me wrong-I’m sure she meant the words she spoke.  But they ring so hollow. Systemic racism is a huge problem in this country (and don’t think for a second that it’s just directed at African-Americans; Indians, Muslim-Americans, Asian-Americans, and Hispanic-Americans deal with this shit too), and I don’t think that she understand the depth or breadth of the problem.  She certainly doesn’t indicate such an understanding in her short speech addressing the events in Ferguson.  In fact, her speech comes across like “Do I really have to talk about this? Ok. Fine.  I’ll say a little something and then move on.  That should make people happy.”  Fuck that noise.  Hillary Clinton has a huge fanbase. She is hugely influential and as a certain amazing arachnid at Marvel Comics often says “with great power comes great responsibility”.  Hillary Clinton has spoken at length, passionately about the rights of LGBT citizens across the globe.  She’s used her position of power (and let’s be clear here, by power, I don’t just mean a political office; Clinton has a tremendous amount of influence, despite not holding a political office, and influence is a form of power) to advocate for a group of people-LGBT individuals-of which I belong, and I’m grateful for that.  She can do more though.  She could advocate for the rights of racial minorities in the US and around the world.  She could have used the events in Ferguson to attempt to open a dialogue about the civil rights violations of blacks across the country.  She could have used her influence to talk to people about the militarization of the police* in the US and how that disproportionately affect People of Color-especially African-Americans.  She could have spoken up about how the US justice system is deeply broken, and how People of Color are disproportionately incarcerated, policed, and sentenced to death at significantly higher rates than their white counterparts. But no, she spoke at length 4 sentences about the events in Ferguson, without touching on the wider culture of racism that permeates the United States, and in so doing demonstrated her privilege.  She doesn’t even touch the role of race in the events in Ferguson.  She sidesteps the issue, and in so doing demonstrates a level of apathy that is shameful (perhaps she’s afraid of alienating any of her supporters who are Darren Wilson fans).  She can speak 4 sentences and then move on.  Racial disparities don’t directly affect her. Unfortunately, for millions of Americans, the racism that pervades our society is something they cannot avoid.  Perhaps in the coming days, Hillary Clinton will come to recognize how hollow her words were and commit to do more to battle racial injustice, or at least open a dialogue with the American public about racism.  Until that happens, color me unimpressed with her statement on Ferguson.

*She does address the militarization of police in the US, but doesn’t tie it to the racist practices of many US police departments

Edit:

It has come to my attention (thank you rq) that Hillary Clinton spoke more than a few lines about Ferguson. Indeed, she *did* speak about racism.  I did not know about this, and I should have dug deeper.  My apologies.  An article for the Washington Post reveals:

Imagine what we would feel and what we would do if white drivers were three times as likely to be searched by police during a traffic stop as black drivers instead of the other way around. If white offenders received prison sentences ten percent longer than black offenders for the same crimes. If a third of all white men – just look at this room and take one-third – went to prison during their lifetime. Imagine that. That is the reality in the lives of so many of our fellow Americans in so many of the communities in which they live.

 

This is quite a bit better than her four lines.  In fact, it’s better on a couple of levels.  For one, she’s talking directly about racism, rather than skirting the issue (as I mistakenly thought).  For another, she’s asking white people to put themselves into the shoes of black Americans.  She’s asking people to engage in empathy.  That’s important.  Her words need to be heard and taken to heart.  If you follow the Washington Post link above, you’ll find a video recording of her statements.

Again, I apologize for not being more informed on her speech and the extent to which she did comment on racism in the US.

 

Hillary Clinton speaks out about Ferguson. I am underwhelmed.

This country needs to talk about Ferguson and more

Tony Thompson

From The Good Men Project, an article about a school district that banned the discussion of the events in Ferguson.

On Thursday, August 21, the following message was released to parents of students in Edwardsville School District 7–a district roughly 30 miles outside Ferguson, MO.

Subject: Discussion of the Ferguson/Florissant Incident

On Friday, August 15, 2014, and Monday, August 18, 2014, Dennis Cramsey, EHS Principal, and I were inundated with calls from parents complaining that some EHS teachers were biased and injecting their own opinion regarding the shooting of Michael Brown, an 18 year-old African American student, by a Caucasian police officer in the Ferguson/Florissant community. The general consensus of parents who called was that if the administration did not get a handle on this situation, there might be violence among students occurring at EHS.

