IT: Civil Rights, environmental racism, and climate justice on MLK Day

Yet a large majority of the population would rather call people racists doing more harm than good. You think calling someone a racist is going to somehow magically remove hate from society? Calling someone a racist is causing more harm than good, just creates more division. But again, I’ve seen a lot of NPC’s on here. Lots of hardcore Democrats that have been trained to hate the other side

@targeted you rock!

we are NOT much better in 2022 When Asian American & Jewish Americans are still being hated that’s not what l learned MLK stood for!!! Voting right challenged Abortion rights challenged in the States that need it the most!!! Immigration fighting, the people who do the work you don’t want to do!!! Sad, sorry, spoiled Americans we are so divided

Florida could shield whites from ‘discomfort’ of racist past .. bill approved in state senate Blocking voting bills Blocking / delaying approvals of admin appointees Blocking valid electoral counts Enacting voter restrictions in practically all states This is NOT democracy This is NOT America Zero credibility on world stage even commenting on elections in other countries Shame on congress Shame on scotus & judiciary Rotten to the core gop

For those of you who do not think that or Supreme Court Justices have become political: Why in hell have they not yet ruled to release the documents from the National Archives to the Select Committee. The Select Committee pleaded for decision no later than December 31st. (to sustain the lower courts decisions that there is no claim of executive privilege for the trump with regard to the specific documents requested). Why are they intentionally rope-a-doping their determination to the point that Republicans will claim that this is a mid-term political maneuver? Executive privilege only pertains to the current President-elect. The Supreme Court is acting like they are motivated by the desires of the RNC. If they hope to maintain any credibility as an unbiased interpreter of our laws they better damn well start acting like it. They are currently daring the legislature to make significant structural changes to the Supreme Court. Vote BLUE.

Is The Second Dark Age is Upon Us? For your consideration: From late 400 AD until around 900 AD we had the Dark Ages, an era marked by economic, intellectual, and cultural decline. There was population decline, especially in urban centres, a decline of trade, a small rise in average temperatures in the North Atlantic region and increased migration. Between Climate Change, the Pandemic and the Rise of the Stupid and the Truly Immoral we may be entering a Second Dark age. How do we get people to accept facts as well… facts? How do we get people to see that lies are untruths? We’d better Prepare ourselves and our families for what may come. Some Links China’s Births Hit Historic Low, a Political Problem for Beijing - The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/17/world/asia/china-births-demographic-crisis.html Grocery stores empty shelves 2022: Shortages continue as prices rise https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/shopping/2022/01/12/shortage-grocery-store-empty-shelves/9178100002/ Just spoke to friends on Long Island, NY they’re having problems getting chicken. Is There a Chicken Shortage in 2022? Not Yet, but It's Possible https://marketrealist.com/p/is-there-a-chicken-shortage-in-2022/

Fuck You, Gorsuch! From the story on NPR. ... "It was pretty jarring earlier this month when the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court took the bench for the first time since the omicron surge over the holidays. All were now wearing masks. All, that is, except Justice Neil Gorsuch. What's more, Justice Sonia Sotomayor was not there at all, choosing instead to participate through a microphone setup in her chambers. Sotomayor has diabetes, a condition that puts her at high risk for serious illness, or even death, from COVID-19. She has been the only justice to wear a mask on the bench since last fall when, amid a marked decline in COVID-19 cases, the justices resumed in-person arguments for the first time since the onset of the pandemic. " .... Full article .... "Supreme Court justices aren't 'scorpions,' but not happy campers either" ... https://www.npr.org/2022/01/18/1073428376/supreme-court-justices-arent-scorpions-but-not-happy-campers-either ... That's just fucking CHILDISH!! Grow up little boy!! Roberts, This not only LOOKS political, it IS political

