CPAC 2013: Ann Coulter links illegal immigrants to Republican Party woes

Courtesy of Samuel-warde.com

I usually don’t do posts like this because I think it’s a waste of time pointing out a person’s inconsistent statements if their following is exponentially larger than yours and if that person would never consider statistics or facts.

The 2013 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) is a 501(c)3 charity hosted annually by the American Conservative Union Foundation.

This year, as the party tries to regain ground lost from the 2012 election, the party has actually held on tighter to their core beliefs while drawing from the same minds that more than likely lost them last election.

Who doesn’t still remember this?

A familiar face at this year’s CPAC was conservative columnist and New York Times best-selling author Ann Coulter.

There’s not really much that needs to be explained about Coulter’s speech. Not only is her speech filled with such vitriol toward minorities and the most vulnerable among us, but her speech is shallow and hardly based in truth.

But Coulter deserves credit where it’s due. She knows what makes many of us “tick.” She understands innate human desires and is therefore able to take advantage of it for her own benefit.

Unsurprisingly, Coulter doesn’t care about the human consequence of her beliefs. Our beliefs are important in defining our lives because they eventually turn into actions. What we believe and what is engrained into our culture inevitably manifests as what is “real” to us.

Coulter’s words are insensitive at best.

At the 11:24 mark of her speech, Coulter says,

“If amnesty goes through, America becomes California and no Republican will ever win a national election.”

The thing about this statement is that there are valid arguments against amnesty that Coulter could have made (like putting their concerns before legal immigrants, the initial cost to taxpayers to house them through building communities, etc.), but her reason for why we should continue to assist in ruining young Latinos’ lives is because the Republican Party needs saving.

Coulter is not against amnesty because she feels it might save the country or because it’s the right thing to do, but because she only cares about “winning.”

Coulter even makes note of this win-at-all-costs attitude at the 6:37 mark when she says,

“Show me one example in the last ten years of the Democrats giving up a winnable seat — no that hasn’t happened. Passion is great, but in politics, remember, scoring is all that counts.”

Coulter then goes on to say the only state that has given the Republican Party Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, California, will never elect a Republican again if amnesty occurs.

I want to know why Coulter is defending a president in Nixon, but that might take some time.

Anyway, California ia a big state. Is Coulter saying the reason California produces some of the more prominent liberal candidates is because of the small percentage of illegal immigrants? In a slick way, Coulter links amnesty of illegal immigrants to the woes of the Republican Party.

The math just doesn’t add up if you say that California is liberal because of illegal immigrants (who the majority of are Mexican). Yes, California is more progressive, but it is only so at the state and federal level. If you call California a liberal state, you have to include the voting preferences of the vast majority of Latinos who are not just Mexican. (By the way, the AP Stylebook refers to Latinos as being from Central America, South America and the Gulf.

The fact of the matter is by 2014, California’s population will be predominately Latino. In this political environment, it’s important for political leaders to dilineate Latinos in general from illegal immigrants, which happen to be Latino. Just like the purpose of black appreciation holidays, it’s past time to parade Latino accomplishments and contributions to the American population. More importantly, it should be the people who educate themselves on this subject.

Illegal immigrants only represent 6.8% of California’s population, however California’s Latino population is pretty much a majority of the state’s population. Why not ask why the majority of legal Latinos in California back more progressive issues?

Wrapping this point up, Coulter’s statement is false on yet another level because locally, California is not even that liberal of a state. Take a look at the counties that voted red and blue during the 2012 election. Outside of the major metropolitan and coastal areas, much of California voted Republican.

Coulter not only trivializes the immigration debate, but creates an immediate negative reaction between frustrated Americans, illegal immigrants and Latinos.

Cohn and Passel of the Pew Research Hispanic Center wrote:

“The falloff in the stock of unauthorized immigrants has been driven mainly by a decrease in the number of new immigrants from Mexico, the single largest source of U.S. migrants. As the Pew Hispanic Center reported earlier this year, net immigration from Mexico to the United States has stopped and possibly reversed through 2010. At its peak in 2000, about 770,000 immigrants arrived annually from Mexico; the majority arrived illegally. By 2010, the inflow had dropped to about 140,000—a majority of whom arrived as legal immigrants, according to Pew Hispanic Center estimates.”

Even though the amount of illegal immigrants in 2007 was a legitimate problem, that problem is no longer a major concern as Cohn and Passel allude. Amnesty would legalize 11 million illegal immigrants out of America’s 315 million residents, which is .035% of the total population. But Coulter thinks this would spell doom for the Republican Party?

These statements from Coulter encompass why the party is struggling: it’s only about winning to its leaders, which makes it more transparent that they are only about keeping power and not representing the people, which is what politics should be about.

People want to see a difference and experience a society that is continually evolving. People don’t want what to hold on to the burdens of ignorance from previous generations, but that is what the establishment of both parties continue to push because change is a threat to their reign.

Coulter represents the establishment in every sense.

Moving away a bit from amnesty, but staying on the topic of legal and illegal immigrants, at the 18:08 mark Coulter says,

“Teddy Kennedy specifically designed his Immigration Act of 1965 to change America demographically without checking with the American people. It’s virtually impossible to immigrate here from Europe now. About 80% of our immigrants for the last 30 years have come from the third world. About 60% of them go on welfare — much higher percentage than native-born Americans. This is so Democrats get themselves more voters. We have a more dependent society, we have people who want welfare and we cannot get the votes of a dependent society without changing our principles.”

