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1/29/2022
Something to remember when Democrats claim racism: 13 Senate Democrats voted against Black female judge nominated by Trump
With the new Supreme Court nomination coming soon, claims of racism are sure to be lodged against any Republican who votes against the black female that Biden has promised to nominate. From Fox News:
Brown, a Black woman, was confirmed in September 2019 by a vote of 80-13, with the 13 "nay" votes coming from Democratic Senators Chuck Schumer, Tammy Baldwin, Richard Blumenthal, Sherrod Brown, Maria Cantwell, Catherine Cortez Masto, Kirsten Gillibrand, Mazie Hirono, Ed Markey, Patty Murray, Brian Schatz, Debbie Stabenow and Ron Wyden.
Only two of the offices for the 13 senators who voted against Brown’s confirmation responded to Fox News Digitals’ requests for comment.
This paints Zimmerman as a very kind man. From DC Fox 5 News:
Woodson, who is black, said Zimmerman offered Woodson a place to live in Florida when he fell on hard times and the two have known each other for years. . . .
NBC fires "seasoned" producer who doctored Zimmerman's 911 tape
I would be interested in knowing whether this "seasoned" producer is able to get another media related job. From Fox News:
NBC News has fired a producer who worked on a 'Today' show segment that featured a heavily edited 911 recording in which George Zimmerman appears to racially profile Trayvon Martin before the teen's shooting, according to The New York Times.
The name of the Miami-based producer who was fired was not released, according to the Times report, which does not refer to any disciplinary action that may have been taken against other NBC staffers.
NBC News has been slammed for the report since last week, and had promised an investigation into what has been described as a grossly misleading editing of the tape.
NBC declined to confirm the firing, according to the Times report.
"An internal investigation determined that a "seasoned" producer was to blame for the edit, NBC had said earlier in the week, before news of the firing.
The edited version of the call that aired on Today clearly made Zimmerman appear to say Martin looked dangerous because of his race. . . .
Jailed for 56 days for offensive comments? Unbelievably, yes.
The notion that the government can determine whether your speech is offensive and throw you in jail is scary. You can read articles from the BBC and other sources and not find what it was that this 21 year old man actually said. From the BBC:
A student who admitted posting racially offensive comments on Twitter about footballer Fabrice Muamba has been jailed for 56 days.
Swansea University student Liam Stacey, 21, from Pontypridd, admitted inciting racial hatred over remarks about the Bolton Wanderers player, who collapsed during a FA Cup tie at Tottenham.
A district judge in Swansea called the comments "vile and abhorrent".
Muamba, 23, who suffered a cardiac arrest, is still in intensive care.
Sentencing Stacey at Swansea Magistrates' Court, District Judge John Charles told him: "In my view, there is no alternative to an immediate prison sentence.
"It was not the football world who was praying for [Muamba].... everybody was praying for his life."
Stacey broke down in tears as he was led away to begin his jail term.
As he passed the public gallery, he was briefly embraced by friends and his parents.
A second year biology student at Swansea, Stacey was arrested after his comments on the social networking site were reported by other users. . . . .
In response to people being upset Mr. Stacey made two other posts. The second one could be construed as racist, though it wasn't made directly at Mr. Muamba.
WIth a $10,000 bounty on Zimmerman, just how irresponsible was it for Spike Lee to tweet what he thought was Zimmerman's address? How bad is it that Lee gave out someone else's address? From the Daily Caller:
Filmmaker Spike Lee tweeted the wrong home address for George Zimmerman, the Sanford, Fla., man who many are claiming should be arrested for shooting and killing Trayvon Martin. The tweet could have potentially put the woman who actually lives at that address in danger. . . .
As Florida braced itself for what could be the biggest day of protest yet in the Trayvon Martin case, police revealed new details that depict the slain 17-year-old as the aggressor and appear to support George Zimmerman's claim that he was acting in self-defense when he shot the teenager. . . .