"Justice delayed is justice denied." @jimK's recent comment* using Boxing terminology regarding delaying tactics used by the Conservative Judges on the Supreme Court regarding “Executive Privilege” has me thinking. Between McConnell & Trump and recent rulings, it is clear that the Supreme Court has become as politicized as the nation has in general. Given that six judges are conservative, those views and beliefs control the agenda considerably. My interest is in knowing what is going on behind the scenes. Also, do the more moderate and liberal justices get the legal support they need in opposing conservative biased rulings. Going 15 rounds on issue after issue, the efforts must be exhausting. Still, it seems that the moderate / liberal justices need to do much more. #SupremeCourtReform #AddMoreJudges * @jimK’s comment: https://www.causes.com/comments/1516508

larubia: Thanks for sharing the great wisdom of Martin Luther King in the quotation you have posted. His words still inspire me as they should inspire all of us.

So, here are a group of Republicans, members of the party which at the state level are using election fraud as a reason for a wave of laws that make voting harder if not impossible for some, committing election fraud by a different route. Gerrymandering, taking away routes to the ballot box by people who can’t or can’t without extreme difficulty get to a ballot box, reducing poll station hours, creating administrative obstacles to voting, closing polling stations, denying the use of video-monitored and locked absentee ballot boxes in favor of unmonitored and locked but accessible mail boxes, and removing the political independence of election officials and processes are all invoked to protect against voter fraud that all efforts to prove have only proven it doesn’t exist on any impactful scale (and what was found was mostly committed by voters casting ballots for Trump). And now this. But the RNC and Republican elected officials insist they want free and fair elections. The hard evidence indicates otherwise, in my opinion. In any event, no matter which party or philosophy you support, if you do, we all should see these maneuvers as unethical - demonstrative of an appalling lack of integrity. “The Republican efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election have created a multifaceted scandal, but in recent weeks, there's been an unexpected twist. Republicans in multiple states created forged election materials and sent the documents to, among others, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Archivist, as if the materials were legitimate. They were not. Among the many questions was one obvious line of inquiry: Was this legal? According to some who've reviewed what transpired, the answers is, perhaps not. The Detroit News reported the other day: Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel said Thursday she referred to federal prosecutors a probe into Republicans who signed and submitted a certificate falsely claiming Donald Trump won Michigan's electoral votes. The revelation demonstrated the potential seriousness and ongoing nature of the investigation and could have repercussions throughout state politics, as the 16 Republicans in question include high-ranking members of the state GOP, like Co-Chairwoman Meshawn Maddock. Nessel, who made the comments on The Rachel Maddow Show last week, added that she believes a variety of legal lines may have been crossed — and while she's referred the matter to the Justice Department, the Michigan attorney general hasn't ruled out the possibility of state charges. She's not alone. The Albuquerque Journal reported that New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas has made the same referral. "Election laws are the foundation of our democracy and must be respected," the Democratic state AG said in a written statement. "While review under state law is ongoing, we have referred this matter to the appropriate federal law-enforcement authorities and will provide any assistance they deem necessary." In case anyone needs a refresher, it originally appeared that the controversy was limited to one state. In December 2020, while Wisconsin electors met for an official ceremony at the state Capitol in which the state formally assigned its participants in the electoral college, a group of Wisconsin Republicans quietly held a separate, fake ceremony — in the same capitol, at the same time — to cast electoral votes for Donald Trump, despite his defeat in the state. They then proceeded to forge the official paperwork, claiming to be the "duly elected and qualified electors," though that was plainly false. They also submitted the bogus documents to government agencies. We learned soon after, however, that Wisconsin Republicans had some company: Republicans in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Nevada did the same thing. And when I say "the same thing," I mean the same thing: The fake documents had identical formatting, spacing, fonts, and phrasing, leaving little doubt that there was a template for Republicans to follow in each of these states. In two other states — Pennsylvania and New Mexico — Trump fans took similar steps, but they added qualifiers to the materials, saying that someday, under some circumstances, the GOP electors might eventually become the real electors. The caveats mattered: Because these Republicans did not purport to be the "duly elected and qualified electors," their efforts are qualitatively and legally different. In fact, a local report out of Lancaster reported yesterday, "The Pennsylvanians' insistence might've spared them from a criminal investigation." State Attorney General Josh Shapiro's office added in a written statement, "Though their rhetoric and policy were intentionally misleading and purposefully damaging to our democracy, based on our initial review, our office does not believe this meets the legal standards for forgery." But for Republicans in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, and Wisconsin, the legal scrutiny — at the state and federal level — remains ongoing. All of which brings us back to the three questions we considered when this story first came into focus. 1. Was this scheme legal? I can't speak to this with any authority, but it increasingly appears that some state attorneys general believe the legal controversy is serious enough to warrant investigation. 2. How many states were part of the scheme? As of now, the answer appears to be five, though if we include Pennsylvania and New Mexico, it's seven. 3. Who orchestrated the scheme? Clearly, several states didn't generate fraudulent election materials entirely on their own. The Republicans who submitted the bogus documents had some outside help. We don't yet know who provided this assistance and/or created the fake materials for official submission. That said, the report out of Lancaster quoted a local GOP official in Pennsylvania who pointed the finger at a Trump campaign lawyer. The Detroit News had a similar report, quoting a Michigan GOP official who also said he'd received guidance from a Trump campaign lawyer.” https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/states-refer-forged-pro-trump-election-docs-federal-prosecutors-n1287622