According to Coulter, there was a conspiracy led by Ted Kennedy to legislate amnesty to Asians and Latino while depressing European immigration numbers in order to drastically change the demographic of the country (without the “country’s” permission).

Does that statement even need to be dissected? Yes actually, it does.

Coulter continues to degrade illegal immigrants (and Latinos, remember she has lumped them together by saying “illegal immigration is why California is so liberal” when we know the state comprises various backgrounds of Latinos that still vote more progressive) by saying they vote Democratic because most of the ones who come here vote in favor of “entitlement programs” due to an independence deficiency.

Again, California’s illegal immigration population comprises 6.8% of the total population (37,210,000), but 10% of the labor force.

So let’s break that down for a minute.

Illegal immigrants represent a higher percentage within the workforce than they do as a percentage within the total population. For those who might not understand percentages, this means these are some hard-working immigrants.

Coulter has successfully created a cognitive link between illegal immigrants and Latinos to why the Republican Party is struggling with minority demographics. Coulter is basically blaming illegal immigrants for the fall of the Republican Party and the American economy all while trying making us favor white European immigration over brown. Here, Coulter plays the “us vs. them” card well, pitting native-born Americans against Latino immigrants and the vulnerable children of illegal immigrants. But people like Coulter still wonder why Latinos, blacks and young people don’t agree with their stances.

Coulter is riling up racial insecurities by telling white conservative they should be afraid of “the other.” Why does Coulter point out that there is a sinister plot to limit European immigrant numbers while inferring America doesn’t enforce the rules when it comes to Mexicans and Latinos? Talk like this is how race riots and conflicts spark. Blaming the poor and minorities for the economic woes of white and black Americans is not a smart move by Coulter.

Not only that, but have we forgotten why Mexicans are fleeing their country? Does U.S. government and bank laundering of Mexican cartel money have something to do with the rise of gangs and Mexican violence?

So let me get this straight, we are a country whom ruins the lives of people who come to American to live a better life (and unfortunately many do it illegally due to their dire situation that America has contributed to, but that’s a different conversation) and while literally doing our shitty jobs we demonize them, blame them for our poor institutional decisions, label them as criminals and savages and stereotype the whole Latino population with a small percentage of illegal immigrants?

Is this really the state of our Republic?

Romney Booed by NAACP for Mentioning the Repeal of ‘Obamacare’

Mitt Romney’s experience with the NAACP has been regurgitated by Fox News and MSNBC over and over. Both outlets are taking the simplistic route in evaluating this speech.

Earlier today, Romney spoke to the NAACP and stuck to his guns, but surprisingly showed a bit of flexibility. He was greeted with a decent applause, but when he discussed his efforts to repeal “Obamacare, the boos rained down.

But we know how politics really work. Few politicians really mean what they say and speak out of the side of their mouths. Really, Romney was talking to independent, suburban, white voters and conservative voters who may “resent” blacks. These conservatives have a harder time believing Romney holds conservative beliefs. According to Jamelle Bouie of The Prospect,

“The point of this address to the NAACP was to send a signal to right-leaning, suburban white voters—that Mitt Romney is tolerant, and won’t represent the bigots in his party. But there’s a sense in which Romney had it both ways: Not only did he reassure hesitant whites, but by pledging to repeal Obamacare—and being booed by the audience—he likely increased his standing with those who do resent African-Americans. By going to an audience of black professionals and sticking with his stump speech, there’s a sense in which Romney might receive credit for refusing to ‘pander.’”

I think Bouie was correct in assessing that Romney wanted to show right-leaning, suburban white voters that he is tolerant and won’t represent the more extreme viewpoints because he refers to President Obama as a “black citizen.” Romney said,

“Now if someone had told us in the 1950s or 1960s that a black citizen would serve as the 44th president of the United States, we would have been proud and many would have been surprised.”

Bouie also makes a good point by saying that Romney wanted to reach out to the more conservative Republicans who may not have view the NAACP in the most positive light. A lot of conservative still have trouble backing Romney because they feel he’s too much of a moderate. On Hannity, frequent guest Michael Meyers said,

“The NAACP has become a hate group.“

So there we have it. As a Republican nominee (or so we think.. erh em… sorry Ron Paul) you have to make sure that you don’t alienate the viewers of Fox News.

Others believe Romney showed guts, stuck to his guns and was “aggressive and genuine” as blogger Crystal Wright (@GOPBlackChick) wrote in her latest blog. She summarized the speech as such:

“This was one of the rare instances in this campaign where Romney gave us more than words; he revealed a personality and emotion, things that make a candidate real to voters. Romney not only acknowledged the challenges of the post Civil Rights Movement and the election of President Obama, something the Republican Party has failed to do, though ironically Republicans were responsible for passing the 1964 Civil Rights Act.”

Wright also makes some good points by noting how Romney congratulated Obama on breaking a major racial barrier. She believes Romney appealed to liberal voters in his speech by showing that he’s a respectable candidate. However, I don’t think many liberals will be considering Romney based on his track record and previous gaffes (e.g., saying “corporations are people, my friend“). Plus support for the Affordable Care Act of 2010 is up since the U.S. Supreme Court ruling last month.

