Civil & Human Rights

What is wrong with America in one photo

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is a guest of Bill O'Rielly at the FAUX News Fraudcasting table, at the 2013 White House Correspondents' Association Dinner. For those of us who have to actually read the transcripts of U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments, Scalia asks questions based upon willfully ignorant information he obviously learned from watching FAUX News, with a disturbing regularity.

Screenshot from 2013-04-28 13:43:14

And why is this important?

Gary May writes at the Washington Post, Scalia’s limited understanding of the Voting Rights Act:

In the debate over the future
of the Voting Rights Act, it sometimes becomes apparent that certain members of the
Supreme Court are either oblivious to our nation’s recent history or
willfully ignore it. Justice Antonin Scalia
made this abundantly clear in his comments during the Feb. 27 oral argument in
Shelby County v. Holder, statements that he repeated in a speech on April 15.

To Scalia, the Voting Rights Act — especially Section 5,
which requires covered states to submit any changes in voting practices
to the Justice Department or a Washington court for approval — is a
“racial entitlement” and a violation of state sovereignty. In his view,
it unfairly and unnecessarily treats seven Southern states, plus Alaska,
Arizona and parts of six others, differently from states not covered by
the act. This month, according to the Wall Street Journal, he called
the act a form of “racial preferment” that affected only African Americans while ignoring the white population.

President Obama at the Planned Parenthood National Conference

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

President Obama became the first sitting president ever to address a
Planned Parenthood event this morning, speaking at the health care
group's national conference.

From the Transcript of prepared remarks (excerpt):

[O]bviously this is a special national conference, because it’s been
nearly a hundred years since the first health clinic of what later would
become Planned Parenthood opened its doors to women in Brooklyn.  And
for nearly a century now, one core principle has guided everything all
of you do — that women should be allowed to make their own decisions
about their own health.  (Applause.)  It’s a simple principle.  

So what I see in this audience, extraordinary doctors and nurses, and
advocates and staff who work tirelessly to keep the doors at health
centers all across the country going, then I'm reminded of those very
early efforts and all the strides that we've made in subsequent
decades.  And I also think about the millions of mothers and daughters
and wives and sisters, friends and neighbors who walk through those
doors every year. 

Somewhere there’s a woman who just received a new lease on life
because of a screening that you provided that helped catch her cancer in
time.  Somewhere there’s a woman who’s breathing easier today because
of the support and counseling she got at her local Planned Parenthood
health clinic.  Somewhere there’s a young woman starting a career who,
because of you, is able to decide for herself when she wants to start a
family.  (Applause.)

One in five women in this country has turned to Planned Parenthood for
health care.  One in five.  (Applause.)  And for many, Planned
Parenthood is their primary source of health care  — not just for
contraceptive care, but for lifesaving preventive care, like cancer
screenings and health counseling. 

Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham: Screw the Constitution

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Posted  by AzBlueMeanie:

Remember just a few weeks ago when the right-wing was all in a tizzy about the village idiot Aqua Buddha, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), and his filibuster of the nomination of John Brennan for CIA Director over the use of drones in the U.S.? There was a lot of highfalutin talk from these right-wingers about the constitutional rights of American citizens on American soil — when they thought they were talking about far-right fringe groups like white supremacists, Christian nationalists, the militia movement, and gun worshipers and fetishists.

Then came the Boston Marathon bombing.

The 19-year old Boston Bomber suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, is a naturalized American citizen. He possesses the same constitutional rights as any natural born American citizen. A naturalized American citizen does not lose his constitutional rights any more than a natural born American citizen who is a terrorist, Timothy McVeigh for example, loses his constitutional rights.

McCain-GrahamBut the "war on terror" twins, Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, are once again seeking to redefine the constitutional rights of American citizens under the rubric of their Neocon "war on terror." They would declare criminal actions an "act of war" for convenience sake and to declare American citizens on American soil an "enemy combatant" in order to deprive American citizens of their constitutional rights.

Americans have more to fear from the "war on terror" twins, Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, than any wingnut conspiracy theory about President Obama using drones to kill American citizens on American soil. This pair of assholes actually wrote their bastardization of the Constitution into law, and the U.S. Supreme Court took a pass on its constitutionality. This threat is genuine.

Tom Horne: Coward

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By Tom Prezelski Cross-posted from Rum, Romanism and Rebellion The Arizona Republic reports that scandal-plagued Republican Attorney General Tom Horne turned down a chance for a televised debate against once-and-future Democratic AG candidate Felecia Rotellini regarding his fit of rage over Bisbee’s civil unions ordinance. He said that he “didn’t feel comfortable appearing with Felecia.”  … Read more

GOP rebranding fail

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

New And ImprovedAfter the 2012 election "autopsy," the GOP decided that it would rebrand itself with fancy "new and improved!" packaging and soft-sell messaging, all the while retaining its poisonous product inside the box that it is selling to an unsuspecting public. So how's that working out?

Just last week RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, the guy who told Republicans that they need to stop being stupid and to "tone down the language" about things like "legitimate rape," returned to the GOP war on women with another attack on Planned Parenthood and Democrats. Priebus suggests Obama, Democrats 'endorse infanticide'. This is "toning down the language"?

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus suggested
that Democrats "endorse infanticide" by supporting women's
health provider Planned Parenthood.

In an op-ed posted on the conservative site RedState,
Priebus highlights movements made by state legislatures in North Dakota
and Florida over the past week to restrict abortion rights. And he
targets President Obama, congressional Democratic leaders and party
officials over their support for Planned Parenthood.