Please pass Amendment 2 of the US Congressional map thanks

Lisa Murkowski, vote to pass the Voting Rights bill tomorrow! If you do not, we’ll see what the 2022 election holds for you. I won’t waste my breath on Young or Sullivan...

Environmental racism? Climate justice? Let’s get to real issues / causes. What about port-a-potty racism?

MLK represent freedom for all people, not a select few. Voting rights to all people, not a few. Equality for all people, not a few. Justice for all people, not a few. Freedom from suppression for all people, not a few. Freedom of speech for all people, not a few. Freedom to assemble for all people, not a few. Human right for all people, not just a few, He had a dream for all people, not for just a few. That all people are created equal and no one is above the law. To this day, Republican Party votes against everything Martin Luther King stood for, the advancement all American people, not just a few! Republicans mock MLK by their quotation of him, but in their action they do just the opposite. 217 house republicans voted against the John Lewis bill and voting right act. Democratic look more like American, with all the diversity, discussions and opinions. They embrace other’s cultures, religion and ethnic groups views and opinions. They believe in women rights of self determination and happiness. They believe truth matters!

Senators Cornyn and Cruz, I ask for you to vote FOR the Voting Rights Bill tomorrow. .... ... Ok, I asked 🤮. ... Since I can't get either of you in Nov., then I'll go after .... DEFEAT THE TEXAS TALIBAN!! Congressman kevin brady, FUCK YOU! Gov. abbott, FUCK YOU! Lt. Gov. patrick, FUCK YOU! Tx. House Rep. toth, FUCK YOU! Tx. Sen. Rep. creighton, FUCK YOU! All any of you do is try to restrict and deny voting rights to keep your dumb asses in office. i know all of you and I VOTE every damn time. And if it takes me another few years, I will eventually get your asses out. Thanks Glowurm for the idea! At least you MIGHT have a chance👍🤞.

Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream should serve as a roadmap for our country. He had a dream!!! “I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream…Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice…We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream…I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character…I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed — we hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal…Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred…The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges…Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children….We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back…Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood…We refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt…In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds….When we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: “Free at last! Free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!” Some of us hold these words close to our hearts & continue this march, for we know we are better together & believe in a nation that has equity for all people!

So many delusional white people. Unbelievable. And racism is just the tip of the iceberg.

Fun Website: Visit https://app.capitoltrades.com/ Find your Represenative and Senators and see if they have Stock Market Activity. Who knew? It’s 10 PM how many inside trades have your representatives made today?