Others believe that Romney showed how disconnected he was by discussing Obamacare. This may have been the case when Romney mentioned Obamacare, but Romney did throw out a lot of statistics and facts about issues within the black community. Though he was vague in discussing what he would do specifically to alleviate the pressure of these issues, he did show some progress in being “in touch” with people other than older, white, rich men. Romney said,

“Now with 90% of African-Americans who typically vote for Democrats, you may wonder…  or some may wonder why a Republican would bother to campaign in the African-American community and address the NAACP. One reason of course is that I hope to represent all Americans of every race, creed and sexual orientation—From the poorest to the richest, to everyone in between.”

He later said,

“Now if someone had told us in the 1950s or 1960s that a black citizen would serve as the 44th president of the United States, we would have been proud and many would have been surprised.”

And he finished with these two ideas:

“Picturing that day we might have assumed that the American presidency would be the very last door to opportunity to be opened. Before that came to pass every other barrier in the path of equal opportunity would surely have had to come down. Of course it hasn’t happened quite that way. Many barriers remain. Old inequities persist. In some way the challenges are even more complicated than before”

-and-

“If equal opportunity in America were an accomplished fact, then a chronically bad economy would be equally bad for everyone. Instead its worse for AA in almost every way—The unemployment rate, the duration of unemployment, average income, median family wealth are all worse in the black community.”

And for that he received a thorough applause from the crowd. But that awkward 15 seconds where Romney winces while being booed makes me think he did slip up a bit. He then went on to talk about a poll from the Chamber of Commerce. Speaking about the CoC—a group of conservative corporations and super rich friends of Romney—was probably the wrong thing to say to the NAACP.

Also, did anyone notice the sign behind Romney on the stage? It read:”Your power. Your decision. VOTE!” Interesting how Romney left out the efforts by his party to disenfranchise minority voters. This is a highly controversial issue and something dear to many blacks. Romney was careful in not bringing that up. However, that omission supports the argument that Romney is out of touch with what’s important to blacks. “The Young Turks” host Cenk Uygur of Current TV expresses this point well:

And lastly, some people are going as far as to say that Romney was a winner because by standing by his convictions among an unpopular crowd, he showed moderates and those on the right that he was willing to brave fierce opposition. Romney said he knew he would receive boos for talking about repealing the ACA and this supports the notion that by doing this, Romney showed how “brave” he was. Similarly, one writer thinks Romney showed that he will not cater to those who think differently than him just to pick up a few votes.

Personally, it’s difficult to know how the speech fared for Romney. I think Romney had to do the speech because he was receiving allegations of being out of touch with minorities and the middle-class. By doing this speech, I think Romney had nothing to lose—So Romney won this round.

I do know that Obama didn’t show up this year to speak to the NAACP and that is unfortunate. Sometimes politics become a dirty game and in a pivotal election year, Obama chose not to show up because he didn’t want to risk seeming “too black” to the same white, suburban independents that Romney is trying to reach.

The worst part about this situation is that none of these candidates were truly speaking to the NAACP and the black community. They were all trying to win over independents. Republicans know that blacks will vote for Obama and vice-versa. The fact that blacks were used as a pawn in order for these candidates to advance is what leaves me disheartened.

–

If you want, here is a look at Obama’s speech to the NAACP in 2009:

Bush Administration Charged With War Crimes; Tribunal Moves to Enforcement Phase

The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal, which is based on the trails at Nuremburg, is proceeding to its enforcement stage after convicting various members of the Bush administration of war crimes.

The tribunal, based in Malaysia, comprises the International Criminal Court, the United Nations, and various national courts.

Among the heated topics discussed were American torture techniques. Testimonies (as reported on by Press TV) from alleged victims included horror stories of the removal of fingernails with pliers, electrocutions and sexual humiliation — Oh, let’s not forget the friendly fraternity, hazing-style activity of waterboarding.

This is the first conviction of the Bush administration like this anywhere in the world. The magnitude of this conviction is immense.

The War on Terror has been nothing short of a disaster. Ten plus years in Afghanistan, a lack of cultural perspective when engaging in these wars, soldiers returning home unhinged, pitting Islam, Christianity, races and cultures against each other like a novel from the Dark Ages and an Iraq War that was based on lie have bankrupted the country, killed millions of civilians and cast a dark vibe over the world.

The enforcement phase remains a bit unclear, but the tribunal has already issued that the American government pay reparations for the crimes committed under the 5 Complainant War Crimes case.

Questions still remain. Will the Bush administration really be held accountable for various war crimes against nations and humanity? Is this even a realist opportunity to make an example out of the previous administration? Who will foot the bill of reparations if properly charged? And when will the tribunal turn its attention to the Obama administration?

The Madness Behind the Trayvon Martin Case

I’m not even sure where to start on this one. A lot has happened since my initial posting on the Trayvon Martin case.

The first thing I want to say about where this case has gone is “WOW”! Are you freaking kidding me? Zimmerman still hasn’t been charged and he was given his murder weapon back by Sanford police? At least the DOJ is getting involved.

And of course, Fox News and right-winged sites have turned this into a political issue where if you’re white you have to take Zimmerman’s side and yes, people I know took the bait.