The Orlando Sentinel is reporting that police sources say Martin was the aggressor on Feb. 26, knocking Zimmerman to the ground with a single punch and then climbing on top of the 28-year-old neighborhood watch captain and slamming the back of his head into the ground. Police say this account, given by Zimmerman, is supported by eyewitnesses, according to the Sentinel's report.
One such witness reportedly told police that he saw Martin on top of Zimmerman, striking the man, while Zimmerman cried out for help. The attack left Zimmerman bloodied, police sources told the Sentinel, and led him to fire at Martin in self-defense.
Police say Zimmerman was bleeding from the nose, had a fat lip and confirm that the back of his head was cut. He received first aid at the scene but refused to go to the hospital and received medical treatment the following day, according to the Sentinel's sources. . . .
There is an incredibly poorly written piece in the Orlando Sentinel available here.
As Dan Linehan, a blogger at Wagist.com, pointed out, correspondence with Martin on Twitter before he died alludes to an incident with a bus driver. "Yu ain't tell me you swung on a bus driver," Martin's cousin wrote to him on Feb. 21.
The same week, Martin was suspended for 10 days from Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School in North Miami-Dade. "He was not suspended for something dealing with violence or anything like that," his father said. "It wasn't a crime he committed, but he was in an unauthorized area [on school property]," declining to offer more details.
But a family spokesman told the Associated Press on Monday that Martin was suspended because marijuana residue was found in his book bag. . . .
Why the shooting in Florida isn't covered by that state's "stand your ground" law
The "Castle Doctrine" or "stand your ground" law doesn't let you pursue someone and then shooting them. There is a reasonable person test that the victim felt that they were in danger and that it was necessary to fire the gun in self defense. From Fox News:
Media stories sharing the transcripts of the 911 tapes from the evening of the incident clearly show that Mr. Zimmerman was instructed by authorities to remain in his vehicle and to cease pursuit of Mr. Martin. George Zimmerman seems to have ignored the direction of the authorities and continued his pursuit of Mr. Martin.
Mr. Zimmerman's unnecessary pursuit and confrontation of Trayvon Martin elevated the prospect of a violent episode and does not seem to be an act of self-defense as defined by the castle doctrine. There is no protection in the "Stand Your Ground" law for anyone who pursues and confronts people. . . .
His parents believe that race was a factor in their son’s death. . . . . Zimmerman’s family made a statement saying, he grew up in a multiracial family and that he was not racist. He has since moved out of the family home after receiving death threats. . . . .
More is available here. Audio of 911 call
Listen to the audio and tell me if you can tell when George Zimmerman supposedly uses the term "fuckin' 'coons." I have listened a couple of times and I can't hear it. Even the left wing Daily Kos only says:
It's not clear. It's said in a low voice. But, in the opinion of many who have listened to this publicly available version of a 911 call made shortly before he shot unarmed Trayvon Martin to death last month, George Zimmerman seems to be saying "fuckin' 'coons." . . . We know for certain that the 28-year-old Zimmerman, who has been identified as the "captain" of an unregistered neighborhood watch group in some reports, made other comments in that 911 call that could, in context, be considered racially charged. For example, "These assholes, they always get away."
I am not sure how that last quote is racist given that Zimmerman never even volunteered the race of Martin until he was specifically asked about it and that it could have been referring to the criminals that had been breaking into homes that he was obviously upset about.
"The guy on the bottom, who had a red sweater on, was yelling to me, 'Help! Help!' and I told him to stop, and I was calling 911," said the witness, who asked to be identified only by his first name, John.
John said he locked his patio door, ran upstairs and heard at least one gun shot.
"And then, when I got upstairs and looked down, the guy who was on the top beating up the other guy, was the one laying in the grass, and I believe he was dead at that point."
-- The witness reports that George Zimmerman was on the ground and Trayvon is on top of him punching him.
-- The witness says that George Zimmerman was screaming and yelling for help.
-- Police arrive and find Zimmerman bleeding on his face and the back of his head. He also has had grass stains on his back. All this confirms the story told by Zimmerman and the witness.