As Superintendent, I will take full responsibility for not preparing administrators and staff members how to deal with this volatile situation. As a result, on Monday afternoon, the decision was made to cease discussion of the event because of the tension, emotion, and anger surrounding the Ferguson/Florissant events.

It was not our intent to ignore the educational relevance of these events. However, we felt it was important to take the time to calm a potential situation at the high school and to prepare administrators and teachers to approach this critical issue in an objective, fact-based manner. Everyone has an opinion – the sharing of which can be polarizing. Far too many facts remain unknown, and without these facts, none of us is in the best position to moderate between opposing views.

 

 

 

20 Powerful Protest Signs That Prove America Stands with Ferguson

Here are a few:

 

 

I’m not “there”, but I’d still be pissed off and blogging about it.

It’s nice when white people understand their privilege.  Now if only more of them did.

 

 

7 Things Worth More Than a Black Person’s Life in America

This will make you madder than you probably already are, because of how true it is.

 

 

 

6 reasons America must stop ignoring its black youth.

 

 

 

What We Mean When We Say ‘Race Is a Social Construct’

 

Our notion of what constitutes “white” and what constitutes “black” is a product of social context. It is utterly impossible to look at the delineation of a “Southern race” and not see the Civil War, the creation of an “Irish race” and not think of Cromwell’s ethnic cleansing, the creation of a “Jewish race” and not see anti-Semitism. There is no fixed sense of “whiteness” or “blackness,” not even today. It is quite common for whites to point out that Barack Obama isn’t really “black” but “half-white.” One wonders if they would say this if Barack Obama were a notorious drug-lord.

When the liberal says “race is a social construct,” he is not being a soft-headed dolt; he is speaking an historical truth. We do not go around testing the “Irish race” for intelligence or the “Southern race” for “hot-headedness.” These reasons are social. It is no more legitimate to ask “Is the black race dumber than then white race?” than it is to ask “Is the Jewish race thriftier than the Arab race?”

The strongest argument for “race” is that people who trace their ancestry back to Europe, and people who trace most of their ancestry back to sub-Saharan Africa, and people who trace most of their ancestry back to Asia, and people who trace their ancestry back to the early Americas, lived isolated from each other for long periods and have evolved different physical traits (curly hair, lighter skin, etc.)

But this theoretical definition (already fuzzy) wilts under human agency, in a real world where Kevin Garnett, Harold Ford, and Halle Berry all check “black” on the census. (Same deal for “Hispanic.”) The reasons for that take us right back to fact of race as a social construct. And an American-centered social construct. Are the Ainu of Japan a race? Should we delineate darker South Asians from lighter South Asians on the basis of race? Did the Japanese who invaded China consider the Chinese the same “race?”

Andrew writes that liberals should stop saying “truly stupid things like race has no biological element.” I agree. Race clearly has a biological element — because we have awarded it one. Race is no more dependent on skin color today than it was on “Frankishness” in Emerson’s day. Over history of race has taken geography, language, and vague impressions as its basis.

“Race,” writes the great historian Nell Irvin Painter, “is an idea, not a fact.” Indeed. Race does not need biology. Race only requires some good guys with big guns looking for a reason.

 

 

 

The complicity cost of racial inclusion

 

 

Ferguson fallout: Black Americans grapple with victim-blaming

 

When pol
ice in Ferguson, Missouri, released a video showing Michael Brown allegedly robbing a store and shoving around a clerk shortly before the unarmed teen was shot dead in a seemingly unrelated confrontation with an officer, many accused the department of engaging in deliberate character assassination — a tactic that some rights advocates say is commonly used against African-American victims of excessive force in an attempt to shift blame from perpetrators to victims.

Hassane A. Muhammad, chief operating officer for Black Lawyers for Justice, called the decision to go public with the footage an act of “visual provocation” that played into old stereotypes of black men as violent.

“It’s a common playbook used by police to criminalize black victims of excessive force,” said Muhammad, whose group has been active in the local protests that erupted — and at times turned violent — after the killing of 18-year-old Brown on Aug. 9 by police officer Darren Wilson. 