Political pundits are using his death as political fodder for the upcoming election cycle and it’s despicable to say the least. Here’s a look at the media madness surrounding Trayvon’s death:

• Geraldo Rivera said that Trayvon wearing a hoodie was equally responsible for his death as Zimmeran’s shot.
• Glenn Beck’s site the Blaze smeared Trayvon by looking into his past and insinuating that his suspension from high school equals a criminal background. We now know that he was suspended for having traces of marijuana in his pocket.
• This illustration (seen below) which was probably photoshopped has been circulating around Twitter without a source. An obvious attempt to depict Trayvon as a thug.

You can say Trayvon looked like a thug (which a lot of people are saying as if that makes it okay to kill someone), he may have gotten suspended for bullying or that he refers to himself as a “nigga.” None of that means ANYTHING! It’s all speculation. So let’s look at the facts (I know this is a scary word to a lot of people out there):

• Trayvon was killed with a bag of Skittles and an iced tea in his pocket (no gun, no knife, no weapon, no nothing). He was unarmed.
• Zimmerman has a police record after assaulting police in 2005 and resisting arrest. Trayvon has NO criminal record. Let me spell that out again… NO CRIMINAL RECORD.
• Zimmerman called SPD 46 times between Jan. 1, 2011 and the time he shot Trayvon showing that he had a close relationship with Sanford police.
• Trayvon was bagged and taken to the morgue where he was labeled a John Doe for three days before police contacted his parents.
• His cell phone was confiscated (who knows what the police did to his phone history and texts).
• Zimmerman was not following neighborhood watch rules (especially the one that says you can’t drive around your neighborhood in a vehicle strapped). If you see something suspicious, you report it to police and let them do their job. In Zimmerman’s initial 911 call, you can clearly hear the police officer tell Zimmerman not to pursue the suspect, but he did anyway.
• Multiple witnesses say they heard someone scream for help many times then a gunshot was heard and the screaming stopped (visit this site to hear the witness 911 calls).

A lot of people are alluding to the Stand Your Ground law in Florida that states that a person does not have to retreat if they feel their life is in danger. They can shoot first. But the law does not say that you can follow a suspect, engage with them, shoot and kill them, then claim self-defense. If that’s the case, I can shoot anyone I want and claim self-defense. I’ll be sent home with a pat on the back.

;

Sanford Police Department’s Incompetence

The SPD is trying to cover for Zimmerman for whatever reason. If you can recall, Chief Lee (who has now stepped down until further notice) said he cannot prove that Zimmerman didn’t act in self-defense. That’s weird because I though you had the “burden of proof” in a murder case. Imagine going to a judge after you kill someone and the judge automatically takes your side and defends your innocence. In America, you have to provewhy you’re innocent… What’s the point of the judicial system if you don’t even have to defend yourself and the police, the prosecutor and the judge immediately take your side?

Despite multiple witnesses that want to use their accounts as evidence, Sanford police refuse to do so because they feel that Zimmerman’s account is all they need. They even allegedly told a witness that it wasn’t Trayvon they heard screaming but it was Zimmerman. Can they even do that?

Sanford police lied to the Martin family telling them that Zimmerman’s record was clean. Zimmernan’s father also lied by claiming Trayvon chased after Zimmerman. That was not what the 911 call exposed. Now SPD is saying that Trayvon decked Zimmerman with one blow and that Trayvon reached for Zimmerman’s gun as if to say that the use of deadly force was reasonable by Zimmerman. But what about the fact that Zimmerman pursued Trayvon? Funny how they leave that evidence out.

Even if Trayvon did beat Zimmerman’s ass, he had every right to. Zimmerman had no right to follow Trayvon, confront him and question his residence. That’s not his duty.

The craziest thing about this story is what the first officers to the scene did. Not only did an alleged narcotics officer arrive before the homicide unit, the two initial officer tried to resuscitate Trayvon through CPR. Really? A kid has a bullet hole in his chest and is bleeding to death and you think breathing in his mouth is going to help? CALL THE EMT YOU FOOLS!

Unbelievable… This is why the Department of Justice must get involved. The Sanford police are not cut out for real police work. They will be exposed.

;

Taking Sides

This case is not a black and white issue (despite a black boy being killed in cold blood) but this is America so blacks and whites will make it such. Black people want to get involved in this case because a black boy was killed and white people want to protect Zimmerman because they want to play the reverse racism card.

People on Twitter are saying things like “Well, a white boy was beat up by a black man yesterday” (as if this is equivalent to the Trayvon case where a boy was KILLED). And my response to that is, “Did perp get sentenced?” And they respond “Yea, he’s in prison.” And I want to be like, “So what’s your point?!” Zimmerman hasn’t even been charged or put on trial. How are these cases equivalent?

In the cases where whites are beaten or killed by a minority assailant, the minority goes to prison. When Trayvon Martin gets killed by a white person, not only is there no investigation, but the cops cover up the crime, let the man walk free and give him back his murder weapon.

This isn’t about people getting excited over a white man killing a black boy. This isn’t about the “liberal media” painting Zimmerman as a racist. This isn’t about Obama and the Department of Justice taking on this case because they love black people and hate white people.

This is about a dead child who has not received justice and an incompetent Sanford Police Department that has a history of cover-ups.