-- Police play the 911 tape for Trayvon Martin's father, who tells police that the voice screaming is not the voice of his son.
A copy of the police report available here confirms some of these points.
"Make no mistake: This tragic shooting represents the National Rifle Association's vision for America. The NRA's vision is an America that looks just like Florida, where it's easy for criminals and dangerous people to get, carry, and use guns. The NRA wants us to be a nation without any gun laws, a nation where just about anybody can get a gun and take it anywhere. Their leaders and spokespeople use fear, paranoia and misleading notions of self-defense to justify flooding our streets with armed and violent people, and the result is more tragedies like Trayvon's.
Trayvon's life has been lost not because of an accident, but because of the easy access to a gun by a violent person permitted by a state with weak gun laws. It is time we stand up to the NRA and the politicians who put the agenda of the gun lobby ahead of the safety of the people they have been elected to represent. It is time that we as a nation flatly reject the vision of the gun industry and replace it with the vision where our young people can grow up without the fear and tragedy of gun violence."
The Brady Campaign's Vice President Dennis Henigan also had some very strong words and managed to link it to the recent Maryland judicial decision that the government can't completely ban people carrying guns:
“Recently Judge Benson Everett Legg of Maryland became the first federal judge to hold there is a Second Amendment right to carry a gun outside the home. Only days before, Trayvon Martin, a Florida teenager, lay dead from a shooting that dramatically illustrates the price in lives we will pay if Judge Legg’s renegade ruling becomes the law across the United States.”
After speaking with Gov. Scott, State Attorney Norman Wolfinger voluntarily decided to step aside form the case to avoid “the appearance of conflict of interest,” according to a release put out by the governor’s office on Thursday evening. Angela B. Corey of the Fourth Judicial Circuit has been appointed the Assigned State Attorney in the case.
Gov. Rick Scott also announced that Florida will put together a task force to study the state’s Stand Your Ground law, which has come under intense media scrutiny in the wake of Trayvon’s death. Lt. Gov. Jennifer Caroll, House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, and Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, will be involved in the task force.
“They will be recommending individuals for me to appoint to the Task Force, which will thoroughly review Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law and any other laws, rules, regulations or programs that relate to public safety and citizen protection,” Scott said in a release. . . .
MSNBC host blames Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum for death of Trayvon Martin
Karen Finney blamed the language of Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Rush Limbaugh for creating the enviroment that led to the shooting of Trayvon Martin. . . .
Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson said Friday that he's grateful the rest of the country has sat up and taken notice of the tragic slaying of Trayvon Martin. But he can't help but wonder: Why has it taken so long for everyone else to recognize the chronic injustices that African Americans face?
"We're surprised that everyone else is surprised," Jackson told the Los Angeles Times. African Americans have tried for decades to get the rest of America to understand their plight, he said, particularly their beliefs that justice is still elusive in many parts of America, especially the Deep South.
Then along comes the Trayvon Martin case, and facts that are not in contention: Volunteer neighborhood watch captain George Zimmerman pursued and then gunned down the unarmed 17-year-old last month, and never faced arrest because police said there was no evidence to contradict his claim that he fired in self-defense.
"I hope that this will be a transformative moment," Jackson said. . . .
President Barack Obama weighed into the controversial killing of a black teenager in Florida in very personal terms on Friday, comparing the boy to a son he doesn't have and calling for American "soul searching" over how the incident occurred. . . .
"If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon," Obama said in his first comments about the shooting, acknowledging the racial element in the case.
"Obviously, this is a tragedy," Obama told reporters. "I can only imagine what these parents are going through. And when I think about this boy, I think about my own kids."
The case has rippled across the nation and prompted rallies protesting the failure of the police to arrest the shooter, George Zimmerman, and, more broadly, a pattern of racial discrimination black leaders cite in Sanford and elsewhere in the country. . . .
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said Friday that the “stand your ground” self-defense law he signed while in office should not apply to the case of a teenager who was shot by a neighborhood watch volunteer in his home state.