Occam's Razor Applied To Voting Rights, Sort of. Very Sharp! In finding solutions to problems, crimes, etc., there is a strategy called "Occam's Razor." In layman's terms, this problem-solving method states that "the simplest explanation is usually the best one." It is more nuanced, of course, but let's go with that definition in this instance. @Sharon nicely fills in many details about why Republicans do not support voting rights. She attempts to portray the Republican's "principles." She finds them objectionable, I agree. See her essay: https://www.causes.com/comments/1516445 None of the Republicans' “Core Principles“ is convincing. Everyone deserves to vote in person or by absentee ballot. Applying Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation for Republicans making it harder to vote is given by a recent Gallup Poll: 31% of Americans identified as Democrats, 25% identified as Republican, 41% as Independent. Of the Independent voter: 50% lean Democrats 39% lean Republicans This means that 52% of voters will likely vote Democratic, and 41% will likely vote Republican, with a 7% toss-up. It's highly unlikely but let's say all the toss up vote goes Republican, the Democrats still win at 52% to 48%. In any fair & free Election, Democrats will likely win. In their arrogance, Republicans have chosen to (1) Lie about Voter Fraud, and (2) Pass State Laws to make it harder to vote. An Extremely Corrupt Power Play! Republicans are not just playing hardball politics, but are just brazen liars and cheaters! Denying Voting Rights must be Stopped and Reversed. Everyone must call out the lies big and small about elections. Everyone must object to the state law changes and set about to reverse those changes. Don't count on integrity or shame. The foul politicians must be voted out.