Above everything else, why can’t we let Trayvon rest in peace. We keep digging up dirt, smearing him and referring to him as a thug. Who cares? What does that have to do with the evidence on the scene? I didn’t want to write this, but this story has turned so ugly so fast. There’s so much misinformation going around, I had to step in.

Look up the facts. Don’t spread lies. Don’t believe the hype and show some respect for the dead.

-D

Man Takes Law Into Own Hand and Kills Unarmed Boy: No Charges For Killer

On Feb. 26, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was visiting his father’s house in a gated community just outside of Orlando. He decided to leave his father’s house and grab some snacks for his little brother so they could enjoy them during this year’s NBA All-Star weekend.

Upon returning to his house, Martin was confronted by 28-year-old, neighborhood watch captain George Zimmerman. Before following Martin to his father’s home, Zimmerman called 911 to notify Sanford police that a suspicious person had entered the community.

Zimmerman followed Martin as he entered the gated community and an altercation shortly ensued. Before the Sanford Police Department (SPD) arrived to the community, Zimmerman wielded a 9 mm handgun and shot Martin once in the chest. Martin died from the gunshot wound.

A young man, Martin, who was excited to spend time with his father and younger brother during All-Star weekend lay lifeless on the ground with nothing in his pockets but a bag of Skittles and a can of tea.

As of March 13, no arrests have been made and Zimmerman still remains without a charge. Zimmerman claims he was defending himself.

Sanford Police Chief Lee said during a press conference on Monday,

“It is with that thought that we want to make sure that we do a fair and complete and thorough investigation so that we can reach some form of justice with this event.”

He then added,

“That there is the right for someone that has a concealed weapons permit to carry that weapon” and that they support neighborhood watch.

From what Police Chief Lee said, no charges can be brought to a man who shoots an unarmed boy in his neighborhood as long as the perpetrator says he or she did so in self-defense.

As devastating as all this sounds, it gets worse.

Zimmerman, who is a white and Hispanic man, killed Martin, a black boy. As anyone probably expected, there are many who believe this killing was racially motivated.

It’s hard to see how this wasn’t racially motivated, but this could also be a case where Zimmerman was unhinged and too mentally unstable to have been using a gun. But when Zimmerman is alleged to have said he had no intention of letting Martin out of his sights because “these assholes always get away,” the line between a racially motivated killing and an honest mistake becomes blurred. The question is, who is the “these” Zimmerman was referring to?

Though Zimmerman’s charges were dropped, he has doesn’t have the “squeaky-clean” record the SPD claimed he had. He was arrested in Orange County in 2005 and charged with resisting arrest with violence and battery on a law enforcement officer. According to other neighborhood watch members, Zimmerman patrols the community in his car (What? Does this guy think he’s Batman or something?)

Also, on March 1, a member of the neighborhood watch was asked to leave a meeting after expressing frustration with Zimmerman’s previous actions which allegedly include stalking that member and following him to his home.

I’m left with too many questions. The main one I have is why Zimmerman hasn’t been arrested, detained or held in custody. Why is Zimmerman taking the law into his own hands and taking deadly actions before the police show up to the scene? This is not a lawless society, despite those who want it to be.

Is the police department experiencing such drastic budget cuts that it hired a neighborhood watch captain, who hasn’t been trained by law enforcement, to do the work the department is unfit to do?

So I guess we’re at the point in America where if you legally protest, are a whistleblower or get caught with a personal amount of marijuana, you can be detained, arrested and/or tortured without charges or due process. And if you’re deemed a terrorist (even if you’re an American citizen) you can be killed by a drone attack without due process, but if you shoot a kid in cold blood, you will essentially be protected by police so long as you claim it was self-defense (even if you were the aggressor).

I also can’t help but think of how different this situation would be if Zimmerman was a black male and shot an unarmed white boy. Would the police have believed Zimmerman’s case then? Would the State Attorney’s Office have said, “[the case] will be thoroughly digested and we will make decisions”?

The saddest thing about all of is what young black men still have to go through in America on a daily basis. Medgar Evers, Emmett Till, the Tulsa race riot anyone? This time, a young black man didn’t “whistle at a white woman.” Martin’s crime was buying Skittles and ice tea without asking the neighborhood watch captain for permission to enter his own home.

RIP Trayvon Martin and may you and your family find peace and justice.

Are We Incentivizing Incarcerations?

The other day, I came across this disturbing memo (courtesy of the Huffington Post) from Corrections Corporations of America (CCA). The CCA wants to buy up state-owned correctional facilities in exchange for cash in order to help states ease budget shortfalls due to the Great Recession.

CCA wants to purchase state-owned prisons in exchange for cash to alleviate budget shortfalls as long as the state can guarantee the prisons would be filled to at least 90% capacity.

Hold up… rewind. Yep, you heard that right. The state must guarantee that the prisons stay full. This is code word for putting more cops in the streets looking for crimes that may not even exist and passing more legislation aimed at minor drug offenses. This, of course, incentivizes corruption and improper incarceration.

However, this is nothing new to those who have payed attention the last 20 or so years. There has been a push to make prisons a mainstay in America. From the immigration debate and SB 1070 in Arizona to Florida politicians receiving millions of dollars from GEO Group and CCA, prisons are becoming big business nowadays (Oh and let’s not forget the successful War on Drugs).