“This law does not apply to this particular circumstance,” Bush said after an education panel discussion at the University of Texas at Arlington. “Stand your ground means stand your ground means stand your ground. It doesn’t mean chase after somebody who’s turned their back.”
He was referring to reports that the 17-year-old, Trayvon Martin, was pursued by the volunteer and fatally shot in a scuffle.
“Anytime an innocent life is taken it's a tragedy,” Bush said. “You've got to let the process work.” . . .
Newt Gingrich thinks that the shooter is at fault, but still had this to say.
“It’s not a question of who that young man looked like. Any young American of any ethnic background should be safe, period. We should all be horrified no matter what the ethnic background," Gingrich said. "Is the President suggesting that if it had been a white who had been shot that would be ok because it didn’t look like him?" . . .
National newspaper editorials have concluded that Zimmerman must be prosecuted. The piece obviously has its facts wrong.
"Obama: Black Lawmakers Must Rally Voters Back Home"
S0 much for bringing the country together. Remember this back in April (see particularly from 1:55 on to 2:30)?
What would have been the reaction if a white politician had made a similar plea? Now the Associated Press notes that he makes this address:
In a fiery speech to the Congressional Black Caucus, Obama warned that Republicans hoping to seize control of Congress want "to do what's right politically, instead of what's right — period." "I need everybody here to go back to your neighborhoods, to go back to your workplaces, to go to the churches, and go to the barbershops and go to the beauty shops. And tell them we've got more work to do," Obama said to cheers from a black-tie audience at the Washington Convention Center. "Tell them we can't wait to organize. Tell them that the time for action is now." His speech acknowledged what pollsters have been warning Democrats for months — that blacks are among the key Democratic groups who right now seem unlikely to turn out in large numbers in November. . . .
With the Republican Party hoping to regain power on Capitol Hill in the November election, Obama described his adversaries as "a crowd ... that wants to do what's right politically, instead of what's right -- period." He never named the opposing party, referring to it as "the other side."
"I need everybody here to go back to your neighborhoods, and your workplaces, to your churches, and barbershops, and beauty shops. Tell them we have more work to do. Tell them we can't wait to organize. Tell them that the time for action is now," Obama said in his remarks. . . .
For Obama, the caucus dinner at the Washington Convention Center capped a week of concerted outreach to minority supporters, a traditional wellspring of Democratic strength.
The effort began Monday with a White House reception for black college officials. It included speeches by the president on Wednesday to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and by first lady Michelle Obama to a black caucus legislative conference that same day.
Last week, Obama was interviewed on "The Tom Joyner Show" radio program, which enjoys a large black audience. . . .
Race and sex of owners played role in what GM dealerships were shutdown
Well, this is pretty disturbing from the TARP Special Inspector General Neal M. Barofsky. The race and sex of the dealership owner apparently factored into determining whether dealerships would be closed down. First some background. GM and Chrysler were forced by the government to close 2,000 dealerships and putting 100,000 people out of their jobs during a recession. Now it turns out that these closing probably didn't save the car companies any money and it may have even cost them money (p. 30, from the "Factors Affecting the Decisions of General Motors and Chrysler to Reduce their Dealership Networks," July 10, 2010, Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program).
In fact, when asked by SIGTARP what GM will save by closing any particular dealership, one GM official stated the answer is usually “not one damn cent.”
Furthermore, a GM official stated that removing a dealership from the network does not save money for GM—it might even cost GM money—and that savings cannot be attributed or assigned to any one dealership. According to one GM official, it was a “math exercise” to assign a savings amount to one dealership; it was difficult to estimate savings for a particular dealership because the savings are expected to be achieved when the entire dealership network plan is accomplished.
The report concluded (pp. 28-29, see also pages 11-12):
One, although there was broad consensus that GM and Chrysler generally needed to decrease the number of their dealerships, there was disagreement over where, and how quickly, the cuts should have been made. Some experts that SIGTARP spoke to in connection with this audit questioned whether it was appropriate to apply the foreign model to the U.S. automakers, particularly in small markets in which the U.S. companies currently have a competitive advantage, a concern apparently not substantially considered by the Auto Team when they adopted this theory. The conclusion that the manufacturers should close dealerships more rapidly than originally planned was also criticized as being potentially counterproductive; one expert opined, for example, that closing dealerships in an environment already disrupted by the recession could result in an even greater crisis in sales.
