Civil Rights

In West Virginia thre is a cohabitation law, which makes it a misdemeanor for unmarried people to "lewdly and lasciviously associate" and live together. This law is being challenged by a lawsuit, filed by the ACLU on behalf of an inmate whose parole was delayed because of his plan to cohabit with his fiance.

Well, I have lewdly and lasciviously associated and lived together with women before I was married. And enjoyed it very much, thank you. And I considered it none of the government's business that I did so. However, I always had the option of marrying who ever I wanted to lewdly and lasciviously associate with.

Since gays are not allowed the same right to marry eachother that I have, this cohabitation law seems to clearly discriminate against gays, preventing them from lewdly and lasciviously associating with eachother legally.

But really, the fundamental question here is what business is it of the government to care who lewdly and lasciviously associates with who? When will we get the governmemt out of our bedrooms? Oh, yeah. When we get rid of Republican control over our government.

As many states face a decision of what technology to choose to replace the old voting machines, more security issues are cropping up around the touch-screen (DRE) machines.

I already have reported on how the DRE machines are easily hackable, use prorietary software that prevents open public oversight of elections, have no official paper trail preventing any kind of independent recount and, on top of it all, are far more expensive to buy, maintain and replace than the alternative, "scantron" (PBOS) system. A summary of a Princeton study on security issues surrounding DRE machines can be found here.

But the DRE machines are also easy for almost anyone to open. Turns out the locks they use can be opened by a standard key that will open hotel minibars and many kinds of office furniture. From the "Freedom to Tinker" technology blog:

“Hotel Minibar” Keys Open Diebold Voting Machines

Monday September 18, 2006 by Ed Felten

Like other computer scientists who have studied Diebold voting machines, we were surprised at the apparent carelessness of Diebold’s security design. It can be hard to convey this to nonexperts, because the examples are technical. To security practitioners, the use of a fixed, unchangeable encryption key and the blind acceptance of every software update offered on removable storage are rookie mistakes; but nonexperts have trouble appreciating this. Here is an example that anybody, expert or not, can appreciate:

I swear, this whole red alert drama was created to indispose me. You think I am exaggerating? Then why is it that even though I was born in the United States, I have to carry my US passport in order to not be stopped and frisked at every gate in every airport of this great nation of ours ... including the it's lovely colonial Island of Enchantment ?

If the red alert drama was not created to make my life miserable while traveling, then why would anybody want to go to the lenghts of banning all liquids including hand lotions, hair glossers, medicines and asthma inhalers from all flights? I mean if George Bush hates black people the next logical step is to hate black Puerto Rican women named Liza Sabater. That would explain why he would want me to travel with ashy skin, split hair ends, and children with runny noses and wheezing chests.

George Bush hates me and that's why he called in the red alert.

There is a diary over at My Left Wing that is well worth reading. It describes an attempt by a thoughtful teenager to redo the "Doll Test" from the 1940s and 50s. In the original test researchers showed that when black children were shown two dolls that were identical except for "skin" color, the children would overwhelmingly choose the white doll as the "nice" one and the black doll as the "bad" one. This was used to show the effects that institutional racism had on children's self image and was used as evidence in Brown vs. Board.

The new "study" can't be called scientific, but it is still very interesting. Kiri Davis, a 17-year old filmmaker, wanted to see The Doll Test repeated today. With help from my neighborhood YMCA in Brooklyn, she did her best to do just that. The results were essentially the same as the original, pre-Civil Rights era study. Read the diary for more details.

I think this is something of a condmenation of our society. Our society teaches children as young as 5 years old to consider black skin "bad" and white skin "nice." The MLW diary's author links this to the complete abandonment of black Americans after Katrina hit, which at the time I felt showed quite starkly that the Bush Administration cared not one whit for blacks. Together, these two snapshots of blacks in America really show that our society has not escaped racism. I have always felt that until our society can face up to our slave past we will have a hard time overcoming racism in America. You can take the racism out of the laws, but you can't get rid of the racism unless you face the fact that America was founded with a legal definition of blacks as property and as 5/8 of a person. Even today, history books that cater to Southern markets refer to slavery as not that bad, say that blacks were better off as slaves, and paint the post-Civil War reconstruction government as corrupt carpetbaggers, a myth that was never as true as our history books portray. Isn't it time we admit that as a nation we committed a sin in slavery, admit that our society is still far from fair racially and try to find solutions. The denial of American racism is widespread. Claims that all is equal ignores the reality on the ground. Blacks were left behind after Katrina. It is black skin that is reviled. In NYC our mayor declared victory over unemployment at a time when 50% of black males were without work. It is mostly black district polling places that seem to have problems on election day. Even life expectancy is lower for blacks than whites...a fair amount lower.

Without even assigning blame here, can't we at least admit that there is something deeply wrong in a society with discrepancies like that?