This is becoming a problem in America because not everyone who goes to jail is guilty (yea I know, crazy, huh?). Not everyone who goes to jail is guilty because the system is biased. Some people may say the prison idustrial complex is racist and that is definitely debatable. The system most likely is racist, but the system becomes a larger problem when we start throwing people in jail for minor violations like having a personal amount of marijuana or being a drug abuser. This act of incarcerating these people goes beyond race. It hits everyone. Plus, drug abusers don’t need to be placed in prisons, they need medical help because they are sick.

 

Incarceration Statistics

Since the Nixon administration started the War on Drugs, you would figure that incarceration rates and drug use would have gone down. I mean, the purpose of building prisons is to deter violent crimes and drug peddling; It’s supposed to give people the time to think about the wrongs they’ve committed onto others. So we should see less prisons being built and less crime committed. That should be an agreeable product of success.

But history supports that the War on Drugs and the prison industrial complex work hand in hand—With lobbyists’ hands in the pockets of prison-profiteering politicians.

Let’s take a look at the crime numbers according to the New York Times,

The odds of being murdered or robbed are now less than half of what they were in the early 1990s, when violent crime peaked in the United States. Small towns, especially, are seeing far fewer murders: In cities with populations under 10,000, the number plunged by more than 25 percent last year.

That’s good news, right? Violent crimes are decreasing so the prison system must be working. But if that’s the case, why are our incarceration rates increasing at alarming numbers?

Even though crimes rates are falling, incarceration rates are steady on the uptick because prisons equal profit. It’s a sad reflection of the times we live in, but it’s the truth nonetheless.

And with the system being inherently racist, this means that our tax dollars are being used to fund a failing War on Drugs and a racist prison system that is ruining the culture of millions of minorities in America. It’s tearing families apart, but do we even care?

And I don’t mean to point out the potentially racist system to make any one culture feel guilty. I point this out because if the weakest among us are being unjustifiably imprisoned, it’s going to have an effect on all of us, regardless of race, creed or income.

For a so-called Christian nation, we have our values twisted.

Registering Poor to Vote Gives Them Others’ Money?

Homeless person right outside the White House

Matthew Vadum of American Thinker posted a column in September that shouldn’t surprise anyone these days. The post is just more vitriol spewed at the poor for being in their condition. It is as if he believes we are not in a great recession, jobs aren’t stagnant and the unemployment rate isn’t at 16 percent. That’s the problem with people like Vadum, they blamed Obama from 2008-10 about not having jobs, then they turn around and tell the jobless to go find a job.

His column was titled “Registering the Poor to Vote is Un-American.” He characterizes the poor as “open to demagoguery and bribery,” and compares registering them to vote to “handing out burglary tools to criminals.”

So according to Vadum, the poor are too dumb to vote for their own interest because they are easily manipulated. And they’re criminals if the tax dollars that they pay are used to help them in any way.

This is where Vadum shows his true colors. He only talks about the poor voting and being manipulated by the left, ACORN and the Obama administration. He and his commenters continue to bring up the NAACP and the Black Panthers for obvious reasons. They know that ACORN made a concerted effort not only to help the poor afford housing and to vote, but they aimed their work towards those races who have a higher poverty rate: blacks and Hispanics.

However, Vadum and his followers feel as though blacks and Hispanics (i.e., minorities) are the only poor in this country. Here is what commenter RBDLA posted on Sept. 1, 2011 at 9:32 a.m.—And this post is not an outlier:

If a citizen doesn’t have a stake in a society, an economy, i.e. own property or a business, they don’t have an interest in seeing that the government has a pro-business outlook.  If there is a pro-business outlook, things should be getting better for all.  People will have jobs.  They will spend their money at the businesses of others spreading the wealth around in a healty way that creates more jobs, and eventually more property and business owners.  Having said that, I believe that the vote should be limited to people that own property or a business.  Of course, if a citizen owns several tracts of land or several businesses, he/she is still limited to one vote.  Ownership is obtainable for all here in the U.S., it just requires work and savings.

Besides the fact that this post is discriminatory towards those without property (i.e., minorities and poor) and reminiscent of Jim Crow, they fail to realize that poor whites account for 42.4% of people in poverty (scroll to p. 17 for the stats). Blacks and Hispanics have higher proportions of their race in poverty, but don’t account for high numbers like whites do.

He also fails to realize that in states like Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and other southern states, there are high numbers of poor rural whites and these states usually vote red. According to the 2010 Census, the South was the only region to have the amount (number) and percentage of (rate) poor increase (information can be found on p. 18 under “Region”). So if he doesn’t want the poor to vote, this should apply for whites and minorities. He just doesn’t want poor minorities to vote because they usually vote Democrat and that’s not in his interest. Average, everyday people outnumber rich, lunatics like himself and that makes him uncomfortable.

After the backlash Vadum received for the obvious prejudice his post exuded, he tried to backpedal—somewhat— at a conference. Here are the important parts of his defense for being prejudice towards the poor and unfortunate:

How else can you justify a law that mandates that welfare recipients be encouraged to vote when they’re there in the cheese line picking up their check? [...] We shouldnt be encouraging people to destroy the country. We shouldn’t be encouraging people [welfare recipients and the poor] to vote by using tax dollars to encourage them to vote [...] And this is pathological to go to people who have no stake in the society and to use tax dollars to encourage them to vote themselves more benefits [...] And this is not to say anybody should be discouraged from going to the polls [...] but the government should not be encouraging this kind of behavior [...] using tax dollars to register the vote is a bad idea.