So how did GM determine who to shutdown? (pp. 17-18)
GM determined that dealerships with a DPS Score of 100 were average performers; those below 70 were considered poor performers and would not be retained. SIGTARP noted, however, that GM did not uniformly apply the phase one criteria to the entire network. For example, our analysis found that two of the wind-down dealers did not meet either criterion. Furthermore, we found that, of the dealerships that met only one of the two criteria:
• GM retained 355 (or approximately 41 percent) of the 858 dealerships that had a DPS score below 70.16
• GM retained 9 of the 394 dealerships that sold fewer than 50 new vehicles in 2008.17
GM officials attributed these inconsistencies primarily to a desire to maintain coverage in certain rural areas where they have a competitive advantage over import auto companies that are not typically located in rural areas, although ultimately close to half of all of the GM dealerships identified for termination were in rural areas. Other dealerships were retained because they were recently appointed, were key wholesale parts dealers, or were minority- or woman-owned dealerships.
More than half of the GM dealerships that were identified to be closed were in rural areas (p. 24). Yet, as noted above, this were probably not the best places to shutdown dealerships.
The White House denied Thursday charges by conservative bloggers that President Obama's Auto Task Force, which is overseeing the restructuring of the U.S. auto industry, targeted for closure Chrysler dealers who have contributed to Republicans.
"We don't make those decisions. Ok?," said White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. "Chrysler makes those decisions. So I am sure you can send Chrysler the address of the blog that you refer to. ... We're not involved in making those decisions I would think your question would be appropriately dealt with by the company that is." . . .
I said last year that I didn't believe that there was evidence to support this claim.
John R. Lott, the professor best known for his books, "More guns, less crime: The bias against gun rights" and "Freedomnomics," called earlier this week to talk about the possibility of partisan political considerations in the Obama administration's closing of nearly 800 Chrysler dealerships.
"I just don't see the evidence for partisanship," said Lott, who is a senior research scientist at the University of Maryland. He's prevously held professorships at the Wharton School, University of Chicago and Yale. When this guy has an opinion about an issue that is subject to data-driven analysis, I listen. . . .
This is pretty strange. I guess that I don't understand why this is such a struggle. It also indicates to me a certain anger against whites that he won't even acknowledge his heritage. Is he worried that his black base will be upset if he acknowledges that he is half white? Why can't he even try bringing people together on this issue of race? Presumably it would be even more difficult for his children, though if a typical child were one-quarter asian or American Indian or I presume black, the child would be listed as having that racial background.
He may be the world's foremost mixed-race leader, but when it came to the official government head count, President Barack Obama gave only one answer to the question about his ethnic background: African-American.
The White House confirmed Friday that Obama did not check multiple boxes on his U.S. Census form, or choose the option that allows him to elaborate on his racial heritage. He ticked the box that says "Black, African Am., or Negro."
Obama filled out the form on Monday, supplying information for himself, first lady Michelle Obama and their daughters Malia and Sasha, as well as for Mrs. Obama's mother, Marian Robinson, who lives with the family in the White House.
For Obama, whose mother Ann Dunham, a white woman from Kansas, married his father, Kenyan native Barack Obama Sr., the question of his racial identity has been a lifelong struggle. His first memoir, "Dreams From My Father," is an account of a difficult journey of discovery. . . .
Just out of curiosity, why do the Dems think that convincing a journalist not to run the Reid "Negro" quote was so plausible?
Why do these guys think that they could have convinced the reporters not to use the explosive quote? How would they have convinced the reporters not to use it?
On Friday at 10 p.m. — half a year after the interview — The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder e-mailed Reid’s staff with questions about a “light-skinned” candidate without a “Negro dialect.”