“Instead of giving us an ounce of justice, they would rather send in troops and spend taxpayer money to defend one white man,” Muhammad said. “It shows you how much value they place on his life versus Brown.”

Rights advocates say such character assassination operates on a broad level, through public discourse that lends credence to the victim-blaming theory of poverty or in the idea that lower-income communities are responsible for their conditions because of poor decision-making.

What connects the Brown shooting with cases such as that of Trayvon Martin — an unarmed black teen shot dead by a self-appointed neighborhood watchman in Florida in 2012 — is that both shooters perceived a risk, said Yohuru Williams, a professor of history at Fairfield University. 

 

 

 

Why the Feds are investigating Ferguson

 

This country needs to talk about Ferguson and more

Voting in Ferguson, a televangelist lies, and more

Tony Thompson

GOP Calls Ferguson Voter Registration Drive ‘Disgusting’; Terrified Community Will Start Voting

The executive director of Missouri’s Republican party could barely contain his rage when he learned that one of the facets of recent protests in Ferguson has been a voter registration drive. His reaction betrays a sense of entitlement that comes from living in an age of political apathy: citizens shouldn’t be allowed to vote for change when they see injustice in the world, that isn’t “fair.” Have we gone mad? That’s exactly what voters are supposed to do.
Like many economically distressed communities around the country, Ferguson’s voter turnout for the last few elections has been dismal. Just 12% of residents bothered to vote one way or the other in the last election. It may explain why Ferguson’s politicians are mostly white and mostly out-of-touch with the residents.

 

Right-Wing Media Continue To Decry Ferguson Residents Registering To Vote

Breitbart: “Liberal Activists” Are Promoting Voter Registration Drives That Local GOP Calls “Disgusting.” On August 18, Breitbart quoted the Missouri Republican National Committee executive director who attacked the registration effort as “completely inappropriate” and characterized voting rights advocates’ calls for Ferguson residents to “get on the juries, choose your leaders” as “liberal activism”

[…]

Fox News: Voter Registration Booths In Ferguson Show That “Protestors Aren’t Out There For Free Speech.” On the August 21 edition of Fox & Friends, host Anna Kooiman complained that Ferguson residents protesting the fatal shooting “aren’t out there for freedom of speech. They’re out there to push their side.” Co-host Clayton Morris responded, “Setting up a voter registration booth? Yeah, you think?”

[…]

Rush Limbaugh: Registering Voters In The Wake Of Michael Brown’s Death “Encompasses Everything That The Democratic Party Is.” On his August 19 radio show, Limbaugh also criticized the Ferguson voter registration drive, and condemned Democrats for “try[ing] to ramp up black turnout” by exploiting Brown’s death

Hey Look! Pat Robertson told a lie!

Televangelist Pat Robertson on his “700 Club” show today decided that repeating many right-wing lies about what happened in Ferguson during the shooting death of 18-year old Michael Brown would be a good idea.

Robertson called the unarmed college-bound teen a “giant” and surmised that he must have been on a “hallucegenic” [sic] or “PCP” because he “acted like someone who was crazy” who “beats the daylights out of” officer Darren Wilson. The octogenarian also wondered aloud why the police didn’t “do a blood test on that guy, on the dead man,” whom Robertson couldn’t bother to mention by name.

Robertson also repeated the lie that officer Darren Wilson’s “occipital bone was crushed.”

And he chastised Attorney General Eric Holder for standing up for the oppressed — which is in part his job.

“It just looks bad,” Robertson lamented — not once ever offering one word of sympathy for the death of Michael Brown.

I’m shocked, I tell you! SHOCKED that Pat Robertson displays not compassion for the death of a young unarmed black man.

 

Missouri Councilman Excuses His Racism As Being ‘A Very Active Republican’

 

Says it’s a feature not a bug.

 

okay but when you have holocaust survivors and people who were activists during the civil rights movement supporting mike brown and then KKK members and neo nazis supporting the officer you should be able to figure out which side is the right one.

(via blastortortoise)

 

 

(source: sand&glass, via angrynativefeminists)

 

Houston Gay, a 103 year old who marched with MLK 50 years ago, at a peaceful demonstration in Ferguson.

(source: zubat; via angrynativefeminists)

 

Voting in Ferguson, a televangelist lies, and more