People like Vadum will always show their true colors. They feel as though the poor are scum and shouldn’t be given any rights us normal people have. They feel as if the government only works for people like him, but for not the less fortunate among us. People like Vadum always point to the fact that the poor (and some middle-class citizens) don’t pay an income tax, as if that means they pay no taxes at all. They think that any program aimed to helping the poor is taking from their hard-earned money, again, as if the poor don’t pay taxes and support the government like all Americans.

Even though the poor are growing as a direct result of the fraud and practices by corrupt members of Wall Street and the federal government, Vadum will never see that. By denying the poor the vote, siphoning money away from poor communities into more affluent ones and by standing idly by the fraudulent practices of Wall Street and the federal government, Vadum will only help to perpetuate the population of the poor in this country. He’s too busy hating them to see that.

Governments, Corporations, Banks and Wall Street: The New Faces of Organized Crime

Prison Industrial Complex fueled by The War On Drugs

More people are waking up by the moment. Louis Farrakhan put it in plain English: If we knew what our government’s real foreign policy was, we wouldn’t stand for it. Obama, the government, and the corporate owned media are so busy feeding us crap and telling us to fear the brown guy from Africa or the Middle-East, that they forget to tell us what’s really going on within our borders. Did you catch that? I said forget… If forget means to purposefully leave out and to deceive, then that’s what I meant.

Are we really that ignorant to believe that the world’s super power — where the top 1/5 of earners own more wealth than the bottom 4/5 and where the top 1% have seen their income grow by 275% while the middle-class has only seen a 40% increase — is not a part of any corruption that goes on in the world?

The banks and corporations have a way of keeping us in check. It’s a hidden tax that you may know as inflation. To be more specific, the dollar has experienced a 212.5% inflation increase since 1979 — the same period in which the richest 1% have seen their wages grow by 275%. So every dollar spent in 1979 is worth $3.13 today. Do you see what has happened? We have been taxed at unbelievable rates and are living a subpar standard of life, but the 1% have their heads above the water, barely…

Similarly, when we have fractional reserve policies pushed by the Federal Reserve where $90 billion is created from every $10 billion loaned from the Federal Reserve, inflation will continue to rise and we will be in perpetual debt. Debt is money and money is debt in this system. And it all comes out of thin air. The money was never there; This land was stolen to begin with. If there really was such a thing as debt, we’d be paying the slaves and Native Americans for what we did to them, not corporations and banks.

Are we really that ignorant to fear a “terrorist” organization called Al-Qaeda when only 68 American deaths are tied to terrorism per year, but 440,000 Americans die each year from cigarette related complications? As of 2011, the “War on Terror” costed us $1.4 trillion in total. Was all that money necessary to keep 70 people from dying a year due to terrorism? And $18.4 billion were allocated to fight a faux “War On Drugs” in 2000, yet $106,415 are lobbied by tobacco companies each day in Washington. One of deadliest drugs known to man is not only supported by our government, but billions of dollars are spent each year by these companies to buy our politicians; Our politicians are drug pushers.

We have our priorities mixed up in America. Stop looking for that brown person of African or Arab decent to be your enemy and look within your own country for the thieves. As a matter of fact, look inside yourself, because the true enemy is only a mirror away.

Duane Buck: Guilty Of Being Black

Credit to HowStuffWorks.com (2001)

Join me as we journey back to the Dark Ages and promote the indiscriminate killing of others, cheer like barbarians when so-called leaders brag about the number of humans they’ve killed since being elected and where we kill people to make money for the state. Oh wait… This is 2011 in America, the land of the free unless of course you’re a black man who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time: Texas.

Meet Duane Buck, a black male who may be one of the unluckiest persons in America. He was found guilty of murdering his girlfriend back in 1997. He is to be executed soon, but the Supreme Court has since stepped in to stay his execution until further notice. But what makes this case so scary for black males in America is that is shows the increased likelihood we might be found guilty of any crime and sentenced to death– just because we’re black. In Buck’s case, his own lawyers brought “psychologist” Walter Quijano before a Texas jury and he said that Buck was more likely to repeat violent offenses because of his color. Walter used the term “future dangerousness.” In Texas, whether or not you should be sentenced to death is based on how likely you are to be a repeat, violent offender.

In 2000, Buck ‘s case was one of six cases found to be tainted by Quijano’s testimony by then Texas Attorney General John Cornyn. The other five were still sentenced to death so this doesn’t leave a lot of hope for Buck.

To be clear however, I am not here to make the case for or against Buck. I was not a part of the jury and do not know the details of the case (from what I’ve heard he is guilty of killing his sister and girlfriend). Also, what is to be understood is that he should be in jail. But should he be sentenced to death for being black?

I do know that everyone deserves a fair trial in America. Under our system, we are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. If we ignore the rules of the justice system like we did in Buck’s case, who’s to say this won’t happen to you? Like many people know, this country still deals with its haunting past of slavery, xenophobia and racism. People will object to my view by saying I’m the true racist and if you ignore racism, it won’t affect you. Well these people obviously don’t know what it means to be black in America (or a minority for that matter).