Civil rights. Something many Americans take for granted. Today, in my opinion, not only are many taking them for granted but a lot of us are ignoring or denying the current and aggressive threat to one of the most important: the right to vote. “Last year, 19 states passed 34 laws making it more difficult to vote, according to the tabulations of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. For 2022, Brennan reports, 152 restrictive bills are carrying over in 18 states, while new proposals to impose further restrictions or launch partisan reviews of the 2020 election are surfacing as well. In Georgia, where Republicans passed a sweeping bill last year imposing new restrictions, a prominent GOP state senator has already proposed eliminating all ballot drop boxes in the state.” https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2022/01/manchin-sinema-filibuster-voting-rights/621271/ “In total, more than 400 bills with provisions that restrict voting access have been introduced in 49 states in the 2021 legislative sessions…. the Republican Legislature and governor of Texas passed and signed into law SB1, which bans drive-thru voting, 24-hour voting, and the distribution of mail-in ballot applications; imposes new and extraneous ID requirements for voting by mail; authorizing "free movement" to partisan poll watchers, effectively turning them into vote suppression vigilantes; requires monthly checks of voting rolls to facilitate purging unwanted voters; and imposes onerous new rules for voter assistance. Similar laws have been enacted in Georgia, Florida, and 15 other states.” https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/politics/589984-voting-rights-is-a-constitutional-right-failure-is-not-an-option I should note that not just the right to vote is under pressure, but the power of the vote which is the only thing that ever gave ordinary people - you and me - any voice in laws and policies that directly impact our health, financial security and mental health has all but disappeared with the corruption introduced by the outsize influence if the upper 2% and corporations via campaign donations interacting with a lack of moral principle and integrity among our politicians. I believe this will only worsen because I think narcissism is on the rise in our society as a whole. The Supreme Court has failed and will likely now just refuse to uphold and protect our civil right to vote, just as they are probably going to refuse to protect a woman’s right to choose how her body is used or treated medically. “The decision by Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin to block their fellow Democrats from passing new federal voting-rights legislation clears the path for years of tightening ballot restrictions in Republican-controlled states. It also marks a resounding triumph for Chief Justice John Roberts in his four-decade quest to roll back the federal government’s role in protecting voter rights. Roberts as much as anyone set in motion the events that have led to this week’s climactic Senate confrontation over voting legislation. In a series of rulings over the past 15 years, the Supreme Court, often in decisions written by Roberts himself, has consistently weakened federal oversight of voter protections and struck down federal regulations meant to reduce the influence of money in politics. Almost all of those decisions have unfolded on a strict party-line basis, with the Republican-appointed justices outvoting those appointed by Democrats. Those decisions have had an enormous practical impact on the rules for American elections. But many voting-rights advocates say that the rulings have been equally important in sending a signal to Republican-controlled states that the Supreme Court majority is unlikely to stand in their way if they impose new restrictions on voting or extreme partisan gerrymanders in congressional and state legislative districts…. As the journalist Ari Berman recounted in his 2015 book, Give Us the Ballot, Roberts “led the charge” against the bipartisan 1982 reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act, which ultimately reversed a Supreme Court decision (supported by Rehnquist) weakening one key section of the law. Roberts wrote “upwards of 25 memos” opposing the legislation’s provision requiring that the Justice Department prove only discriminatory “effect” rather than purposeful “intent” in order to block state or local voting restrictions. (The Court had ruled the opposite, severely limiting the law’s applicability.) In one memo reported by Berman, Roberts revealed his broader philosophy about voting rights: The test for federal objection to local voting laws should be extremely difficult to meet, he wrote, “since they provide the basis for the most intrusive interference imaginable by federal courts into state and local processes.” That approach has guided Roberts on the Supreme Court. As the Harvard Law School professor Nicholas Stephanopoulos, an expert in voting law, wrote in a 2019 law-review article, “The Roberts Court has … never nullified a law making it harder to vote.” To the contrary, in a series of landmark decisions, it has nullified efforts to ensure voter access, combat gerrymanders, and to limit political contributions and spending. Those cases have included Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission in 2010, which swept away federal prohibitions on undisclosed, unlimited corporate spending in federal elections; Shelby County v. Holder in 2013, which eviscerated the Justice Department’s authority under the Voting Rights Act to review, or “preclear,” any changes in voting procedures in states with a history of discrimination against minorities; Rucho v. Common Cause in 2019, which ruled that federal courts cannot overturn even the most extreme partisan gerrymanders; and Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee in 2021, which severely weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act—the same provision that Roberts, as a young Reagan aide, targeted all the way back in 1982…. Of Roberts’s voting-rights decisions, the Shelby ruling in 2013 contributed most to the confrontation unfolding in Congress now. The case’s immediate impact was to free states with a history of discrimination from the requirement to receive approval from the Justice Department for changes in their election laws…. But the blast radius of the Shelby decision extended far beyond the states directly freed from DOJ oversight, many analysts believe. “Shelby County in practical ways made a huge difference, and then in psychological ways, it also made a huge difference because it signaled to everybody that this is a Supreme Court that doesn’t really give a blank about your voting rights,” Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Marymount Law School who specializes in election law, told me….. [T]he Republican-appointed Court majority might go further to undo election protections: Under the “independent-state-legislature doctrine” that several conservative justices have already touted, the Court could bar secretaries of state from changing election rules without explicit authorization from state legislatures or conceivably even prevent state supreme courts from overturning gerrymandered congressional maps (as Courts have done over the past few years in several states including North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and most recently Ohio)…. The one force that was best positioned to resist Roberts’s …. vision was the ability of Congress and a president to sign new laws reasserting federal voting protections. And now Manchin and Sinema, combined with the impenetrable Senate Republican opposition, have blocked that route—possibly for years. Without federal legislation restoring a baseline set of national voting rights, “it’s hard to imagine the political process delivering any sense of fairness that represents the will of the majority,” Nelson [ Janai Nelson, the associate director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund] said. “I think the ramifications will endure for generations. It is truly that consequential.” https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2022/01/manchin-sinema-filibuster-voting-rights/621271/ For the record, I don’t necessarily think Roberts is a crummy person. I think that he, like many lawyers, become first entranced by an intellectual argument leading to a philosophical entrenchment. The problem with lawyers who simply enjoy the intellectual challenges involved in merely debating a side or in winning a case can be a failure to consider the broader impact or the practical effects of their conclusions or wins. And, as Sophists demonstrated, logic can lead to lies or wrong conclusions just as easily as it can lead to truths. Intellectual arguments that ignore concrete fact or the real world in which we live can and will do great harm in the hands of those who wield power or hold a degree of authority.