When I was in fifth grade, the Equal Rights Amendment was making its rounds about the states, looking for confirmation from the legislatures. It was a hot topic in our classroom. On the television at night, we saw the images of war and destruction in Viet Nam, saw the colour images of soldiers being carried off the battlefields. Saw the sawgrass whipping in the wind of the helicoptor rotors. We saw the dead Vietnamese, too. The little kids, our age, covered with napalm, or the men in their black pyjamas. It was our nightly dinner companion, the war, and for many of us, it was the conversation at the dinner table, too.

My parents didn't believe in the Domino Theory. They believed the war was bullshit, a waste, and the images would enrage my father. Shortly before the November, 1972 election, Henry Kissinger stood in front of microphones and promised that "peace was at hand." I begged my father to vote for Richard Nixon over George McGovern because I honestly believed that Nixon was going to end the war. I wanted to take off the bracelet I wore, the one that bore the name of an American POW who had been captured in 1965, and who still sat in a Hanoi jail. I thought about his family, his children, and wondered how they coped with their father gone.

So, when the teacher in our class suggested that we should debate the ERA in our classroom, it was those images that filled our heads and coloured our debate. The boys found our Achilles' heel, and they shot at it. "If the ERA passes, girls will be drafted, too," they taunted. We caved. I didn't want to go to war. I didn't want to get shot. I didn't want to be one of those people laid out on a gurney dying a horrible death in the maelstrom of the chopper blades.

To a girl, we voted down the ERA in our classroom. And to a boy, they voted for it.

Democrats are divided over whether appealing to the moderate center or galvanizing their progressive base is the better strategy. Given the public's declining confidence in Republican leadership, either strategy may enable Democrats to win at the polls. But neither approach will give them the electoral mandate required to govern effectively and retain the public's support once they're in office.

Fortunately, choosing between these two strategies is unnecessary. There is an alternative to left-right politics and by adopting it Democrats can remain true to progressive principles while attracting millions of voters from the non-ideological middle.

The step beyond the "New Deal," the "Fair Deal," and the "Great Society" is a "Dignitarian Society." The slogan is Dignity For All.

What does this mean in practical terms? How would we translate it into legislation? In a word, what is the platform for the party that champions a dignitarian society?

Before answering this question, I want to qualify my answer. While it's tempting to guess at what others would want, that's contrary to the spirit of the dignitarian process--which requires asking the people whose lives are affected what they want.

So, with this proviso, I'll simply indicate the kind of legislation that I personally would expect from my congressional representatives if they want my vote. I hope others will add to this list, which is only a start:

* Compensation for my labor that enables my family to live with dignity.

* Access to quality education for family regardless of our financial circumstances.

* Affordable basic and specialized health care for my family.

* A system for funding campaigns that enjoins lawmakers to put the public's interests above special interests. Incumbents should be barred from using the power inherent in their position to gain an unfair advantage over challengers.

* Protection of my privacy and autonomy against unwarranted intrusion from my fellow citizens or the government.

* An equitable tax policy. The word "equitable" acquires meaning through national dialogue. What we agree to be fair is fair, until we change our minds. Periodic renegotiation occurs in the form of a democratic political process that gives electoral weight to the interests of every citizen, no exceptions. This means devising a way to give electoral weight to the interests of those too young to cast their own ballots. The interests of one-third of Americans (those under 18) are unrepresented in the electoral process. As the electorate ages, the result will be calcification and national sclerosis.

* A national defense that deters would-be aggressors and defeats them if they mount an attack, and international policies that avoid giving the kind of offense to others that incites their revenge.

* Participation in global treaties that foster international security and environmental sustainability.

He has been silenced in a country where he is revered. Or he has chosen to silence himself. It's not clear which. Nelson Mandela, one of my heroes, is 88 today. And I miss his voice.

The voice of the revolutionary:

Our fight is against real, and not imaginary, hardships or, to use the language of the State Prosecutor, 'so-called hardships'. Basically, we fight against two features which are the hallmarks of African life in South Africa and which are entrenched by legislation which we seek to have repealed. These features are poverty and lack of human dignity, and we do not need communists or so-called 'agitators' to teach us about these things.

And the voice of the peaceful struggler:

I wonder how Joe Lieberman is feeling about his Right Wing Christian extremist buddies these days? And how will this play in Crown Heights where Hassids love the Right Wing Republicans?

Hate Crimes have been on the rise in America since 9/11, and, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, hate groups in America have increased by 33% in the past five years. A peak in attacks on Muslims after 9/11 was rapidly followed by an increase in anti-Semitism in the US and worldwide. There was a slight decline in anti-Semetic incidents in 2005, but incidents are still at disturbingly high levels.

Back in February I reported an incident that, while not a hate crime, was certainly a frightening trend. In Indiana, a prominant politician told a group of Jews that their opinion on the recitation of Christian prayers at legislative sessions didn't matter because they only made up 2% of the population. This is a further sign of the rise of Republican, Christian Taliban in the US.

But now it is pogroms. I use that word carefully. In Delaware, two families, one Jewish the other as yet anonymous, were forced to flee the town due to threatened violence by right wing Christian fanatics who were pushing Christian prayer in school.