Since last year, violent crimes have gone down 13%, but don’t let facts affect the way you live your life. What’s important is that you make money and unknowingly fuel a racist system whose goals are to imprison Hispanics and blacks and make a lot of money while doing so. Keep watching football, keeping buying useless stuff, but by any means, never think about how your actions fuel the system. It’s important not to question the system because there is no way that the system may turn on you.

Equal opportunity is a joke. The system is made for certain people to fail— this is why education is so important, but then again look at the statistics to get a better understanding of who gets the better education in America. I’ll give you a hint, it’s not the poor or brown…

While people’s heads explode over affirmative action (which women enjoy just as much as minorities), we’ve got a prison industrial complex that puts more cameras and police in black neighborhoods and seeks-out misguided black males to fill their prison cells and the pockets of the men behind this deceit.

Panthers Owner Threatened Newton; Warned Against Tattoos or Piercings

By now, you should be aware of what North Carolina Owner Jerry Richardson said on a recent episode of Charlie Rose when referring to the rookie situation with QB Cam Newton. When discussing the pre-drafting process of Newton on the show, Richardson went on to say that he talked to Newton about his appearance. He said he asked Newton if he had any tattoos or piercings. Then Newton went on to say no. Richardson then responded, “Good, we want to keep it that way.” He then went on to say to tell Newton “We want to keep no tattoos, no piercings and… I think you got a very nice haircut.”

Seriously, man? I’m not sure if this can be classified as racist, but it also can’t be classified as not racist. This does not make Richardson, the Carolina Panthers organization and similar organizations look good through a racial lens. There are more than enough metaphors that can be linked to leagues like the NFL and NBA and the ratio of white owners to black players. We already know that there is a racial bias, at least among fans, when it comes to the disliking white vs. black players. Black players are held to a much tougher standard than white players in the NFL. The most obvious example is the treatment by NFL fans of Michael Vick compared Ben Roethlisberger. Though there is a racial bias in the NFL, what trumps all discrimination, racism and double-standards is that big W. If you win and put Lombardi trophies in the franchise’s halls, you can do whatever you want. You can rape white women, electrocute dogs and/or sniff coke through your ears before every game.

Let’s be real though. Does Richardson have the right to tell Newton what he wants him to look like as the poster boy of the franchise? Yes. Does Newton have the right to tell Richardson off and do with his body what he wants? Yes. Let the pieces fall where they may after that. I’m almost certain that the Carolina franchise would not punish Newton if he chooses to get a tattoo, a piercing or grow his hair into locks. I am also saying that the franchise would continue to pay him. Newton has the upper hand on this. Plus, Michael Vick has a long hair, tattoos and piercings. He has a six-year $100 million contract. Jeremy Shockey (who is a Carolina Panther) has “distracting” tattoos—as LA Times reporter Bill Plaschke said—and long blonde hair. I still think Carolina sought Shockey because he’s a proven player.

As of now, the “suggestion” by Richardson seems harmless because he hasn’t had to respond to any stimulus (i.e., Newton choosing to alter his body). But these suggestions are really threats. What Richardson didn’t tell us is what the consequence would be if Newton “disobeyed.” We also don’t know if Newton asked this question or not, but I think Newton, his father and his agent should have.

My biggest question is why would Jerry Richardson bring this up to Cam Newton in the first place? I find it hard to believe that Richardson would be asking this of a white quarterback or a non-black player. Did Richardson ask this of Jimmy Clausen when he drafted him? And if you are going to ask this kind of controversial statement of a player, why would you say you did on national TV? I don’t get it.

This also exposes Richardson’s irrational logic of the situation. Cam Newton has been through some tough times and hasn’t shown any assuring signs that he’s going to become a thug or some kind of hoodlum. Does Richardson think that if Newton gets a tattoo that he will all of sudden become violent or do things he would have never done before getting the tattoo? This is probably not why Richardson went ahead and said these words to Newton though.

Richardson spoke these purposeful and non-coincidental words to Newton because Richardson is a business man whose ugly side has reared itself from the bowels of a kind of hell that once existed in the South. Richardson sees Newton as a commodity of the franchise—the most important. This is a ploy to appease fans and business partners of Richardson. The more Newton, a 22-year-old black male, fits the image criteria of Richardson, a 75-year-old white male, the more money Richardson can bring in.

Allegedly Richardson will pay and support Newton as long as he fits Richardson’s warped criteria for how a quarterback should look— and a black quarterback at that. Richardson’s logic goes as follows: Since I own the Panthers and pay the players on the team. In a sense, I own their minds and bodies. I decide what they can and cannot do with the body God gave them.

This is what is meant by selling your soul to the devil. If this is true, both Newton and Richardson have turned to the dark side. It’s disgusting. This is why the black community needs to do what we can to own property and valuable assets in the U.S. Being a multi-million dollar athlete simply won’t cut it anymore. There are far too many of us in this wealthy system of sports for there not be more of us in ownership and coaching positions. Either the system is designed for us to fail or we are failing ourselves. For someone to allow another human being to decide what he or she can and cannot do with their own body is unacceptable.