In the second-guessing that followed, Capitol Hill veterans said there was no way that such inflammatory words from a Senate majority leader would remain off the record, even if that had been the arrangement.
But because Manley had not sounded an internal alarm, he and the rest of the damage-control squad were caught flat-footed by Ambinder’s e-mail, several people close to the situation told POLITICO.
“They could have had weeks to prepare for this or to try to convince Halperin not to run it,” said a Democrat who participated in some of the damage control.
Obama could do something to stop racial recriminations and he does very little
Hume: (Obama's) repudiation is quite mild, he's really not slammed the door, he's really not sent a signal that 'I'll have no part of this,'If he did, and if he said, this is not about race, this is about honest policy differences and shouted it from the rooftops, that I think would be in keeping with the person he projected to us in the campaign which is post racial man, he hasn't done that and I think that leaves the door open to the toxicity that is likely to creep into the debate from here forward. People who are honestly opposing Barack Obama and there are lots of them, do not like being accused of a racist. . . . .
Hume goes on to say: "He is not doing all he could . . . ." The problem here is that when Obama says that it is not "mainly" about race it fans the flames of these concerns.
The continued debate over racism in the criminal justice system
After Loury's initial claims here and my response, Professor Bruce Western tried to come to Loury's defense here. My response is here. Feedback on all this is appreciated.
Racial infighting among Democrats, which marred the presidential primaries, has flared up again at the party’s convention in Denver, where a black Hillary Clinton delegate is accusing a black Barack Obama delegate of calling her an “Uncle Tom.” . . .
Obama said that "John McCain and the Republicans, they don’t have any new ideas, that’s why they’re spending all their time talking about me. I mean, you haven’t heard a positive thing out of that campaign in ... in a month. All they do is try to run me down and you know, you know this in your own life. If somebody doesn’t have anything nice to say about anybody, that means they’ve got some problems of their own. So they know they’ve got no new ideas, they know they’re dredging up all the stale old stuff they’ve been peddling for the last eight, 10 years.
"But, since they don’t have any new ideas the only strategy they’ve got in this election is to try to scare you about me. They’re going to try to say that I’m a risky guy, they’re going to try to say, 'Well, you know, he’s got a funny name and he doesn’t look like all the presidents on the dollar bills and the five dollar bills and, and they’re going to send out nasty emails."
The bizarre thing is that Obama had made similar charges earlier in the day and had been called on them, but he claimed that it was due to other unnamed sources. You would think that he would have been more careful later in the day. Now he is saying McCain and Republican, so McCain is definitely implicated even if there are other unnamed Republicans.
This news story at Fox News would be pretty funny if it weren't so sad:
DALLAS — What do "black hole," "angel food cake," and "devil's food cake" have in common?
They're all racist terms, says a Dallas County, Texas, official.
A county commissioners' meeting this week over traffic tickets turned into a tense discussion over race when one commissioner said the county's collections office was like a certain astronomical phenomenon.
"It sounds like Central Collections has become a black hole," Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield, who is white, said during the Monday meeting.
One black official demanded an apology, and Commissioner John Wiley Price, who also is black, said that type of language is unacceptable.
At the meeting, Mayfield said he intended his comments to be taken in the context of the scientific meaning, and became upset that he was being misunderstood.
In astronomy, the term black hole refers to a star that has collapsed upon itself, creating something so dense and small that it does not have any physical properties besides a gravitational force so great that even light cannot escape its pull.
Later, Price told MyFOXdfw.com that he believed it and other terms were racist.
"So if it's 'angel food cake,' it's white. If it's 'devil's food cake,' it's black. If you're the 'black sheep of the family,' then you gotta be bad, you know. 'White sheep,' you're okay. You know?" Price said. . . .
William Sjostrom over at the AtlanticBlog has a discussion about Brad DeLong's unbelievable "over the line" attack on Thomas Sowell (disclosure: Sowell was a professor of mine). What is it about Brad DeLong, Paul Krugman, and others that have them engage in such mean destructive attacks on those with whom they disagree?
