Posted by Carolyn Classen Long time political talk show host John C. Scott was let go at KVOI radio station (AM 1030 on the dial) on December 17, 2013 but is re-surfacing today at KVET AM 1210, from 3 to 5 p.m. John C. Scott and his producer son Mark Ulm advertise their show … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Jamelle Boiue writing at The Daily Beast expounds upon Attorney General Eric Holder's call to end felony disenfranchisement of former prisoners who have served their sentence and repaid their debt to society. The Jim Crow Zombie That Won't Die:
Felon disenfranchisement laws are, literally, a vestige of Jim Crow. It’s time for them to go.
Nationwide, five million Americans are barred from voting because of felony convictions. In recent years, a coalition of reformers on the left and right (including former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell and Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky), have moved to either mitigate the effects of this, or push for full repeal of these felon disenfranchisement laws.
And for good reason. As is true of most things in the criminal justice system, this is a status quo with particular harm for African Americans. Thanks to the rampant racial disparities in arrests and prosecutions, blacks—and black men in particular—bear the brunt of these policies. More than thirteen percent of black men are unable to vote because of a felony conviction, with no regards to the nature of the offense or time served.
Indeed, for reasons you can imagine, the biggest impact is felt in the states of the former Confederacy, where disenfranchisement laws are especially draconian, and several states—Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi—have lifetime voting bans.
By Karl Reiner
Early in the Civil War, Gen. Joseph Johnston and his generals in Northern Virginia quarreled with Confederate President Davis in Richmond over the practicality of the president's defensive war policy. While advocating a defensive posture in Northern Virginia, Davis was also eager to extend Confederate power as far as the Pacific. Taking control of California's lucrative gold fields would provide a source of revenue for the haughty, new Confederacy. Any westward expansion of slavery would also be strongly supported by the South's politically powerful large plantation owners.
For years, variations of the expansionist dream of slave owners had been a mainstay of dinner conversations in the South's finest plantations. The objective was to create a confederation in the Western Hemisphere which would include the Southern Slave States, the territories of the southwest United States, possibly Cuba, parts of Central America and northern Mexico. Although it is now largely forgotten, the hazy notion was a subtle part of the ideology driving many of the promoters of secession. The dream held out a promise of an empire based on cotton production and slavery. It offered a sparkling alternative to the fraying relationship the South had in the Union. It was a belief held by many of the South's leaders despite the fact that the institution of slavery was being dismantled in other parts of the world.
Posted by Bob Lord There seems to be an awakening of sorts in the writing on inequality recently. It's really not about the top one percent. The top one percent (and its counterpart, the 99 percent) is a useful frame, but it's imprecise at best, and I would say inaccurate. Check out this piece by … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: I noticed that a recent AZFactCheck at the Arizona Republic, The issue: The gubernatorial candidates' position on Medicaid expansion, repeated something that Governor Jan Brewer's publicist, Howard Fischer, has managed to work into his reporting on the governor at every opportunity, to wit: Brewer herself is still considered a potential gubernatorial candidate. … Read more